‘And as to why, you’ve all seen the text. The purpose of the Menologium is to ensure the coming of the Aryan empire of the future. And it will be an empire of the sea. “Across ocean to east/And ocean to west/Men of new Rome sail/from the womb of the boar./Empire of Aryans/blood pure from the north...” Who but the Northmen and their dragon ships could knit together an empire of oceans? And, can you not hear, the Menologium is telling us that we of the north, we Germans and Northmen - we Aryans - we have the purest blood, the better stock. Rome and Greece and Baghdad flame brightly today, but the world will belong to us in the future, not the Greeks or the Romans or the Saracens or any of that lot, for we are the superior race ...’

Aelfric remembered how Boniface had spoken of his own people as poor, illiterate, pagan barbarians, how Bede had been wrong to look back to the Romans. Perhaps the Menologium’s cruel poetry of race and blood was a consolation to him for his own poor birth - a confirmation that if the past had belonged to the south, the north would own the future.

Belisarius said coldly, ‘And for this dream you have betrayed your brethren? Do you really imagine you are carrying out God’s will, Domnus, by allowing your monastery to burn?’

‘My brothers have been released from the prison of their lives,’ Boniface murmured. ‘And besides, our lives don’t matter. Not to the Weaver. To him, we are mere figures embedded in the past, locked in history as firmly as Romulus and Remus, Julius and Augustus. In a sense we are already dead, nothing more than ghosts invoked by the master of the future.’

Macson lunged. He grabbed the old monk’s habit and shook him. Boniface flopped, limp as a doll. Macson shouted, ‘Enough of this rubbish. The prophecy was robbed from my ancestor, Sulpicia. I’m damned if I will allow it to be robbed again!’ He thrust his hand inside the monk’s habit, searching.

Boniface tried feebly to resist. ‘Leave me be! You shouldn’t be here. You British are irrelevant - the prophecy doesn’t concern you - leave me be!’

Macson dragged the Menologium out of his habit. It was a slim scroll.

Boniface, slumped against the wall, lifted his head and began to scream, high-pitched but strongly. ‘Help me! You Northmen, help me! In here!’

Macson jumped on him again. ‘They’ll hear! Shut up, you old fool!’ But he couldn’t quell Boniface’s yelling.

Belisarius took Aelfric’s arm. ‘The game is played out. Aelfric - go now, quickly. There is no need for you to suffer, to die.’

‘But the Domnus, the prophecy—’