One character who I found especially fascinating was Sam from the Saga of Hrafnkel Frey's Godi. First, Sam is a unique name among Vikings, so he's easy to remember. I thought his reaction when Thorstein told him of his cousin's death was almost funny in its understatement: "It's no news that Hrafnkel kills people." I admired the way he took over what he thought was a hopeless case from his uncle. I was entertained by the creative methods they employed in getting support from influential people at the Althing. Even more interesting were the choices Sam made once he obtained power by temporarily throwing Hrafnkel out of power--his show of mercy was definitely not rewarded in the end and he ended up getting revenge taken on him, including the death of his brother. It's implied that he had bad luck because he didn't listen to advice. Since I've been looking at various ideas of fate and why different things happened to different people according to the sagas, the fact that his misfortunes were his own fault was interesting.