Daoud saw no one. In a candlelit alcove behind Manfred hung a painting of a red-bearded man in mail armor partly covered by a black and gold surcoat. It was not painted on the wall, but seemed to be on a separate piece of wood with a gilded border, which was hung on the wall. The man looked a bit like Manfred, and Daoud suspected it must be his father, the famous Emperor Frederic. There was an idolatrous look about the painting and the way it was displayed that made Daoud uneasy. It reminded him a bit of the saint's image Sophia had kept in her room at Orvieto.
"David of Trebizond!" came a cry from beside Manfred. Manfred reached down and helped a bent, monkeylike figure scramble up to stand on the table.
"God blesses our meeting, Daoud ibn Abdallah—this time," said the dwarf Erculio.
He grinned at Daoud through his spiky black mustache. At the sight of him Daoud winced at the memory of all the pain this little man had inflicted on him. He still felt some of that pain, especially in his feet, despite the tawidh's hastening of the healing process. But Daoud also felt a sudden warmth that reminded him of the first time he had seen the little man, here at Lucera. Deformed in body and soul, required to do unspeakable things, Erculio had still found a way to serve God.
"If my lord Daoud wishes to kill me, I am at his service," said Erculio in Arabic. "I have finished the work our sultan sent me to do in Italy."
Daoud found himself smiling in spite of himself. "You would have saved me from a mutilation worse than death, Erculio. I cannot hate you for that. You did your work well."
Erculio looked like a spider when he bowed, his head touching the tabletop, his elbows bent upward. "I am my lord's slave."
He was the more admirable, Daoud thought, because despite being so deformed, he had found important work to do in the world.
"How is your former master, d'Ucello, faring with the Sienese in Orvieto?" he asked Erculio.
Erculio spread his hands wide. "Alas! The podesta is dead."