The forensic photographs of Angelika Blüm’s devastated body now hung alongside those of the two previous victims. Photocopies of pages from academic books on Viking ritual were pasted next to copies of the e-mails from the killer. Fabel had written the names of the three victims, with the second identified as simply ‘Monique?’, in the centre of the whiteboard panel. Above the names he had written the name ‘Son of Sven’ and the words ‘Blood Eagle’. Over to the right, the name ‘Hans Klugmann’ was linked with an upward arrow to ‘Arno Hoffknecht’ which in turn had an arrow connecting it to ‘Ulugbay/Yilmaz’. Next to this, punctuated with a question mark, he had written ‘Ukrainians’. On the other side he had written the names of the two known date-rape-drug abduction victims. This was linked to the words ‘Blood Eagle’ by a line broken by the words ‘Odinist cult?’

On the table in front of Fabel sat the case file to which had been added his report of what Professor Dorn had told him and the preliminary forensic and pathology reports on the Blüm murder. They had recovered Klugmann’s cell phone from Sonia’s apartment and it now sat in a plastic evidence bag, on top of the file. The entire principal Mordkommission team, except Maria Klee, was now gathered around the cherrywood table: Fabel, Werner Meyer, Anna Wolff and Paul Lindemann. Fabel was annoyed that Maria wasn’t there.

‘She’s tying something up,’ explained Werner. ‘She said she won’t be long.’

In addition to the core Mordkommission team, there were half a dozen other KriPo detectives who had been drafted in by Van Heiden to support Fabel’s inquiry. Fabel had phoned Susanne Eckhardt, and she had joined the meeting. At the end of the table, Van Heiden sat impassive, as Fabel outlined his conversation with Dorn. When Fabel finished, Susanne Eckhardt was the first to speak.

‘I can see that Herr Professor Dorn has been able to draw on his expertise as a historian, but why is he so involved in, well, to be frank, amateur psychology? He has identified the modus as being reminiscent of this sacrificial rite, but he seems to have extrapolated a profile of the killer as well.’

‘Professor Dorn has worked for many years with offenders,’ said Fabel.

‘But that hardly qualifies …’

Fabel turned and locked eyes with Susanne. There was a cold steel edge to his voice. ‘Dorn was my European History tutor at university. His daughter, Hanna, was abducted, tortured, raped and murdered. About twenty years ago. She was twenty-two. I think Professor Dorn has a more …’ he sought the right word – ‘intimate understanding of murder than we do.’

What Fabel omitted to say was that Hanna Dorn had been his girlfriend at the time. That he had gone out with her for only a couple of weeks. That they were only just on that threshold between awkwardness and intimacy when an unremarkable thirty-year-old hospital orderly called Lutger Voss snatched her from the street as she made her way home from a date with Fabel. The police had questioned Fabel as to why he hadn’t walked her home. He had asked himself the same question over and over again and having an assignment to complete had never seemed a substantial enough answer. Fabel had graduated before the trial. Immediately after the trial he had joined the Polizei Hamburg.