No matter. Percy could play at being a predator all he wanted; Ranka had been born one.

She scented the morgue long before she saw it; death and decay blanketed the sharp bite of chemicals, bodies preserved just long enough for their families to mourn. The flame vanished, and light spilled into the tunnel as a hatch creaked and Percy and Aramis climbed out. Ranka counted to twenty, then scaled the grime-slick ladder after them.

“Cremated tomorrow… matches the rest…”

Their voices were too far away.

Leave, a voice in her head whispered.

Ranka grit her teeth and climbed through the hatch.

A layer of dust covered the floor. Mold grew along the walls, and the windows were streaked with black paint. This morgue hadn’t seen proper use in years. And yet the glow of firelight came from a far room.

Aramis’s voice broke the air. “Lights above, Percy. What—what is this?”

“I’m sorry. I never thought it’d get this far.”

Ranka breathed in. Her knees buckled under the sharp scent of pure, naked fear. She stole across the room, slid behind the open door—and time ground to a halt.

A dead witch lay in the morgue. She radiated the same rot Ranka had encountered back in Witchik. Fist-sized purple cysts had destroyed her skin, erupting across her body, leaving it raw, broken, and weeping. The fingernails on her right hand were sharpened to coal-black points, and though Ranka couldn’t see the others, she wagered they were a pale gray.

She had died with her eyes open—one a blood-witch white, the other a pale brown.

It wasn’t possible. Not this far south.

Aramis stared at the corpse. “How many?”

Percy winced. “This makes seven.”

“How is that even possible?”

“I don’t know, okay? The strain shouldn’t be able to replicate.” A shudder rolled through him. “But that’s why I’m here. To fix it.”

Aramis trailed her fingers over the face of the dead witch. There was no revulsion in her eyes, only a desire to understand. Her fingers skimmed over the wooden prayer beads studded through the witch’s ears. “She’s Kerth. The bracelet isn’t witch craft, though.”

Aramis lifted the witch’s other hand—the one that had lain out of Ranka’s sight, clawed and curled in death. A pale leather bracelet flashed in the light. It was a worn, unremarkable piece of jewelry, the once-vivid orange beads bleached by sun and time.

Ranka would have known it anywhere, because there were only three in this world, and one encircled Ranka’s wrist.

Her knees buckled.

No.

Yeva would never have willingly taken that bracelet off. It had to have been stolen.

But how had it ended up here?