The girl pouted ostentatiously, finally fell silent, and stared out the window. I closed my eyes, studying her surreptitiously. At the Academy, I had graduated with honors in Soul-Science, yet now I found myself at a loss to diagnose her. At this moment, she seemed perfectly normal, as if her madness were artificial, switched on and off at its owner's whim. Like a mask. No, not one mask—several, which she alternated in a bizarre sequence, shedding one only to don another, leaving everyone around her bewildered. And then a question struck me: how close was she to the line? Was it possible she had already crossed it, and that a witch —a mind surrendered to demons—now sat before me? I shuddered.

  The girl leaned closer; her face swayed with the carriage's motion directly opposite mine, mere centimeters separating us, her eyes fixed on me with hungry intensity.

  "Sit back!" It was foolish, but I suddenly felt like a maiden trapped alone with a lecherous degenerate. "Stop staring at me!"

  The girl sighed. "Can't touch you, can't stare at you. What can I do, then?"

  I needed to distract her from sinful thoughts immediately.

  "How serious is your... illness?" I hesitated.

  "I am not a witch." She seemed to read my mind, and I trembled. "That's what you meant, isn't it, inquisitor Tiffano?"

  "But you are very close to the line, aren't you? What are your symptoms? How often do they manifest? Have you sought treatment?"

  She gazed at me thoughtfully. "Trying to diagnose me? Don't trouble yourself. My madness is hereditary. Incurable."

  Such things were common enough in noble families. Well, that much I could believe.

  "But treatment can slow the progression, alleviate the symptoms..."

  "Enough." The girl frowned, her mood shifting again. "I'll manage my own affairs, thank you. We have more pressing matters. What do you intend to do as part of the inquiry?"

  She had so addled my mind that I hadn't even stopped to consider the case or my next steps.

  "I lack the primary piece of evidence—thanks to you, I might add—which I could have sent to the local Academy for analysis."

  "But one can think carefully and obtain other evidence, can one not?" The girl was behaving like a stern professor with a negligent student.

  "You seem to have done my thinking for me. We are going somewhere, are we not?"

  "Oh, don't disappoint me." She pouted, looking offended. "Show me what they taught you at the Academy. They did teach you something, didn't they?"

  I sighed.

  "Very well. First, I would verify the information regarding the suspect's age. If she is indeed far older than she appears, that would provide additional grounds for bringing charges. Still, it would only be circumstantial evidence."

  "Not bad. Continue." She nodded approvingly. Was she deliberately tormenting me? "How might we connect the suspect to the missing children? You don't think Cathérine is her first victim, do you?" The girl smiled at me, very-very sweet.

  The realization struck me like a physical blow. It could very well be true!

  "What makes you believe Cathérine is not the first victim? And how can you be so calm when speaking of this? Does the suffering of others not move you at all?"

  The girl shrugged indifferently.

  "Why trouble myself over what I cannot change? Cathérine is not the first victim—that much is perfectly obvious. Let us calculate. Baroness Malko must be around sixty, yet according to witnesses, she appears thirty at most. Why? The answer is obvious: she uses witchcraft to preserve her youth. And how does she do it? If she requires a child for this purpose, the conclusion is equally obvious: she drains their life force through some ritual. The result is that very substance I found on the doll. The question is: in what quantities? Roughly speaking, how many children does she need?"

  I felt nauseated. Her reasoning was disgustingly logical.

  "Nor is it clear how long this sorcerous elixir's effects last. If we assume it sustains the witch for, say, a year, then even the most conservative estimate would suggest some twenty or thirty children must have disappeared over all these years. So where should we go first?"

  "To the archives," I was stunned. "But is it possible that a witch could have been abducting children for twenty years without anyone noticing?"

  The girl stared at me in astonishment.

  "Where on earth did you come from? Do you have any idea how many children go missing in large cities every year? I won't even mention the homeless waifs, the child slaves, or the poor who have more children than they can feed. Now that is what truly surprises me..."

  If you discover this tale on Amazon, be aware that it has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road. Please report it.

  The carriage stopped so abruptly that my companion, seated opposite, lost her balance and flew directly into me. Her more-than-generously exposed décolletage pressed into my face as she landed in my lap.

  "Oh, damn!" She made no move to extract herself, shouting past my ear at the driver. "What kind of braking is that, you clumsy oaf!"

  "Will you kindly get off me!" I had struck my head painfully and was now rubbing the injured spot. "Did you do that on purpose?"

  "You're far too suspicious. Come, we've arrived."

  The archive building stood on Azure Square, between the city administration and the hospital. An old stone structure, once a warehouse for a local silk manufacture, had been converted into the archives. It housed records of births, marriages, and deaths for the city and its environs, as well as commune investigation files, court rulings, church proceedings, chronicles, copies of trade agreements, purchase-and-sale transactions, slave contracts, and other information pertaining to the citizens' commercial life. I had a rough idea how to find baroness Malko's birth records, but how to locate files on missing children?

  An obstacle unexpectedly appeared before us in the form of a grim-faced guard, who resolutely blocked our path. A hefty fellow with an unshaven, wine-soaked countenance flatly refused to admit us. He ignored my entreaties and even threats, parroting like a broken record that no one was permitted entry without the burgomaster's personal authorization. I knew I could obtain that permission tomorrow and return, but precious time would be lost. Frustrated, I kicked a stone that caught my eye and returned to the girl, who had been watching my altercation with the guardian of order with detached interest.

  "Nothing for it," I said bitterly. "We'll have to come back tomorrow..."

  The girl curled her lip mockingly. "Is that the best you can manage? Wait here."

  She approached the burly man. I expected almost anything except what happened: the guard's face split into a foolish grin, he gazed at the girl as if mesmerized, nodded compliantly, unlocked the door, and wandered off in some unknown direction! The girl didn't even deign to glance at me, darting inside the building instantly. I hurried after her.

  "How did you manage that? What did you say to him?" I obediently followed the girl down the dark corridor. The archive had no windows, but she had prudently taken a candle from the porter's desk.

  "I told you, I have connections in this city." I couldn't see her face, but I knew she was curling her lip in that mocking way again. And lying. She stopped abruptly and turned to face me so suddenly I nearly collided with her.

  "Careful!"

  She handed me a candle stub, lit it from her own, and nodded toward a row of ledgers stretching away to the left.

  "Birth, death, and marriage records. Search for the Malko family. Take everything you find, you hear me? Everything—on the husband, on her, on their relatives, her parents' lineage. Meet me in the reception hall. Don't dawdle."

  "And where are you off to?" I resented my own helplessness and her frankly commanding tone. Who did she think she was?

  "I'll search for records of missing children."

  "And how, pray tell, do you intend to do that? There are thousands—no, hundreds of thousands of files here!"

  "There is, in fact, a classification system." She brandished a thick ledger before my face. I hadn't even noticed where she'd got it.

  "Inquisitor Tiffano, I suggest you are in hurry. I need to be at the church by six."

  I trudged between shelves lined with enormous volumes, trying to make sense of the classification. And of myself. This case, which had seemed trivial at first, was taking on increasingly terrifying dimensions. Though I had dealt with sorcerers before, I had never conducted an inquiry independently. There had always been a mentor, an experienced inquisitor who made the decisions. And those cases had been simple: petty witchcraft, and one where the supposed sorcery turned out to be a swindler extorting money from gullible fools with crude tricks he passed off as magic. I felt utterly unprepared to shoulder the responsibility for a missing girl's fate. The knowledge that other children's safety—potential victims—depended on me weighed heavily, but even more troubling was the necessity of tolerating this addled creature's participation in the inquiry. Though, to be fair, I had to admit that without her, there would be no case at all; the witchcraft would have gone undetected.

  The girl would have been searched for a while, and in time the case would have been closed, as others before it likely had been. And gaining access to the archive on a Sunday was also her doing. I finally found the letter "M" and pulled out a dusty volume of church records. The marriage record of baron Malko to the maiden Etna Khristovich was in the middle of the volume; I carefully folded down the page, tucked the volume under my arm, and went in search of the letter "K".

  I reached the reception hall first. My candle stub had nearly burned down; I risked being left in complete darkness. A noise behind me announced my partner in unlawful archive entry. I couldn't see her face; she was carrying a stack of several dozen thick volumes before her. A nearly melted candle perched atop the unstable tower, dripping wax mercilessly onto the topmost volume and swaying with her movements. I rushed to help, piling the tomes onto a table and then chiding the girl for her careless treatment of precious archival documents, now stained with wax. She only snorted contemptuously in response.

  She divided her stack into two distinctly unequal piles, slid the smaller one toward me, and said:

  "Look for records of missing girls. I think we can limit the age from about five to... When does puberty begin? Around twelve or later?" She rose and lit a gas lamp that, as it turned out, hung above the archivist's desk. "Yes, from five to twelve, I'd say."

  "Why...?"

  "I'll explain later. Fold down the pages of relevant entries and show them to me."

  "Wouldn't it be simpler to copy them? We'll need to visit the petitioners and question them about—"

  "Yes, yes," she murmured distractedly, flipping through volumes without seeming to read them. "Where are the records on the Malko family? Did you find them?"

  "Here." I pushed two volumes toward her, deciding it was easier not to argue or provoke her further. "The relevant pages are folded down."

  She set aside her own books and read aloud from the church records:

  "Baron Janusz Malko entered into holy matrimony with the maiden Etna, née Khristovich, at the Church of the Holy Protectress Milagros in the city of Kliechi, in the year 905 of the Great Act.

  In the year 908 of the Great Act, Anna Malkovich, born baroness, daughter of Janusz Malko and Etna Malko, received blessing at the Church of the Holy Protectress Milagros in the city of Kliechi.

  In the year 915 of the Great Act, Yanka Malkovich, born baroness, daughter of Janusz Malko and Etna Malko, received blessing at the Church of the Holy Protectress Milagros in the city of Kliechi"

  "So she has two daughters of her own. Interesting. Where are the records for the baroness herself? Ah, I see. "

  "In the year 890 of the Great Act, Etna Khristovich, daughter of Karl Khristovich and Carmelia Khristovich, received blessing at the Church of the Holy Protector Timothy in the city of Kliechi. "

  "So the baroness is fifty-eight years old. And she is not of noble birth at all."

  "I think I'll copy all this information down." I reached for paper, ignoring her condescending snort.

  "Don't bother. You'll have to return tomorrow with official authorization anyway, so the archivist can make certified copies. Or are you afraid of forgetting a few dates?"

  The girl flipped rapidly through pages, occasionally jotting something quickly on a sheet of paper. I couldn't contain myself.

  "Why are you putting on this act? You're not even reading them!"

  She looked up at me, her eyes narrowing in surprise.

  "I am scanning them."

  "Impossible. No one can read an entire page with just a fleeting glance."

  She sighed, handed me her volume, and said, "Ask me about any entry on this page, or any of the previous ones."

  Annoyed, I took the book and randomly picked a line: "'Complainant Magnus Averyano filed a petition for investigation into...'"

  The girl cut me off: "Into the disappearance of his wife, Adele Averyano, on the fifth of March, year 945, aged thirty-four. The woman went to the port market and never returned. Three days later, her body was found outside the city limits; she had been robbed and stabbed to death. The investigation was conducted by the commune investigation office..."

  "Enough," I interrupted, stunned. I had opened to a random page and chosen a random entry, and she had quoted it verbatim! "How do you do that?"

  The girl waved a dismissive hand, already turning back to her records. "I have a perfect memory."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I don't read the entries, you're right about that. But one glance at a page is enough to commit it to memory. The actual reading—selecting the necessary information, so to speak—I'll do later, at home. I'll compile a list of addresses for you, don't worry." She returned calmly to her books.

  "Incredible!" I was genuinely astonished. "If what you say is true—" I stopped short under her disapproving glare. "Then you should be doing something... something more useful than private investigation. You could apply to the Academy, pursue research—not necessarily theological, medicine or history, for instance. With your memory, you could easily achieve success..."

  "You don't think, Inquisitor Tiffano, that my current occupation is considerably more useful than your muddled academic pursuits? And please, stop distracting me."

  I fell obediently silent; arguing was futile. She seemed genuinely unaware of the unique gift the One had bestowed upon her.