The duchess steps back rapidly and gestures for the doors to her room to be closed, but we can still hear the regent, swearing and damning his soul at the top of his voice. The duchess shrugs – men will be men, and this is wartime – and my aunt smiles understandingly, the lute player increases his volume as best he can and starts to sing. I go to the window and look out.

In the market square they have a half-built pyre, a strong structure with a big central beam and the wood stacked around it. Joan has confessed and recanted, she has been found guilty of her crimes and sentenced to imprisonment.

But they are not taking the wood away.

My aunt gives me a nod that we are going to leave, and I go to the hall to wait for her as she delays inside the duchess’s rooms, saying a few words of farewell. I have my hood pulled up over my head, my hands tucked inside my cape. It is cold for May. I wonder if Joan has blankets in her cell, as the big double doors to the duke’s public rooms are thrown open and the duke himself comes quickly out.

I sink down into a curtsey, and I imagine he can barely see me, wrapped in my dark cape in the shadowy doorway. I expect him to brush past; but he pauses. ‘Jacquetta? Jacquetta St Pol?’

I sink even lower. ‘Yes, Your Grace.’

He puts a firm hand under my elbow and raises me up. His other hand pushes back my hood and turns my face to the light of the open doorway, his hand under my chin as if I am a child, and he is looking to see if my mouth is clean. His men are waiting for him, there must be a dozen people around us, but he acts as if we are quite alone. He stares at me intently, as if he would read me. I look back at him blankly, I don’t know what he wants with me and my aunt will be angry if I say the wrong thing to this most important man. I give my lip a little nip and I hear his sudden intake of breath.

‘My God, how old are you?’

‘I am fifteen this year, Your Grace.’

‘And here with your father?’

‘With my uncle, Your Grace. My father is Pierre, the new Count of Luxembourg.’

‘The new count?’ he asks, staring at my mouth.

‘On the death of the Demoiselle of Luxembourg,’ I mutter. ‘My father is now Count of Luxembourg. He was her heir.’

‘Of course, of course.’

There seems nothing else to say but still he is staring at me, still he holds me, one hand y elbow, the other on the edge of my hood.

‘Your Grace?’ I whisper, hoping he will come to his senses and let me go.

‘Jacquetta?’ He whispers my name as if he is speaking to himself.