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province-states and organise significant resistance. He won a string of victories. ‘Artorius’ may have been a nickname, meaning ‘the Bear man’, perhaps a reference to his size. He was said to be the nephew of one of the last Roman commanders to have stayed at his post in Britain.
    ‘All this was a century after the Roman severance,’ Ammanius said. ‘Artorius won peace for a generation. But all he really secured for his people was time.’
    Wuffa asked, ‘So why would this Artorius come here?’
    ‘He retired here after a last battle,’ Ambrosias said. ‘Already an old man he was gravely wounded - worn down by the treachery and cowardice of his own men as much as the enemy’s efforts. He died, here at Banna - on the Wall, the greatest monument of the empire to whose memory he devoted his life.’ He was misty-eyed now. ‘In another age they would have built him an arch here to rival any in Rome! And I, a child, was presented to him. He ruffled my hair! Here.’ He knelt stiffly, presenting his bowed head to Wuffa. ‘Touch my scalp. Go on!’
    Wuffa glanced at the bishop, who shrugged. Wuffa laid his hand on the old man’s head. His skin felt paper-thin, stretched over a fragile skull.
    ‘Always remember. Tell your children! ...’
    After more conversation of this sort Ammanius stood and stretched. ‘You’ve worn me out, sir, with your kind hospitality,’ he said in his dry way.
    Sulpicia stood. She wasn’t about to be left alone with Wuffa and Ulf, even with the old man as chaperone. ‘I will bid you goodnight too.’ And, impulsively, she planted a light kiss on the crown of the old man’s head.
    Ambrosias smiled, pleased.
    Wuffa and Ulf began to clamber to their feet too. But Ambrosias raised his hand in an unmistakable gesture. Wait. Let them go.
    Ambrosias closed the door behind the bishop and the girl. Then, padding quietly, he went to a cupboard. ‘I thought the bloody-nosed old fool would never tire. Our business is nothing to do with bishops, or even with that rather charming girl you both lust after.’ Wuffa avoided Ulf’s eyes. Ambrosias drew a scroll from the overfull cupboard. He glanced at the two of them, with a complicated mixture of regret and longing. ‘Chance has brought you two here, in the wake of the bishop. But this was meant to be, the ancient words have been fulfilled.’
    Wuffa glanced warily at Ulf. He felt his heart hammer; suddenly, in the presence of this limp old man who brandished nothing but a scroll of parchment, he felt fearful. He asked, ‘The words of what?’
    ‘This.’ Ambrosias unrolled the parchment, holding it in trembling hands. ‘It is the prophecy of Isolde.’

X
    The document was yellowed with age, grimy with much handling. Wuffa recognised handwriting in somewhat ragged lines, perhaps scrawled in a hurry. But he couldn’t read it. He couldn’t even read his own name.
    ‘So this is the prophecy,’ prompted Ulf.
    ‘Yes! It was written down at Isolde’s birthing bed. For two hundred years my family have preserved it - two hundred years of waiting, reduced to this moment. I knew you would come. I knew.’
    Ulf said cautiously, ‘What do you mean? How did you know?’
    ‘Because the light has returned to the sky.’ Ambrosias pointed to the ceiling of his cramped room.
    ‘The comet,’ Wuffa breathed.
    ‘Yes! And it is the comet around whose visits the prophecy is structured.’ In a quavering voice Ambrosias began to read:
     
    These the Great Years/of the Comet of God
Whose awe and beauty/in the roof of the world
Light step by step/the road to empire
An Aryan realm/THE GLORY OF CHRIST.
     
    The Comet comes/in the month of June.
Each man of gold/spurns loyalty of silver.
In life a great king/in death a small man.
Nine hundred and fifty-one/the months of the first Year.
     
    The Comet comes/in the month of September.
Number months thirty-five/of this Year of war.
See the Bear laid low/by the Wolf of the north.
Nine hundred and eighteen/the