The Cairo Interlude

The party arrived in Cairo as the last light of day faded over the city, their donkeys clattering through the dusty lanes of the Muski district until they found themselves standing before a blue door set into an otherwise anonymous whitewashed wall. Behind it lay the Auberge du Muski, a secure inn with a tiled courtyard in worn blue and white, a running fountain, and an ancient vine climbing the south wall as though it had always been there. Sergeant-Fusilier Bruyère, a one-eared French…