Page 76 of A Kingdom of Monsters

“We were injured.”

I grinned at him. “Your pride was injured, perhaps. If Iola and I hadn’t been there you all would have starved.”

“Untrue.” He looked down. “We literally couldn’t starve if we tried.”

I opened my mouth to needle him again, but stopped. His words had jogged something in the back of my mind, raising a question. “Do you think I could starve to death? Or would that not be possible.”

Scion shrugged. “I don’t know. Why?”

“I’ve just thought, maybe that’s part of why I survived the dungeon for so long when no other human could. I was starving, but maybe that couldn’t kill me.”

Scion didn’t answer. He scowled, looking angry. I knew he wasn’t angry with me for bringing it up, rather with himself. I reached out almost unconsciously and ran my fingers through his black hair.

“You may be right,” Ambrose said thoughtfully, as he strode out from behind the bar carrying a plate of roast sausages and diced vegetables. “I’d rather not test it, though.”

I smiled at him, and reached immediately for the plate. “This smells wonderful. I assume you made it?

“Yes,” he replied. “It took me several years in Aftermath, but I eventually grasped the concept. There wasn’t much food in the storage cellar. I wonder if they cleared most everything out before leaving.”

Scion looked grateful for the change of subject.“I still want to know where they went.”

“As do I,” Ambrose replied darkly. “I’m not used to being so ignorant of other’s movements.”

Scion looked for a moment as if he might reply, but swallowed it, seeming to decide it wasn’t worth needling his brother. I relaxed, grateful that for once they were—if not getting along, at least ignoring each other. That was about as much as I could hope for at the moment.

After we’d all eaten,the three of us sat around the table, passing the jewel of Inbetwixt between us and inspecting it. I held the ruby up to the light and looked carefully into its crimson depths, thinking hard.

“It really does seem to be just a gem,” I said, finally.

“I think it is,” Ambrose replied, taking it from me as I passed it to him. “The power isn’t in the gem itself, but in the curse that Aisling placed on it and all the other parts of the crown.”

“That the Source placed, you mean,” I corrected. “She didn’t have that magic herself, she bargained for it.”

Ambrose waved me off. “Whichever.”

I pressed my lips flatly together. Maybe it didn’t matter, as he seemed to believe, but I couldn’t escape the nagging feeling that there was something important in how the curse had come to be. Regardless, it wasn’t anything I hadn’t thought about before, and we had more pressing things to focus on.

“I think we should leave to look for the next gem as soon as possible,” I said.

“Agreed,” Scion said. “There’s no reason to wait around here, especially with Cross missing.”

“Where to next though,” Ambrose asked. “Overcast?”

“I assumed so.” I looked at Scion. “The rest of your family is there, wouldn’t they be able to help?”

“…Yes,” Scion said, after a long pause. “They could if they wanted to.”

“But?” I asked, resigned.

Scion glanced at Ambrose. “But, they may not be so willing to help.”

“That’s foolish,” Ambrose snapped. “This affects them just as much as the rest of us.”

“Sure,” Scion said acidy. “But do you want to try and explain that to Raewyn?”

Ambrose let out a sudden bark of laughter that made me jump. “Once, I asked Raewyn for help interpreting a vision.”

Scion blanched, looking at him with incredulity. “Why?”

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