Renunzio watched Miles’s face, waiting for the thoughts to register. The rebel leader fought to keep his face expressionless, but the inquisitor must have seen something, for his eyes brightened with delight. “Past experience has shown me that would-be assassins like that usually act alone,” he said, “crazed by grief, bitterness, or some other cause. I would rather you told me willingly, so that your words might be more trustworthy.” But the gaze he turned on the rebel leader belied his words, so bright was it with avarice.
“Why did you keep him in agony so long, then?” Miles asked, quaking inside.
“Why, to give the Watch time to gather the citizens to view his hanging, of course! And to make sure there were enough marks on his body to scare our good citizens so thoroughly that none of them will dare try to assassinate our beloved Protector, or to work against him in any way. Come, for you too must see!”
And come Miles did, for the guards bundled him after Renunzio, through an iron gate and past sentries, up three flights of dank stone steps, through a brass-bound portal of six-inch-thick wood and past another sentry, down a lightless tunnel to another door with a small barred window, out between two more sentries and into a huge courtyard, open to the city itself, where three major roads debouched into a vast plaza. It was crowded now with people, merchants in the plain broadcloth of their warehouses, tradesmen in their aprons, and housewives in theirs, some with utensils still in their hands. Ordinary people they were, common people, and Miles could see only the leading rank of soldiers at the back on the side nearest him, but knew they were there behind the people all about, having just herded them from their shops and houses.
They stood in glum silence, those people, or with a low, apprehensive murmur. It was a grim crowd, but Renunzio signed to a watchman who stood on an iron-railed balcony above, and he signed toward the crowd. Here and there, voices began to chant, “Traitor! Traitor!” and the rest of the people, knowing what would keep them alive and what would see them arrested, began to chant with them. The noise grew, gained a life of its own, and even people who hated this event (which included most of them) found themselves chanting with anger and even eagerness, “Traitor! Traitor! Hang up the traitor!”
Renunzio seized the back of Miles’s head and yanked, turning his face upward. “Look!” he commanded, and Miles couldn’t very well disobey, since his gaze was already on the top of the castle wall.
There, an iron beam jutted out from the stone with a rope curling from its end back to the parapet. As he watched, guards shoved a man stumbling to the edge of the wall, and Miles saw that the rope was tied around his neck. One guard struck him in the belly, making him double over, so that he couldn’t help but see the huge fifty-foot drop before him. It was the would-be assassin, and he began to scream at the sight below. He screamed even louder as a hard boot struck him, sending him plummeting off the edge, screaming in terror, a scream that ended very suddenly.
At the last second, Miles wrenched his head about, trying to turn his eyes away, but Renunzio’s claws held him in an iron grip. “That is your fate,” he hissed, “unless you tell me what I wish to know.”
Miles stared at the poor, pathetic body above him, at the raw welts and livid brandmarks. “Yes,” he gasped, hating himself for it. “Yes, I’ll tell you. I’ll tell it all.”
“Good man.” Renunzio patted him on the back, quite gently, and as he turned Miles away to go back into the prison, the rebel leader couldn’t help the horrible surge of guilt that came with the suspicion that Renunzio wouldn’t have made the poor felon suffer nearly as much if he hadn’t been trying to scare Miles into surrender.
Which, of course, he hadn’t done. Miles had made as much of a show as Renunzio had. He didn’t expect it would take the inquisitor long to realize that what he was hearing was as complete a fiction as any minstrel would sing—but the more time Miles could buy, the fewer of his people would be taken.
For the revolution was finished now, he knew—defeated, without a single stroke against the Protector. His last order had been for everyone to flee to the forest and the mountains. The longer he could draw out Renunzio’s game, the more of them would escape to safety.
Miles screamed as the branding iron bit into his chest. It was even worse than the pain that raged through every joint, for Renunzio had left him stretched out on the rack only overnight. The worst of the burning pain eased; he saw the iron rising away and lay staring in terror and amazement that it could have hurt so much.
“I don’t believe a word of it,” Renunzio chuckled, gazing down with glee into Miles’s eyes. “A city of madmen in the forest? Ridiculous! Do you think I’m fool enough to believe a fairy tale like that?”
“But it’s true!” Miles protested. “The knights cured them of their madness, taught them how to be magistrates and reeves, and sent them out to take office in place of the real ones!”
Renunzio’s mouth thinned with scorn; he waved to the torturer, and pain stabbed through Miles’s toes. He had no idea what they had done, couldn’t see down far enough, but the pain was so intense it nearly made him faint. The inquisitor saw and gestured to a torturer, who dashed water into Miles’s face, ice water, and the shock almost made him pass out, then brought him a clearheadedness he regretted.
“Worse and worse!” Renunzio hissed. “First a city of madmen, then two knights who can magically cure their madness, and finally a spirit who lives within a wall and teaches the madmen in a matter of months what real officials take twenty years to learn! Can you do no better than that, dear Miles?”
The worst of it was that he meant the “dear”; the rebel leader’s pain made him precious to Renunzio, made him feel some sort of bond between them.
“I-I’ll try,” Miles gasped. His terror at the pain hid his elation. He had gambled on telling the truth first, sure that Renunzio would think it a lie. Indeed, if Miles hadn’t lived through it himself, he would have thought it a fairy tale, too.
Something seared his arm, a brief sharp pain that made him cry out, then clamp his jaws shut, ashamed when the pain was so small compared to the rest.
“Just to claim your attention,” Renunzio explained. “Now, let’s begin with those two knights, shall we? What were their names?”
“Sir Dirk Dulaine,” Miles gasped, “and Sir Gar Pike.” Renunzio frowned, and Miles braced himself for pain, but the inquisitor only said, “I would think ‘Gar Pike’ was a lie, if ‘Dirk Dulaine’ weren’t coupled with it; the name almost makes sense. And where are they now, these two champion traitors?”
“Gone back where they came from,” Miles said. Renunzio’s eyes kindled with avarice again. “And where is that?” he purred.
Miles braced himself; the man wasn’t going to like the truth. “The stars—in a ship that flies.”
Renunzio’s face went rigid, eyes burning with rage, and he raised a hand to gesture.
Something boomed against the torture-chamber door. Irritated, Renunzio looked up, lowering his hand. He nodded at the guard, who pulled the door open.