“So, Lady Julia,” he said, completely buggering up the verse, “you already spoke to my lord Francisco?”

“What?” I said, tearing my eyes from the stage door where Brundage and Rufus were whispering just out of the audience’s sight-line. “Oh, right. Yes. I did.”

Someone in the front row nudged her neighbor and giggled. Even in my stark, bewildered terror, a tiny part of me hated her for it.

“And,” said Rafe, laboring and glaring still more pointedly, “Lord Francisco told you that-”

“That,” I said quickly. “Something. Yes. He told me something.”

It was like I was watching someone else, some stupid kid in a dress who had no right being onstage in public.

A ripple of mirth coursed through the entire pit and I flushed. There was a long pause and Rafe glared at me. I had no idea what my lines were. I couldn’t remember the plot or who I was supposed to be. All I could see clearly was Rufus waiting for me in the green room with his cudgel. Then there was a bang at the back of the house and, for the briefest of moments, things seemed to be looking up.

The bang came from the main street entrance into the theatre. I heard shouts, and the crowd standing in the pit began to part like sheep before a dog. Probably a rowdy drunk, I thought: just the excuse I needed to slip away until things cooled down a little.

But it wasn’t a drunk. It was a man on a horse, riding right into the theatre. He wore silver plate armor and a white cape. Behind him were twenty foot soldiers: Diamond Empire guards. There was a murmur of discontent, but the air smelled of unease, even panic. Nothing like this had ever happened before.

The mounted officer produced a roll of parchment and, as his horse skittered to a halt on the cobbles, started to read aloud in one of those voices that you can tell isn’t used to being messed about.