He only managed to reach the vestibule, where the products were stored to be distributed by the pages. Reynevan, single-mindedly carrying out his plan, put down a basket, slipped unnoticed out of the ranks of servants returning to the kitchen and sneaked behind the marquees. He drew a dagger to cut a viewing hole in the canvas. And it was then he was caught.

The grip of several pairs of strong hands immobilised him; one iron hand clenched him by the throat and another, just as powerful, prised the dagger from his fingers. He ended up inside the marquee full of knights much quicker than he had expected, although not quite in the way he had hoped.

He was shoved hard, fell over, and saw right in front of him some fashionable poulaines with incredibly long toes. He was jerked upright by Tristram of Rachenau, a relative of the Sterczas. He was accompanied by several Baruths—also related to the Sterczas—with black aurochs on their doublets. It couldn’t have been worse for Reynevan.

“An assassin,” Rachenau introduced him. “A killer, Your Grace. Reinmar of Bielawa.”

The knights surrounding the duke murmured menacingly.

Duke Jan Ziębice, a handsome and well-built man in his forties, was dressed in a tight black justaucorps, over which he wore a fashionably loose claret houppelande trimmed with sable. A heavy gold chain hung around his neck and on his head he sported a fashionable chaperon turban with a liripipe of Flemish muslin draped over one shoulder. The duke’s dark hair was also cut according to the newest European styles and fashions—in a pudding bowl, two fingers above his ears, with a fringe at the front and shaved high at the back. The duke was shod, however, in red Polish poulaines with fashionable long toes, the same ones Reynevan had just admired from floor level.

The duke, Reynevan noted with a painful tightness of the throat and diaphragm, was arm-in-arm with Adèle of Stercza, who was wearing a gown of the most fashionable vert d’emeraude, with a train and slashed sleeves that reached the ground. A gold hairnet graced her tresses and a string of pearls encircled her neck above a cleavage boldly peeking out from a tight corset. The Burgundian was scrutinising Reynevan and her eyes were as cold as a serpent’s.

Duke Jan took Reynevan’s dagger from Tristram of Rachenau, examined it and then raised his eyes.

“And to think,” he said, “that I didn’t quite believe it when you were accused of those crimes, of the murders of those merchants. I didn’t want to lend credence to it, yet here you are, caught red-handed as you tried to sneak up on me from behind with a knife in your hand. Do you hate me so much? Or perhaps somebody paid you. Or you are simply insane. Eh?”