42 | John W. Warner IV some of the finest cars are wasted on the worst people, senora, thats all. One of the nuns translated his mishmash gibberish. They passed the ornate medieval entrance, its tall cast iron lanterns age-old sentinels, two robed monks stood there with smiles. One asked a nun what church they belonged to. The woman said Santo Martinho up ahead, whose bell was now ringing the hour. The long table, elegantly set with the finest Italian china, 18th-century silverware from France, a red silk tablecloth, and thick local bundles of twig greenery, shimmered in the dim torch light of the grand cellar eighty feet below grade. Multitudes of candles were then lit, and a heavenly glow descended. Bishop Arruda, a local man fresh from Romes intrigues and elegant private salons, a proud House of Savoy Venetian Black Nobility member, his telltale family pin shiny, held up a golden chalice to the twinkling altar that rose above him, eager to perform Maleficium. Speaking ancient Sumerian, he made an offering to male and female effigies. He finished up in Latin, shaking with devotional vitality. Thy will be served; thy will is truth. Kissing the bare nipples of the granite statue, her three arms holding a key, dagger, and flaming torch laced with incense, he then bowed in ritualistic fashion over and over, massaging the delicate, fine carving of the iron-spiked wheel at her feet. More rituals followed, more deep-toned chanting, the smoky atmosphere fouled but energized. O mighty Catherine of the Wheel. ‘Thirteen children, all under the age of eight, sat still. Tied tightly to their chairs with hemp rope, a few shed tears, others wore blank stares, their innocence and sanity long gone and shattered. Some wet their pants or dresses, the urine dripping down their legs to their bare, bruised feet that bore blistered burns from hot iron appliques centuries old, rusty relics of the Inquisition. They had been locked in small boxes for days with severed body parts from rotting corpses, or put in cages with vicious monkeys or other animals to condition them, their personalities fractured into shards. Those that lived would be the strongest, yet the easiest to control. Upon adulthood they would become mindless assassins, their souls caged. Four tall priestesses in symbol-embroidered black wool garb stood behind them, ensuring discipline, ensuring devotion; long red zodiac sashes cascaded to the floor. Their eyes were darkened in ancient Egyptian style, oddly predynastic yet different,