Page 7

Chapter Seven

K i s a

K isa’s coffee has long gone cold by the time she returns to the sick bay. She keeps her head down to hide her disappointment from Hajun. I’ve stepped in it, Kisa thinks bitterly, trying not to look at the red thread. That’s the problem with her, isn’t it? She gets so enthusiastic, so very lost in her own whirring mind, that she forgets to slow down. Kisa feels her throat tighten in shame as she brushes off a curious Hajun and slips into the bathroom for a few moments of privacy.

Seokga was quite clearly, obviously, visibly upset. Of course. Why did I say it like that? Kisa curses herself, pumping some of the sweet-scented foam soap into her hands and scrubbing them underneath a jet of warm water. Technically, such sanitization is unnecessary when one is already in the underworld, but old habits quite literally die hard. A research collaboration ? Working with him on this development?

It’s true, of course, that she’s jubilant to be experiencing something like this—the gap in the literature is astounding; if she can manage to write something, that could be invaluable —but she should have eased into it. Kisa has frightened him off.

The right thing to do would have been to tell the god she was looking forward to getting to know him. That’s almost certainly what a normal woman would have done, right after finding themselves thrilled— exhilarated, even—to be Threaded to a god …and, at that, one as—as handsome, as powerful, as Seokga. There would have been no flustered ramblings about research or libraries or awkward stammers to fill an equally awkward silence. She’d just been so excited…

“Kisa?” Hajun asks, gently knocking on the door as she dries her hands. “Are you okay?”

No. No, she’s not. She’s a bloody mess. Taking a few deep breaths, she reknots her hair and slips back out into the clinic.

“Oh, no,” Hajun says, staring down at her with those wide, heavily lashed eyes she so often envies. It’s not uncommon that a deep sadness churns in their depths, but right now, only a tender concern shines through. “You blew it, didn’t you?” His tone isn’t accusatory at all (it’s empathetic, really), but Kisa still winces.

“Was it that obvious that I would?” Her shame grows. Why, she thinks bitterly, can’t she be normal ?

Her friend’s eyes soften even further. “I think anyone would blow it. I mean, the fact that you didn’t scream and run away is already impressive. You saw me. I threw a paperweight at him.”

She can’t hold back a small smile as she steps behind the counter, riffling through a few charts. In her absence, Hajun has logged treating a few guests for seasickness. There will be more in the coming hours.

“Besides,” Hajun continues, leaning on the other side, “if you really are soulmates, he’ll forgive you for whatever you said.” His pink lips curve into a hesitant smile as he props his chin on a hand. “And I promise he’ll come to love that freaky brain of yours…”

“Hajun.” Kisa almost laughs.

“I’ll never understand how you keep so much stuff in it.”

Slowly, with Hajun’s light, kind teasing, Kisa’s mood begins to rise. By the time the clinic is flooded with gwisin (who, despite being dead, are still capable of vomiting from seasickness), Kisa has managed to lose herself in her tasks, pushing her disastrous meeting with Seokga from her mind.

It’s what she’s always done, burying her emotions in work. It’s what made her such a brilliant shaman, why the SH Magical Maternity Unit had a mortality rate lower than .02 percent. Gods, how Kisa misses being a shaman. Samsin Halmoni’s patronage, and gifted powers, ended the moment she died. The goddess has no use for dead shamans.

The loss of it, that power, was debilitating at first. Like learning to walk again with only one leg. Kisa has learned to stumble and hop, but there is a dry, empty well within her where her shamanic magic used to gather and grow.

Up to her elbows in seasick gwisin and determinedly compartmentalizing her emotions into little boxes on a shelf, Kisa hardly notices the woman who practically sashays into the med bay, grinning with teeth stained blue with blood. It’s only when Hajun, having walked over to the woman with a correct amount of trepidation, politely inquires how he can help her that Kisa snaps to attention and hurries out of the small patient room (where a man is dry-heaving into a bucket) and into the clinic’s foyer.

“What, uh, um, happened to you?” Hajun eloquently asks through a terrified smile that still somehow manages to be sweet and concerned.

Kisa narrows her eyes. “Who did you try to eat?” she inquires sternly, having already noted the woman’s small white canines and the distinctly unhinged look in her eyes. Gumiho. It’s a problem on board: Unruly gumiho crew members (placed on the Flatliner as punishment for murder) will try to steal souls through their usual method of kissing. They’ll soon realize it’s impossible: Everyone on here is a soul. After realizing that, they’ll shift into their fox forms and try to directly eat their victim.

But the woman isn’t dressed in uniform. She’s wearing a vintage black peacoat, curly black hair chopped into a distinctly French bob, feet slipped into Jimmy Choos. An Unruly gumiho—but not a crew member? Warily, Kisa watches as the guest smiles.

“Some old banker,” she says, wincing, a hand fluttering to her stomach. “He got away. You might want to expect a patient with a big bite mark sometime soon. I don’t feel all that great now, unfortunately. Do you have any Tums?”

Hajun backs away. “Please don’t eat me,” he whispers.

The woman tilts her head, looking at him. “You’re too pretty to eat,” she says and—to Kisa’s shock—Hajun blushes before hurrying over to one of the seasick patients.

“You can’t eat people on board,” Kisa says, folding her arms. “Not only is it not allowed, but—as you’re experiencing—it’s very uncomfortable. You’ve basically imbibed a part of somebody’s raw essence…Which is fascinating, really, but beside the point…” Walking past the gumiho, Kisa rummages through one of the medicine cabinets, and shakes a few green pills into the woman’s hand. “Flesh doesn’t really exist here. We’re all souls, pure energy under the illusion of physical form because we’re used to existing in bodies. But it’s really not the same as it is in the world of the living. If you absorb a portion of someone else’s soul, symptoms will include—”

“Stomach cramps,” says the woman after swallowing the pills. “Dizziness. A powerful urge to gargle dish detergent.” She shudders.

“And cold sweats. Those will start soon, but the pills will expel the foreign essence.” Kisa sighs, grabbing a clipboard. “Name?”

“Nam Somi,” the woman says with a self-satisfied smile.

The name doesn’t mean anything to Kisa. “You’re a guest?”

“Yes,” Somi says, pouting sarcastically. “I worked so hard in my life. It’s actually pretty difficult being a serial killer.”

Frighteningly enough, Kisa doesn’t think that Somi is joking. She stares at the gumiho, who meets her eyes—and curiously, seems to falter for a moment.

“Do I…know you?”

“I’m afraid not,” Kisa replies blandly. “Now, if you don’t mind me asking…”

“I know what you’re thinking,” the gumiho says slyly as her face clears from whatever confusion had clouded it a moment before. “That I don’t deserve to be a guest on board. That’s where having illicit affairs with jeoseung saja come in handy.” She sniffs. Although the two women are similar in height, Somi’s heels boost her at least five inches above Kisa. “I guess I’ll stop trying to eat people. Only if this will happen every time, though. It’s worse than the Jitters and Cravings I used to get.”

Jitters. Cravings. Kisa arches a brow. Gumiho hypersensitivity to soul-absorption and liver-imbibing is rare, but so are Unruly gumiho. Many of the nine-tailed foxes steer clear from eating men at all, a modern taboo. “If you do this again, it’ll be the same result,” Kisa confirms, unamused, finishing her log. “I’ll also have to report this to the on-board haetae.” Officer Shin Korain is head of the ship’s security unit, and asks that any wrongdoing be reported to him immediately.

Somi shrugs. “He knows. I did it in front of him.” She wipes her mouth. “I told him I slipped and fell. My teeth just happened to puncture the banker. I think he believed me. I’m just banned from Deck 6 now, which is a shame. The greenhouse is so pretty. Thanks for the pills.”

Hajun joins Kisa’s side again as Somi struts out.

“That one is going to be trouble,” he says, but he’s smiling a little bit.

Kisa’s lips are a thin line. “Yes,” she replies. “I think so.”