The rumour was true. The sorcerer Rupilius really had resided at Trosky Castle. And still did. For ever and ever.

The fundamental problem of magical amulets, Telesma, the Prague sorcerer from the Archangel, had once explained to Reynevan, is a matter of size. The matter of size is even more significant than that of price. Everyone knows that the more valuable the material a talisman is made from, the more powerful it is. But it was the Phoenicians who came up with the principle that good means dear. Buy cheap, buy dross—that axiom was also said to have been conceived among the merchants of Tyre and Sidon.

The claim that the more substantial the mass of the amulet, the greater its power was a truism, and an extremely problematic one at that, for the very nature of magical periapts demanded that they be handy. A talisman was useful if it could be carried on one’s person—in a pocket, inside a jacket, on a finger. So what if a dried and pressed stork allowed one to easily read a stranger’s thoughts? said Telesma. Or a mummified corpse’s leg could reliably protect one against spells. Where is one to carry it? On a string around one’s neck? It looks ridiculous.

All one can do, the sorcerer finished his theorising with a practical conclusion, is to reconcile oneself with the fact that amulets, talismans and suchlike are only suitable for weak magic, for lower-level sorcery. Having reconciled oneself thereto, one should do what one can—which means to miniaturise. If it can’t be more powerful, let it at least be more convenient to carry around.

So Telesma experimented thoroughly—with varying results. And when Reynevan left Prague, he received as a gift a small copper casket no larger than two human fists. The satin-lined compartments concealed no fewer than twenty small objects: miniaturised amulets with various uses.

Naturally, Reynevan guarded the box carefully and didn’t expose it to any risk. Since the expedition to Trosky Castle was damned risky, the box had remained in Scharley’s care. With certain exceptions. He took two amulets with him: a ring for healing wounds and a periapt for detecting magical activity. Aside from being useful, the two talismans also had the virtue of being inconspicuous. The healing ring, cast in tin, concealed a large diamond. The magic-detecting periapt was made of gold wire masked by entwined horsehair.

Its inconspicuousness hadn’t protected the ring—everything had its value to Hurkovec’s martahuzes, even tin. When stripped of his sheepskin coat, hat, pouch, belt and Venetian dagger, Reynevan had also lost the ring—he’d been fortunate not to lose the finger as well. However, the horsehair-covered magic-detecting periapt fastened around his arm above the elbow had escaped the attention of the men who searched him. And was now the only thing Reynevan could count on.