The music heightens, the musicians’ fingers and bows fly over their instruments until Tycho can no longer follow the melodies. The lead part is played by a girl in the bloom of adolescence, easy on the eye, with clean features and a sharp little nose, her hair carefully pulled back behind her ears so as not to disturb the strings. She is lost in her playing, and the music sways her body to and fro as in a dance. Half-closed eyes under long lashes bound along the dots and lines of the notation. Ceton is filled with the feeling that he is witnessing a moment that is intensely private, something intimate and sensual. In the moment she is wholly and completely herself, as if she were alone, and the room empty. But the music takes over, and he must close his eyes. The voices of the quartet blend together in an irresistible whole, and which sound comes from which bow is no longer possible to say. He rocks on his seat in time to the music, his mouth open.
Someone is brusquely shaking his shoulder. The enchantment is broken, and in furious surprise he spins around in his chair. Jarrick, on his knees beside him, as misplaced as a stray dog, his face a mask of bruises and wounds. The liveried servants who have failed to prevent him from interrupting the performance stop at the back row when they see that he is Ceton’s man, and while the shushing of the audience causes the cellist to lose his tempo, Jarrick grunts his message in Ceton’s ear.
He feels all the blood rush from his face, his head spins, and he gets up abruptly enough to send his chair toppling backwards into the lap of the woman behind. He must lean against Jarrick’s shoulder to keep his balance. He is lost. Enemies more numerous than he can count, recently locked into an enforced truce, will soon gather as the scent spreads. His defense ruined beyond repair, whether by accident or design. His sight goes dark. Only escape remains. Together they lurch towards the door. Many point and whisper, unable to contain their pleasure at seeing the state he’s in. The fugitives hunch under the starry sky of Castle Hill, and hurry to take cover in the indifferent grid of the alleys, soon swallowed in the shadows that pass judgment on no man. Over the rooftops in the City-between-the-Bridges, the church bells ring from each tower. United, they thunder in the night as a call against approaching danger.