The tavern yard by the wharf steamed with heat and smoke, though the February night bit at the riverbank. Carnival had swollen Antwerp past its seams; even here, in a yard meant for wagons and hogsheads, the crowd pressed shoulder to shoulder. Torches hissed in their brackets, smoke curling into the rafters, while fiddlers sawed at reels so fast the strings snapped. The air smelled of frying fish, ale thick as mud, roasting chestnuts, and the sharper tang of pitch and tar from the moorings below.
Joseph sat with his troupe at a trestle so warped it rocked with every thump of Joos's elbow. Tankards clattered, grease pooled on platters of half-gnawed meat, and onions rolled underfoot when the benches tipped too far. Sailors bellowed songs they barely knew, apprentices tried to snatch kisses from kitchen maids, and somewhere a dog barked every time the fiddler struck a high note.
'Drink, fool!' Joos shoved a brimming cup at Joseph, ale slopping over his fingers. 'To Antwerp! To Carnival! To our glory!'
Joseph laughed, though the sound caught in his throat. 'Glory? We limped tonight.'
'Bah!' Joos wiped foam from his chin. 'A limp's still a stride. Antwerp laughed. That's coin enough.'
'Coin enough for you,' Isabelle cut in. She sat straighter than the rest, her patched kirtle tight at the waist, hair bound with a ribbon that had seen better years. Her eyes, sharp even in torchlight, missed nothing. 'Antwerp laughs tonight, yes — but Antwerp remembers longer than it laughs. We must be sharper tomorrow. Tighter. Faster. No stumbles.'
Her gaze slid to Joseph. He looked away, jaw tightening.
Bram lounged at her side, his smirk as lazy as the hand that toyed with his cup. 'Let her scold,' he drawled. 'Carnival's a beast. Feed it scraps, feed it gold, it still gulps and grins the same.' He tipped his chin at Joseph. 'Besides, Belle's right in one thing — your eyes are elsewhere, fool. Counting coins not on this table.'
'Dreaming of sausages, more like,' Rik said, scraping a wild flourish from his fiddle. 'I saw him eyeing Joos's string of links the whole play.'
The table roared. Even Pietje, balanced on the wagon's wheel-rim, bobbed and shrieked, 'Pretty fool! Pretty fool!'
Joseph forced a grin and took a gulp of ale, though it tasted more of river water than hops. His companions roared again at Pietje's cry, but for him the laughter rang hollow. His thoughts strayed — not to sausages, not to coins — but to torchlight on stone walls, to a square gone silent, to a girl who had spoken his name like it mattered.
Katelijne.
He pressed a hand against his doublet, where the handkerchief lay hidden still. The stitches were fine as pearls, the faint perfume of rosewater clung even after nights pressed close to his chest. Fool's treasure. Dangerous as fire. He should burn it, he knew — but the thought of letting it go struck harder than hunger.
'Joseph.' Isabelle's voice cut sharp as glass. She had not even raised it, yet he felt the weight. 'Are you listening?'
He forced a smile. 'Always.'
'Then hear me: Antwerp forgives nothing. Another slip, and we'll be jeered from every square before Carnival ends. Keep your wits with us — not wandering.'
Bram leaned in, lazy grin widening. 'Let him wander. Every fool chases shadows. At least this one's amusing to watch.'
Joos banged the table. 'Less scolding, more ale!' He tugged a maid onto his lap, who shrieked and wriggled until Rik broke into a reel that drowned her protests in laughter.
The yard blurred with dancing — boots thudding, skirts flying, hands clapping. Even Isabelle let Bram tug her half into the circle, though she kept her eyes bright and guarded.
Joseph slipped away toward the shadowed edge. The river wind cut sharper there, smelling of tar and fish, but it cleared his head. He leaned against the wagon wheel, the torches painting smoke into the night sky. Somewhere across the city she might be sitting with her rosary, or at her father's board, or staring from her chamber window into the dark. Did she think of him?
He almost laughed at himself. Fool. Always a fool.
A tug at his sleeve. He turned. A boy stood there — thin, barefoot, cap sliding off one ear, eyes quick and wary. No older than nine.
'You the bird-man?' the boy asked.
Joseph crouched, heart already hammering. 'Sometimes. Who asks?'
The boy thrust out a grubby scrap of paper, but his other palm stayed open. Joseph fumbled for coin — a clipped silver, heavy enough to keep the boy's silence. The child darted it away and was gone into the dark before Joseph could speak again.
Joseph stared at the folded scrap, hardly daring. His fingers shook as he lifted it to the nearest torch. The paper was smudged, the charcoal hurried — but the words leapt clear all the same:
I will go. Tomorrow. After dusk. — K.
For a heartbeat the yard vanished. The jeers, the fiddles, the stink of ale and onions — gone. All he heard was the echo of her voice. All he saw was her hand writing that single, impossible line.
A laugh broke out of him, sharp and half-sobbing. He bit it back, folding the paper twice, pressing it against his chest with the handkerchief. His ribs ached from the force of his heart.
Behind him Pietje shrieked, wings clattering against the wagon. 'She'll come! She'll come!'
The crowd howled with laughter. Sailors banged their mugs on the trestle, taking up the cry.
'She?' Bram's voice rang over the din, mocking, curious. 'Who is she, eh? Some fishwife's daughter? Or a merchant's pretty chick?'
Joseph forced his grin wide. 'No one you could afford.'
Roars shook the yard, but Isabelle's head snapped round. Her gaze fixed on him, too sharp, too knowing. The smile she wore for Bram did not reach her eyes.
'If your bird's a prophet,' she called coolly, 'then he'll earn us more coin than your stumbling verses.'
'Pretty fool! Pretty fool!' Pietje screamed again, bobbing his head with relish. The crowd roared louder, but Joseph felt the weight of Isabelle's stare long after she turned away.
Rik scraped another jig; Joos whirled his maid until they both toppled into the onions. Bram leaned close to Isabelle, his smirk curling like smoke. Sander declaimed a new rhyme to a girl who rolled her eyes and kissed him anyway.
Joseph slipped back into the dance for a moment, enough to keep suspicion thin. A girl caught his sleeve, laughing, but he shook his head gently. 'Another night. I'm promised elsewhere.'
She laughed harder, thinking it a jest, and spun away.
Sander drifted close again, hat brim crooked. 'You look like a man who tossed dice blind and threw sixes.'
Joseph grinned, breathless. 'Better than sixes.'
Sander raised a brow but asked no more.
When the reel slowed, Isabelle was suddenly at Joseph's side. Her hair had come loose from Bram's rough spinning, and a flush coloured her cheeks — but her eyes were clear, watchful.
'Who sends scraps to a fool in the dark?' Isabelle murmured low, so only he heard. Her eyes glittered like flints catching fire. 'What girl risks her name on charcoal letters?'
Joseph's throat tightened. For a heartbeat he thought of lying again. But the note in his hand felt like a spark too bright to smother.
'Not just any girl,' he said, voice rough. 'Katelijne.'
Her head snapped up, incredulous, then sharp laughter burst from her lips — too loud, drawing glances from Bram and the others. She leaned close again, her smile fixed, her whisper a blade:
'A merchant's daughter? Saints preserve us, you've lost your wits.'
'I haven't,' he bit back. 'She's worth more than wit, more than coin. More than all this.' He swept a hand at the rough tables, the spilled ale, the jeers.
For a moment Isabelle's eyes narrowed, weighing him. Then her laughter softened into something stranger — not quite scorn, not quite admiration.
'Madness,' she said at last. 'But perhaps a kind I recognise. You'll need me, brother, if you mean to drag a gilded bird into our cage. She cannot walk into a barn dance wearing pearls and velvet. She'll need a disguise. And I've rags enough to make her one of us.'
Joseph stared at her, half-relieved, half-afraid. 'You'd help?'
Isabelle's grin turned sly. 'Help? I'd pay coin to see it. The lady in motley. Let her try the life you think so fine. Then we'll see what she chooses — her feast of silver, or your scraps of bread.'
She left him then, swept back into the light, her laughter loud enough to draw Bram closer — but Joseph heard the edge beneath it, a challenge hidden inside the promise.
The reel spun louder again, boots stamping until the trestles shook. Smoke and sweat pressed like a cloak. Joseph drank deep of it — not the ale, but the moment, the certainty that tomorrow would not be dream or jest but truth.
When the crowd swelled louder still, he slipped away once more, past the torches, out toward the river. The Scheldt rolled black in the night, its surface flecked with lantern light from the moored ships. The wind tasted of salt and iron.
He drew the note again, careful, tracing the smudged letters with his thumb. Tomorrow. After dusk. He whispered it aloud, as though the river itself might carry it back to her.
Danger pressed close. Isabelle had seen too much, Bram sniffed like a dog at every secret, and Willem's warnings rang in his ears. Yet none of it could silence this fire.
He tucked the note back with the handkerchief, close against his heart. Behind him the fiddles screeched, Pietje shrieked, the yard roared.
Joseph lifted his face to the night, and smiled.
Tomorrow. Whatever the cost.