Page 23

CHAPTER 23

REN

The Under World

Fifth Ward, the Outer Ring

AT SOME POINT later, Sunho must have carried Ren into the apartment because she woke to the sound of the door catching against the frame. Sunho stepped inside, setting a paper bag on the small table.

He’d visited the bathhouse while she’d slept. His hair was swept back from his face, a few strands curling lightly over his forehead. He’d also changed out of his robes and now wore a loose white shirt and black trousers.

Ren rubbed her eyes as she sat up from the cot. “ I would have liked to bathe,” she said, pouting a little.

“Sorry.” He ducked his chin. “I didn’t want to wake you. You looked… peaceful.”

She immediately forgave him.

“I brought you something.” He shifted open the paper bag. A fragrant aroma permeated the tiny space. She shifted toward the edge of the bed as he walked over, pulling a steamed bun from the bag.

It was still warm, and she blew softly on the surface before biting into the fluffy exterior. The rich, sweet filling of red beans exploded against her tongue.

“I could eat five hundred of these,” she said, devouring the bun in several large mouthfuls.

“Help yourself.” He took out one bun for himself and tossed her the bag with the rest.

She ate three more in the time that he ate his one.

“So,” she said, licking her lips, “what’s the plan?”

“We’ll head to the seventh ward. I have a contact that—” He stopped with a frown, his eyes flitting to the door. It rattled against the frame as someone banged loudly on the surface.

Ren reached for her satchel, but Sunho shook his head slightly, pointing to his ear—he could hear whoever was outside. He placed his sword against the wall next to the door, then opened it.

A sallow-faced man stood outside. “You’re back. It’s been two weeks. I thought you’d run off.”

“What do you want?” Sunho said.

The man’s eyes shifted over Sunho’s shoulder, narrowing as they caught sight of Ren. Sunho moved his body, blocking the man’s view of her.

He sneered. “You’re not paying rent for two. If the girl wants to stay, there’s a vacancy below.”

Sunho tensed. “Vacancy?”

“That woman and her brat couldn’t make rent. I reported them after you—hey!”

Sunho shoved him backward and he fell. Ren hurried to follow, jumping over the man, who was now cursing loudly from the ground.

She found Sunho on the floor below, coming out of an identical apartment. His expression was grim.

“What happened?” she asked, peeking behind him. The apartment appeared ransacked, the small bed frame in the corner overturned. She noticed a child’s wooden sword discarded on the floor. “Who lived here?”

“A boy,” Sunho said grimly, “Haru, and his mother. I saw him a few days before I left the Under World. He’d told me the landlord had been hounding them for rent. If the landlord reported them, it’s likely Haru was taken somewhere to pay off their debts.” He dropped his head. “It’s the same as when my brother and I were indentured to the army. I should have done something. Haru’s just a kid…”

Ren understood Sunho’s guilt. He might not have remembered what had happened to him, but she had a feeling a lot of the children in the Under World, at least in the Outer Ring, had a similar story.

“We’ll get him back,” Ren said. “It’s not too late. We can save him, like your brother, and my uncle. Let’s save him, because it’s the right thing to do. Because we can .”

That was the difference between when Sunho and Ren were children and now. They were older, they were stronger .

Sunho raised his eyes and she saw it again, that flash of blue.

“Okay.” He nodded. “All right.”

The landlord was still outside Sunho’s apartment, rubbing his backside.

“Haru and his mother,” Sunho said, his voice cold, “where did they go?”

“How am I supposed to know? I don’t keep track of pathetic dregs who can’t even cough up a coin to pay rent.”

“You kept track of Sunho,” Ren reasoned, “enough to know that he’d been gone for two weeks.”

“That’s different. He’s a mercenary. I want to keep my limbs intact.”

“And I’m assuming you still want that,” Ren said, waggling her eyebrows. The man scowled, but that didn’t stop him from shooting a fearful glance at Sunho.

“I don’t know about the mother,” the landlord said, “but the boy was taken by someone who works out of the Madang District. That’s all I know, I swear.”

Ren looked at Sunho’s troubled expression to see that wasn’t a good sign.

Back in the apartment, Sunho grabbed his sword while Ren fetched her satchel. Now that the landlord had seen her face, they wouldn’t come back here.

Outside on the landing, the sniveling man was nowhere in sight. Sunho led Ren down the metal stairs back onto the street. Without the sun, it was difficult to gauge the time, but it must have been closer to evening.

Old men smoked pipes on street corners, smoke drifting in lazy swirls. Most storefronts had lanterns hanging outside them, giving off enough light to see by. There was a bathhouse where steam puffed out from a crooked pipe. Next to it was a bakery that had a signboard outside depicting a variety of pastries and breads. A chime tinkled as a girl slipped through the door, carrying a covered basket in one hand, a lantern in the other.

Ren pointed to the shop. “Is that where you bought the steamed buns?”

Sunho nodded, though his attention was focused ahead of them. A group of boys around their age approached from the opposite direction, flinging themselves against one another in a rowdy manner. Ren felt a pressure on her arm, and she found herself being gently maneuvered to the side, Sunho taking the place she’d previously occupied. He’d positioned his body so that he was nearest the group of boys when they passed, one of whom knocked against his shoulder.

Ren looked up at Sunho, biting her lip to contain her smile.

Sunho raised his brow. “What?”

“Nothing.”

From the fifth ward, they made their way through the sixth, keeping to the outskirts to avoid running into patrols. Sunho had explained a bit of the city on the boat, how it was sectioned into nine wards with the Outer Ring surrounding them, that if they were to keep walking, they could circle the entirety of the city, though it would take a while.

After passing the marker for the seventh ward, they left the wider street onto narrower and more winding ones, and Ren quickly became disoriented.

They were passing a pawnshop when Sunho stopped. “I’m going to ask for directions.”

Ren nodded, and he entered the tiny shop, pushing aside the short curtain hanging over the doorway.

Ren pressed her back against the wall to wait for him. Across the street, a girl was selling flowers from a basket. They appeared to be cosmos, though Ren could only guess where the girl might have gathered them in a city without sunlight.

They weren’t pink and yellow, like those that grew in the valley, but blue. They reminded her of Sunho’s eyes. She approached the girl, reaching into her sash and pulling out the last of her remaining coins in exchange for the flower. She then brought it to her nose, inhaling its fragrant perfume. When she let out a sigh, they both giggled.

A few minutes later, Sunho stepped out of the pawnshop, glancing at the girl, who was already moving away.

“We’re almost there,” he said, nodding down a street that ran perpendicular to the shop.

Ren fell into step beside him. “You never finished telling me about this contact of yours.” She tucked the flower in the pocket of her skirt, its blue-petaled head peeking out.

“There isn’t much to tell. Before I left the city, I was given the name of a place to go to if I should ever need help.”

“Yes, but who told you?”

He glanced at her, then quickly away, and Ren was surprised to see a blush rising in his cheeks.

Who was this contact? A friend of his? Though he’d mentioned Rohoon and Heetae, his friends from when he’d been a soldier, he’d never spoken about anyone from the Under World.

An uneasy feeling lodged unbidden in her stomach, though she didn’t quite know why .

The road they walked on turned into a series of alleyways. They wove in and around laundry left out to dry and climbed up and down narrow stone steps, pieces of which sometimes crumbled beneath their feet.

At the end of a particularly long alleyway, an old woman sat cross-legged on a large woven mat, plucking the tails off bean sprouts. Her fingers were large and knobby, and she pinched the tails with practiced efficiency.

“Excuse me, grandmother,” Sunho said. “I’m searching for a place. It goes by the name of Wolryudang.”

The grandmother lifted her head slightly, peering first at Sunho, her eyes narrowing at the sight of his sword strung across his shoulder, then at Ren. She seemed to come to some sort of conclusion because she raised one arm and pointed to a small opening between two buildings, barely discernible in the darkness.

“Thank you,” Sunho said, bowing to her.

The opening was so narrow that they had to turn sideways to pass through.

“I think that grandmother might have been playing a trick on us,” Ren said, grimacing at the close proximity of her nose to the wall.

At last, they stepped out into a wide, open space surrounded on all sides by tall buildings, though none of them appeared to have doors. If there were other access points, Ren couldn’t see them.

They were in a courtyard, at the center of which stood a teahouse. It was two stories tall. Someone had strung lanterns from the eaves of the second story so that it glowed bright against the darkness. A sweep of stairs led up to the paper-lined doors, through which more lanterns could be seen glowing softly within.

As they approached the stairs, Ren noticed a large object at the edge of the courtyard, covered by a tarp. Her attention shifted away to a wooden signboard beside the teahouse, where the name of the establishment was written in elegant calligraphy.

“Wolryudang,” she read aloud. The Place Where the Moon Stays.

Sunho pushed open the doors. Inside it was quiet, peaceful. Dozens of lanterns were propped on tables and against the walls on the floor. Ren’s curiosity about this place and Sunho’s mysterious contact only grew stronger.

An elderly woman sat on a stool behind the bar at the back, sipping tea while reading a clothbound book. She peered over thin spectacles as they drew near. “Can I help you?”

Sunho took a deep breath, then said, “Yurhee gave me the name of this place. Could you let her know I’m here?”

Ren’s gaze darted to Sunho. Yurhee?

“There’s no one by that name here,” the old woman said. She took off her spectacles, wiping the lens with a piece of cloth. With the state of the cloth and the glasses, Ren wasn’t certain which was making the other worse.

“What about Tag?” Sunho offered.

The woman shook her head, placing the spectacles on the bridge of her nose. “I’m sorry, you’ve come to the wrong place.”

A crease worked between his brows. There was a long pause in which Ren wondered what he’d do next. Then he leaned forward.

“I’m looking for…” He pitched his voice lower, mumbling something.

“I can’t hear you,” the woman scolded. “Speak up!”

Sunho looked pained. He took a deep breath, and said, all in a rush, “I’m looking for the most beautiful girl in the Under World.”

The woman’s eyes widened. Ren gaped at Sunho, who turned his face from her, a blush creeping up his neck.

The woman cackled. “That girl!” She slapped her book closed onto the counter and hopped off her stool. “She’s always up to something. Wait here.” She shuffled through a curtain behind the bar.

Left alone with Sunho, Ren didn’t know what to say. This was an excellent opportunity to tease him, and yet she felt embarrassed herself. Clearly it was a passcode of some sort, but that didn’t stop the unpleasant feeling curdling in her chest.

They didn’t have to wait long. A door banged somewhere above them, followed by the sound of someone bounding down the stairs. The curtain behind the counter flung wide and a girl barreled through.

Ren’s heart sank. Yurhee wasn’t just beautiful, she was older .

“Sunho!” Rushing forward, she threw her arms around Sunho’s neck. He took a few steps back, his hands going up to catch her waist.

“I can’t believe you really showed up!” she exclaimed. Her voice was annoyingly pleasant. “Tag is going to be ecstatic!” She let go of him, though she kept one hand on his shoulder. “This might come as a surprise, but he really liked you.”

She smiled as she peered up at him. “You look different. Is that a hint of color in your cheeks?” She lifted her hand to his face, her fingers grazing his chin.

Ren had enough. She coughed. Loudly.

Yurhee turned, arching a brow. “Who’s this?”

“The most beautiful girl in all the worlds,” Ren declared, a little too loudly.

Now it was Sunho’s turn to gape at her.

Yurhee dropped her hand with a smirk. “Oh, is that how it is?”

“Ay, Yurhee,” a soft voice said before the curtain was pushed back to reveal a sleepy-eyed boy with light-colored hair. “You could have warned me before rushing off like that.”

“Tag!” Yurhee squealed, spinning on her heel. “Look who dropped in for a visit!”

The boy’s expression remained blank. “Sunho, isn’t it?”

“Oh, he’s such a tease. Don’t play coy, Tag.”

“If you’re going to talk, sit down and have some tea at least.” Having come back through the curtain, the old woman plopped a tea tray onto the closest table. She clicked her tongue as she walked away.

“Where are my manners?” Yurhee ushered them to take seats at the table. “My name is Yurhee. And this here is Tag.”

“I’m Ren,” Ren said, blushing furiously. She felt foolish now after her outburst.

“You’re not from the Under World, are you, Ren? You don’t have the look about you. Not pasty enough. How’d you end up here, and with Sunho of all people?”

Ren met Sunho’s gaze, and he nodded at her. She’d only tell them information that was necessary for them to know. Sunho had come to them, which meant he must think they could help in some way. “It’s a long story. My caravan was attacked by a demon, during which my uncle was severely injured. He contracted a fever for three days, and then his blood turned blue. The demon was from the Under World. I thought that if I could discover where it originated from, then I could find a cure. Sunho and I met along the way.”

Tag frowned. “A demon?”

“What’s in it for you?” Yurhee asked Sunho.

“I have my own reasons for helping Ren,” he answered. His gaze then shifted to Tag. “We call it a demon, but it’s not as simple as that. We killed one, and afterward it transformed back into a man. On his clothing was an emblem of a black wing, folded in half.”

Tag and Yurhee exchanged a glance. “I think I’m starting to understand why you came looking for us,” Tag said grimly.

“That night we broke into the mithril factory, you stole a map of the mines,” Sunho said. “That same symbol was on that map. If there’s something to discover that might lead us to a cure, I think it’ll be there.

“I know you have plans to infiltrate the mines.” Sunho met Yurhee’s gaze, then Tag’s. “Can you take us with you?”

Ren looked at Sunho in surprise. She hadn’t realized this was his plan. “Aren’t the mines…?” She pointed up.

He nodded. “We’d need something that can fly, an aircraft, but you have one of those, don’t you?” His eyes flitted to the doors leading to the courtyard.

Ren realized he was referring to whatever was beneath the tarp.

“We are planning on infiltrating the mines,” Yurhee said. “Tomorrow night, in fact. During the Festival of Light. At that time, hundreds of aircraft will flood the sky. We were going to use the commotion to slip by unnoticed.”

Ren leaned forward with excitement. “That’s perfect!”

Yurhee shook her head. “I’m afraid we can’t take you with us. We’ve been planning this for a long time. You two are unknown factors.”

“Won’t you at least think about it?” Ren pleaded.

“I’m sorry, truly. We want to help you, but we can’t take the risk.”

Ren slumped back in her chair.

“There’s one more thing,” Sunho said. “I’m looking for someone. About two weeks ago, my neighbor, a boy of around six or seven, was taken to pay off a debt, by someone in the Madang District.”

Yurhee cursed. “Bastards who traffic in children belong in another kind of hell.”

“I have a contact in the Madang District,” Tag said. “We can investigate in the morning. I have an errand to run in that part of the city.”

“I’ll go with you,” Sunho said, and Tag nodded.

“I’m sorry we can’t be of more help,” Yurhee said, “but you’re welcome to stay here for as long as you need. You can have your pick of the rooms upstairs.”

Then she said the words that could make Ren forget, at least for a short time, her worries. “But first, a bath!”