“But this is not a matter of a few people making trouble in the marketplace,” Brum continued wearily. “If the people begin to see our enemies as Saints—”

“There are Fjerdan Saints,” offered Hanne, almost hopefully.

“But they are not Grisha.”

Nina bit her tongue. Maybe they were and maybe they weren’t. Sënj Egmond, the great architect, was said to have prayed to Djel to buttress the Ice Court against the storm. But there were other stories that claimed he’d prayed to the Saints. And there were some who believed that Egmond’s miracles had nothing to do with divine intervention, that they had simply been the result of his Grisha gifts, that he had been a talented Fabrikator who could manipulate metal and stone at will.

“The Fjerdan Saints were holy men,” said Brum. “They were favored by Djel, not … these demons. But it’s more than that. Did you recognize the third Saint flouncing across that stage? That was Zoya Nazyalensky. General of the Second Army. There is nothing holy or natural about that woman.”

“A woman serves as a general?” Hanne asked innocently.

“If you can call a creature like that a woman. She is everything repugnant and foul. The Grisha are Ravka. Fjerdans worshipping these false Saints … They are giving their allegiance to a foreign power, a power with whom we are about to be at war. This new religion is more of a threat than any battlefield victory could be. If we lose the people, we lose the fight before it even begins.”

If I do my job right, thought Nina.

She had to hope that the common people of Fjerda didn’t hate Grisha more than they loved their own sons and daughters, that most of them knew someone who had vanished—a friend, a neighbor, even a relative. A woman willing to leave livelihood and family behind for fear of having her power discovered. A boy snatched from his home in the night to face torture and death at the hands of Brum’s witchhunters. Maybe with her little miracles, Nina could give Fjerda something to rally around, a reason to question the hate and fear that had been Brum’s weapons for so long.

“The Apparat’s presence here undermines all we’ve worked for,” Brum went on. “How can I purge our towns and cities of foreign influence when there is a heretic at the very heart of our government? We look like the worst of hypocrites, and he has spies in every alcove.”

Ylva shuddered. “He has a most unnerving way about him.”

“It’s all for show. The beard. The dark robes. He likes to terrify the ladies with his strange pronouncements and his skulking, but he’s little more than a squawking bird. And we need him if we’re to put Demidov on the throne. The priest’s backing will matter to the Ravkans.”

“He smells of graveyards,” said Hanne.