Sulay tried hard to lead as normal a life as possible in the most abnormal of circumstances. He tried to make up for missed schooling by following online tutorials, he downloaded Hollywood shows to remind him of home. His favourite was Game of Thrones.

But with the internet strictly prohibited in the caliphate, he would be punished whenever he was caught.

As the jihadists became ever-more brutal and the US-led coalition turned up the heat on its bombing campaign to defeat them, the pair’s attempts to escape became more focused. But each time they were caught and brought back.

The first time Sulay was arrested he spent a few days in prison, but the longest of the eight stints was two months. “They interrogated me, beat me, told me I was a spy for America and called me a disbeliever for wanting to leave,” he says. He was denied food and put in Guantanamo Bay-style stress positions. He remembers one British fighter, who went by the nom-de-guerre Abu Adam al-Britani, for his particularly creative torture techniques. Sulay says he saw Abu Adam the other day on TV, swearing to the interviewer he wasn’t a threat to the UK and should be allowed back home.

By the end, Sulay had completely shut himself off. The few friends he did have had all been killed. Each day had become a matter of survival.

Gailon and Sulay were eventually caught by the US-backed and Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) as they closed in on the town of al-Shafaa in January.

Gailon had dressed Sulay up in a niqab in the hope SDF fighters would mistake him for a woman, but he was discovered when the headscarf slipped. As they were being pulled apart she grabbed her son and kissed him on the head. “I love you,” she said. “Just remember I love you.” She knew she could not protect him for whatever was coming next.

They were bundled into trucks which sped off in different directions - the last time they saw one another.