The sun struck hard against the cobbles, too bright for a city that thrived in shadows. Antwerp in daylight was merciless: fish scales glittering on boards, fruit skins rotting underfoot, merchants shouting their wares until the air itself seemed bruised.
Joseph tugged his hat lower and walked on — another nameless figure in a plain jerkin, with no feather, no braid, no parrot at his shoulder to betray him.
Pietje had been left in the cart, locked in with a slice of pear. The bird hated the quiet. Joseph hated the absence of him, the way his balance felt wrong without that shifting weight, but today he needed no one to know him. A carnival player was recognised by the tilt of his hat, the glint of colour in his sleeve. He wore none of it, only ordinary cloth, dull as river mud.
He told himself he had an errand. Rope, perhaps — something to justify why he was in this quarter instead of hiding with the troupe. A man walking with purpose was left alone. But purpose faltered when memory dogged his heels, and his thoughts kept circling to her. Katelijne. The sound of her name could still undo him, though he had sworn off saying it, even in thought.
The crowd opened — one of those strange tides when the press of bodies shifted of its own accord. And in that clearing, he saw them.
Floris's voice carried above the street noise, booming like a herald. He was just as Katelijne had described: stopping at a stall so others might admire the pair of them, lifting his free hand in greeting, drawing eyes the way a showman would draw coin. A merchant's son knew performance, no doubt.
And Katelijne — she looked radiant. More beautiful than Joseph had ever seen her. Her gown of pale blue silk shifted with each step, embroidered trim catching the sunlight in sparks of silver. A fine cap framed her face in lace and pearl, crowning her like a lady fit for court. Her gloves gleamed pale against the darker blue of her skirts, the leather so soft and new it seemed her fingers had never known work. She walked with a composure that made her seem taller, older — every inch the fine young woman Antwerp expected her to be.
At her side, Floris clamped his arm around hers, guiding her as though she were a prize beast he had led to market. His grip was firm, claiming. He laughed too loudly, chin jutted proudly, swaggering so that everyone must notice them. And when they looked, his posture shouted: She is mine. Look how fortunate I am.
Katelijne tilted her head, her smile unwavering. She received compliments like a jug receives wine — filling, never spilling. She looked every inch the obedient daughter, the betrothed worth boasting of.
But Joseph caught the shadows. The pause before her laugh, as though she weighed its measure before letting it slip past her lips. The way her fingers pressed too tightly into her glove, a small act hidden beneath all the finery. A glance aside — brief, sharp — like a bird testing whether the sky was still open above its cage.
It struck him like a blade. He wanted to believe it meant she remembered — that her thoughts might have flown, just for a heartbeat, back to the barn's lantern-light, to the nights when masks and music had given them a space of their own.
He swallowed hard, knowing it was folly. The truth sat plain: Floris could lead her through the city at his side; Joseph could not walk three paces without shame dragging at his steps. His jerkin was patched, his purse light. He had no place among them — not in daylight, not in their world of coin and contracts.
A bitter heat spread through him. He despised Floris's swagger, but more than that he despised himself — for the hunger in his eyes, for the way his feet refused to move, for hoping that a flicker in her smile meant she felt the gulf as cruelly as he did.
She looked up then, past the stalls, over the heads of the crowd. Not at him — he was too well hidden under his hat — but her gaze skimmed the space where he stood, and for an instant he felt the madness of imagining she had seen him. His heart lurched, foolish as a boy's.
Then Floris drew her closer, laughing too loudly, and the spell broke. They moved on, a group of women following, leaving him rooted like a man struck dumb.
He might have stayed there all day, watching her vanish into the press of bodies, had not a prickle run up the back of his neck. It was the feeling of being seen — not by Katelijne, but by someone who meant him no kindness.
He turned, slow as a man fearing what he would find.
Isabelle stood a few paces off, half in shadow, half in light. She needed no colour to draw attention; her presence was sharp enough. The crowd bent around her without quite knowing why, giving her space as water gives space to a stone.
Her eyes found his at once. She had caught him staring, caught the rawness he hadn't meant to show. There was no triumph in her smile, not outright. It was thinner than that, like the edge of a blade being tested. Satisfaction, yes — but bitter, worn smooth by her own disappointments.
Heat rose in his face. He yanked his gaze down, tugged the brim of his hat lower, but it was useless. Isabelle had already seen enough. She knew. She always knew.
He shifted his weight, meaning to leave, but her presence pinned him as surely as Floris's arm pinned Katelijne. His thoughts tangled: shame at being exposed, anger at Isabelle's silent judgment, despair that even here in the anonymity of the market he could not keep himself hidden.
For a breath, he imagined what she must be thinking: Did you really believe she would choose you, Joseph? A player with patched boots and a hungry bird?
The words did not need to be spoken. They hung in the air between them, heavy as church bells.
Isabelle's mouth curved a little higher, the faintest show of teeth. It was not joy, nor laughter — it was the cruel satisfaction of a wound pressed to see if it still hurt. She had her answer in the slump of his shoulders, the hollowness in his chest.
He broke her gaze at last, turning back to the street where Katelijne and Floris had disappeared. But the sight of them was gone. Only the echo remained — and Isabelle's eyes on his back.
The noise of the street pressed in again: hawkers calling, wheels clattering over stones, a dog barking after a cart — but it all sounded thin, as if distance had crept between him and the world. His breath came shallow, his hands tight in his pockets, knuckles sore from clenching.
He wanted to walk after her. Fool that he was, he imagined weaving through the crowd, catching her glance, finding a sign that the flicker he had seen in her eyes was real. But the truth stood taller than his want: she walked proudly at Floris's side, beneath her mother's approving gaze. He belonged nowhere near that company.
Isabelle had not moved. He felt her gaze still, heavy and measuring. She didn't need to speak — her silence was sharp enough. She had seen his heart laid bare, and she would carry that knowledge like a knife she could use when she pleased.
At last he forced his feet forward, away from her, away from the place where Katelijne had been. The crowd swallowed him, nameless again — just another man in worn clothes with nothing worth noticing. Yet the image clung: Floris's proud grip, Katelijne's stiff smile, the quick tremor of her eyes when no one else was watching.
He told himself it was enough — that glimpse. Enough to remind him why the gulf between them would never close. Enough to break him afresh.
A trumpet blared somewhere in the distance, calling the troupe to gather. He pulled his hat lower, letting the brim cut off the sun, and quickened his pace.
But even as the noise of the city swept him on, one thought burned, cruel as the glimpse itself:
She looked every inch his prize. And he — nothing at all.