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  Brother Jerome looked away. “I couldn’t say,” he said shortly. “I know of the Moor Radu Bey—he is second in command to the sultan himself, a danger to every Christian and every Christian community in the world.”

  “He’s not a Moor,” Ishraq pointed out. “He’s fairskinned.”

  “But why is he a particular enemy to Milord of the Order of Darkness?” Isolde prompted.

  “Every Moor is our enemy,” the Inquirer ruled. “For it is their advance which signals the end of days. But this Radu Bey is not part of my inquiry, nor is he mentioned in your orders. I don’t speculate about him.” Brother Jerome closed the conversation by reaching into his pocket and drawing out a rolled manuscript.

  Freize nodded toward Luca as if this confirmed his worst fears. “More sealed orders,” he said. “And so adieu to the stewed chicken and dumplings.”

  “We like to speculate,” Ishraq remarked dulcetly and earned a swift reproving grin from Luca.

  “Do you share the orders with everyone?” the Inquirer asked, looking at Luca.

  The young man nodded. “Without everyone’s insights and skills, we would have been lost over and over again.”

  The stranger raised his eyebrows as if he found this a most odd way of going about an inquiry and then he broke the seal and spread the rolled paper on the dining table.

  They all sat. They all waited.

  “There seems to be an outbreak of what is called dancing sickness,” he started. “La maladie de la danse. Milord wants you to take the the old road north, and then go east along the banks of the River Danube. Somewhere along the road you will hear reports of dancers, there is an outbreak in that area, they are traveling downriver, I don’t know where they are right now, you will have to ask for them and find them. You are to meet them and examine them as they dance together. Those who can speak should be interviewed individually. You will consult with the local priest and see if any exorcism or praying has worked on them. You may experiment with cures. You may test individual dancers with anything that you think might work—but only if they are people of no importance whose death or destruction does not matter. You will address the local landowner, Lord Vargarten, who rules north of the river, and speak with the bishop to see if they have had previous outbreaks, and if so what was the cause, and how it ended. And you will report back to Milord as soon as you know whether this is some kind of frenzy or poisoning or madness, or something worse.”

  “Worse?” Freize asked anxiously. “In heaven’s name, what sort of a world do you people live in? What do you imagine can be worse than a frenzy, a poisoning, or madness?”

  “Possession,” Brother Jerome said shortly. “If they have been invaded and taken over by demons. And if it is the demons who are making them dance.”

  “Demons?”

  “Possibly. Yes.”

  Freize’s horrified face spoke for them all. “Demons?” he said again. “You want us to go among people who may be possessed by demons?”

  The man bowed his head. “It is, of course, the work of the Inquirer to see the terrors of the world and discover their nature. You are free to decide that you don’t want to accompany him. That must be between him and all his companions.”

  “But to go looking for them?” Freize asked. “If they are demons? What if they want to possess us?”

  The Inquirer exchanged a smile with Brother Peter at the simplicity of the servant. “We will not be affected,” he said. “We are men of education; we are men of the Church.”

  “Then what about the girls?” Freize demanded.

  At once, the Inquirer lost his pompous confidence. “Ah, now that: I don’t know,” he said. “Women are known to be more vulnerable to madness and to fits. Their minds are frail, they have little determination, and they are not strong. Perhaps these young women should be left behind for their own safety.”

  “It’s our road. We can follow the River Danube east,” Isolde said drily. “The journey we have undertaken so far is proof enough of our determination and strength; and we both have had an education. If schooling makes you safe, then we should be fine.”

  “I don’t mean singing and needlework,” the man said, smiling at the pretty young woman.

  Isolde looked at him with such disdain in her deep blue eyes that for a moment he gasped as if he had been winded by a blow. “No, neither do I.”

  “Lady Isolde was raised by her father, the Lord of Lucretili, in Italy, to inherit his great estates, and to take his role in council,” Luca explained. “She ruled his castle and lands during his illness. She is a midons, a lord of the castle. She has studied a lot more than singing and needlework.”

  He bowed his head. “But may I ask, why is her ladyship not at home, ruling her lands at Lucretili?”

  “My brother stole my inheritance on the death of my father, and I am going to find my godfather’s son and ask him to raise an army for me to win it back,” Isolde said simply. “I am planning a battle to the death. I won’t be stopping on the way to dance.”

  “But what about your slave?”

  “I’m not a slave, I’m a free woman,” Ishraq corrected him. “The Lord of Lucretili allowed me to attend the universities of Spain and I studied there.”

  “Do Moorish universities admit women?”

  “Oh yes,” she said with a little smile. “Some of their finest philosophers and scientists are women.”

  Brother Jerome tried to nod as if this were not startling and unsettling news to him. “They are?”

  “I studied philosophy, and astronomy, geography and mathematics, and I trained as a warrior,” she said, smiling as his wonderment grew. “The Lord of Lucretili was generous enough to give me a wide education. I should be safe enough.”

  The priest bowed his head. “And I am learning much right now. You have studied things that I am forbidden to learn: banned books, heretical knowledge. Astronomy alone is limited, some men have said the wildest things, heretical things . . . well, I can see that your learning will protect you, and it is your decision. But I am bound to warn you that there may be danger.”

  “But what about Freize?” Isolde asked. “Will he be tempted to dance? He’s a young man of great courage and enterprise, but you had no schooling, did you, Freize? Will he be all right?”

  “I can’t really read,” Freize pointed out. “I can sign my name and reckon. But nobody would call me a scholar. Will that mean that I’ll dance about when we get wherever we’re going, God help us?”

  “I don’t know,” Brother Jerome said frankly. “That is the danger you face. We don’t know what causes the dancing sickness, why it stops, why it starts. That’s the reason for the inquiry: to discover the cause and the cure and to save the people from the sickness and send them home.”

  “Has anyone ever cured it before?” Luca asked.

  “Of course many people claim to have cast out demons, but the dancing sickness seems to start and to stop for no reason. That’s what makes us think it is a sign of the end of days. Surely it cannot be that people just take it into their heads to dance till they die. It must mean something. Perhaps you can find out why. I will pray for all of you.”

  “I thank you for your prayers,” Freize said unhappily. “But then what? After we have danced about with madmen?”

  The Inquirer looked up and allowed himself to smile. “Then your master Luca will make his report and I, or another messenger, will deliver your next mission,” he said. “In the meantime, I think you are carrying a quantity of gold from Venice which belongs to Milord?”

  “We are,” Brother Peter said. “And we would be glad to be relieved of the burden.”

  “You can give it to me in the morning when our ways part,” the Inquirer said. “I am going west. I will hand it over to another Inquirer, who will take it to Rome and to Milord himself.”

  “Why, how many Inquirers are there?” Ishraq asked curiously.

  The man looked at her as if she were an enemy spy, trying to worm secrets from him. �€