Page 120 of The Girl with a Thousand Faces
Instead, you are only amazed.
Even… awestruck, if only briefly.
For she is beautiful, in a twisted way, and something about her sorrowful, ferocious expression restores a hint of the wonder you once felt, long ago. You’re not fully immune to her ghost glamour, not when clothed in human skin.
Tilt your head up, hold her gaze. Neither of you speaks, because neither of you can. It doesn’t matter. Some moments don’t need words. She is holding your body, you realize with shock; somehow, that detail escaped you till now.
Your mind is awhirl. A part of you is angry that Mercy broke out so quickly. The rest of you rather admires her for it. The prison that was supposed to last years has done about three hours, if that.
Perhaps this is just divine destiny. If so, who are you to argue with heaven?
Hello, niece, Mercy says.
“You remember, at last. Took you long enough.” Incredibly, a torrent of emotions stirs in your chest. As it did not do when you killed her again and locked her away.
I do remember, she says.It has come back to me… all of it, everything. I’m afraid I have not behaved very well.
“That’s a hell of an understatement!” you hiss. “Youdareshow your face to me, even still?”
Because I have to stop this madness!Her gesture takes in the half-finished fu talisman, the city at large.Kit Ling and Cobra Lily, all the other people in this city, these ghosts you want to free… none of that is necessary. You can have your body back. You’ve already killed me. What else is there to do?
“Why would I even want that, Chen Mei Chi? My old, tired body, that you have used, abused, riddled with scars, and worn out? No, thank you! I would never settle for my own skin when I can have a closet full of them.”
She blinks slowly.You want… immortality?
“I don’t want immortality, I simplyhaveit, and so do you. This is a powerful curse, Mei Chi. We can live for all eternity with a thousand different faces. Which you wasted by sulking on an island for years, then traipsing around inmybody for even longer.”
Do youknow, she says, thoughtfully,I think you might be the first ghost in history to outsmart her own curse. Niece, I must applaud your creativity in learning how to exist forever, even if I disapprove of what you’re doing.
Her attitude is grating. “It’s not about living forever,” you snap. “It is deeper than that. You wouldn’t understand.”
Try me, little girl. You have destroyed a city and killed people I care about to get my attention. Don’t you want to talk? I am here, I am listening.
Almost, you shout thatNo, I don’t want to talk, I want to punish you foreverbut you realize with faint chagrin that isn’t true.
Maybe it’s the influence she has, that strange unspoken knack which drives ghosts to speak with her, when they should not. Or maybe it’s simply the full force of the history between you both, bearing down on your tongue with the weight of a thousand angry words.
Whatever the reason, words come pouring out.
“How little you know,” you say, voice crackling. “To be killed, betrayed, and abandoned is one thing entirely. To have your tormentor forget about you, as if all the pain you have ever known meant nothing and could not touch them, is something else entirely. Can you even begin to understand that?”
Of course I can, Mercy says, sincerely.I am the one person in your life who understands that pain so perfectly.
“Then why did you inflict it on me? Do you drown and abandon all the nieces you like, or only the special ones?” Your volume ratchets louder with every word. “It’s as if all that I am, or ever could be, means nothing.Imean nothing to the one person who defines my whole existence. It’s not fair!”
Then what would make it fair?she says.
“Your destruction!” Point at the gourds beside you with a snarl. “That is also what they will want, when I free them. To hurt those who betrayed them. The price of peace is always death, and we need death for our peace!”
Did you feel better when I was stuffed in a barrel, or did you feel the same?she retorts, and you hiss at her in fury, because she’s not wrong.I may be a silly old woman, but I do know this much, Siu Yin. When I drowned the village of Shek Ham Chau, my heart was not calmer at all. Not a jot, not for a second. I am sure that yours isn’t, either, despite trying to punish me. You might think that unleashing hell on Hong Kong is going to heal your heart, but it won’t.
She’s thinking of Cobra Lily, telling her a few days ago that this is justice and wishing she’d questioned it. Justice can involve death, and certainly has, but Cobra Lily’s outlook was far too narrow. Just like yours is now.
“Then whatwillheal me?” you snarl, unable to stop yourself from asking the question. “Since you’re so wise and have so much wisdom!”
Nothing, she says, simply and sadly.Pain and grief are holes that never fill. We just learn to step around them as we walk.
“Not good enough,” you say, ragged and shaken. It’s eerily similar to the sort of thing your father might have said, back when he was alive. “Not fucking good enough!”
