'Have I mentioned how much I hate your plan, by the way? Why couldn't we-?' He stopped, looking down the road. 'Saint Zaghev's balls-'

We halted our horses before the oncoming horde of weary travellers. The shuffling of their feet along the dusty road kicked up such a cloud that it was hard to make out their numbers.

'How many?' I asked, trying to wipe the dust from my eyes.

'Must be a hundred of the poor bastards.'

Kest stood up in the stirrups and surveyed the mass. 'Closer to a hundred and forty.'

Neither number made me comfortable. Today was our sixth day riding the northern roads, the second since we'd crossed from Aramor into Domaris. Every day we encountered pilgrims, a few here, a few there, sometimes as many as a dozen together: little flocks of determined men and women, their bellies empty, extending shaking hands towards us as we rode by, hoping we might drop some morsels of food. We gave what we could for the first few days, but after that, necessity reined in our charity. Those we encountered never complained or cajoled or threatened; more often, seeing our grey Inquisitors' garb, they praised us as we past.

'They're afraid,' Ethalia said, tired eyes staring into the cloud of dust and dirt. 'They're drowning in fear.' Now that we'd left the Palace of Luth the fever was worse than ever. The paleness of her skin accentuated how tightly it was stretched against the bones of her face. She shivered during the day, even under the noon sun; at night I watched the sweat drip down her face and dampen her blankets. Always I sought for something to say or do that might ease her suffering, but the kindest thing I could do was to keep my distance.

'They're getting close,' Kest said, his voice soft, as if that might somehow lessen the insult of what had to come next.

'I'm so sorry,' I said to Ethalia. 'You need to put the hood back on, and the bonds.'

She nodded and reached down to the grey linen hood tied to the front of her saddle. She slipped it over her head and then placed her other hand back in the iron handcuffs dangling from one wrist. Now she looked every bit the heretic being brought to trial by three Inquisitors. I reached back and took her reins so that I could lead her past the crowds, all the while hating myself, and the world along with me.

We kept the horses to a walk, not wanting to look too eager to get by, but the crowds parted easily for us, bowing their heads as we went by, holding out their hands in case we had anything to give them.

'Falcio,' Brasti said. His voice was low and even, immediately catching my attention, as he pointed to a bend further down the road. Several men were standing around a tree.

'What's going on up there?' I asked, my vision not being as good as his.

The crack of a whip filled the air, followed by a scream, and I was leaning forward in the saddle, trying to see what was happening, when a moan from behind me made me turn to see Ethalia leaning heavily to one side. She was barely keeping herself in the saddle.

'What's wrong?' I asked her.

'They're beating the hells out of some boy tied to a tree, from what I can see,' Brasti said, but my attention was still on Ethalia, who was getting worse the closer we got.

'Is it the boy's pain?' I asked urgently. 'Is it-?'

'That,' she said, her words muffled by the grey hood, 'but more the enjoyment of the men hurting him. The emptiness in them, the lack of-'

'The lack of mercy,' I said, remembering my first encounter with Saint Birgid. I've called out to you, she'd said. Always when the victory was won but before the final blow was struck. Was that what repelled Ethalia not the necessity of violence in my life, but my inability to stop when the fight was done?

Whether from my words or my thoughts, Ethalia nodded.

'Here,' I said to Kest, handing him her reins. 'Stay with Ethalia; we'll go ahead.'

'Falcio, if you interfere . . .'

'If I don't interfere, Ethalia's going to be screaming by the time we get there and that's going to raise even more questions.'

He held my gaze for a moment, then said, 'I know, but I would urge you to be a little . . .'

'Subtle?' I asked, and he nodded, his forehead furrowing and making him look a nervous mother about to send her child into the city alone for the first time. I found it oddly funny.

'I can be subtle,' I said, kicking my horse into a slow trot through the crowds of pilgrims. 'I'm the very Saint of Subtlety.'

The big man's head snapped back as my fist collided with his mouth and the whip fell out of his hand as he stumbled back into his friends. The one who caught him saw the look on my face and promptly let go of him, watching helplessly as he slid to the ground.

'This is subtle?' Brasti whispered from just behind me, but I didn't bother replying. This was as subtle as the situation allowed. Three men had been taking turns whipping the boy, whose back was now as bloody as if he wore a scarlet cloak. I'd told the man to stop what he was doing and he told me to go and bugger myself I'd been about to give him a second chance when I remembered that we were disguised as Inquisitors. I'd never heard of an Inquisitor taking kindly to an insult, so I hit him.

A sharp pain in my right hand caught my attention and I held it up and saw something small and yellow protruding from the skin of my index finger. It was one of the whipmaster's teeth.

Okay, so maybe I didn't need to hit him quite that hard.

The man was struggling to get up without any noticeable help from his friends. Once he'd got his feet back under him, the first thing he did was run his fingers through his long, unkempt black hair. I thought it an odd gesture, but felt it would be impolite to comment.

'You lousy son of a bitch,' he said.

I sighed, then punched him in the face again.

To his credit he stayed on his feet this time, shaking his head like a bull preparing to charge.

'Thank me,' I said, my voice cold and made colder by the imperious accent I'd taken on. Inquisitors, from what I understood, were drawn mostly from noble families.

'Thank you? You stupid-'

I held up a finger, so close to his face he could have reached out and broken it. 'Thank me.'

'For what?' he asked, defiance slipping from his tone as he noticed his friends backing away. Some of the pilgrims shuffling by us were slowing to watch what was happening.

'For saving your life,' I replied. 'I instructed you to stop whipping that boy and you failed to comply. Your choices now are to walk away or, if you prefer, I will put you to the trial and see how pure runs your soul.'

He looked from me to Brasti and back. 'I I was just doing what the other one said . . .'

'The other what?' I asked, with as much lack of interest as I could muster.

One of the man's friends spoke up. 'The other Inquisitor,' he said, and pointed behind me to a man in a grey coat much like mine although I suspected his was earned the more traditional way walking towards me. He had several white-tabarded Knights on foot alongside.

'Hells,' Brasti said, thankfully low enough that I doubted anyone else had heard him.

Blind fool, I cursed myself. You never checked to see if there were more than just pilgrims and priests in the crowd.

The Inquisitor stopped less than two feet in front of me. He offered no greetings nor asked any questions, just stared into my eyes.

He's testing me. I'd feared something like this might happen. We knew little about the Inquisitors they served and answered to the Church, so they had never been of much interest to the Greatcoats. I didn't have the slightest clue about their rituals or protocols, so the next few minutes were going to be all guesswork and bluff.

I kept my eyes on his, but took note of his posture, the tension in his mouth. Was he waiting for me to speak, or to see if he should do so first? The first speaker perhaps had to be of higher rank. I saw no insignia on his clothes I hadn't seen signs of status on any Inquisitor save for Quentis but the way this man was watching me told me that just because they didn't wear any special markings on their clothes didn't mean there wasn't a hierarchy.

I caught a tiny movement in the man's mouth just as his eyes narrowed. He was looking more certain than when he'd first arrived. He wants to speak first which means the higher rank controls the conversation.

I waited until he opened his mouth and immediately cut him off. 'Silence,' I said.

His eyes widened, and the Knights in white tabards beside him tensed.

Shit. I got it wrong. I let my hand drift towards the sword at my side, but the Inquisitor didn't notice. He was bowing his head low.

Oh thank you, Saint whoever-the-hells-deals-with-this-stuff.

I caught the gaze of one of the Knights behind him and stared at him until he knelt down. His fellows followed suit.

'You gave this man leave to beat this boy?'

The Inquisitor looked up. 'The child is a heretic.'

'And his heresy?'

'He invoked the Saints.'

Behind me, Brasti said, 'Since when does-'

I held up a hand to cut him off, but too late, unfortunately.

The Inquisitor rose to his feet. 'Forgive me, Cogneri,' he said, not looking apologetic in the least, 'but I'm afraid I must ask your name and rank.'

I decided to ignore the question and try to make the best of what Brasti had blurted. 'Since when does an Inquisitor delegate the punishment of heresies to others?' I asked.

'I . . . appointed these men as Servanti to complete the trial.' Then he added, 'As is my right.'

That pause, that tiny, beautiful pause almost made me want to sing. I had no clue how any of this was supposed to work, but I know when a man thinks he's been caught. I looked around at the three men, rough bully-boys all. 'You felt the Gods' work could be left to such as these.' I made sure it didn't come out as a question.

The Inquisitor looked a little pale now. 'We . . .' He looked around at the Knights by his side, who were very focused on counting every pebble on the road. 'I felt I could not delay our journey. My instructions were-'

I cut him off with a wave of my hand. 'Leave us.'

'What about the boy?'

Shite. Good question.

I looked over at the child. He couldn't have been more than nine or ten years old, and mercifully he was unconscious, most likely from terror and exhaustion. 'You've made a mockery of the sentence,' I said. 'A beating by curs such as those you chose for your Servanti will have done nothing to purify him. He'll have to die now, by my hand, delaying my own mission, which I assure you is considerably more important than herding pilgrims.'

For just a moment, the Inquisitor looked as if he might turn and begin the long march with the others. Then he paused and said, 'Forgive me, but my orders came from one above.'

One above. Okay, so they don't say the names of superiors unless they have to.

The Inquisitor went on, 'He will demand the name of the one who . . . corrected . . . my verdict.'

I looked at him. The Knights had evidently decided they no longer needed to concern themselves with the pebbles on the ground and were now staring straight at me.

Now he's wondering if I'm a higher rank than his superior hells! Why does everything to do with religion have to be so damned complicated?

Now a good many of the pilgrims had stopped too and were watching our exchange. A tall, stoop-backed cleric in dirty grey robes, his hood down over his head, shuffled towards us, leaning heavily on his staff. I kept my eyes on the Inquisitor, searching for some sign of what would happen if I refused. The way he'd said 'the name' made me think this wasn't a simple matter of making something up.

Well, when in doubt, stick with what works, I thought, and I backhanded the Inquisitor so hard he spun a quarter-turn and barely managed to catch his balance.

Damn, I swore, forcing myself not to hold my hand. I've really got to start wearing gloves if I'm going to hit people this often.

'My name?' I said, my voice loud enough now that everyone could hear it. 'You want to know my name?' I took a step towards him and raised my hand again, and he flinched. 'Call me Falsio-fucking-dal-Vond if it pleases you, you foetid little worm.'

He looked at me, eyes wide with shock, then someone in the crowd laughed and it quickly spread to others. Even the old bent-backed cleric chuckled from inside his hood, 'Falsio dal Vond! Well done, Inquisitor,' he said. 'You've found the Greatcoat hisself!' He stood there chortling as he tapped his staff on the ground three times, then twice again, a pattern that took me by surprise. I let it go though; I had more pressing concerns.

Even a couple of the Knights were laughing at the joke.

'That's right,' Brasti said, 'and I'm Brasti Goodbow!'

The Inquisitor looked up at us. 'I'm sorry, who?'

Brasti swore under his breath behind me, 'There is something deeply wrong with this country, you know.'

'Did you have any more questions for me, Cogneri?' I asked the Inquisitor, keeping my voice light and pleasant, whilst still making it clear I would have no hesitation in dishing out significantly worse, should he choose to speak again.

He shook his head and turned, signalling his Knights to follow him, and they soon disappeared, leaving only the cleric standing there.

He knelt down before us and bowed his head low until it touched the ground; that at least I recognised as a plea to make confession.

'You may speak, cleric,' I said. I had no idea what the proper words were, but I was fairly certain I could knock the man out before anyone noticed if he tried to raise the alarm.

'"Falsio dal Vond"?' he asked, his voice so quiet I could barely hear it. 'Really do like to play it close to the edge, don't you, First Cantor?'

For the first time I took in the broadness of his shoulders and the ease with which he held his heavy staff. From under his hood I could now see a wide grin. I really should have recognised Allister Ivany from the staff, if by nothing else.

The crowd of pilgrims was slowly disappearing from view, but still I kept my voice low as I asked, 'What in the name of Saint Forza-who-strikes-a-blow are you doing here, Allister?'

The King's Shadow was still kneeling on the road in front of us, his head bowed. 'I'm afraid the God's Needles killed Saint Forza last week, Falcio, so you'll need to find someone else to swear by.' He glanced back to the road. 'Are they gone yet?'

'They're still too close,' Brasti said. 'Someone might see if you stood up now. Besides, you look good on your knees, Allister. Very natural.'

'As soon as you and Falcio are done wrecking the country, Brasti Goodbow, I'm going to beat the pair of you so bloody people will think there are two Saints of Swords.'

Brasti tapped the toe of his shoe against Allister's staff. 'Won't you need to get yourself a proper weapon first?'

Kest appeared, leading his and Ethalia's horses. 'How long have you been masquerading as a priest?' he asked as they joined us.

'About a week,' Allister replied. 'I was heading to Aramor and needed a way to blend in. I'm telling you, being a cleric is the easiest job I've ever had. You just find a few gullible fools along the road, spout a bunch of nonsensical pseudo-doctrine and people will follow you anywhere.' He looked up at me. 'Kind of like what the King did to us, don't you think?'

'Leave it,' Kest said.

But Allister wasn't done goading me. 'Come on, Falcio, tell me I'm wrong. Enlighten me at last as to the King's grand plan.'

My nerves were already on edge and the situation might have escalated had Ethalia not interrupted. 'Please,' she said, her voice muffled inside the hood, 'this . . . isn't helping.'