The room fell quiet the instant the red robed priest entered the tavern. Nobody expected an inquisitor to come here, and nobody really felt comfortable around him. There was a nervous shuffling, and some lucky few who were close to other exits left before there could be any trouble.

The priest, for his part, surveyed the room until he found the men he'd sent before him to ensure there would be no trouble with this stranger. The man who had called him here was not difficult to find, he would have been head and shoulders taller than anybody else in the room, even had he not been seated alone, the surrounding tables mysteriously devoid of any other patrons. The priest went over to sit with him.

The priest asked a question in spanish. The seated man answered something in french. As neither could understand the other like this, they settled to speaking latin, the priest with passing familiarity, if a rough and unpracticed accent, and the warrior with the coarse brevity of only passing knowledge.

"You have something to tell us about one of our prisoners?"

"Yes. His true value. You don't know it."

"Which prisoner is this?"

"Name? I don't know. Not his real name. The one less bothered by your presence. You know him, I'm sure."

The priest grimaced. "I believe I know of whom you speak. Go on, then."

"He is important. Dangerous. Agents everywhere. Even the Church. Plot to assassinate the Pope, control the Vatican. Use you for his goals."

"Agents inside the Church?" the priest repeated with a disbelieving smirk.

"Yes. Vampire. Warlock. King of the Night. Satan has strings you don't know. We are everywhere."

"We?" he noted with a dangerous tone to his voice.

"Yes. How else I know this? With King dead, other King replace him. Yes?"

"And what exactly makes you think you will be allowed to leave after these confessions?" The priest started raising his hand to signal to his underlings, but something in his interlocutor's eyes forced him to stop. A red fire burned there, and the inquisitor felt as though he were staring into the very pits of Hell, and the promise of his doom should he not do as commanded.

The stranger got up and bowed sarcastically before leaving. It would be several minutes before the inquisitor's shock alleviated and he could move, albeit shakingly, once more.

As for Charles, one part of the reason he had come here to Barcelona was accomplished. Though he did not well understand how people thought, he surmised that the inquisitors wouldn't execute their prisoner, not now, not until they had learned what secrets he hid. And the King of the Night would not reveal them easily, so the vampire lord would be tortured for a very, very long time.

And that was a pleasant thought for two entirely separate reasons. For one, it served his intentions, that reason he had come here. For the second, he always enjoyed gratuitous pain, especially against those who were above him.