I stared at my own hand, white-knuckled on the slim pole that upheld a brocade canopy over our heads. The scar on the back of my wrist stood out starkly, reminding me how close I’d come to getting assassinated once again.

Scars. There was something else it reminded me of. Something I’d realized in a flash when Orthys trapped us in the theater, and forgotten in the chaos that followed.

“Graces preserve us. I think Orthys worked for Prince Ruven.”

That got my mother’s attention. She swiveled on her cushioned bench. “What?”

I touched my own face. “One of Orthys’s men had a scar like a handprint. Half Ruven’s servants have the same scars, from his Skinwitch powers. I don’t know anything else that could leave a mark like that.”

For a moment, La Contessa was silent. Then she drew in a long breath. “Damn Leodra to the Hell of Disaster. Cleaning up this mess may take more work than I thought.”

We swept into the Imperial Palace like a winter storm, leaving courtiers shivering in our wake. My mother closeted herself in the inner council chamber with the doge and what few of the Council of Nine happened to be currently in the palace—Leodra not among them—while Ciardha, Marcello, and I stood vigil outside.

We didn’t have to wait long. Perhaps a quarter of an hour passed before my mother called Marcello and me in to tell what we’d seen. The doge listened, eyes glittering, from his modest throne, while two other members of the Council stood by with tight lips and pale faces. When we finished, the doge rose. His richly embroidered robes fell about him like gull’s wings.

“We will detain Baron Leodra at once,” he said. “We must handle this quickly and quietly. We cannot afford a prolonged internal conflict now, with Ardence and Vaskandar watching us for weakness, and the eyes of the Empire upon us.”

“It would be my pleasure to handle the matter,” La Contessa offered.

The doge gave a curt nod. “You have my blessing and my full authority.”

My mother swept up Ciardha on her way out the door and immediately started giving orders. “Get me a platoon of Imperial Guards. Send spies ahead to find Leodra. Set our most trusted intelligence officers to determining who is loyal to him, tracing his people and papers, finding every scheme he has his fingers in. We need to stop any contingency plans he may have in place before he sets them into motion. And especially look for any sign of what happened to the Ardentine children.”

Ciardha bowed without slowing her pace. “It will be done, Contessa.”