Page 101 of Reign of the Talon
“She killed people!” Eunbi fists the fabric of Sang’s tunic and glares at him.
“She thought she was protecting you,” Yoonho says sternly, and the tension bracketing his mouth is sorealthat it dawns on me that this is not a dream, not a dream at all. Somehow, I see Jeoseung, the underworld. Somehow, it calls to me, revealing this scene.
Why?
“Eunbi, honey,” Chryse says gently, “all Lina ever thought about was her little sister. Give her another chance. A lot of very, very bad things have happened to her.”
“She’s not the one who’s dead,” Eunbi weeps, clinging to Sang.
“No,” Sang agrees, “but some fates are even worse. Jeoseung…” He smiles a bit. “It is certainly no hell here. And Lina is hurting.”
“Do you remember your fifth birthday?” Chara asks. “The present Lina gave you?”
Eunbi’s fifth birthday was her first one after the death of our parents. I’d wanted to make it special, somehow. To make her happy or laugh for the first time in nearly a year. The twins had taken me to the Fingertrap, where I’d scoured the marketplace for the perfect gift. I’d almost settled on a storybook that was only slightly weathered, when I saw them.
A set of beautiful, porcelain dolls. Their hair seemed to be made from the finest, thinnest thread, and it flowed in waterfalls of inky black down their light hanboks. One of the dolls was small, nestled against the larger one, who stared down at her adoringly with meticulously painted eyes.
It was perfect. I’d rushed over to the merchant, eagerly fumbling for my pouch, but the woman took one look at me and laughed. The dolls, she said, were more yeokun than I could afford. Fifty yeokun for the small one, one hundred thirty for the larger one.
At that point, I hadn’t earned much with the Talons. The gang had money, of course, but I had very little for personal use, especially with the fees to keep Eunbi safely ensconced in the mountain school. Chara and Chryse offered to pool in their money, too, but I wanted this gift to my sister to be from me. Yet the merchant refused to haggle, and I’d left with a burning determination. Upon arriving back at the palace, I’d marched right up to Yoonho and asked how I could make one hundred twenty yeokun—the exact amount I’d needed to buy the dolls.
The answer was an assignment. My first one out of training. I’d never killed before, but I did that night, fueled by my own terror and childish, desperate need to buy Eunbi those godsdamned dolls. To make her happy. The man was a trafficker, but I didn’t enjoy it as much as I would grow to enjoy the others. I cried afterward in the twins’ room, but the next morning, I paid for the dolls in the Fingertrap, and Eunbi’s face when she’d opened the box had been…Gods, it had been the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.
I watch as Chara tells Eunbi the story, watch as my little sister swallows hard and listens raptly.
“She loved you so much,” Chara finishes hoarsely. “All she could talk about for weeks afterward was your face when you saw your present. From then on, she rarely bought herself anything. It was all for you, honey—for your school, for your clothes, for anything else you might have wanted. Your safety. She refused to buy herself new shoes for months, even when hers began to fall apart.”
My sister blinks glassily and mumbles something.
“What was that?” Yoonho asks gently.
“She shouldn’t have killed anybody for me. I never asked for that.”
“You didn’t,” agrees Yoonho, the lines on his face suddenly appearing deeper, “but I did.”
My heart falls as Eunbi glares at him, a stark reprimand in her shining eyes. Even Yoonho seems to wither underneath my sister’s unflinching judgment. It’s almost shocking, how the gang leader’s shoulders seem to hunch as Eunbi shakes her head in a depthless disappointment that goes far behind her years. Sang and the twins shift uncomfortably, staring down shamefacedly at their tea. Despite the pain in my heart, I fight back a small smile at Eunbi’s power over a gang of dangerous assassins, thieves, and spies.
The air in the room grows very thick, and only then does Eunbi glance away from the Talons. “Is she hurting badly?” Eunbi asks, staring down at her feet.
Sang swallows. “Very badly,” the spymaster whispers.
“AndIcan make it better?”
“If anyone can, it’s you,” Chara murmurs.
Eunbi draws a shuddering breath, leaving Sang and standing up straighter. “Then maybe,” she says, scrubbing at her puffy face, “maybe I should go. Again. She asked me to listen, but I didn’t.”
In a movement that reminds me very much of myself, Eunbi smooths down her hanbok and marches toward the delicate screen door…
On the bed, my eyes open. I stare at the cabin’s ceiling, breathing hard. My mouth tastes like cherry blossoms, and I can almost feel the white mist of the underworld coiling around my body. Itcallsme to it.
Not for the first time, I wonder what it means that these visions come to me. That Jeoseung seems to be…talkingto me?
There is a hesitant knocking on the cottage door, and I freeze. Eunbi. It must be. Slowly, as the knocking continues, I inch out of bed. One hand hovering above the doorknob, I hesitate. Am I strong enough to face her? To look my mistakes in the eye and know there is nothing, nothing I can do to take them back?
What I would sacrifice to give Eunbi the gift of life once more. A bitter taste replaces the cherry blossoms in my mouth as Eunbi calls my name. Slowly, steeling myself, I open the door.
Eunbi stands there, avoiding my eye. “Chara told me about the dolls,” she whispers. “From my fifth birthday. I didn’t know about them.”
