They walked through the back of the crowd in the cathedral; the same crowd whose front had just watched the duke contract some dread disease. They crossed the nave and left by the side chapel door, which was open, and crossed the street into the poorer neighborhoods behind the church school. They walked fast, but that was normal for well-dressed people in this area, and as soon as they entered the stews, they were clear of the press of people flocking to see what had happened. The duke was a very unpopular man, and the series of open doors and gates they’d just passed mapped his unpopularity across the city.

The middle-aged couple walked out the back of the stews and along a line of traveler’s taverns by the city’s Berona gate. There were soldiers there, but there were soldiers everywhere, and the couple went into the second-to-last inn, and emerged with the lady’s face clean, at least; she looked as if she’d been beaten, but that was not so uncommon. Both of them riding good horses. Excellent horses, in fact—Ifriquy’ans.

They rode to the gate with a baggage donkey behind them. By then, there was a rumour that the duke was dead and a demon had emerged from his body and now it was dead, too, and the soldiers were on edge, debating closing the gate.

The couple were patient and meek, a merchant and his wife going to Firensi on business.

“There’s a war in the way, you fool,” growled one of the soldiers.

The merchant bowed. “I have a pass from the duke,” he said. “And one from the Count of Berona.”

The gate captain assessed the cost of two such passes and the magnificent riding horses and became more respectful.

“We should close the gate,” demanded his sergeant.

The gate captain nodded. “No one’s ordered it,” he said, pocketing the golden coin he’d just found stuck to the merchant’s pass with a bit of beeswax. “Let ’em through!”

The merchant and his wife rode slowly out of the city, their horses ambling, and could be seen for half an hour as they made a quarter circuit of the city walls at a glacial pace before turning into the countryside.

A mile south of the city, they turned sharply off the road, onto a farm track that led into a farm yard where two infidels were holding horses.

M’bub Ali emerged from the barn. “Well?” he asked.

Brown shrugged. “A fucking disgrace.”

“Did you get him?” Ali asked.

Brown shook his head. “No idea. The poison didn’t kill him outright; never seen anything like it.”

The woman, Donna Beatrice, raised her face. “I saw,” she said. “There was a daemon from hell inside the duke. He ripped the duke open and came out into the light of the sun, which shriveled him black.”