The Pillars Of The World

through the villages, singing the songs that revealed the witches’ foul deeds, would prepare the ground for the ideas he would plant later, after those who had magic running through their veins—the Small Folk and the Fae—were driven off by the death of magic in the land. After it was safe to linger in one place long enough to teach men how to be the masters of their lives.
    His Inquisitors also reported that several Old Places had been abandoned recently, and in each there had been signs that the women who had lived there had fled in haste. They had fled him in Wolfram and Arktos, too. It hadn’t done them any good. He’d found them in the end.
    He read the next letter the courier had brought him—and frowned. He hastily read the others, then stared at the courier. The young man, glancing over at that moment, abandoned his meal and hurried to stand beside the desk.
    “Why are all of my Inquisitors asking me to replenish their purses?” Adolfo asked softly. “I gave each of you sufficient coin to cover ordinary expenses.” He continued to stare at the courier, only now considering that the young man’s hunger had been more than a day’s riding would warrant. “Is your purse empty as well?”
    The courier licked his dry lips and looked at the desk. “Yes, Master Adolfo,” he whispered.
    “What did you do with the money? Were you gambling? Drinking?” He paused, then added with rapier delicacy, “Whoring?”
    “N-No, Master,” the courier said, stammering in his haste to get the words out. “It’s just—”
    The courier bit his lip so hard Adolfo waited to see if it bled.
    “The gentry have refused to pay for the food and lodging,” he blurted out. “They said that since we hadn’

    t been invited and had done nothing to prove our worth, there was no reason why they should pick up the tab at the inn.”
    “Did any of you explain that it was customary—and an honor—to provide for an Inquisitor’s well-being while he is in a village?”
    “They said it wasn’t their custom!” The courier sounded outraged and shocked and so very young.
    Adolfo sat back in his chair. Yes, most of the men he had brought with him would be shocked by such a lack of respect. They were used to the deference tinged with fear that they received in Wolfram and Arktos. They were too young to remember a time when that had not been so. But he had slept in many barns and had felt the keen edge of hunger many times when he’d first begun his quest to annihilate the witches.
    “Master . . .” The courier hesitated. “Could these witches be different from the ones that were in Wolfram and Arktos? Could they be ... good witches, and that’s why the villagers don’t want them caught?”
    So very young , Adolfo thought sadly, and just weak enough to listen to strangers, and wonder. And once one man begins to wonder if what we do is right, that doubt can spread like a plague through the others. Something will have to be done. But not just yet. He has the stamina for the courier work and will be needed for a little while longer .
    “There are no witches who are not the vessel of evil,” Adolfo said. “There are only fools who believe they are something else.”
    “Yes, Master.”
    “There is a cot in my dressing room. You may sleep there for the night. You should turn in now. You’ll have another long ride ahead of you tomorrow.”
    “Yes, Master. Goodnight.”
    Adolfo waited until the courier had retired before picking up the last letter. Expensive paper. A family crest pressed into the sealing wax. He opened it, scanned the evasive prose, and read between the lines.
    Baron Prescott had made a deal to sell some fine timber, a deal that would replenish his family’s dwindling funds. But the land upon which the timber stood did not belong to the baron. However, a man of Adolfo’s skill would be able to rectify the matter quite easily.
    Yes, Adolfo thought as he folded the letter, he could rectify the matter quite easily for two bags of gold paid in advance. The baron would protest the sum, but not for long. They never protested for long. All it usually took was explaining what a changeling child was and how witches often exchanged their own children for gentry children, sometimes for vengeance, sometimes simply to have their children raised in luxury. Gently suggesting that the children be examined to see if such a thing had befallen the family was usually sufficient persuasion for any gentleman.
    So he would