He could neither sleep nor move to escape the constant pain. Every muscle in his body was being stretched to its breaking point. He was trapped in a never-ending hell, without a way out, without the slightest relief. Two, maybe three, hours passed before he regained control of his thoughts and once again focused on the table in the room.

If only he could move it closer to him. He grabbed the chain with his hands and held on tight as he swung his body in an arc above the floor. His big toe brushed the edge of the table, which made a clattering noise. Daniel paused momentarily, listening for footsteps in the hallway, then swung himself over and over again towards the table; each time it moved by a fraction. And each time he listened to see whether the noise attracted any attention. Finally, the table was close enough that he could pull it underneath him with his legs.

He stood on the table top. The most wonderful feeling flowed through his body as he sank his arms down from their outstretched position. The relief spread from his elbows to his shoulders. He stood there for a long time, enjoying this new sensation, until the thirst overcame him. Thoughts rushed through his head: To be free from this world, to decide for yourself when you want to leave it. That’s all I want.

He bit his wrist hard. It started bleeding and a stab of pain rushed through him. He couldn’t do this to himself. But imagine if he could just drink a little blood or escape. Or simply disappear.

He looked at the chain that hung from the hook on the ceiling above him. If it could be an instrument of torture, it could also be one of liberation. His hands reached for the cool metal and wrapped the chain around his neck, so it rested against his skin.

For a moment he frightened himself. He had lived a wonderful life, he thought to himself. Even if he hadn’t had any children. The fact that he hadn’t left his mark on the next generation suddenly meant much more to him than he’d ever expected. He recalled the day he had been kidnapped and thought about his Syria project. At least he hadn’t just sat at home in indifference and done nothing. He rested his arms and felt the chain around his neck as he stood still for a brief moment. The thirst had disappeared.

Suddenly he sensed someone looking at him. As he turned his head, he could just make out the outline of a small figure in the doorway. It had to be a child. Daniel turned his head back – and jumped. He sprung off from the table towards the ceiling. He felt a violent jerk in his body and the plaster from the ceiling raining down on him. There was a tightening sensation around his neck and everything went black. He felt his body tingle and he urinated in his trousers.

He descended further and further into darkness.

· * ·

Arthur was working undercover to locate Daniel. After extensive discussions in various towns along the Syrian border, he hired several locals to help him with the search. These included Alpha, whom he called his assistant and who had an extensive network, and Majeed, whose task it was to track down the group that had kidnapped Daniel.

Majeed was a local television journalist who had previously worked as a fixer for foreign journalists in Syria. When Alpha rang Majeed and requested his help, he agreed despite the high risk he’d be taking, not only for himself, but also for his wife and their three children. But he needed the money and he felt sorry for the vanished Dane. Even though Majeed didn’t know Daniel, he got the impression that Daniel had travelled to Syria to tell people’s stories through his photos. Perhaps Daniel was someone who thought everyone else was just as kind as he was – but Syria was no longer like that.

With a file in his bag containing information about Daniel, Majeed travelled around Azaz and the surrounding area searching for clues. He held countless futile meetings, until he finally succeeded in making contact with an influential ISIS figure in the area. The man went by the nom de guerre Abu Suheib al-Iraqi, which meant he came from Iraq. According to several sources, he was about forty years old and had been a soldier under Saddam Hussein. In other words, he was a former Ba’ath Party loyalist turned ISIS hardliner, now fighting in Syria and involved in kidnapping both foreigners and Syrians.

Along with a trusted friend, Majeed drove to the house where they knew that Abu Suheib was staying. A chubby man with a full beard covering his wide face greeted them with a bowl of fruit and an otherwise unwelcoming attitude. When Majeed explained that they were looking for information about a disappeared Dane, Abu Suheib spat out, ‘You dare to come here and ask me about an infidel who has sullied the Prophet’s name? We will slaughter him.’

‘Who has sullied the Prophet’s name?’ asked Majeed.

‘Denmark. Wasn’t there a cartoonist in Denmark who sullied the Prophet’s name?’

‘You want to kill a Dane because another Dane has insulted the Prophet?’ proceeded Majeed carefully.

‘All Danes are infidels and we will slaughter them all, and because you have come here to ask about him, we ought to slaughter you too.’

The only positive outcome of the meeting so far was that Majeed had finally found someone who admitted that he knew of Daniel’s existence. He tried to calm him down.

‘What do you want?’ asked Abu Suheib.

‘We want to bring Daniel home to his family.’

‘How many “notebooks” will you give me?’ asked Abu Suheib.

Majeed didn’t know what he meant by ‘notebooks’, but later found out that in Iraq a notebook is the equivalent of $100,000.

‘It’s impossible to put together such a huge sum of money,’ objected Majeed. ‘His mother and father and fiancée are the ones trying to get him home, not the state.’

‘The man works for the intelligence service – he’s admitted it.’

‘He’s a photographer,’ answered Majeed, who wanted to show Abu Suheib his file with information about Daniel for proof. But Abu Suheib wouldn’t budge. He demanded an ambulance to transport wounded ISIS soldiers and seven notebooks. When Majeed pleaded again, explaining that they couldn’t pay so much, Abu Suheib asked him to leave.

Arthur viewed Majeed’s meeting with Abu Suheib as a possible opening. Abu Suheib seemed willing to negotiate and he knew where Daniel was. More names began to emerge. On his notepad he wrote ‘Abu Athir’ and drew a square around the name as someone to be investigated in greater detail. The information suggested that Daniel was being kept under Abu Athir’s control somewhere in Aleppo, even though it was likely that Abu Suheib’s local ISIS group in Azaz had been the ones to kidnap him.

· * ·

Daniel had now been missing for more than two weeks. After the first week, Susanne and Kjeld were trying to get back to their normal routines. On Sundays Kjeld rode his bike to clear his mind. It helped to calm him. Every morning Susanne wrote a few lines in her diary and researched uplifting quotes online, which she used to look up for use in greeting and birthday cards.

On 25 May she wrote in her diary: ‘I survived the time before last and I survived the last time, so I will have to survive now to survive next time.’

They finally told their immediate family that Daniel had been kidnapped. They also told Christina, whom they had put off with white lies until now. She wept and made herself refrain from googling stories about Syria. It was too frightening.

· * ·

Daniel felt hands on his neck and shoulders. Some people were holding him up, others fiddled with the chain. For a brief moment he thought God’s hand was lifting him up towards the light – until someone threw cold water on his face. He was reluctant to wake up, but moved his head instinctively when a boot threatened to step on it.

The guards broke out in cheers: their hostage was alive and kicking. They celebrated by beating him with a plastic tube, which bent around his tormented body, and then they left him tied to the radiator in the room.