“Oh, oh,” said the old wizard happily. “How wonderful! Sit beside me, Master Scharley, tell me…”

Reynevan joined the other mages. Radim Tvrdík poured him some wine, Spanish Alicante judging from the bouquet.

“How are things?” asked Štěpán of Drahotuše, nodding towards the closed door leading to the occultum, the room of divination and conjuration. “Any results? Or at least some heavenly or earthly signs?”

Svatopluk Fraundinst snorted. Telesma did, too, although he didn’t raise his head from the talisman he was polishing with jeweller’s rouge.

“Herr Meister Axleben prefers to work alone,” said Teggendorf. “He doesn’t like people looking over his shoulder. He guards his secret methods closely.”

“Even from those who play host to him,” Fraundinst remarked sourly, “thus showing what he thinks of them—as nothing but thieves, out to steal his secrets. He probably hides his pouch and poulaines under his pillow before going to sleep so we can’t steal them, either.”

“He began at sunrise,” interjected Radim Tvrdík, seeing that Reynevan was more interested in Samson Honeypot than opinions about Axleben. “Indeed, all alone with the object, meaning Samson. He didn’t want any help, although we offered it. He didn’t ask for anything, neither instrument, nor incense, nor aspergillum, so he must be wielding some powerful artefact.”

“Or it’s true what they say about Manusfortis,” added Brehm. “He shouldn’t be underestimated.”

“We aren’t underestimating him,” assured Telesma. “It is, after all, in spite of everything, Vincent Axleben, magnus experimentator et nigromanticus, in person. He’s certainly not short on magical knowledge. He’s a master. So he’s entitled to be somewhat extravagant.”

“What a grand word,” said Fraundinst, grimacing. “In my village, Malá Smědava, people wouldn’t call someone like Axleben ‘extravagant.’ They’d call him—simply, coarsely and bluntly—an ignorant fucking swine.”

“No one’s perfect,” noted Teggendorf. “Including Vincent Axleben. And the fact that his working methods are bizarre? Why, we’ll judge how effective they are. We’ll find out and judge them as the Bible instructs: a fructibus eorum.”

“I’ll wager,” Svatopluk went on, “that the fructus will be sour and misbegotten. Who wants to bet?”

“I definitely don’t,” said Štěpán of Drahotuše with a shrug. “For men do not gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles. Axleben won’t succeed with Samson and it’ll end as we did at Epiphany. In other words: in a failure. Axleben will be undone as we were—by his pride and vanity.”