Tarcho, evidently growing bored, shrugged. He reached inside his tunic and drew out a battered slip of wood. ‘You were right. Somebody did make a copy, from memory at least - a pagan, probably, too superstitious to risk offending the gods by destroying their words; you’re right about that too. Here.’ He flipped it to Nennius. ‘Probably all a forgery anyhow, or a hoax.’

Nennius grabbed the slip and unfolded it tenderly.

Another surge of pain, and there was liquid between Isolde’s thighs. Now she did cry out. Maria, with calm competence, felt between Isolde’s legs. ‘Your waters have broken. Oh, by Jesus, I think I can feel its head.’

‘It can’t be. It’s too early,’ Isolde gasped.

Maria rolled up her sleeves and made Isolde lie down on the couch. ‘They make their own time, dear.’ She turned to a waiting servant. ‘You, fetch my sister. And get some clean water and cloths.’

The servant hurried from the room.

Even now Nennius was more concerned about his precious Prophecy than about his daughter. He read, ‘“ash child! Bound in time’s tapestry, and yet you are born free / Come, let me sing to you of what there is and what will be” ... Sixteen lines - the alpha-omega acrostic - it’s all here - oh, Tarcho, I think it’s genuine all right! And here are the lines about Claudius, and Hadrian - the “little Greek”, hah, I knew what it meant, I was nearly right in my reconstruction. This reference to a “God-as-babe” must refer to the birth of Christianity, for the faith was finding its feet in Hadrian’s time.

‘Oh, and here are the lines that must refer to Constantine. “Emerging first in Brigantia, exalted later then in Rome! / Prostrate before a slavish god, at last he is revealed divine, / Embrace imperial will make dead marble of the Church’s shrine” ... Yes, yes! Wasn’t Constantine proclaimed at Eburacum? Wasn’t Christianity always called a cult of slaves? Didn’t he have himself deified after his death, despite his conversion to Christ? And a church turned into dead marble - yes, surely that refers to Constantine’s institutionalising of the faith. It speaks the truth! I knew it. I knew it all along, that the Prophecy was real, that it was truthful. If only Thalius and his plotters could have seen this document in full! How might history have been deflected?’

Isolde barely heard any of this. Her world contracted to the inside of her head, the heaving of her lungs, and the pulsing contractions of her belly.

Maria murmured in her ear, ‘Don’t worry, love. We’ll fetch the army doctor. He’s the son of a doctor too. I told you you’re in good hands ...’