Tóla’s arm comes up as if he’s going to smack me in the face. I grab his wrist hard, push him away. The two lads move a bit closer, look at each other, look at me. I glare and growl, and they back off. What now?

‘Take your hands off me,’ Tóla says. Sounds like a king talking to the lowest scullery boy.

The way I’m holding him, I could snap his wrist without much effort. Give him a taste of how it feels not to have the use of your hand. ‘Send your boys out and I will,’ I say. ‘You won’t want them to hear what I’ve got to say. They can wait outside the door.’

‘Go!’ says Tóla, and they do, quick. I let go his arm, and he rubs his wrist with the other hand. ‘You should lose your job right now,’ he says. ‘How dare you lay hands on me?’

‘Thing is,’ I say, ‘if it looks like a man’s going to take a swing at me, I like to stop him before he does it, not after. And I’m quick for a big man. Isn’t that why I got the job? Build the house and keep your wild man in order?’

Tóla’s at a bit of a loss. Not sure what to say, from the looks of it. Fiddling with the things on the table, not meeting my eye. ‘This should not have come to blows,’ he says. ‘I need you for the job, yes. I expected you to guard him and you have done that. I did not expect you to appoint yourself his champion. I did not expect Mistress Blackthorn to stick her nose into my business. She’s been seeking out information, hasn’t she? Information she might pass on to my daughter.’

‘I can’t answer that. Seeing as you don’t want me to mention Cara.’

He makes an impatient, angry noise. Sweeps his hand across the table, fist clenched. Knocks a cup, an ink pot and some sheets of parchment to the floor. ‘Don’t try to be clever,’ he snarls. ‘It doesn’t suit you.’

Next thing he’ll call me Bonehead and I’ll really snap. Breathe, I tell myself.

‘What is it you have to say? What is so particularly private? Spit it out.’