“I can read it.” Asyil stepped forward, looking everywhere but at Ranka. She and Yeva had come to the Skra late, and Ranka had often wondered if it was not their witchery that had kept them weak, but their former lives, clinging after all these years like a stubborn second skin. Asyil took the pin, held it up to the light, and read. “ ‘We are Solomei’s light. We are her Hand in the night.’ ”

Solomei. The sun goddess humans prayed to.

Ongrum had gone terribly pale. When she spoke, her voice was ragged. “When I was a witchling, a trader brought a collection of prayer plates north, each from a different city within Isodal. He said every city had a different mantra, to mark the temple sect there. They were useless to us, but beautiful, and obsessive in that odd human way. But only one carried this line.”

Ongrum closed her eyes. “This pin is from Seaswept.”

The royal city.

The home of the prince Ranka had rejected.

The Skra began to shout again, crying for bloodshed, for the very coup they’d cast aside when Ranka wasn’t brave enough to play the role of assassin. Ongrum stepped toward Ranka. Ranka flinched—but all Ongrum did was settle a callused hand on her cheek. Her thumb traced the scar that wound from Ranka’s left eye to the corner of her mouth. Yeva always said the scar made Ranka look like a fish that’d escaped being hooked. The truth of how she’d earned it was a lot less charming.

“I know that look on your face,” Ongrum murmured. “Careful, witchling, before you start a fire you cannot put out. It could just be a coincidence—she could have stolen that pin. Or the humans could have no connection at all.”

“You know as well as I do that’s not true,” Ranka whispered. “Could it still work? Your plan?”

Ongrum’s face grew grave. “We couldn’t go south with you. Until the coronation you’d be on your own. If this goes wrong, I wouldn’t just lose the coven’s only blood-witch. I’d lose the only person I ever considered a daughter.”

“I am no one’s daughter,” Ranka whispered. “I am a weapon. Use me.”

Ranka thought she saw Ongrum smile, but then it was gone. A trick of the light.

Ongrum raised her voice. “You chose, as Bloodwinn, to deny the treaty—and deny the coup. I respected that. I stood down, even with freedom within our grasp. But now one of our own has been taken. If you want this fight, I will not stand in your way. If you want the prince’s blood, it is yours to spill. Every witch here would be honored to fight with you.”

“It would be war. If we killed their prince—”