By late afternoon the light had softened to gold, shadows stretching long across the cobbles. Guild banners vanished one by one into taverns thick with smoke, while lanterns flared at street corners, their flames trembling in the chill. Yet Carnival still clung to the air.
Clusters of townsfolk pressed about the troupe, eager to clap their shoulders, toss them coins, or trade a word with the parrot who had stolen Antwerp's heart. Pietje screeched obligingly from Joseph's shoulder, earning peals of laughter wherever they went.
'We'll never get back at this pace,' Joos groaned in mock despair, bowing grandly to yet another admirer. 'Too many fans. Fame is a cruel mistress.'
'Cruel to you, maybe,' Rik shot back, tucking his fiddle under his arm. 'The ladies want music, not that nose of yours.'
'They want neither of you fools. It's Pietje they adore,' Isabelle said, dry as vinegar.
'Love you, love you!' Pietje squawked, bobbing his head as the crowd howled with laughter.
Carnival antics spilled down the street as they made their way back to Willem's inn, giddy with the day's triumph. Jugglers lingered at corners, masked revellers reeled arm in arm, and music drifted in snatches from every square. But the laughter had roughened with drink, the masks grew stranger as the light failed — horned beasts, painted devils, wide grins flickering in and out of shadow. Through the revelry darted a ragged knot of children, quick hands snatching at crusts in the mud, at ribbons trampled underfoot. Isabelle's gaze lingered on them, her smile thinning. She had known that scramble once — she and Joseph both — before there was a troupe to feed them, before there was even a roof over their heads.
Still, their boots rang light on the cobbles, their pockets jingled heavier than when they had set out, and for once the weariness of the day felt sweet. Across the rooftops to the west, the wealthy quarter glowed — tall houses blazing with lanterns, windows spilling glitter into the dusk. Joseph paused, catching the faint swell of violins on the air, carried down the streets with the night breeze. He turned his face from it, following the others through the inn's courtyard gate.
They left the wagon there, its paint peeling but suddenly looking grander than it had that morning. Inside, the inn was already bursting, long tables jammed shoulder to shoulder, merchants elbowing sailors, apprentices squabbling with masters. The air was thick with stew and ale, voices rising in a dozen tongues.
Willem beamed from behind his counter, sleeves rolled high, face shining with sweat. 'You've done it, my friends!' he boomed, slamming a tankard in front of Joos. 'Packed to the rafters, and every soul in Antwerp talking of the parrot and his fools. You've made my house the place to be this Carnival!'
'To us!' Rik shouted, swinging his fiddle like a banner.
'To us!' Joos echoed, raising his drink like a conquering general. Even Sander, usually shy of noise, tipped his mug with a grin.
Joseph drank too, though the ale was bitter on his tongue. He caught Isabelle's smile across the table, rare but genuine, as she spread the day's coins in her palm.
'Not bad for orphans who started with nothing,' she said, her voice pitched for the circle alone.
The laughter softened, turned fonder. Joos leaned closer. 'Is it true you two were barely more than children when you set off?'
'Ten years gone,' Isabelle said, tucking the coins into her apron. 'Our parents taken by fever, the house sold. We had only each other. So we learned to survive.'
'And in Amsterdam,' Rik put in, wagging his bow, 'they found us starving by a canal. Me with my fiddle, Joos with his nose. We were made for each other.'
'Or doomed,' Joos added, earning a roar.
'And Sander?' Willem asked, wiping a mug with his apron.
The boy flushed under the sudden attention. 'Only this year,' he admitted. 'Ink-stained, half-starved, dreaming of rhymes no one wanted. They gave me a place.'
'A family,' Isabelle said simply.
The mugs clinked again, rough but heartfelt, and for a moment the noise of the tavern seemed to fall away.
But then Isabelle's eyes cut sideways at Joseph, sharp as ever. 'Only some of us remember why we perform,' she said under her breath.
Joseph frowned. 'The crowd laughed. The coins—'
'Not because of you,' she snapped quietly. 'You were staring at the stands as if a girl in silk might climb down to follow you. Keep your eyes on the crowd, Joseph. They're the ones who feed us.'
Heat crept up his neck. Pietje pecked at crumbs, oblivious.
'It was nothing,' he muttered.
'Make sure it stays nothing,' Isabelle warned. Then she swept away to haggle with Willem over supper, apron heavy with earnings.
Joseph sat for a moment in the press of noise, ale sour on his tongue. He knew she was right — she always was. A player could not afford dreams. And yet when he closed his eyes, he saw hers still: the girl's bright gaze through the crush of Carnival, laughter meant for him alone.
The pull was a hook behind his ribs. Dangerous, foolish, irresistible.
Then Joos slung an arm around him, bellowing a half-sung verse, Rik's bow squealing a merry tune. Joseph forced a grin, raising his cup with the others.
He had learned how to wear masks on stages from Paris to Amsterdam: hide the truth in laughter, bury the ache in applause.
So he shouted with the rest, Carnival's din swallowing him whole.
But somewhere beneath the noise, the girl's eyes burned still.