I was forced back to my knees, the barrel of the AK ground against my temple, told to put my hands on my head. The flash eliminator at the end of the barrel dug into my forehead. Was this the Islamic Movement of Kazakhstan? It wasn’t unusual to come across men who didn’t know who they were fighting for that week. Deals were made several ranks higher, sometimes countries away. My phone was torn out of my pocket then thrust at me. I entered the password, watched out of the corner of my eye as he tried to scroll through with gloves on. I tried to decide which cover story was least likely to get me shot immediately. One of the Kazakhs was going through the truck. He spoke in faltering Arabic to the Syrian. There was a debate along the lines of: should we kill him or take him? It was my lucky day: my hands were bound behind my back with duct tape, and I was marched to their vehicle, a blue Toyota Cruiser with roof rack, where I was offered the boot.

The only other time I’d ridden in a boot it had been voluntary, and got me across the border with Kashmir. That boot had been larger and more recently hoovered. I rested my head on a coil of old rope and believed I was going to freeze to death before we got anywhere. When the car started I jammed my feet against the metalwork to stop myself being bounced too hard. Kept thinking through cover, feeling out any remote possibility of surviving the night.

After thirty minutes we pulled over ruts. I was hauled out and a bag came down over my head. We entered somewhere heated, which felt like a reprieve in itself. The bag came off.

We were in a brick-walled farmhouse. I was put in a side room with a concrete floor and a small barred window. Twenty minutes later another vehicle stopped outside and my cell door opened. I looked up to see a man in his fifties or sixties, hard-looking, Syrian or possibly Iraqi. He had a nickel-plated Kalashnikov slung over his shoulder. His hands were gnarled.

While the rest of the men explained finding me, I pondered this multinational get-together. Chechens got around; in Syria, at least one vicious rebel crew – Jaish al-Muhajireen wal-Ansar – was Chechen-led. You found Chechen Islamists wherever there was the opportunity to fight Russians – especially since Russia had gained the upper hand at home. And Russia had pushed plenty of its own Chechens into Syria to fight for Assad. Same war, different country. Many of the Islamists joined IS.

It made some sense that they’d head north again.