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There’s another story about how each god shared their magic with Oz, and that it was their magic that brought crops, rain, precious metals and minerals, and the animals that roamed the land.

I keep reading.

The cigarette smokes out between my knuckles and I toss it into the ceramic dish where it smolders to ash.

In the origin stories, the more I read, the clearer it becomes that the prevailing theory is the gods shared their magic by bleeding into the earth.

But is it literal or figurative?

I keep flipping pages and come to a section of colored artwork featuring oil paintings of each god, their palms forward, as if in offering, while their arms are sliced open and dripping with power.

The last painting depicts Valon, the God of the North, of Thunder and Sky … and he’s a dragon.

I glance up at Tin.

He mentioned a dragon multiple times but I thought he was joking.

Do dragons really exist in Oz? And one of them is a god?

The book isn’t very long, and I flip past the paintings, skimming a few more notes and references.

And then, I’m at the end.

I stare at it, a little stunned.

Did I miss something?

What clue was Henrietta trying to share with me?

“Think, Dorothy,” I mutter and put my face in my hand and sink into the darkness behind my closed lids.

Rook told Tin he wanted to find the gods, but Tin doesn’t think he wants to find them to save Oz. Instead, it’s something about his faulty magic.

Gods. The Wizard. Rain. Metal. Crops. Animals. Divine magic bleeding into—

“Oh shit.”

I lurch out of the chair. It teeters on its back legs before knocking to the hardwood floor. Tin jolts awake and bolts to his feet, his hand automatically going to his axe. But it isn’t there. It’s sitting across the room on the table.

“It was just me,” I say. “I’m sorry.”

“What the fuck.” He sighs and scrubs at his face. His pants are still unbuttoned, and they hang low on his hips, revealing a trail of hair all the way down and a deep cut of muscle on the V of his torso.

I take in the sight for far too long and when I finally yank my gaze back up, I find him watching me, scowling.

“I think I found something,” I say before he can call me out for ogling him.

“What?”

“I have a theory on Rook’s plan for the gods, why he wants to find them.”

He sits back down. “I’m listening.”

I come forward and flatten the book open on the coffee table in front of him to the art depicting the gods bleeding for the world.

“I think Rook wants to kill them so he can steal their power for himself.”

NINETEENTinman