Daoud moved to the doorway, and as he looked into the smoky, candlelit hall, his heart sank.
The crowd of men and women in the room were turned toward Lorenzo Celino. He stood against the far wall, the long blade of his sword gleaming in the candlelight, facing six naked daggers.
Beside Celino, the hound Scipio stood stiff-legged, tail whipping from side to side, fangs bared, growling softly. Fear of that dog was keeping Celino's opponents back as much as fear of his sword, thought Daoud.
The bearded old man who had spoken to Daoud was standing to Celino's left and a little behind him. Celino's eyes flicked toward Daoud for an instant, and then quickly away before anyone might notice that he had looked toward the doorway.
Daoud scanned the room for Sophia. She was standing in the shadows, almost invisible in a long, hooded cloak. No one was threatening her.
One of the men facing Celino, Daoud recognized, was the innkeeper himself. He was a huge man with broad, rounded shoulders and a shock of thick black hair cut off at the same length all the way around, so it looked like a bowl. The dagger he held was a long, murderous blade, but his big hand made it look like a toy.
"Give us the Jew," the innkeeper said to Celino. "We have no quarrel with you."
The old man was a Jew? How was it, Daoud demanded of himself, that these people had known that and he had not?
"You do have a quarrel with me," said Celino, "because I do not care to see you torment and rob this old man."
Daoud swore to himself. Was this the kind of madman Manfred had yoked him with? Sworn to the utmost secrecy, carrying a fortune in jewels, and now he brings a whole inn down around his ears by defending some dusty old man?