‘We live according to the guidance of Saint Benedict,’ said Dom Boniface in his heavily accented Latin. ‘The rules are elaborate, but at their heart are simple principles. Our waking hours are devoted to the Work of God, the Work of the Body, and the Work of the Mind.’ Opus Dei, Opus Manuum, Lectio Divina. ‘And as far as possible we inhabit the Great Silence, listening only to the echo of our own souls, and the Thoughts of God ...’

They sat in the monastery’s small library, a nest of books, scrolls and bound parchments heaped up on shelving. The only light came from oil lamps. There was a smell of old leather and sour ink - although that was to be preferred to the seven varieties of shit that greeted the nose in the average German village.

The only other person in the room was this young novice who served the wine, Aelfric, a slight, oval-faced youth. Macson could hardly keep his eyes off Aelfric’s smooth neck - but he was obviously confused by his own reaction. Belisarius understood what was going on, but decided mischievously he would let Macson suffer a little before putting him out of his misery.

And Aelfric, though the novice scarcely said two words, seemed fascinated in turn by Belisarius, a man of the Roman east. The Greek recognised a deep curiosity in her.

Deacon Elfgar had brought them to the monastery in the middle of the afternoon. They had been welcomed by the abbot, who promised to look over Belisarius’s stock of books for sale - but not until the end of the monastery’s day. While Macson retired to a cell and slept, the death of his father still weighing on him, Belisarius had explored the monastery, with its little workshops and gardens tended by silent monks and novices. He sat in on no less than three services in the little church, intoned and sung beautifully by black-robed monks lined up like so many crows.

Theirs was a rigid, enclosed life, with every waking hour dedicated to some purposeful task or other, with little room for the exercise of free will. But, compared to the chaos outside, this was a calm, ordered, thoroughly civilised environment, and it was no wonder that the sons of kings fled here. Why, the monks even had a latrine that sluiced into running water.