Höskuldr Hvítanessgoði

Höskuld Hvítanessgoði is Njáll's beloved foster-son, and his unjust killing is the act that finally dooms the house of Bergþórshváll. Gentle, well-loved, and blameless, he is raised by Njáll, who loves him as his own and contrives a special priesthood for him so he may prosper. But the Njálssons, poisoned by the schemer Mörð's whispers, come to fear and envy him, and they kill him one morning as he sows his field, unarmed and offering no harm — a murder so plainly wrong that it can never be settled. His widow Hildigunn flings his blood-stiffened cloak over her uncle Flosi to goad the vengeance, and from Höskuld's unjust death flows the Burning itself. He is the saga's image of the innocent whose killing cannot be atoned — the good foster-son murdered by the very family that loved him, the wrong so naked that it pulls the whole house down into fire.