“Good,” Flutek said through clenched teeth. “Good, Praguians. Keep it up! Oh, you won’t get out of this alive, Lord Kolštejn of the Valdštejns. You won’t survive.”

As though Hynek of Kolštejn had heard, his regiment suddenly split into two units. One, with around a hundred horses and led by a knight with a silver and black shield, galloped towards the Church of Saint Michael. The other, with Hynek leading, rode at the mob attacking from Dlouhá třída.

Reynevan lost sight of the first unit and could only gather from the yelling and clanking that the horsemen were trying to force their way through the barricades and hack a path to the bridge and the Lesser Quarter. He did see Hynek’s unit plough into the armed townspeople, cut down the front rank and break up the next. And saw them stopped by the third, skewered on a wall of gisarmes, spears and pitchforks. The Praguians stood firm, undismayed. There were too many of them. They were strong. Confident.

For reinforcements kept coming.

“Death to the traitors!” they yelled, attacking. “Into the Vltava with them!”

“Kill them, give no quarter!”

Wounded steeds neighed, rearing up, and their riders fell to the ground, slippery with blood. And from the windows came an unceasing stream of bolts…

“Kill the traitors! Into the Vltava!”

The riders retreated, returned to the square, dispersed and regrouped on their own initiative to force their way through the barricades and chains near the Church of Saint Nicholas and in Michalská Street. But Hynek wasn’t with them. The horse of the hero of Vyšehrad had fallen under him, cut down by a scythe blade across the forelegs. The knight managed to jump free in time, his sword still in his hand, and smote those who leaped at him. Back pressed against the wall of the House at the Elephant, he called several men to him. Seeing that they were falling from crossbow belts, he darted into a vaulted hallway, barging open the door. A mob of Praguians rushed into the house after him. Hynek didn’t have a chance. It wasn’t long before his bloodied body, shrouded in a tunic decorated with the lion of the Markvartic family, tumbled from a window on the first floor and thudded onto the Prague cobblestones.

“Defenestration!” Flutek laughed, his face contorting demonically. “A fresh defenestration! That’s to my liking, dammit! Justice and symbolism!”

Hynek, having been thrown from the window, was still showing faint signs of life. The Praguians crowded around him. They hesitated for a time. Finally, one man overcame his reluctance and stabbed the knight with a spear. Another hacked at him with a poleaxe. And then all the others fell on him, stabbing and hacking.

“Oh, yes!” Flutek laughed. “Symbolism! Well, Reynevan? What do you say—”

He broke off. Reynevan wasn’t in the room.