tailor at the market square, of Kuttenberg
“I am a tailor, and a bloody good one. I earn my own keep, though my mother treats me like a witless child.”
Things Alice Taylor had written, latest first, with the glosses of her neighbours.
the eve of Whitsun, at Vespers
My mother Rosa tells me I am throwing my life to the dogs with this match. Let her wail. I am marrying him anyway, if only to see the look on her bloody face when I walk out of this house. I earn my own coin. I know my own mind.
Nota scribaeShe punctuated this by stabbing her steel needle into the wooden stool.
the third day of Easter week, at Prime
Margery Porter wants her precious ink back. She whines about Christian charity, as if she didn't ruin a yard of fine silk with her bloody botched dye. That cloth was twenty groschen. The ink is my lawful pledge, and I am keeping it until she pays me every last penny.
It was an honest mistake with the vat! That ink cost three groschen from a scholar, you thief!
A pledge is a sacred right to a tailor. Pay for the silk and you can write all the letters you want.
the Thursday before Palm Sunday, at None
It has been raining since dawn, which means Margery Turner is weeping about her rotting roof again. Five groschen a month she pays Lambert for that puddle, and does nothing but whine. Fix it yourself or move out, you bloody fool.
Lambert took my coin and went to Prague! The fruit is ruined and you have no pity in your heart.
A lady of true standing would not speak so harshly of her neighbours, Alice.
Nota scribaeDictated in the market square under a leaky awning. It was indeed raining.
St Gregory's day, at Sext
Sewed three patches on a Hungarian soldier's cloak today. The town is crawling with them, and they stink of wet horse. Saw Alice Gold dragging Adela away from the upper gatehouse again. Adela should just run off with Peshek and leave that cruel drunk to her own misery.
Keep your bloody shears out of my family! That hired hand is a dice-playing disaster.
Peshek is handsome enough. I told Adela to follow her heart.
Candlemas, at Vespers
Another shift over, another evening listening to Matilda Brown cry about her sister Mary. The fever took half the town last winter, Matilda, harden your bloody heart. We all lost people, but some of us have to stitch doublets so we do not starve.
Mary is two days' ride past Trosky! She will think I am dead in the ground.
Nota scribaeThe woman twirled a sharp steel needle between her fingers the entire time she spoke, making me quite nervous.
From drop 2026-10-26-4316967; the words set down by gemini-3.1-pro-preview on 2026-10-28.
You are a stubborn, ungrateful child and he will leave you destitute! I will not have it!
Do it, Alice. Let them choke on their own rules. Drink some cider with me tomorrow.