Page 193 of Sigils & Spells

She stood shaky, using Minho’s shoulder as a balance and collapsed on the bed.

“Oh my god this is so comfortable.”

“You can’t go to sleep yet.” I said. “You’re here! That means we can go.”

“Go?”

“Like escape,” I waved a vague arm at the window. “We can go home.”

Ruby sat up and frowned at me. They were all frowning at me.

“What?”

“Julian, we haven’t solved the whole reason we came here in the first place.” Ruby said. “You’re still tied to Maeve.”

I shrugged. “So? It doesn’t matter if the alternative is dying. I’ll go crazy instead of getting you all killed.”

Alice was shaking her head, but Ruby looked like she was in deep thought.

“Ok, but hear me out.” Minho started. “I don’t want you to go crazy. I want to help you get free. That’s why I came. It’s the new moon, dude, which I feel should be proof that I’d do anything for you. And I know you’d do the same for me.”

“So we agree we’re not going to let Julian go crazy.” Alice said, crossing her arms pointedly and sitting on the bed next to Ruby. The other two nodded.

I rolled my eyes. “Ok fine. Then what do we do instead.”

Ruby was pinching her chin in deep thought. “Well, Maeve will see soon enough that Minho and I escaped, and she’ll be pissed.”

“Because you were the leverage against me.”

“Exactly.” Ruby nodded. “So she’ll probably put some kind of time crunch on you. But Maeve is infamous for an outlandish temper, which means she might also be illogical.”

“Easier to trick.” Alice said.

“Yeah, but we don’t have any leverage. They took my bag with the artifacts from my uncle. I still have the book.” Ruby patted her pocket, “and the favor, but I don’t think the favor would be enough.”

“I’m sorry about the artifacts.” I grimaced.

“Don’t worry,” Ruby waved me off. “They’re of no value to me or humans as a whole, but fairies love that stuff.”

“What do you mean ‘the favor,’” Alice asked.

“It’s a favor from a demon.” Minho answered, like he was talking about some dude owing him a large Baja blast. “And it’s my favor. Ruby used hers.”

Ruby shushed him. “Maeve is pissed that she lost Julian, or else she wouldn’t have had guards in the dark woods waiting for us to pop out of a gateway.”

“Wait,” I interjected. “We were in something called the dark woods?”

Ruby nodded.

“Is that why…”

“It was so dark?” She finished, smirking. “Yeah, it’s a little on the nose. Anyway, none of the artifacts would have worked anyway. She’s too mad to be bought easily, but she’s mad enough to trick. I just don’t know how we could trick her.”

The memory of something Ruby had said a couple days ago rushed back into my head, and an idea dawned on me.

“Ruby, you said Fae are obsessed with games right? Like gambling.”

The pink haired witch frowned. “Yes?”

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