Inkdeath is a fantasy novel written by award-winning German author Cornelia Funke, and the third in its series. It is a novel set inside another novel, which has been written so well as to come to life. Numerous characters, good and evil alike, struggle to influence the outcome of the story by the use of words alone.

Inkdeath begins with Mortimer, the Bluejay, in the forest near Ombra, attacking the forces of the Adderhead wherever he can find them. This draws the attention of Orpheus, a man who has learned how to change the land and its inhabitants by writing words and reading them aloud. Orpheus has sworn to bring back his favorite hero, Dustfinger, and Mortimer agrees to summon the White Women in order to allow him to do so, for they can release people from death itself. However, Mortimer is betrayed by Orpheus, who attempts to exchange Dustfinger's life for that of the Bluejay. When the white women appear, they take Mortimer with them and disappear, leaving no trace of him. His wife, Resa, suffers from guilt, since she was the one who begged him to make the deal. His daughter, Meggie, blames her mother for her father's death and the two find themselves at odds with one another upon his disappearance.

However, the White Women soon release Mortimer, alongside Dustfinger, because they wish the immortal Adderhead to come to an end. Their leader is angry with Mortimer for making the Adderhead immortal in the first place, and they threaten to take his daughter unless he kills the Adderhead. In order to do this, Mortimer must write three words in a book he once bound for the Adderhead in order to make him live forever. Furious at the reappearance of Mortimer, the Adderhead demands the children of Ombra be taken hostage until the Bluejay gives himself up. Mortimer gives himself up both to save the children and ensure that he may be put closer to the Adderhead and the White Book. Meanwhile, Dustfinger condemns Orpheus for attempting to trade Mortimer's life for his own, and Orpheus becomes spiteful with jealousy, resolving to aid the Adderhead in order to show Dustfinger what a terrible mistake he made.

Mortimer is aided in his attempt to defeat the Adderhead by the evil ruler's own daughter, Violante. Violante hates her father because of his cruelty, and she saves Mortimer's life by pretending to take him captive. She moves him from Ombra to the Castle in the Lake in order to keep him safe from servants of the Adderhead who hate Mortimer even more than the Adderhead does. Meanwhile, Mortimer's family and friends must struggle to keep the children safe, as they are hunted by the Adderhead's forces. In the end Mortimer is saved by his own wife and manages to write in the book. The great evil brought to the land by his rulership is brought to an end, and Mortimer and his family stay in Ombra. It has become more real to them than the world they once left.