What's the Difference Between Apprentices and Torturers?

Torturers are known as apprentices, but they're not masked yet. Wolf doesn't want to shy away from Severian's capability for casual cruelty or his inability to empathize with someone. The executions I have seen performed and have performed myself are so often are no more than a trade, a butchery of human beings who are for the most part less innocent and less valuable than cattle. That statement is straight up horrendous that he wrote that.