So I just took a deep breath, dropped to my butt, and reassured myself that going down had to be easier than coming up. If nothing else, it would be faster. I closed my eyes and pushed off.

My stomach dropped as I hurtled downward, the wind whipping across my face and gaining speed every second. At first I was terrified, but after a minute, I inched my eyes open and saw the clouds whipping by as the ground approached at high velocity. Feeling a rush of exhilaration, I opened my mouth to whoop with joy and caught myself just in time to remember that the monkeys would hear me. Instead, I let out a quiet little squeal, grinning from ear to ear.

I landed with a thump on solid ground, where Indigo and Ollie were waiting for me, both looking a little shaky.

“That was actually sort of fun,” I said, scooping myself to my feet and dusting myself off.

Indigo glared at me. Ollie looked away, and I instantly realized my mistake. He wasn’t thinking about the slide or the thrill of survival. He was thinking about the monkeys.

I wondered how it had felt for him to be so close to his people and to not even be able to look at them. The monkeys weren’t evil: they were slaves, and some of them had probably been his friends once. Were his parents and his sister up there somewhere? Had he recognized any of the voices that had cackled in his ears?

“Ollie,” I said. “I’m sorry.”

He shook his head like it was no big deal, but when he finally spoke, it was through gritted teeth and I could tell he was angry. Maybe not at me, but it didn’t really matter.

“I would do anything to get them back,” he said quietly. “Is there anyone in your life like that? Anyone you’d do anything to help? No matter what?”

“I . . .” I bit my lip and hesitated. There was a time when I would have said my mother. Now I wasn’t sure. I had tried to help her so many times, had done everything I could possibly think of, and none of it had worked. Not even a little. Now she was probably dead. “I don’t know,” I finally said, feeling my face flush with shame.

He cocked his head like he didn’t believe me. It wasn’t the answer he had expected.

Indigo just rolled her eyes. “I feel sorry for you,” she said. “I really do.”

We didn’t say anything after that. We just trudged on ahead.

But I couldn’t stop thinking about the question Ollie had asked me. I made a decision. A promise to myself. I couldn’t help my mother anymore. If I’d ever had a chance, it was long gone now. But if I ever had a chance to help the monkeys, I would take it. No matter what it cost me. It was the least I could do. Not for him, but for myself. Just to say I had someone.

When the road turned a few minutes later we found ourselves in an apple orchard. The trees were lush and green in contrast to the icky cornfields. Huge, red apples dangled temptingly from their branches, shiny and juicy-looking.

I stepped off the road, the grumbling in my stomach outweighing what I’d seen with the mutant corn.

Star, still in my pocket, knew what was up, too. She poked her nose out and chirped hungrily as I reached for a piece of fruit.

For a split second I thought I saw the tree blink. I snatched my hand back.

I looked at the talking monkey next to me, remembering that anything was possible here. “Did that tree just move?”

“They talk, too, but they’ve taken a vow of silence.”

“Voluntarily?”

“The princess felt that their conversation ruined the apple-eating experience and was therefore a violation of the Happiness Decree.”

“What about their happiness? The trees, I mean?”

“I think we all realized a little too late that the only happiness that matters is Dorothy’s,” Indigo chimed in.

Ollie looked at me. “I know you want to, but you can’t.”

“Is it poison? Or is it forbidden?”

“It’s against the Happiness Decree. It’s not worth the risk,” Indigo said.

“But we need to eat. And Ollie needs his strength. No one is around.”

I plucked two apples and nodded at the tree, meeting its sad eyes. “Thanks,” I said. I handed one to Ollie, who took it and examined it, unsure.

The first bite melted in my mouth. It tasted like pie. Apple pie. Apple and cinnamon and sugar and butter all mosh-pitted around in my mouth. It was a magically delicious apple! Finally, something in Oz that was actually as cool as advertised.

It was too good to last. I’d just taken another satisfying bite when I saw Indigo’s face go white. She pointed behind me and opened her mouth to say something. No sound came out.

And then.

It started to get dark. But it wasn’t the sun setting. The sky was as sunny as ever. Instead, it was like the world around us was being covered in shadows, starting with the yellow road. Then the shadows began to rise up from the ground, curling and inflating and twisting into forms. They were taking on shapes. Shapes that looked oddly, eerily familiar to me.

It was the Tin Woodman. He wasn’t alone.

I knew we were really in trouble when I saw that Indigo was too scared to even mutter an I told you so. She was just a little wall of fear with wide eyes. The color seemed to drain from her tattoos until they were just gray impressions on her skin. Ollie was shaking right down to the tip of his tail, the uneaten apple still in his hand.

This Tin Woodman was not the Tin Woodman I remembered. By now I shouldn’t have expected anything different—nothing was the way it was supposed to be in Dorothy’s remade Oz. Still. I wasn’t prepared for what I was looking at now.