I finished tying the naked young man into the chair, and whipped the bag off his head. I looked into his terrified eyes and said, "I'm going to remove the gag now. You can scream if you want to. Nobody's going to hear you, and it'll probably end with me cuffing you again and putting the gag back in until you're ready to be civil. So I thought we could just skip all that. Agreed?"

The man's head bobbed up and down frantically. I yanked out the gag, sending him into a coughing fit. "W-where am I-I-I?" he said, still coughing heavily as his nose and eyes leaked.

"You're in a place that I keep for…well, for exactly these occasions."

"W-who are y-you?"

"You aren't the first person to ask me that question today. We'll get to that in a minute. For now, I need your name."

"K-Kurt."

"Kurt. Nice to meet you," I said in what I thought was an amiable manner, though the man appeared more disconcerted than ever. He was older than he looked, I realized. When I had first captured him, I thought he was only a kid, but now he looked to be in his late twenties, which fit much better with my theory about who in the cult was still alive. "My name is Erich Duquesne, and as you've probably guessed, I'm a witch hunter. But that's not who I am, or at least not all of who I am. I am a contradiction."

The man looked more and more confused, "What's a c-contadriction?"

"A contradiction, is when two things are in opposition. So if I told you that the sky was purple, and you said it was blue, you'd be contradicting me. Sitting before you is not one man but two, and they contradict each other. One of those men, exposed to a lifetime of horrific violence and unrelenting brutality first as a knight and then as a mercenary, is a cruel bully. That man has murdered and violated a lot of innocents, stolen their property and then burned what was left. He enjoys violence and making bad decisions. The other man before you, conditioned by years of reading textbooks and being lectured to by some of the most progressive minds in the known world, is a rigorous thinker and bit of a philosopher who desires to see justice done in all things. That man has saved many innocents from execution, at no small risk to himself. He enjoys solving problems and testifying against criminals in court.

"Therefore, when I say that I want, heh heh," I said with a nasty chuckle, "to watch you die screaming, you should take me very seriously." The man began to shake uncontrollably. "At the same time, when I say that I would like to see you convicted of your crimes before an impartial tribunal and after a hearing at which you were allowed to present your defense with the assistance of counsel learned in the law, you should also take me seriously.

"Fortunately, and unfortunately, for you and for I, the circumstances of this inquisition demand that your interaction with the State be limited to this, single, encounter, and so neither of my selves will be getting exactly what they want."

Kurt was sobbing openly now, and the chair he was on teetered dangerously, "W-w-w-w-what does that mean?"

"It means that, no matter what happens, I'm going to execute you at the end of our conversation, which the first man will enjoy. That's the bad news. The good news is that that second man doesn't believe that torture is a very good way of getting to the truth. And so, if you tell me anything and everything you know about the cult in a forthright and cooperative manner, you'll die instantly. And, if you like, I'll even absolve you of your sins before I do." Of course, I couldn't actually absolve him, not being a man of the cloth. But there was no reason to let him know that.

By this time, Kurt had sobbed himself to exhaustion, and was only heaving slightly when he said, "Y-you'd really forgive my sins?"

"If it gets me to the truth, absolutely. But, you should know that if you hold out on me, and I'll know, and then I'll torture you to death. And, before you say you don't know anything, or that you're a nobody in the cult, I know that's a lie. The uprising was four days ago. I am reasonably certain that whatever cannon fodder the cult had at its disposal got used up that day. If you're still alive, and a member of the cult, it means that you were too important to be expended, meaning that someone trusts you with something. And, before you say you're not a member of the cult at all, I know you are. You don't appear to have any mutations, though I'm sure an autopsy would reveal many, but you do have a tattoo inside your armpit of a crescent, which I know to be a variation on the Mark of Tzeentch."

Kurt opened his mouth to speak, but then I felt the slightest of breezes on my elbow, and Kurt's mouth closed, and he went completely still. Almost unconsciously, my right hand fell to rest on Arielle.

"Truth." Kurt said, in an odd voice. "Ah, the vanities of you humans. Especially Imperials. Fucking insufferable you are."

"Obviously, you've never met a Tilean," I said, realizing that his misidentification of me was a deliberate insult. "Speaking of, I don't believe we've met," I said, gripping Arielle tighter.

The thing that was and was not Kurt kept talking as though I hadn't spoken, "The problem with truth is that it does not exist. Everything means something different to everybody, and each of their versions is equally true to them. Your quaint ideas about truth and reality are no match the power of perception and self-delusion."

"Well, you would say that," I said, squinting slightly. I noticed a slight blue shimmer at one of Kurt's shoulders, and his unremarkable brown eyes had turned black. "Being a daemon of Tzeentch." I considered for a moment, and raised my eyebrows. "Though I'm hard pressed to call you wrong. What kind are you?"

"What kind am I? Again with truth. The idea that we have 'types' at all is an endless source of amusement among my colleagues."

"Oh, what, at tea parties in hell?"

"More like staff meetings, but yes."

I was taken aback at this bizarre answer, and I couldn't help but chuckle. I mastered myself and asked, in what I hoped a serious voice, "What is your role in the cult?"

"Please, I beg you, stop. You're just embarrassing yourself."

"Fine. Then why are you here?"

"I've come to deliver you a warning-"

"I'm going to interrupt you right there. You should know that warnings will only make me more interested."

The daemon inclined Kurt's head in my direction, saying, "Fair. How about threats? How do you react to threats?"

"Generally not well, though I welcome you to try."

The thing made Kurt grin. "I'll be succinct then. Markus, Ulrica, Wolfgang, Margarethe, Anneliese, Katharina, and Hildegarde. I know you care about them."

My nostrils flared slightly, and my hand gripped Arielle tighter. "Then you know I'll protect them."

"I do. And there's only one way to do it: back off."

At this point, Duquesne omitted to mention to the panel that the daemon had offered another way out: joining the cult. The thing had flattered the hunter's vanity and intellect, but Duquesne hadn't considered it for even a second. Certainly not.

"Why not just kill me?"

"Your superiors would notice, though we will, of course, kill you if it comes to that."

"Oh, you'll try. But there's another way I can protect them."

"You can't kill me with that piddling thing," Not-Kurt said, nodding to Arielle. "And even if you could, Lenz's family would still die."

"What if I kill everyone you send for him?"

"You can't."

"Oh, but I can. See, I know you're bluffing. The cult is weak. Don't try to tell me otherwise. You don't have the resources for a concerted campaign inside the inner wall. Even if you did, you'd risk exposure. And Lenz, fortunately, is a very prominent person in this city. If he died, people would want to know why. And I'd be there, pointing them right to you. I figure you've got the means for one, maybe two, stealthy attacks. That is a challenge to which I am equal. And," I said, now gripping Arielle very tightly, "my rune weapon might not be able to kill you, but I can damn sure cause you pain."

I leapt to my feet, ignored the blossoming pain in my torso and legs, and kicked the chair out from behind me, preternaturally quick. I whipped Arielle from her holster, the Striker blazing brightly. The daemon was still ripping itself from its bonds, when I aligned Arielle with Kurt's face, and pulled both triggers. The Banisher flared to life, its bright blue light almost blinding me, and two huge rifle slugs, imbued with the hatred of long-dead Dwarfs, slammed into the bridge of poor Kurt's nose. His head disintegrated, and there was a brief shimmer around the fountain of blood that had replaced the head, followed by an ear-splitting scream. I screamed back, shouting, "FRIEDRICH UHL! REMEMBER THAT NAME, ABOMINATION! HIS SOUL DEMANDS VENGEANCE, AND BY THE LADY, HE SHALL HAVE IT! I AM CHARLES ERICH DUQUESNE, AND I SHALL NOT! SUFFER! YOU! TO! LIVE!"

Was that lame or unearned? Let me know.