Page 10 of Ozma

“Sure,” Ozma mumbled, barely loud enough for him to hear.

His breath caught. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Nothing.” Ozma’s voice crackled with emotion. “I’m just here for Tip’s things.”

“Tip didn’thavethings,” Jack growled. A few changes of clothes and essential items, but nothing more. Especially not two years later.Patience.Scaring her away wouldn’t get him the answers he needed. “Did Mombi send you? Are you going to report back to her? Tell her that I brought someone here?”

Ozma’s eyes widened. “Why would I need to report to Mombi when she can see you for herself?”

Did she really not know Mombi had left? Could she be who she said she was? His gaze fell to the ground as he ran different explanations through his mind, and Ozma’s bare feet caught his attention. “Tip never wore shoes either,” he blurted before he could stop himself.

Ozma huffed and turned toward Mombi’s hut again, then ran.

Jack stayed where he was and watched her go. There was a familiarity about Ozma. Not her blossom aroma, but beneath that lingered sugar and crisp autumn leaves, just as it had with Tip. And there’d been something in her eyes… It was like sheknewhim. Like she was personally offended by what she had walked in on.

Had Tip survived the Shifting Sands? Had he found his sister and told her about their relationship? Had they laughed at the idea of him alone with Mombi? No… Even if Tip didn’t love him, he wasn’tthatcruel. Perhaps Tip sent Ozma here so he wouldn’t have to see Mombi again? Or so he wouldn’t have to face Jack? Jack looked up just as Ozma disappeared into Mombi’s hut and felt the cracks in his heart breaking open again.

Chapter Five

Ozma

Jack had run after Ozma. But of course he did—a strange female barged straight into his hut while he was... She shook her head, trying to escape the vision of Jack with the other male.What was I thinking, telling Jack I was Tip’s sister?

She wanted to leave, should leave, but she couldn’t. Instead, she ran toward Mombi’s because that was the only place where she could lock herself in for the moment. Ozma was the true queen of Oz and she shouldn’t be wasting time hiding in another dark place to cry. However, she needed to regain focus. This was all Mombi’s and the Wizard’s fault and, more than ever, she needed to run a blade across their throats. For making her feel this way, for making Jack so easily turn to a new lover. Perhaps Jack didn’t love her as much as he’d claimed.

A small voice rang in Ozma’s head, whispering to her that Jack likely believed Tip was dead. She batted at her ear—the voice of reason—as she sprinted, leaping over pumpkins. It didn’t matter because she’dseen himmounting another and she couldn’t unsee that.

Ozma knew she was being deceitful, but if she did tell him the truth, it would always be Tip, Tip, Tip. Jack might not say the words aloud but he would compare her to Tip, to who she used to be. But she wasn’t that fae anymore, in body or mind. From being in that dark place with Reva, learning things, discovering the world—even though she’d yet to see it in its entirety. Stars above, she couldn’t stop seeing Jackthrustinginside that other male.

With shaking hands, Ozma threw open the entrance to Mombi’s and rushed inside. The door slammed, echoing within the hut, rattling the walls as she bolted the lock. She didn’t want to be back in this place. This hut. Thispatch. Earlier, she’d been so focused on having her blissful reunion with Jack after murdering Mombi, to be overly bothered by being here, but neither had happened. Too much time had passed for Jack.

Standing alone, in the middle of this familiar room, seeing the glass vials, the switches in the corner that Mombi would use to slap Ozma’s knuckles, she shivered. Ozma could feel the stings now, along with the painfully vicious strikes against her cheek. No,Tip’sknuckles, his cheek. Her body trembled—it was too much. She didn’t miss being in male form, especially now with the memories resurfacing.

Ozma cupped her nose and mouth, to stifle any more crying. As her chest heaved, she dreamed of shattering Mombi’s glass vials to pieces, setting fire to the hut. Not now, though. She only had the strength to release an ear-shattering scream. What could Mombi do if Ozma did destroy her things? What could be worse than what she’d already done? Put Ozma back in the dark place? Kill her? Make her forget? Perhaps that would be better than the betrayal and hurt consuming her at that moment.

A tapping came at the door and Ozma froze, knowing it wouldn’t be Mombi because she wouldn’t knock at her own hut. Why couldn’t he just leave her alone? But she knew why… Ozma should have just told him she was someone else.Anyoneelse.

She didn’t want to see him. She did want to see him. No. Shedid notwant to see him.

The knob turned and the door rattled as Jack tried to open it, insistent, urgent, like the frantic beat of her heart.

Taking a deep breath, she went to the door and unbolted it before yanking it open. “Yes?” she asked, voice soft, too soft. Ozma should have snapped, asked him why he’d been tumbling another. It had been two years, but JackknewMombi, and he shouldn’t have believed anything she’d said.

Jack ran a hand through his hair, grabbing at the short curls before a lock fell right at his brow. He stared at her, throat bobbing, his eyes dancing with an uncertain emotion. “I wanted to give you a moment to yourself, but you can’t stay at Mombi’s.”

Ozma opened her mouth to say she needed more than a moment when he pressed a finger against her lips. To shush her. She narrowed her eyes, clenching her teeth, but her heart kicked up at his touch anyway. Until a familiar scent of oil hit her nose and she took a step back, away from him. That single digit that had touched her body everywhere … but notthisbody. He’d been with another male only minutes ago.

“Now,” Jack continued, dropping his hand and licking his lower lip, “we’re going to have a little chat. You’re going to tell me why you’re here,howyou’re here, and if Mombi truly didn’t send you. I want the truth.”

The truth… He wanted thetruth. Before, she would have told him, she would have confided everything to him, but after seeing what she had, she just couldn’t find the words.

“I’m not working for Mombi,” Ozma whispered. She straightened so she was closer to his height and lifted her chin. It was strange to now see him almost eye to eye instead of having to look farther up at him. “I came here to kill her, not to collect Tip’s things. And yes, I’m Tip’s sister. Whether you want to believe it or not is up to you, but I am.” And in a way, she believed her words. She’d been Tip in the past, but it felt like another fae now, one she didn’t want to go back to. Perhaps Jack was just part of that old world, that broken place. Perhaps Jack was her lover then, but not meant to be hers now.

Jack cocked his head and crossed his arms as he leaned against the doorframe. “You being his sister doesn’t make a damn bit of sense. Tip died while crossing the Shifting Sands so there’s no way you could’ve known Mombi held him captive once.” He paused, a glimmer of hope crossing his face. “Or are you telling me he’s still alive? Is that how you knew to come here?”

That was what Jack was hoping for. To have Tip back. Because he believed that, maybe, Mombi had lied to him, that Tip was still out there alive somewhere. Tip was Ozma so it was true... She almost told him in that moment. Almost.Butif he’d believed there was a chance Tip could be alive, then why was he taking a lover to his bed—the bed where Tip and Jack had been together, time after time—instead of searching for him. The barrier was gone so there was no excuse.

“Mombi didn’t lie to you about that,” Ozma finally said. “Tip is dead, but it was she who killed him.”

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