Page 46 of Reign of the Talon
The Dokkaebi emperor can’t help but to smirk, but he chooses his next words carefully, although he is loath to steer the currents of the conversation into more dangerous waters. “I…have heard tell that you wish to fight with my armies.”
“We come to lend our aid,” Haemosu says gruffly, crossing his arms. “This war has gone too far. We do not know for sure, but if anything can stop a Prophecy, it is a god.”
“Anda goddess,” Dalnim adds pointedly, and Haemosu grimaces under her glare.
“That is what I meant, sister.”
“Hm.” Dalnim turns back to Rui. “Hwanin, our great emperor, has granted us leave to descend to Iseung and try to protect this mortal realm. Habaek the River God may also come, for he also loved this world, once—”
“You mean he loved the human women,” Haemosu mutters contemptuously. “Went after them like a squirrel goes after nuts—”
Haemosu and Habaek, Rui knows, have a complicated history. Habaek has never quite gotten over Haemosu’s attempt at marrying one of his daughters without first consulting him. The ensuing feud included a battle of shapeshifting and Habaek’s defeat, which the river god did not take in stride.
“—and will fight for it,” Dalnim continues. “Habaek waits, though, to see this kingdom’s fate.” The goddess ignores her brother. “The last war against the Imugi left too many strings loose, and we pay for it now. Perhaps we should not have abandoned Iseung when we did. But we will make up for it now. We have brought with us our Bulgae.”
Rui’s heart nearly stops in his chest.Bulgae. The vicious, mythical fire dogs responsible for lunar eclipses, swallowing the moon and sun as they race against the sky. Yet that is not the only place their talents lie. They are dangerous creatures, capable of hunting down targets using nothing but the smallest fragment of scent, of killing brutally and viciously.
“Where…are they?” he manages to ask. “I see none here, which is perhaps a relief.” He tries for a light, casual tone even as his stomach swims at the suspected answer. “If I remember correctly, they had a tendency to chew up the carpets.”
“Ah,” Haemosu says. “We’ve sent them ahead.”
The world goes quiet. So, so quiet. Rui’s whisper seems to him a scream as he says, “Ahead?”
“The Bulgae may be able to take care of that girl,” Dalnim explains patiently. “The one who leads the Imugi. Shin Lia, is it?”
“Lina,” he manages to get out. “But that’s not her—”
Dalnim doesn’t seem to be listening to him. “We hope our Bulgae can stop their route to Sanyeongto. If not, of course, then we will become directly involved in the battles. But let’s see how this goes, first.” She smiles at him, as if he’s a child she’s given some grand present.
“Wait,” Rui breathes shakily. “Wait.” At once, the beautiful hope he felt after visiting Lina begins to crumble and crumble into something darker, sharper. Despair. “This”—Rui summons the red thread, and the twins do not seem at all astonished to see it—“this thread, its power has strengthened. If she dies, I die. If I die, she dies.”
Dalnim and Haemosu exchange looks. There is no surprise there, but there is in Dalnim’s eyes perhaps a glimmer of pity.
“You knew,” Rui rasps. “Youknewthat.”
Sighing, the goddess nods. “We need a definite way to end this war, Rui. I know you love this girl, but the only sure way to prevent the Prophecy from being fulfilled, and this realm being terrorized by Yong, is to kill her.”
“Why not just killme?” snarls Rui. Not, of course, that he would like that. At all. Yet it makes no sense. “We are linked. Why not—”
“You are my descendant,” she replies quietly. “That means something, Rui. I will not raise my own hand to you. Know, though, that your sacrifice will be appreciated—”
“Don’t. Don’t do this,” Rui begs. “Please.”
Dalnim’s eyes are so very silver and so very sad as she replies, “It’s already been done.”
…
It happens between one step and another.
As Rui staggers from the throne room, a hand pressed to his chest as if he can ease the ache lodged in his heart, he suddenly hits…air.
Rui does not even have time to shout in alarm before he is somehow falling through wisps of cloud and blue sky, unable to do anything but flail his arms in a rather un-emperorlike panic until some unseen force apparently takes pity on him. His descent slows, and he flutters like a cherry blossom to the ground…which is not a ground at all.
Or perhaps it is—it’ssolid, at least—but it is not the soil and grass that one would expect. Instead it is a writhing mass of…of colorfulthreads, moving and twisting beneath each other like a living thing, roiling like a sea of rainbow. Rui can barely stand, his knees threatening to buckle as he looks frantically around him. What in the gods’ teethisthis?
His eyes land on a woman, sitting serenely on the churning, threaded earth. She looks familiar, somehow, with her dark red hair flowing down her back and seemingly melding with the thousands of threads below. Rui’s mind struggles to place her as he takes in the crimson of her hanbok and the slight furrow of her brows…
The woman’s eyes open, warm brown settling on him. “Dokkaebi,” she says kindly, so softly that he strains to hear her voice underneath the sound of the threads rasping against each other. “Won’t you come and sit down?” She pats the ground next to her, but Rui is far too confused to do anything but stare in utter bewilderment.
