The Girl Who Fell Beneath the Sea(64)

Kirin’s grip tightens. “You are, Namgi.”

Before our eyes, Namgi’s body begins to fade.

I look desperately from Namgi to Kirin. “What’s happening?”

“He’s losing his soul,” Kirin chokes. “Hurry, we need to get him to the river. Help me, Mina.”

Together we manage to get Namgi onto Kirin’s back. I take the lead, checking around corners to see if there are any snakes in our path.

Around and above us, the battle rages on. I catch sight of the death god Shiki jumping from rooftop to rooftop, leading a band of warriors with bows slung low across their backs. I look for Shin in the group, disappointed not to find him among their number.

We reach the river. Unlike the night of the storm, it’s calm. Few bodies float on the surface. Kirin and I gently lift Namgi from Kirin’s back and lay him by the shore.

“Look for Namgi,” Kirin says, unbuttoning his jacket. “He should be coming down the river.”

The thought terrifies me. Only the recently deceased float down the River of Souls. Is Namgi … dead? He’s lying so still. A curl of hair falls over his pale face. Without his vibrant soul to light him up, he looks empty …

“Mina!” Kirin shouts.

I snap my head from Namgi’s body to the river. I need to concentrate. He isn’t gone. Not yet.

At first all I see are strangers, older men and women, ghostly shadows in the water. But then …

“There!” I point to a familiar lanky body. Namgi floats facedown on the surface. I look over to Kirin to find him approaching the river.

“Kirin,” I say, suddenly realizing what he plans to do, “Shin said only the dead can enter the river. The current will sweep your soul away.”

“I’m not going into the river.”

Kirin steps to the very edge, the water lapping at his feet. His body begins to tremble, and his skin emits a beautiful silver light. The human shape of him morphs, changing. There’s a burst of illumination, like a star exploding. A beast of myth emerges from the light, its hooves clopping on the stone. Where once Kirin stood, there now stands a magnificent four-legged beast with two horns and a mane of white fire. It has the shape, body, and legs of a deer, but the height and strength of a horse.

“Kirin?” I whisper, and the beast gazes at me with silver eyes. It tosses its head back, jabbing its hooves in the air. It then leaps from the bank onto the water. The beast doesn’t sink but walks on the surface. With every step of its hooves, radiant light pulses outward, trailing incandescence.

Kirin reaches Namgi’s body in the river, nudging his shoulder with his nose. When Namgi opens his eyes, I sigh with relief. With Kirin’s prodding, Namgi grabs on to Kirin’s neck and pulls himself onto the beast’s broad back. Slowly, so as not to let Namgi fall, Kirin begins heading back to shore.

A loud screech draws my gaze to the sky. A sea snake circles in the air above the river, eyeing Kirin and Namgi. If it attacks, it will be disastrous. Even if Kirin can fight in his beast form, he can’t risk dropping Namgi.

With one hand, I grab my great-great-grandmother’s knife, and my skirt with the other. Turning, I sprint from the river, back toward the city. When I hear the scream in the air, I know the sea snake has spotted me. I pump my legs, moving as fast as I can.

I know what I’m doing is reckless. Namgi and Kirin would never ask me to risk my life for theirs. But I can’t help it. It’s true that people do the most desperate things for those they love. Some might even call it a sacrifice—maybe that’s what people believed when I jumped into the sea in place of Shim Cheong. But I think it might be the other way around. I think it would be a terrible sacrifice to do nothing.

And never was it for anyone’s sake but my own. I couldn’t endure in a world where I did nothing, where I let those I love suffer and be hurt. If I had stayed home, if I had never run after Joon, if I had never jumped into the sea, there would have been such a hole in my heart—the emptiness of having done nothing at all.

Still, as I look at the snakes chasing me, the snakes in front of me, blocking my way, I wish the circumstances weren’t always so dire.

I’ve reached the main boulevard outside the Sea God’s palace. The wide-open space is overrun with sea snakes slithering down every alley and climbing over the many rooftops. I’m surrounded. My chest pounds with the pressure from my lungs. My shoulder aches from the wound left by the assassin.

The sea snakes converge upon me, large and terrifying. I brandish my knife with two hands. I can see the faces of people watching me from the buildings. Earlier, a boy had called me the Sea God’s bride and asked me for a kiss. I won’t disappoint him now. After all, I am a Sea God’s bride. Maybe not the Sea God’s bride, but a girl who wished, in a world far distant from this one, for a different fate from the one I’d been given, one I could grasp on to and never let go.

A tremendous roar shakes the city.

I look up.

The dragon crashes down from the sky.

The dragon is massive, three times the size of the largest snake. It sweeps its long tail through the street, hurtling Imugi against buildings. As a pack, the Imugi attempt to close in on the dragon, but it lashes out, thrashing and flailing. A freezing wind picks up. Shards of ice like glass whip out from the air, piercing the thick hides of the snakes. One by one, the snakes fall to the ground, transforming into men. The rest take to the air, screaming their defeat.