And so he did. 'In 441,' Damien said, 'the Roman Empire neglected to pay Attila his proper tributes, and he assaulted the Danubian frontier. He was a magnificent warrior and there was simply no standing against him. A year later, the Romans arranged a truce.'

The class was mesmerized.

'And Attila was a clever politician as well,' Damien said. 'He knew how to turn the superstitions of his people to his advantage. For instance, the Scythians worshipped the bare sword as a god, even though this god was supposed to have disappeared from the earth.

'One day,' Damien continued, 'a herdsman who was tracking a lost heifer in the desert stumbled over a sword that was sticking up in the sand as though it had been thrown down from heaven. He brought it to Attila, who then apeared before his armies holding the sword up in the air, declaring that he wielded the spirit of Death-in-Battle.'

The class hung on his every word. Mark, however, was gradually and inexplicably becoming terrified.

And now Damien said something that even the chaplain had never heard: 'It's possible,' he said, 'that Attila held the sword up in the air like that because it reminded him of his childhood. Attila had been held up like that himself. His mother believed that if she held him up to the sun for an hour every day, he would become invested with the sun's power. Some say this changed the pigment in his skin, accounting for his swarthy appearance.' Damien stopped to catch his breath. His heart was pounding wildly against the wall of his chest. ‘That happened when he was three.'

The chaplain simply gaped at him.

But Damien knew still more. Some other power was forcing the facts out of him. 'Attila bore little resemblance to his brother,' he went on, 'skin pigmentation aside. But then his mother was known to have entertained quite a few men in her time, and openly at that.

'In his first battle, he was about my age.' He quickly corrected himself. 'Our age, I mean. There is a painting that shows him at that age with his sword seeming to impale three different men at once. Probably an exaggeration. He was also very handsome at that age, and desired by many women. Not long after that, he began to participate in black masses.’

That was too much for Budman. 'That's outrageous!' he said. 'Where did you find that information? Name your source!’ It was a favourite command of Budman's.

Damien faltered for the first time. 'I… I don't know, sir.' Suddenly, he seemed confused, bewildered, unsure of himself, as if he had crossed over into unfamiliar territory.

The chaplain seized the advantage. 'And his brother—I suppose he participated in these black masses, too, eh?'

'Oh, no, sir,' Damien said, shaking his head with complete conviction and authority. ‘By that time Attila had killed him.'