Wicked Fox (Gumiho #1)(100)

“I made my own choices. You don’t want to die, Grandson. There’s still so much I hope for you to have in this life.”

He squeezed his eyes shut, the last of his tears streaming down his cheeks.

When he opened them again, she was gone and he was outside. He blinked up at the sky. He lay in the forest under so many stars that they outnumbered the dark.

“It seems you didn’t need me to get into trouble.”

Jihoon glanced at Yena beside him, sitting cross-legged in the tall grass. She watched the heavens instead of him. Why would his mind do this to him? Take his halmeoni away and replace her with this woman? “You might love your daughter, but I can never forgive you for what you’ve done.”

“I never asked for your forgiveness. But if you love my daughter, then let her live.” There was a pleading on Yena’s face, lending a softness to her angles he’d never noticed before.

“I don’t want her to die.”

“But you want to live, too.” Yena’s voice became hard.

As she said it, he knew it was true. New tears sprung to his eyes. It swirled the light of the stars until they mixed into a potion of stardust that blinded him. He couldn’t look his impending death in the eye and accept it. He wanted to live so desperately it hurt.

“At least when humans die there is an afterlife,” Yena said. “Gumiho cannot be promised such things.”

Jihoon was silent, unable to answer.

“Miyoung tethers me to my humanity,” Yena said softly, her eyes shining. Jihoon blinked. Sitting like this, Yena almost seemed human. “I had a human family once. They betrayed me, tried to kill me. Called me a monster and then made me into one. I thought that I didn’t deserve a family until I had Miyoung.”

“Is that why you’re fighting so hard for her?” Jihoon asked. “Because you’re afraid of becoming a monster?”

“I don’t fear my own fate. I was betrayed because I thought with my heart instead of my instincts. I won’t let the same thing happen to my daughter.”

Yena stood, her eyes black as onyx.

“That’s why you must die.”

And Jihoon realized this wasn’t a dream.





69





MIYOUNG FROWNED AS an automated message told her the voice mail was full. She’d been calling Nara all day, and the shaman hadn’t answered.

She shoved her phone into her pocket and glanced out the windows that lined the walkway back to the patient rooms. The sky was cloudy, but she saw, beyond the haze, the full moon.

She clutched the two banana milks tighter so her fingers made small indents in the plastic. Nara would call back. She knew how important this was. Miyoung didn’t want to dwell on the trust she was placing in the shaman again.

It’s too late, there’s no other choice, she told herself.

She stopped abruptly. Pain sliced through her, cold and sharp.

Her heart stuttered, and one of the containers fell from her fingers to splatter on her shoes.



She raced to Jihoon’s room, past startled nurses and patients. The rumpled bed was empty. Sheets tangled at the foot like they’d been kicked away. She dropped the second banana milk when she spun to grab the nearest nurse. The woman looked harried, her arms loaded with gauze.

“Where did the patient in room 1696 go?” Miyoung’s voice lifted in panic.

“I don’t know. Maybe they took him for a scan.” The nurse extracted herself from Miyoung’s grip and hurried away, sending curious glances over her shoulder.

“No,” Miyoung said to no one in particular, pressing her hand against her speeding heart. No matter what she did, she couldn’t slow it down. “Something isn’t right.”

Lights flashed across her vision and she blinked, worried she would lose consciousness if she didn’t calm down. But they wove in and out, stretched across her line of sight.

Somin walked up, eyeing Miyoung suspiciously. “Where’s Jihoon?” she asked, staring at the empty bed.

“I don’t know.” Miyoung squeezed her eyes shut. When she blinked them open, the lights began to bleed together. She realized they were pulsing. A beat like a heart. And it called to her. She knew then that it wasn’t just her imagination or the delirium of her weakening state. It was the bead calling to her. The bead leading her. To Jihoon. She let it embrace her, let it surround her. A glow starting in her chest and growing outward. When she opened her eyes, the lights were now a steady line of glittering crimson. She followed it.

The automatic door opened to let her outside, but Junu blocked her path. “Miyoung.”

She tried to move around him but he stopped her.

“What?” she asked, exasperated.

“It’s Yena.”

Dread settled in Miyoung’s belly. “What did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything.”

Miyoung narrowed her eyes at his careful wording. “You mean you didn’t stop her.”

Junu spread his hands out. “I don’t get involved in situations that can get me killed.”

“You should have stopped her.”

“She paid me well not to. And she paid me to keep you here.”

“Just try it.” Miyoung rocked onto the balls of her feet, ready to fight.