The white-cloth army camp was veiled by burning smoke and dust. Autumn's chill clung to the edge of morning. A strange, choking smell had seeped into the air, yet for some reason it felt familiar, and terrifying. In the mountain wind came faint moans of despairing grief, and hoarse shouts.
"Lord! Please! Save us from the hands of the devil! Deliver us!"
The cries came from within the camp, but were cut off by armored guards gripping weapons. Falling leaves swept past one grave, killing-cold face after another, past the burning torches held high, and the gray, cross-marked surcoats on their bodies. And in the very center of these clustered guards stood one old man and one strong man—the two great figures of highest status in the entire Crusader Army camp.
The old man wore an icy black robe and a plain black hat; from head to toe, there was not a single bright color on him. His eyes were even colder and more solemn than the black he wore, like the glacier atop Mont Blanc in the Alps. The only thing that gleamed faintly was the golden bishop's cross at his neck, symbolizing the lofty status of a high servant of God.
As for his name, there was no one on the peninsula who did not know it, no one who did not fear it; it could even make the great nobles of Castile tremble in their hearts. He was the first Grand Inquisitor of the Spanish Inquisition, the black-robed friar of the Dominican Order, Tomás de Torquemada.
In the six years since Inquisitor Torquemada had taken office, he had already issued twenty-eight inquisitorial edicts, expanded the charges of religious trial to more than twenty counts, personally sentenced over five thousand people to the stake, and over forty thousand