I went in search of the kitchen and, passing the doorway to the courtyard, noticed a female silhouette in a rocking chair. My instincts stirred; I peered into the yard against my will. A weary, vacant-eyed woman sat rocking monotonously, her gaze wandering somewhere beyond reality—as did her mind, clearly. The tailor's wife had evidently lost her mind. Still... I crouched beside her and tried to speak.

  "Madame Adele Izkhazi? Can you hear me?"

  Her gaze seemed to pass through me, then briefly focused. "Eva will be home from her lessons soon. I'm waiting for her... She's such a beautiful girl, a real treasure..."

  Her eyes drifted again. I hastened to reclaim her attention.

  "Adele! Madame Izkhazi! Eva will return from her lessons hungry! Do you hear me? Have you prepared her lunch? What does she like?"

  The woman's gaze focused on me once more.

  "Eva adores fried chicken wings. I prepare them with a special recipe..."

  "Then get up! You must have them ready in time!"

  The woman rose uncertainly from her chair and shuffled toward the kitchen with unsteady steps. I followed. The tailor's wife was not entirely beyond hope, and her madness might be turned to my advantage.

  I returned to the parlor with a glass of water, confident that I could compel Izkhazi to sew my dress. He would work himself to the bone if necessary. The inquisitor was murmuring words of comfort to the grieving father, no doubt spouting some nonsense about resignation and faith in the One. I handed Izkhazi the water and asked:

  "Master Izkhazi, do you know where your wife is at this moment?"

  The tailor glanced at me fearfully, gripping the glass tightly.

  "She's resting in the courtyard. She's... unwell."

  "Unwell?" I raised an eyebrow. "Your wife has lost her mind, and you call that unwell?"

  The man trembled violently. "She's fine! She's just..."

  I shook my head and turned to the inquisitor.

  "Inquisitor Tiffano, we should notify the church hospital. She needs help."

  The inquisitor shot me an outraged look and opened his mouth to object, but I gave him no chance.

  "However, Master Izkhazi..." I fixed the tailor with a questioning gaze. "I've heard you're an excellent tailor?"

  The man dropped to his knees again. "I beg you, do not take my wife away—she's all I have left! I'll do anything you ask!"

  I smiled with satisfaction, sensing the pretty boy's angry glare boring into me.

  "Master Izkhazi, I might be persuaded to overlook your wife's condition, but I require a service in return. Tomorrow is the burgomaster's grand reception, and I urgently need a gown..."

  The inquisitor rose.

  "Enough. This is disgraceful. Leave Master Izkhazi alone!"

  He turned to the tailor and assured him: "I promise you, no one will learn of your wife's condition. Forgive my companion; she has overstepped all bounds. We must go."

  He seized my arm and dragged me toward the door, but I wrenched free.

  "Go on. I'll catch up." I nodded to the inquisitor. He hesitated, shot me a warning glance, and departed. I turned back to the tailor and handed him the sketch of the dress, along with my measurements.

  "I need this gown. And you understand the stakes. The inquisitor may be magnanimous, but I am not." I paused for effect. "Anyone could report your wife to the church hospital. Tomorrow morning, I'll come for a fitting. I trust the dress will need only minor adjustments. Use Xandrian satin—dark grey with a silver sheen. For the insert, the finest Mirstenian lace. Here is an advance for materials."

  The man stared at me with a mixture of fear and revulsion.

  "And remember: if the gown does not please me..." I let the threat hang in the air. "You'll be visiting your wife in the hospital. Though not for long, I'm told. The mad rarely last there."

  At that moment, a bewildered Adele appeared in the doorway.

  "Darling, I wanted to make Eva's favorite treat, but I can't find any chicken wings. I thought you'd bought some... What shall we do? Will you go to the market?"

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  Tears welled in the man's eyes. He addressed his wife: "Of course, my dear. I'll go right now." Then he turned to me, utterly defeated. "I'll do as you ask. Now please, leave."

  I smiled. "Excellent."

  At the threshold, I added: "Oh, and if the gown is truly magnificent, I might consider helping you restore your wife's mind..."

  The tailor stared after me with hollow, unseeing eyes.

  Out on the street, the inquisitor made a scene.

  "I should have expected nothing less from you, but I never imagined you could treat a poor man so vilely, so despicably! Have you not a shred of compassion for another's suffering? Or do only your own interests matter? I find your company repugnant!"

  I took his arm, ignoring his attempts to shake me off, and tugged him along the street.

  "Monsieur inquisitor, we have sixteen addresses remaining. Let us make haste. As for that 'poor man,' as you so kindly put it, you needn't trouble yourself. A little shaking up will do him good."

  The handsome stopped dead in the middle of the street and stared at me as though I were a filthy, stinking rat clinging to his sleeve.

  "A little shaking up? You humiliated the man—on a whim, for no reason! As if he hadn't suffered enough over his daughter, now he must worry for his wife! But you don't care, do you..."

  I had grown weary of his hysterics. My skull had been throbbing with a pulsing ache since yesterday. The stifling, sweltering day only intensified the strange chills that wracked my body—the lingering cold that always followed a bout.

  "Oh, do calm down." My voice was tired. "You are astonishingly blind and naive. I hardly know which is worse—your naivety or your inexperience. Think for yourself. After his daughter vanished, that 'poor' tailor of yours wallowed in his grief, stopped taking commissions, and took to drink. You smelled the cheap wine, didn't you? You noticed the neglect in that house? He and his wife were eating and drinking away their savings; when money ran short, they started selling their belongings. What next? When they've exhausted every last resource, what will become of them? A madwoman living in her own world where her daughter is still alive, and a man who has lost all reason to live? What did you offer him? Words of comfort and empty promises of finding peace in resignation and your damned faith? Do you truly believe that will help?"

  The inquisitor's jaw tightened until the muscles in his cheeks bulged.

  "I will not listen to your insults..."

  "I'm not finished. Now consider what I did. I shook him out of his stupor. I made him remember he still has someone to care for. I'll make him sew my blasted dress, and he'd better not botch it. I gave him an advance for materials—work, which I'll pay for handsomely if the gown pleases me. What's more, unlike you, I gave him hope that his wife's mind might be restored. So now it's all up to him. If he pulls himself together, he might return to a normal life. If not, well, the church hospital for his wife might not be the worst option, considering they'll soon be out on the street, having sold everything down to their last copper."

  The inquisitor continued to stare at me with a mixture of disbelief and disgust.

  "How cleverly you've twisted it all! So now you're the benefactress, are you?"

  "I never do anything without reason, monsieur inquisitor. He's a good tailor. It would be impractical to pass up the chance for a lifetime discount and priority service, wouldn't you agree?"

  "But you gave him false hope! How do you intend to restore his wife's mind?"

  "You mentioned you have a degree in Soul-Science? I have no such degree, but I know madness better than you, I assure you. And unlike your pious sort, I always keep my word. Now let's go."

  We visited nearly every address, save one, which proved false. In five cases, the parents identified the witch—she had been near their homes on the day their daughters vanished, under one pretext or another. In three more cases, the petitioners could not recall the noble woman's face but insisted she had been beautiful and wealthy. The remaining interviews yielded nothing; the parents remembered no significant details. And in one instance, we encountered a happy ending. The parents—a small shopkeeper and his wife—presented us with their daughter, who had disappeared but miraculously returned. A red-haired, sharp-eyed imp of about thirteen declared she remembered the woman in the drawing. The madame had lured her with some invented tale, but the girl had run away. I studied her brown eyes, flecked with green and alight with a mad spark, and could not resist praising her.

  "Well done, you! Always trust your instincts, you hear? No matter what anyone tells you, don't listen—only your gut. It's already saved you from certain death."

  We finished with the inquiries well past noon, and I suggested the inquisitor stop by for dinner, tempting him with the promise of grandfather Ivolga's exquisite pastries.

  "Thank you, but no." His refusal was curt. "I have urgent matters to attend to."

  "By the way." I smacked my forehead in annoyance. "You were planning to send that letter to the bishop, weren't you? I trust you haven't done so yet?"

  The handsome regarded me with suspicion.

  "I have. Sent it yesterday, straightaway. Whyever would I delay?"

  I spat on the ground in frustration. My own fault—I'd forgotten to warn that fool!

  "And what did you write? Laid out all the facts?"

  "I fail to grasp your objection. Church business is no concern of yours."

  "Idiot!"

  I turned to leave, but the inquisitor blocked my path.

  "Explain."

  "Come with me." My voice was weary. "I've no desire to explain your blunder in the middle of the street. My head is splitting, and that wretched girl has worn me thin with her keening."

  "What girl?" The inquisitor stared at me, bewildered.

  "Cathérine, who else? Come. Let's think what might be salvaged."

  Anton had prepared a rich, hearty beef bone broth, which the inquisitor consumed with alacrity, requiring no persuasion. On the other hand, I couldn't force down a single bite; I merely sipped herbal tea, gloomily contemplating the tray of pastries and cakes Martin had thoughtfully provided. The bakery would open the day after tomorrow; customers would come at last, and our investment would begin to yield returns. Still, it would be a pittance—nowhere near enough for what I had in mind. The inquisitor finished his broth and reached for a cup of tea and the pastry tray.

  "Well, then. Tell me whatever it is you wished to say."

  "What's to tell? You've already ruined everything that could be ruined. I ought to have warned you yesterday, but so much happened..."

  The inquisitor narrowed his eyes and set his half-eaten bun back on the saucer.

  "Ruined precisely what? Are you deliberately goading me?"

  "You didn't even bother to think things through!" I shoved my cup away irritably and rose from the table. "I mentioned there might be complications. If you can't figure them out yourself, you might at least have asked me—or reminded me to explain?"

  "I see no complications in this case, save for your involvement..."

  "You don't, truly? You naive fool! Haven't you grasped it yet? Why would the baroness need so many children? We've only examined cases from the last three years. Seventeen—no, sixteen children. Those that were reported. How many vanished from Father George's orphanage alone? How many homeless or peasant children went missing, never reported? Haven't considered that? I have. The witch can drain the life force of young girls to create an elixir of youth—one that heals nearly any illness or wound. What does she do with it? Use it only for herself? Or does she leverage it to secure the patronage of influential nobles, trading it for favors or gold?"

  I sat back down and fixed the handsome with a grim stare.

  "Which means your investigation will affect their interests, too. How fierce their opposition will be is hard to say, but it will come. And I am more than certain the witch has cultivated protectors not only among high society but within Church circles as well. So your inquiry may never even begin."

  The inquisitor shook his head in disbelief.

  "I concede there may be some merit in what you say, but only regarding the secular authorities. No one in the Holy Church would stoop to collaborating with a witch. You may keep your concerns to yourself."

  The headache erupted in a blinding flash of fury. I shot up from my chair and seized the handsome by his clothing.

  "Stop spouting nonsense! Your vile, hypocritical Church is capable of far greater villainy and evil! How I despise... I don't even know whom I hate more—the sorcerers or sanctimonious fools like you, in whose Church's tacit consent such wicked sorcery flourishes!" I was shaking with rage, aware of my own foolishness yet utterly unable to rein in my emotions.

  The handsome looked stunned. Carefully, he pried my fingers from his garments and guided me back into my chair.

  "After everything you've just said, you expect me to allow you near the inquiry? To cooperate with you? To trust you? You have just declared your outright hostility toward the Holy Consistory..."

  "Oh, go to the demon! I'll destroy the witch with or without you. And you... If you, like all the other hypocritical churchmen, decide to back down or stand in my way, I'll destroy you too, do you hear? You'll follow the witch straight into the abyss! Unlike your ilk, I always keep my word!"

  The inquisitor regarded me intently, as if weighing something within himself.

  "I have no intention of listening to any more of your insults. Good day. Tomorrow I shall collect you at six."

  He moved toward the door, but paused on the threshold and turned back.

  "And remember my conditions. I will not tolerate any antics. If I deem your attire insufficiently modest, you will not attend."

  The inquisitor opened the door, and I hurled after him in spite:

  "I trust your own raiment will be equally appropriate, and will not cause me to blush on your account."

  He froze for an instant, fists clenching, shot me a withering glare over his shoulder, and departed.