“I did so because I had to,” she said, biting her lips and lowering her eyes. “Don’t you understand that? When, in the morning, I descended Grochowa Mountain to Frankenstein, I met a merchant, an Armenian. He promised to take me to Stolz. And right outside the town, not believing my eyes, I meet those two, Kasia Biberstein and Wolfram Pannewitz the Younger. They didn’t have to say anything, it was enough to look at them to know that not only I had tasted… Erm… That not only I had… Erm… Intriguing adventures. Kasia was terribly afraid of her father, and Wolfram even more of his own… So what was I to do? Talk of witchcraft? About a flight through the sky to a witches’ sabbath? No, better for both of us to play dumb and claim we’d escaped our kidnappers. I hoped that out of fear of Sir Jan’s revenge the Raubritters would run for their lives and that the truth would never out. That no one would even want to investigate it. For how was I to know that Kasia Biberstein was pregnant?”

“And that I’d be accused of raping her,” he finished bitterly. “You weren’t remotely worried by the fact that for me it meant a death sentence. And dishonour worse than death. A stain on my honour. You are a true Judith, Jutta. By staying silent regarding the rape, you condemned me like your biblical namesake did Holofernes. You gave them my head on a plate.”

“Have you been listening?” She tugged at her reins. “Clearing you of the charge of rape would have meant accusing you of witchcraft. Do you think that your head would have come out of it better? In any case, no one listened to me. What weight does the word of a maid, an irrational maid, carry against the word of a knight making a vow on the cross? I’d have been ridiculed, taken to be suffering from the vapours and palpitations of the womb. While you were safe in Bohemia, no one could get their hands on you there. Until the moment when, as I expected, Wolfram Pannewitz would overcome his fear and kneel at Biberstein’s feet to ask for Kasia’s hand.”

“He has still not done it.”

“Because he’s an oaf. The world appears to be teeming with them. Everyone is vying to bed some girl or other. And then what? They take fright. They turn tail, flee to foreign lands—”

“Are you referring to me?”

“How astute you are.”

“I wrote you letters.”

“Addressing them to Katarzyna Biberstein. But she didn’t receive any of them. The times don’t favour correspondence. Shame. I’d have gladly received tidings that you were alive. I’d have gladly read what you wrote… My Reinmar.”

“My Nicolette… Jutta… I love you, Jutta.”

“I love you, Reinmar,” she replied, turning her head away. “But it changes nothing.”

“Nothing?”