Page 114 of Reign of the Talon
You’re too late,the Prophecy sneers as I shoot upward, back toward the brain, where the parasite digs in its hold, refusing to let go. It shivers and shakes, crouched on the intricate, pink folds of tissue, stretched out to cover all four lobes.I have been Fulfilled.
Not all of you. Not yet.For there is one more line that has not yet come to fruition. One more destiny that I’ve yet to meet.
And it will be me who meets it.Me. Shin Lina.
Even in here, it is as if I can somehowfeelGameunjang watching, smiling as all she has hoped for begins to play out. She has played me as finely as a musician plays her strings, yet there is nothing I can do about it without damning the world to Jeoseung. I must allow fate, no matter how deceitful, to take its course.
“The Prophecy was never about the Imugi or the Three Kingdoms. It was aboutyou.”
Desperately, I launch myself forward and the Prophecy hisses, scrabbling atop my brain. I land, an insubstantial ball of light that barrels forth across the lobes, across the bumps and grooves.
The Prophecy laughs, hideously.
So naive,it jeers, but I am not listening. I am done listening to this parasite, this monster, this disease. Burning brightly with anger, I force the Prophecy back, back. It scuttles off like a frightened insect, shrinking away from my light and warmth. As I cross this land, with its many sections, many ridges and folds, an outside sensation starts to return to me.
The world is screaming.
Blood and ash, in my mouth.
A brief glimpse of a storm-cloud sky, of cold rain pelting down. There, and then gone.
The Prophecy growls and, in a lurching movement, launches for me. Its impact is sharp and jagged, like falling onto the rough rocks at the beach. Yet I hold fast, and we become a blur of light and dark, tumbling across the brain, tearing and shredding into each other like feral wolves.
My body. Mine. No one else’s.
The pain is astounding—it is like nothing I have ever felt, a pain that is exquisite in its agony, a pain that banks as I push determinedly forth, forcing the Prophecy to scuttle toward the end of the brain where nothing but a steep drop into nothingness awaits. Its inky form is dissolving, dark globules tearing off into the air, eaten away by me—by my light, my anger, my godsdamndetermination.
You’ve...lost…the Prophecy gasps as it teeters over the edge, clinging onto a deep groove with spidery, shadow fingers, refusing to fall into the abyss of nothingness that waits for it. I loom over it and look into this creature that has masqueraded as me, that has convinced the world that Shin Lina is a monster, a madwoman.
I look at it, and I see only a figment of a dark dream, a hopeful wish that will be destroyed, a parasite of the lowest order, a pathetic puddle of shit and shadow. I glow brighter and brighter, becauseI have broken free.
Despite all, I have godsdamnedtriumphed.
No. I’ve won, I tell it.
No longer will I be the Prophecy’s host. No longer will my mind be shared by some inhuman creature.
For the first time, I am free.
Free.
With a triumphant burst of energy, golden and blinding and bright, I rip the Prophecy into nothingness, its scream of pain rattling in my ears like a battle song, like my own war cry. I make it painful, dragging it apart, shadowy ligament by ligament, burning it, scorching it with my own power. The Prophecy thrashes and howls as it is torn into shreds, as it dissolves into nothingness, as it withers and rots. I do not stop until the darkness is entirely gone, do not stop until the Prophecy is truly dead, until it is nothing, nothing at all.
And in the world above, in the world that I have been kept from, in the body that is my own…
My eyes fly open.
CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX
Shin Lina
My heart. A pulsing, muscular organ in my chest. Pumping blood through my body, blood that runs green but used to run red.
My eyes. Capturing the storm-cloud sky, the smudged grays and smoky blues. Blinking blearily. Unsteadily.
My ears. The unnatural roars tunnel through them as creatures take to the skies, their monstrous bodies visible through the clouds only when a flash of brilliant lightning illuminates the long, sinuous shadows in the distance, swimming through the sky with predatory grace.
My arms. Trembling as I stand in the storm, cold rain kissing my skin. My fingers. Gleaming with another flash of lightning, rings impossibly shining upon flexing fingers. Jade garakji. A thin, silver band. Both once broken into dust, now somehow whole once more.
