Meanwhile Gisco turned to Nelo. ‘You. Find a sack, a bag.’

‘Yes, sir. What for, sir?’

‘Our keepsake. This brute’s crimson head, boy. We’re on a mission to root out agents of the Hatti princes, like this one.’ He said this absently, while perusing his list by the light of the lantern. ‘You still here? Go, boy, go!’

So they proceeded through Megara. Nelo had to carry the sack, which dripped blood as they walked, and was surprisingly heavy. It got heavier yet as they visited a second house, and a third, each time finding a solitary Rus or Scand warrior living among fearful Carthaginians, each time coming upon him without warning, each time coming away with a head. The whole business, the stink of the heads, sickened Nelo.

Yet it puzzled him too. Even when the warriors saw them coming they made no attempt to resist, not until it was too late and they realised their fate at Suniatus’ hands. They did jabber out pleas in their own harsh tongues, but that was to be expected, and none of the killing party understood a word.

On the fourth killing Suniatus whistled as he sawed at the man’s neck. ‘This is the life for me, aurochs,’ he said to Nelo. ‘Killing these brutes is as easy as picking olives off a tree.’ He threw over the head for Nelo to catch.

They came upon the fifth man in an upper room of a small abandoned temple. By now the day was bright, the curfew lifted, and in the streets outside the wagons of the dead continued their mournful progress, amid the gathering noises of the city day. This time Suniatus struggled to get the Scand on his back before despatching him. Gisco was forced to help, sitting on the man’s legs while Suniatus pinned his chest.

And the man saw Nelo. His eyes widened. ‘Northlander.’

Nelo was startled. He had said the word in the tongue of Etxelur.

‘Northlander. You are a Northlander. I can tell, the hair, the eyes. I visit – I have visited—’ Suniatus punched him in the mouth, knocking his head to the side. But he stayed conscious, and spoke from a bloody mouth. ‘Please. Mistake. They make mistake. I am loyal, loyal to Fabius!’

Suniatus recognised the general’s name, and sat back, panting, pinning the man’s arms. ‘What did he say? Something about my general?’ And he slammed the back of his hand into the Scand’s face.

‘Get on with it, Suni,’ growled Gisco, pressing on the man’s legs.

‘Sir.’ Suniatus made a more determined effort to contain the man’s struggles.

But the Scand still tried to talk to Nelo. ‘Please! Fabius, his men take us, he speaks to us. Offers us gold and bread, more than the Hatti, if we fight for him. He will give us back to our families, when Hatti are gone. That’s what he said.’