“But above all else,” the Lord of Stolz raised his voice, “an example is needed. Quite a palpable one. One that will be talked about in Silesia. One that will be long remembered. When there is a lack of terror, when crimes go unpunished, society becomes demoralised. Am I right?”
No one challenged the statement. Jan Biberstein went closer and looked Reynevan in the eyes.
“I have thought long and hard… about what I would do to you when I finally caught you. I have studied much, and without affronting antiquity, recent history has proved to be the most instructive when it comes to novel punishments. In 1419, barely eight years ago, when Catholic Czech lords caught Calixtines, they executed them in imaginative ways, trying to outdo each other with their invention. In my estimation, the victor’s laurel must go to Sir Jan Švihovský of Rýzmberk. Lord Švihovský ordered that a Hussite he caught have black powder stuffed into his mouth and down his throat and then be set alight. Eyewitnesses claim that when it exploded, fire and smoke belched out of the heretic’s backside.
“When I heard about that,” Biberstein continued, clearly delighting in Reynevan’s horrified expression, “I received enlightenment. I was certain what to have done to you. I shall go further than Lord Švihovský, however. Having stuffed you full of powder, I shall have a lead ball shoved up your arse and measure how far it flies. A rear-end shot like that ought to satisfy both my paternal feelings and my scientific curiosity. What do you think?
“I must declare to you, not without satisfaction,” he went on, not waiting for an answer, “that I shall beset you terribly after your death, too. I considered it idiotic and a waste of effort, but my chaplain insisted. You are a heretic, so I shan’t bury your remains in holy ground, but rather order them tossed somewhere for the ravens to eat. Since, if I remember rightly: quibus viventibus non communicavimus mortuis communicare non possumus.”
“I am in your hands, Lord Biberstein,” said Reynevan, and resignation helped him gather the remains of his courage. “At your mercy. Act with me as you deem fit. If you want to act like a butcher, who will stop you? Or perhaps you’re frightening me with torture in the hope that I’ll begin to beg for mercy? Not a bit of it, Sir Jan. I am a nobleman. And I shall not demean myself before the father of the maiden I love.”
“Nicely put,” the Lord of Stolz said coldly. “Nicely and boldly. You again arouse scholarly curiosity in me: how long will your courage last? Ha, let’s not waste time; the gunpowder and ball are waiting. Do you have any last requests?”
“I should like to see Miss Katarzyna.”
“Ah! And what else? Rut her one last time?”
“And my son. You cannot forbid me that, Sir Jan.”
“I can. And I shall.”
“I love her!”
“I shall soon remedy that.”
“Sir Jan,” spoke the Green Lady, and the timbre of her voice called to mind various things, including honey. “Display magnanimity. Show chivalry, with examples of which recent history also abounds. Even the Czech Catholic lords granted the last requests of the Hussites, I believe, before stuffing them with gunpowder. Grant the request of the young Lord of Bielawa, Sir Jan. The lack of examples of magnanimity, I observe, demoralises society no less than undue leniency. Furthermore, I ask you on his behalf.”
“And that decides it.” Biberstein bent his head. “That decides it, m’lady. It shall be thus. Hey there! Servants!”
The Lord of Stolz issued orders and the servants ran away to execute them. After a painfully lengthy period of waiting, the door creaked. Two women entered the armoury. And one child. A little boy. Reynevan felt a wave of heat run through him and the blood rushing to his cheeks. He also noticed his mouth had dropped open. He clamped it shut, not wanting to look like a dumbstruck moron. He was not certain of the result. He must have looked like one. For that was how he felt.
One of the women was a matron, another a young maid, and the difference in age and the striking similarity left no doubt—it was a mother and daughter. Nor was it difficult to place their origin, particularly for somebody who—like Reynevan—had once heard a lesson about the typical hereditary traits of women and maids of the most notable Silesian families, a lesson given by Lady Formosa of Krossig at the Raubritter Bodak Castle. Both the matron and the maiden were rather short and rather stocky, wide in the hips like women from the Pogorzela family who had married into the Biberstein family long before. Their small, snub and very freckly noses also testified irrefutably to the Pogorzela blood flowing in their veins.
Reynevan didn’t know and had never seen the matron. The maiden he had seen sometime before, and only once. The little boy clutching her skirt had light-coloured eyes, plump hands, a head covered in golden curls and generally speaking was a silly little thing—in other words: a small, gorgeous, chubby, freckled cherub. Reynevan had no idea who he had inherited his looks from. And all in all, it didn’t concern him much.
Reynevan only needed a moment for the above-mentioned observations and reflections, which required several sentences to describe. For according to the more learned astronomers of that age, an hour—hora—was divided into puncta, momenta, unciae and atomi, so one could conclude that Reynevan’s reflections took no more than one ounce and thirty atoms.
Sir Jan Biberstein required more or less the same number of ounces and atoms to analyse the situation. His face darkened dangerously, his Homeric brow frowned threateningly, the nostrils of his Greek nose flared and his moustache bristled ominously. That angelic grandson had for a grandfather, it turned out, an evil old devil. And at that moment, the Lord of Stolz of resembled one so faithfully that you could have painted him on a church fresco.
“It’s not this maiden,” he stated, and when he spoke, there was a growling in his throat. “It turns out it isn’t that maiden at all. Somebody is trying to make an idiot out of me. Lady wife.” His voice rumbled in the armoury like a wagon laden with empty coffins. “Would you mind taking our daughter to the ladies’ chambers and talking some sense into her, in any manner you consider appropriate. For my part, I suggest applying a birch switch to her bare backside until you succeed in obtaining some information. When you come into possession of that information, my dear lady wife, and are able to share it with me, appear before me. And don’t try to do so any earlier, nor for any other reason.”
The matron paled slightly but only curtsied, without uttering a word. Reynevan caught sight of her expression as she tugged her daughter by a white sleeve peeping out from under a green cotehardie. It wasn’t an especially kind expression. The daughter—Katarzyna of Biberstein—also looked on. Through tears. There was reproach in her eyes. And sadness. He could only guess at what saddened her and what she reproached him for. But he didn’t feel like guessing. It no longer interested him. Katarzyna of Biberstein no longer interested him. All his senses flew towards another person. About whom, he suddenly realised, he knew nothing. Apart from her name, which he now knew.
When the women had left with the little boy, Jan of Biberstein swore. Then he swore again.
“Nec cras, nec heri, nunquam ne credas mulieri,” he growled. “Why is there so much perversity in you women? M’Lady Cup-Bearer?”