Page 8 of Inked in Emeralds (Inkbound #3)

W e started out the next morning at the crack of dawn, weighed down by some sacks filled with bread, fruit, and little tartlets that Crumpet the baker had made for us.

The towns folk had seen us off with songs and cheers, but the last words that had left my lips were a promise to the earl that we would rid Oz of the scourge of Almira.

I only hoped I could keep it.

I’d spent the first leg of our journey in silence as the night before replayed in my mind on a loop. So much had happened so fast, but despite being in a different land, with enemies new and old, one thing had followed me through every story.

Doubt.

It had been eating me up inside ever since The Speaker had sacrificed himself and through all that had happened since, right up to seeing Gayelette’s agony.

I’d caused so much pain in my quest to fulfill this prophecy…cost so many people their lives.

What if I wasn’t the good guy in this story like I thought I was?

Even Almira probably didn’t think of herself as a bad witch.

As much as I wanted to save the people of C’an Saas, my desire to see my true home…

to know where I’d come from and learn about my parents was just as big of a driver for me.

Was I fooling myself to think I’d done all this for some “greater good”?

And what made me qualified to be the judge of what “good” was “greater?”

The earl had just said out loud what I’d been wondering in one way or another for weeks. Once Duncan had set me into my bed, though, it had been more than that keeping me awake…

I swallowed hard and laid a tentative hand on the handle of my whip. No crackling, no pulse of awareness that connected me to my weapon. Same as earlier that morning when I’d tried to touch the consciousness of a swallow-tailed kite swooping through the trees.

Nothing.

Not that I was expecting to feel anything.

Whatever Almira had done to me last night had left me feeling dead inside.

Not numb, exactly—that would’ve been better.

But the despair was still there. It was just overshadowed by the fact that the sensation of life—of heat and snapping energy that had grown inside me along with my magic—was gone.

Left in its place was a lump of cold stone, weighing me down, draining me dry.

I hadn’t even processed it myself yet, never mind mentioning it to James or Duncan.

How to work up the nerve to tell them that they’d followed me here and risked everything only to find out that even weakened, at a distance, in another fucking realm, Almira’s magic was so strong that the mere brush of it had blasted mine to smithereens?

Fucking hell.

“We should find a stream and fill up our waterskins,” Duncan murmured.

Hook didn’t slow or glance his way. “It’s not hot out. We’ll have plenty of time to get water once we set up camp.”

The guys had picked up on my mood or were grappling with their own shit, because that was the first peep from either of them in hours.

Either way, I was going to have to come clean soon. I’d be a liability in almost any situation, and, while I had no choice but to follow this path to the bitter end, I needed to give them the chance to bow out before things went any further.

I peered under my lashes at James, sensing the tension in him.

When we’d gotten up this morning to pack, he’d been quieter than usual.

Seeing the familiarity between me and Duncan was already an issue, and that was before Duncan had scooped me up and put me to bed.

I’d been too flattened to tell him to put me down even if I’d wanted to.

Which I hadn’t. Not that it mattered to James anyway, right? He didn’t want to want me. So what was I worried about?

Because there was something about Duncan that made him easy to sink into. To let him carry the burden for a while. And with Hook? It always felt fraught. Loaded. Thick with anticipation and turmoil and need, even now, after he’d crushed any hope of us being together.

He chose that moment to turn his head ever so slightly, his gaze colliding with mine before ricocheting away again. At this rate, I didn’t need to worry about being a liability. This man was going to burst a vein from a combination of rage and misery and drop dead all on his own, no enemy needed.

Surprisingly, a glance at the usually easy-going Duncan told me he wasn’t faring much better.

In a word? Morale was low, and I didn’t have a clue or the energy to find one that might help me pick it up.

As we walked, the vibrant blues and pinks gradually gave way.

The oaks and shrubbery that lined the yellow path grew thicker with each passing mile, and, by mid-day, we found ourselves in a dense forest. It was lusher than any I’d seen in Alabaster, and somehow more vivid, as if all of the colors had somehow been amped up a notch.

“Wonder what type of stone this is,” I murmured, suddenly desperate to break the tension.

Despite being the only road leading to The Emerald City, the gleaming, golden bricks were almost entirely free of wear and tear.

“I’ve been trying to figure that out for a while now.” Duncan scratched at his stubbly chin. “Heinrich and Relyk would’ve killed for the stuff.”

“They would’ve killed for a lot of things,” I pointed out with a frown. “They weren’t exactly choosy when it came to murder.”

He flashed a half-smile, “Fair enough. But this time, it would’ve been over something useful. Imagine having roads that never need to be repaired. It could be used for all sorts of things. Buildings, wells, the list goes on and on.”

I nodded, thinking back to the dirt packed, hole laden streets of The Hollow.

“You should take a brick back with you when we leave. Or…when you leave…” One day, I hoped to go back to that world and see what New Alabaster looked like, but who knew if that was even possible once I returned to C’an Saas?

I absently flexed my useless fingers. If I returned to C’an Saas.

“Strange that there are all these trees, but not a squirrel or chipmunk in sight,” Hook muttered, his expression dark as he looked off into the distance.

“Maybe the monkeys keep the population in check? Or maybe they don’t even have those particular critters here.”

Hook grunted.

“We can afford to go a few days without catching anything, at least.” I felt my pouch, which was stuffed full with Munsch Kin Land goodies.

“Food isn’t the concern. I’m more worried about the monkeys. The sheer number of them is an issue if they catch us out in the open,” Hook said.

“The earl said that we should find a place to hole up, but it’s hard to imagine hiding from that many of them.

” It didn’t take much to recall the horror I’d felt when that black cloud of monsters had descended on us the night before, and I suppressed a shudder.

“And I’m sure they’ll be looking for us. Almira knows we’re here now.”

Duncan nodded, grim-faced. “We’ll want to give ourselves a bit of extra time to prep for this first night until we establish a good routine.”

Hook scowled at him, but I breathed a sigh of relief as he refrained from snapping back with “no shit” or another sharp reply. The friction had been awkward, but so far they’d held back from being openly hostile, aside from the whole pesky saber to the kidney thing when we first got here.

The trees were getting taller as we moved, tendrils of shadow creeping onto the shining road. It only got darker up ahead, with a canopy shielding the road from the sky above. “Going to be hard to see us if they’re flying over, assuming it stays like this,” I said.

A flash of red caught my eye, and I skidded to a halt, peering over at it.

“Is that—?” I broke off, striding to the edge of the yellow brick road that cut a path through the thick trees.

“Apples,” I confirmed, reaching out to yank one free of the nearest branch.

The glossy crimson fruit looked so good it made my mouth water.

“We should stockpile some. We’ll thank ourselves later if we run out of— oof! ”

A jolt of pain arced through me as something hit me square in the solar plexus, hard. My hand was halfway to my whip by the time I saw the apple rolling down the golden path. “What the fuck?”

I reeled around, half expecting to see Cissy Petway hiding behind a bush with her slingshot, but I had no time to consider it further as apples rained down from the trees in a barrage of fruit fire.

I threw my arms over my head, but Hook’s firm grip settled on my wrist, tugging me onward, batting apples away like he’d been doing it his whole life.

“Move, move!” Duncan shouted, sword drawn.

“Is it the monkeys?” I flinched as another apple came hurtling my way, but there was no dodging this one.

A soft twang cut through the air, and my heart skipped a beat as the apple shot sideways just inches from my throat, smacking right into a tree with an arrow through its core. A low rumble rolled through the surrounding trees, and I stared in shock as their branches moved and then stilled.

“Someone else is out here!”

I unfurled my whip with a flick of the wrist, mourning the absence of magic tingling on the surface of my skin as I searched for the unseen archer.

Hook and Duncan had already moved in front of me, so I barely caught sight of the shadowy figure that leapt from what looked like a platform high in one of the trees.

Both men extended their swords as she sidled towards us, bow in hand.

She was dressed in well-worn brown leather from head to toe, except for a camouflage scarf that covered most of her dark hair.

“I’m guessing you all aren’t from around here,” she scoffed.

That voice. Hoarser, and less animated, but that lilting brogue was definitely recognizable.

“B-Billy?” I asked, shoving my way through the two-man wall of muscle blocking my view.

Tawny curls, bright blue eyes…She might look a bit different—leaner, less curvy, more rangy muscle—but it was definitely this world’s version of Billy O’Donnelly.