“I’m looking for work,” she replied freely, rubbing her nose with the back of her hand. “For now, since Master Jew graciously took me aboard, I’ll go with him to Strzelin, and then, who knows, maybe even to Wrocław itself. In my line of work, I can find employment anywhere, though I’d prefer the best…”

“In your… line of work?” Reynevan began to twig. “You mean…”

“Exactly. I am, as you would say, a strumpet. Until recently employed at the Crown whorehouse in Brzeg.”

“I understand.” Reynevan nodded seriously. “And you are travelling together? Rabbi—you took as a passenger a… a woman of easy virtue?”

“Shouldn’t I have done so?” Rabbi Hiram opened his eyes wide. “Well, I did. For, my young lord, I’d have looked a right prick if I hadn’t.”

Footsteps boomed on the moss-covered timbers.

“Problem?” asked one of the three men who had set foot on the bridge. “Do you need some help?”

“It would come in handy,” admitted Reynevan, although he didn’t like the look of the potential helpers’ disagreeable faces and shifty eyes one little bit. With good reason, it turned out, as soon as several pairs of powerful hands had made quick work of pushing the wagon into the meadow beyond the bridge.

“There!” said the tallest of the characters, chin covered in stubble, shaking a stout stick. “Job done, now it’s time to pay. Unhitch the horse from the wagon, Jew boy, take off your coat, give me your purse. And you, lordling, off with your jerkin and boots. And you, my lovely, off with everything, you’ll be paying in kind. Strip!”

His comrades guffawed, baring rotten teeth. Reynevan stooped over and grasped the stake he had used to lever the wagon.

“Look at the bold young master.” The unshaven man pointed his stick at him. “Life still hasn’t learned him that when someone orders you to hand your boots over, you do it. Because you can walk barefoot, but not on broken legs. Come on! Let’s ’ave ’im!”

The thugs nimbly dodged the stake Reynevan was swinging. One ran up from behind and knocked him to the ground with a skilful kick to the backs of his knees, then himself cried out and staggered, shielding his eyes from the fingernails of Dorota Faber, who was clinging to his back. Reynevan shielded himself from kicks and blows and tried to intervene when he saw one of the thugs punching the Jew. And then he saw a demon.

The thugs began yelling. In terror.