“Bois de Haillot?” Willem asked. “It’s in Namur?”

“Just south of it, along the Meuse. It is an Imperial fief.”

“There are many men ready for work here.”

I wondered briefly if that was the normal state of affairs; something about the way he said it made me think it wasn’t. “I could use two dozen. Are there that many?”

“Yes, yes. We had 170 journeymen here for the palace.”

“That, um, sounds like a lot.”

“Aye. Since then there have been many idle hands. There isn’t enough work even in Aachen or Koln to keep us busy. Men have left for Paris—some even for Winchester.”

I nodded thoughtfully, as if this all meant something to me. “I suppose that’s my good fortune, then, to have so many ready to work.”

We were reaching the group of men in the park. “When will you be starting?” Willem asked.

“Right away. My lady is in a bit of a hurry.”

In the trade guilds, individuals climb the ladder from apprentice to journeyman to master. Willem's a journeyman mason (carver to be precise) who ends up playing a big part in Martin's effort to navigate the strange world he finds himself in. And to survive it!

Audiobooks!

The hall was dim, lit only by the low fire in the pit. The kitchen, in contrast, was nearly black, its fire banked. I could half-see the doorway to the rear croft in the spill of light from behind me. I moved to it, grabbed the handle, and pulled. There was movement, but it didn’t open. Somehow it was jammed shut.

“Celestine!” I called. I dropped my sword—I hadn’t belted it yet—and grabbed the door handle with both hands. It wouldn’t budge.

What the fuck?

I headed back into the hall. The fire was crackling. The house had several windows, set high in the walls. They weren’t big, but they were big enough to fit through. They didn’t have any glass—just a cloth pinned over them to keep the warmth in—but they were barred with rough-cut staves of wood about as thick as my forearm. I could probably bust through, but it would be work.

I stepped toward the door. There was a blur in the corner of my eye, and something brushed my shoulder—I jumped about a foot in the air, turning, but there was nobody. Motion caught my eye and I glanced down. A tiny shape, ghostlike dark against the dark of the floor, darted away. I glanced up.

There was motion there, too. Mice, skittering along a rafter above, just under the thatch. Three, four—maybe half a dozen of them, running back and forth. One of them jumped, or fell, plummeting the twelve feet or so to land on the rush-covered floor. What the hell? I watched it run off, then looked back up in wonder.

There was a lot of smoke up there.

“Holy shit!” The crackling wasn’t coming from the firepit. I could see tiny fingers of pale orange materializing in the thatch.