Huncleder attacked across the table with the speed of a wildcat. The hatchet blade whistled but didn’t bury itself in Samson’s temple, where it was aimed. The giant was too swift. He moved his head aside, caught Huncleder above the elbow with his left hand and squeezed the fingers holding the weapon with his right. Everybody heard Huncleder’s howl and the crunch of the bones. Samson prised the hatchet from his broken fingers, gripped it, bent Huncleder over the table and slammed the butt of the axe down on the fingers of the other hand now pressed against the tabletop. Huncleder howled even louder. Samson struck again. Huncleder fell face first onto the table and fainted.

So he didn’t see Reynevan bound nimbly over to the servant holding the crossbow and knock it upwards so that the stock thudded into his lips and teeth. Or Scharley overpower the other servant with his favourite kick to the knee and the punch that broke his nose. Or Amadej Baťa hit one of the swindlers in the lower back with a stool. Or Berengar Tauler use two daggers drawn from God knew where to warn the others not to get involved. Or Reynevan back up the warning with the crossbow he had seized from the servant. Or Jeřábek sitting in shock with his mouth foolishly open, which made him look just like a carved wooden figure from a peasant’s cottage. Or Samson walk calmly into the side room and lead out the red-haired, freckled girl. She was pale and moved with reluctance—why, even quite unwillingly—but Samson wasn’t in the least bothered by that, unceremoniously using gentle but firm force.

“Let’s go,” he said to Reynevan and Scharley. “Now.”

“Indeed,” agreed Berengar Tauler, still holding the two daggers. “Let’s go, and quickly. Amadej and I are coming with you.”

No more than half a mile from the inn, the track led them out of a dark forest onto a patch of stubble, bright beneath the stars. Berengar Tauler, who was leading the cavalcade, stopped and reined his horse around, barring the others’ way.

“Stop!” he called. “Enough’s enough! I want to know what’s going on here—what the Devil is this about?”

Scharley’s horse tossed its head, neighed and flattened its ears. The penitent calmed it down.

“What the hell was that row about?” Tauler continued. “A row we might all pay for with our lives? Why the hell do you want that wench? Where are we bloody going? And above all—”

He suddenly forced his horse straight at Samson as though meaning to ram him. Samson didn’t even flinch. Neither did the girl with the still indifferent, wooden expression and distant stare riding in front of him.

“Above all,” yelled Berengar Tauler, “who the bloody hell is that character? Who is he?”

Scharley rode over to him so aggressively that Tauler reined his mount in sharply.