Cramoisy. Let it be Cramoisy.

They bundled him into the carriage and, clambering in after him, pulled the door to. The Commissaire rapped on the roof with his staff and the carriage lurched away over the cobbles.

Orial started up, wildly staring around her.

She had been in a sunset garden. There had been flowers, colours, sounds… oh, such ravishing sounds…

But then she had heard the voice calling to her from beyond the garden. And there was such anguish in the voice that she had felt compelled to go to the gate to see who was calling. Looking all around, she ventured outside –

The garden gate slammed shut behind her. Outside, all was darkness, beneath a confusion of windblown clouds – and when she strove to find her way back into the garden –

‘She’s awake.’

Orial blinked Cook’s face into focus, haloed in soft lamplight.

‘Cook? Have I overslept? It must be late…’

‘Praise the Goddess, she’s awake!’

She struggled to sit up but sank back, her head swimming.

‘Why… do I feel… so muzzy?’

‘You’ve been ill, my lamb. Now you just lie there quietly and let Cook bring you a nice drink of barley water.’

‘Ill? How long… have I been… ill? And where’s… Papa?’

Cook hesitated.

‘He’s been called out to – on business. Oh, but he’ll be so happy when he hears the news.’

The oil-light cast a striped pattern through the barred grille of Khassian’s cell door. He sat hunched on the wooden bed, staring fixedly at the barred shadow. It could be an empty segment of stave, waiting for notes to be inscribed upon it.

Or a bar of silence.

The Sulien Constabulary had treated him with firm but detached courtesy. They had locked him in a single cell, away from the drunks and petty thieves. He had demanded to see a lawyer, he had demanded that they send for Cramoisy, he had demanded to know the charges on which they were holding him. But no further explanation had been given.

Now he sat here on the bare-boarded bed in the darkness, starting at the slightest sound, tense and anxious.

Why? Why had he been arrested? Who had accused him of a crime? What crime had he unwittingly committed? The Mayor had assured Cramoisy that they could stay in Sulien as long as they wished…

‘On your feet!’

The two constables unlocked the door and beckoned him out.

The first thing Khassian noticed was the Sulien coat of arms on the wall, dominating the courtroom, blue and flaking gilt.

The Commissaire sat at a table beneath the coat of arms, his hat and staff of office before him. He yawned behind his hand, evidently weary of the affair, looking to bring it to a swift conclusion. A clerk sat at his right, pen in hand, ready to record the session.

‘Your name is Amaru Khassian, native of Allegonde?’

‘It is,’ Khassian said, ‘but –’