The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea(15)

“You could run.” The words were out of my mouth before I could stop them.

Hyeri turned to me, her lips painted pink with the crushed petals of azaleas. Her eyes were darkened with coal from the smoldered hearth. “Where would I run to?”

“Don’t you have someone who would look after you? Family to protect you?”

Hyeri shook her head slowly. “Just my sister, and she’s been gone these past five years.”

“Gone?” I leaned forward, encouraged, thinking Hyeri could go wherever her sister had gone. To the capital, maybe. To somewhere safe. “Gone where?”

Hyeri turned away. The open window of the room looked out toward the rice fields and, beyond them, the sea. In the darkness, you couldn’t see it, but you could hear it—the tireless wind blowing the warm air across the room. You could feel it—the salt on your skin, pooling in a thick layer. Like ashes.

Hyeri’s voice was quiet. “I was always better at swimming. Much better than my sister, who feared the water. Tomorrow, when they throw me into the sea, I’m just going to swim. I’m going to swim and swim until I can’t any longer.”

“But your sister—”

“Five years now. They say every bride of the Sea God is the same. But they’re wrong. Why can’t they see?”

Her voice turned urgent then. She grabbed my wrists and pulled me closer, her eyes fever bright. “Some brides are chosen, but then there are those who choose to be brides.”

Dropping my wrists, she closed her eyes. “They wonder why someone would choose to give up her own life. They could never understand.”

“They?” I asked. “The villagers?”

She nodded. “There are the girls who choose to be brides because they want to bring wealth to their family, since the bridal price paid by the village is steep. There are the girls who choose to be brides because they want the glory of being one of those beautiful few, tragically sacrificed. There are even the girls who truly believe that all of this is real, and that they won’t drown, but will be saved by the Sea God.”

Hyeri opened her eyes, her gaze finding the window and the night beyond. “Then there are the girls like my sister, who want to be the Sea God’s bride because it hurts too much to be themselves.”

I moved closer to Hyeri then, taking her cold hands in my own.

“All this makeup will wash away in the water,” Hyeri said, choking back a laugh. “And until then, I’ll look like I have ink for tears.”

“I’ll wipe it off.” I reached for a cloth, dipped it into a bowl of water, and dabbed it beneath her eyes.

“You’re a kind girl, Mina. I may seem confident, but I’m very afraid. I want to live. Is there any way a person can die, yet still live?”

At the time, I didn’t have an answer for her. It was the night, and she would soon leave to be sacrificed in the morning. And for a year, I couldn’t understand why she’d choose to be a Sea God’s bride.

Not until that moment when I stood at the prow of the boat, my anger like a storm in my soul, and jumped into the sea.

“You cry too much.” Dai looks up at me, hands cupped beneath my chin to catch the tears slipping down my face.

“Do I?” I say, laughing. A beaming happiness floats within me, that Hyeri should be here now, alive and well. I point to the slowly moving procession. “Tell me more. Tell me anything.”

“You want to know about Shiki’s bride?”

I nod emphatically.

“I don’t know much about her.” He pauses. “Shiki, on the other hand…”

“Yes?” I smile at him encouragingly.

“He’s a coldhearted bastard!”

“Watch your language,” Mask chides. “Shiki isn’t so bad. Just a little on the serious side. And even if he were a little bad, rumors hint that the death god adores his new bride. The wedding was a grand celebration.”

I widen my eyes, making exaggerated movements between her and the moving caravan. “What was it like?”

“I wasn’t invited!” Mask says. “Only the most important people in the city were invited. The lords of Tiger House and Crane House. The Great Spirit. Every lesser god with a shrine to his name.” Mask scratches her wooden cheek. “Now that I think about it, lots of people were invited.”

“Just not us!” Dai shouts.

“The Sea God, of course, but seeing as he hasn’t left his palace in a hundred years, that was a waste of an invitation! Oh, and Lord Shin, I suppose. Though I doubt he made an appearance. All things considered.”

“They had a huge fight,” Dai explains to me. “Do you know what the fight was about?” he asks, turning to Mask.

“What fights that matter are always about.”

“Food?” Dai suggests.

I think of the local warlords who fight over the land back home. “Power?”

Mask’s expression remains benign, and yet I sense hostility emanating from her. “Who raised you both? Did they teach you nothing? Love is what drove them apart, and love is what will bring them together—if they’re not too stubborn to forgive each other!”

“Shin was in love with Hyeri, too?” Dai asks.

Mask throws her hands up in the air, clearly frustrated. Pivoting, she walks into the crowd that has dispersed around Hyeri’s retreating caravan. We hurry to catch up.