Daoud turned, dragging Celino. A blond man stood, hands on hips, eyeing him with a faint smile. One of the big doors leading into the royal audience chamber was slightly ajar. Daoud was angry at himself for letting someone slip up behind him unnoticed.
"Sire, get back!" Lorenzo shouted.
Sire. Daoud knew at once who this was. The same height as Lorenzo, as Daoud now saw, the man had the very broad shoulders Christian knights developed from wielding their huge two-handed swords. Daoud guessed his age at a little over thirty. His hair, so blond it was almost silver, hung in soft waves below his ears, curling at the ends. His silver-blond mustache was carefully trimmed. His eyelids crinkled with amusement. He wore a tunic of lime-colored silk under a short forest-green cloak trimmed with white fur. His hose and boots were also shades of green. From a chain around his neck hung a five-pointed silver star with a spherical ruby in its center. In every point he fit the description Daoud had been given.
The despair Daoud had been feeling a moment before gave way to a profound relief. It had seemed that everything stood in the way of his meeting this man, and now at last they were face-to-face.
"Sire," Daoud said in Italian, "I know who you are, and you must know who I am."
"I do indeed," said Manfred von Hohenstaufen, still smiling. "Please release Messer Lorenzo."
Daoud hesitated only a moment. But if Manfred allowed Lorenzo to hurt him now, the mission was a failure anyway. Tensed for attack, he let go of Lorenzo, who sprang away.
In an instant the Sicilian had taken a curving Islamic sword from a soldier.
"Sire, at least move back from him," Lorenzo said. "You know what we are dealing with here."
"Quiet, Lorenzo," snapped Manfred. "What we are dealing with is a peddler from some misty land beyond the Black Sea who happens to be infernally nimble. That is all."