I TURNED A CORNER in the dungeon and then I could make out the cells. The odor here was beyond belief, nearly unbearable. My God, Sophie …

I finally set down the soup pot and started to work. These people had to be fed, and while I did the task, I would search for Sophie in every dark corner.

I began sloshing thin, murky gruel into bowls. My heart beat like a warning bell swung furiously back and forth.

I carried two bowls to the first cell. My hands were trembling. Soup splattered on the floor.

At first glance, the cell seemed to be empty. It was like a cave opening, dug out of solid rock, just a few feet deep. No light or sound, just the reek of human filth. A wet rat slithered out in front of my eyes.

Then, in the back, I saw the glow of eyes. They flickered, tremulous and afraid. From out of the shadow-a head. Hairless, gaunt, a sunken face covered with runny sores.

The prisoner crawled toward me, wild-eyed. “I mus’ be dead if it’s a fool come for me.”

“Better a fool than Saint Peter.” I knelt and shoved a bowl under the bars.

His thin, palsied hand darted out and grabbed the wooden bowl. A momentary sadness ran through me. I had no idea [155] what he had done to put him here. In Treille, there was no reason to assume he was guilty of anything.

But I was not here for him. …

In the next cell was curled a Moor. He was naked and filthy; rats nibbled at sores on his legs. He muttered in a tongue I did not understand. He barely looked up at me, glassy-eyed. “Take heart, old man.” I passed the bowl under the bars. “Your time is almost up.”

I moved on to the next cells, not even going back for more soup. As with the first, the captives looked more like hunted animals than men. They groaned, peered out at me with beaten, yellow eyes. I took a breath against the urge to violently retch.

Then, from farther along, came a wail. A woman! My body tensed. Sophie? I did not know if I could go on.

“There’s your date, fool,” Armand brayed from his post. “Feel free to slip inside if she suits you. She has a magical tongue.”

I clenched my fists and made my way toward the woman’s cries. Inside my belt, I grasped the hilt of my knife. If this was Sophie, I would surely kill the guards. Norcross too.

The woman’s wail echoed again. “Go to her, fool. The bitch doesn’t like to be stood up,” yelled Armand.

I held my breath and stepped in front of the woman’s cell. The stench was worse here. Unbearable. Why was that?

She was crouched in a tight ball deep in the cell. A beam of light slanted across her hair, which was long and straggly. She seemed to clutch a doll or toy, whimpering like an abandoned child herself. “My baby,” she said, no more than a whisper. “Please… my baby needs milk.”

I could barely see her. I could not make out her age or her face. I gathered myself and said, “Is that you, Sophie?” Fear shot through me. My breath froze. To be kept like this-it Would be better if she was dead.

The woman sputtered out nearly incoherent phrases. “Poor baby,” she muttered. “Baby needs milk.” Then something that sounded like… Phillipe.

[151] Oh, God. I froze. I stepped closer to the bars. What had they done to her? “Sophie,” I called. My tongue grew dry on her name. It seemed her shape, her hair. Please, turn toward me. Let me see.

“Little one needs milk…” she mumbled again. “What can I do? Breasts are dry.”

Tears welled in my eyes. I still could not see. “Sophie,”I said again.

I rammed myself up against the bars. “Baby needs milk,” I heard her say again, then suddenly she emitted an ear-splitting, wrenching howl. It was like a blade running through me.

I reached out, and her eyes finally caught sight of me. The breath froze in my chest. Her strawlike hair was falling over her face. But her eyes locked on mine. Yellow. Veins running through them. The nose flat and pocked.

Oh, God! It was not her.

My legs buckled. It was not her. Part of me was giddy with joy; another, crestfallen and disappointed.

“My baby …” the woman called, pleading. She held out the doll for me to see.

Oh, God. I recoiled. It was no doll. It was real. A tiny newborn child, bound in a caul, clearly dead, stillborn.

“How can I help you?” I whispered. “How?”

“Can’t you see?” she pushed the infant toward me. “The child needs milk.”

“Let me help.”

“Milk!” the woman shrieked. “Feed him.”

There was nothing I could do. The poor woman was raving mad.

I stared for a moment more, then flung myself back down the corridor toward the stairs.

The jailers laughed as I went by. “Leaving so soon, fool?” cried Armand. “What, no jokes?”

I bolted out of the dungeon and up the stairs.

I RAN IN A COLD SWEAT back to the castle and my alcove under the stairs. There, I threw myself on my mat. My breath raced panicked and wild.

It was not her.

My beloved Sophie must he dead after all.

For the first time, I knew what had been understood all along by the people in my town, Sophie’s brother, even Norbert, my mentor. There was no hope. She had been ripped from her child, raped, and left to die on the road. I knew it now, the darkest lesson in my life.

I buried my head in my hands. This silly charade was over. I had clung to a hope and now that hope was dashed. I must go. I ripped off my jester’s hat and threw it onto the floor. I was no jester. Just a fool! A bigger fool had never lived.

I sat there for a long time. Letting the truth sink in.

I heard footsteps near my bed, then a voice. “Is that you, Hugh?”

I raised my head… to see Estella, the chamberlain’s wife.

She had winked at me in court. Many times. She’d grabbed at me and teased. Tonight, she had a loose shawl covering her shoulders; thick auburn hair, which I had only seen braided and pinned until now, fell all about her neck. Her eyes were [158] round and mischievous. And her timing-couldn’t have been worse!

“The hour is late, my lady. I am not at work.”

“Perhaps I did not come for work,” Estella said, stepping into my bed-space. She let her shawl drop, revealing a loosely fitted bodice.

“What striking red hair,” she whispered. “Now how is it such a fiery fool can look so sad?”

“Please, my lady, I am not one for jokes this night. I’ll be funny again in the morning.”

“I don’t need to laugh right now, Hugh. Let me feel you in another way.”

She sat down beside me. Close. Her body was scented with fresh lavender and lilies. She reached out and stroked my face. I moved away from her touch.

“I have never seen such hair.” She seemed fixed on it. “It is the color of a flame. What are you really like, Hugh, when you are free of all those jokes?”

She pushed herself even closer. I felt the fullness of her breasts against my chest. One of her legs straddled mine.

“Please, my lady.”

But Estella pressed on. She wiggled her shoulders, letting her blouse fall to her waist. Her breasts tumbled forward. Then I felt the hot tip of her tongue dance on my neck.

“I bet other parts of you contain the same fire as your hair. Touch me, Hugh. If you do not, I’ll tell the duchess you tried to grope under my dress. A commoner touching a noble’s wife… Not a role you want to play.”

I was in a trap. If I resisted her molestations, I would be charged with molesting her. She nibbled at me. Then her hand entered my tunic, probing for my cock.

At that moment I felt the tip of a blade digging into my neck. I held very still. A male voice boomed, “What mischief have I stumbled onto?”