‘This is what I wanted to show you,’ Rowena said. From a wooden box she picked out a laminated card and then led Gillard out, back through the wooden door and into the graveyard. He followed her around the overgrown edges of the church where stacks of moss-covered headstones, their engravings now illegible, leaned against the walls. Behind the church apse, she crouched down behind a bush, and pointed to a worn, pillow-sized rock which formed part of the foundations. The stone was dark, quite unlike the honey-coloured masonry which was built upon it, and there were light-coloured scratches in it. With her finger she traced along the line of the marks. ‘This is the prophecy, written in Anglo-Saxon runes, and actually dated in the late sixth century, a little earlier than Augustine’s visit.’

ᛁᚾ×ᚪᚷᛖᛋ×ᚻᛖᚾᚳᛖ×ᚹᚻᛖᚾ×ᛖᛝᛚᚪᚾᛞ×ᚠᛚᛖᛖᛋ×ᚦᛖ×ᚠᚱᚪᚾᚳᛁᛋᚻ×ᚪᚱᛘ×ᚻᛖᚱᛖ×

ᚪᚾ×ᛁᚾᚾᚩᚳᛖᚾᛏ×ᚹᛁᛖᛚᛞᛁᛝ×ᚪ×ᛚᚩᛋᛏ×ᛋᚳᚱᚪᛘᛋᚪᚳᛋ×ᚹᛁᛚᛚ×ᚠᛖᛚᛚ×ᚪ×ᚠᛁᚳᛁᛝ×ᚳᚱᚩᚹᚾ×

‘What does it say?’ Gillard asked.

She looked at the laminated card. ‘Roughly translated, it says: “In ages hence when England flees the Frankish arm, an innocent wielding a lost scramsax will here fell a Viking lord”.’

‘Have they figured out what it means?’

‘Well, as is common in archaeology, there are various interpretations.’ She laughed. ‘The Frankish arm could mean the Norman invasion, which was five centuries in the future. But the Normans were themselves descended from Norsemen and Vikings, not Franks. Of course there were many Viking raids in this area over the following centuries, and indeed some of them settled.’

‘Fascinating,’ Gillard said. ‘But I don’t get the relevance.’

‘To me the word that stands out is scramsax. That is a term for a dagger, not commonly used in England at the time but referenced originally by Geoffrey of Tours in the sixth century.’

‘You’re pretty young to be so knowledgeable.’

She shrugged. ‘I’m sixteen. I’ve been an archaeology geek since I was five, when I found my first Anglo-Saxon coin. When all my friends were playing with dolls I was at the library ploughing through history books.’

‘I’m sure it’s all very interesting, but it’s not going to help us identify the dead body.’

‘I’m not so sure. The chunk of blade lodged in the neck of your dead guy is exactly the right size to be from a dagger.’

Gillard chuckled. ‘Which from the prophecy would indicate that the victim was actually a foreign monarch of some kind.’

Rowena laughed with him. ‘Well, it’s one possibility anyway.’

Gillard heard footsteps. He turned and stood to face a large bearded man with shoulder-length dark hair. ‘Hi there Rowena, how are you?’ asked the man, who was wearing an open-necked mauve shirt, leather trousers and cowboy boots. A face mask dangled around his neck.

‘Hello Matt,’ she replied. ‘I was showing Detective Chief Inspector Gillard here some of the features of our wonderful church.’

‘Matt Cleaver,’ the man said, offering Gillard an elbow. ‘How’s it going?’