Page 33 of The Last Tiger

Eunji

Okay, Eunji. Stay calm.

It’s fine.

The cave is empty, but it’s fine.

The tiger is gone, and you have no way of knowing who took it or where they’re headed, and, sure, you were banking on capturing the animal as your only hope of saving your and your family’s lives and securing any semblance of autonomy and peace in life, but it’s totally fine, this is just…

“No, no, no !”

I throw my fists to the dirt. Kenzo stares down at me.

The muddy feeling coating my stomach turns to something more solid, something icy and burning and sour and sharp. I can’t seem to find any air.

My plan was totally, completely contingent on the tiger being here in the cave.

In retrospect, with the entire empire clamoring to find it, I was a fool to believe it would be this easy. It’s probably long gone by now, in the back of some Dragon soldier’s van.

Which means I’ve come so far for nothing.

“This can’t be happening…”

My hands shake as I claw at my chest, gasping for air. Moonhee’s face flashes through my mind.

He killed her. Isao killed her. And if I don’t find the tiger, if I don’t find it right away, I’m next, along with the rest of my family.

Hot tears form at the edges of my eyes, threatening to spill over. My lungs constrict, unable to draw air. The fact that I’ve barely slept or eaten a thing probably isn’t helping.

Two hands grab my shoulders, and a pale face comes into view.

“Eunji—hey, Eunji, look at me.”

“I—I—”

Kenzo puts his face right in front of mine.

“Breathe. You have to breathe.”

“I can’t—”

“You can .” Kenzo’s hands squeeze my shoulders as he inhales deeply, then exhales, nodding for me to do the same.

I shake my head, shuddering, choking. “I don’t know what’s happening to me—”

“You’re just panicking. It’s okay.” He speaks softly, almost gently. Unperturbed, Kenzo continues moving slowly, repeating the respiration motion until I find the rhythm, mirroring him. “You’re calm. You’re okay.”

Relief gradually floods into my veins. My lungs fill with air. Kenzo begins to rise from his kneeling position, lifting his hands, but I reach up and hold them back down, despite myself. I’m afraid I’ll forget how to breathe again if I’m left alone.

Kenzo nods as though he understands, settling on the ground, coating the bottom of his cloak in dirt.

I’m not sure how long we remain there, sitting in the glen in front of the open cave, neither of us saying a word. Finally, my pulse slows, and the heat in my cheeks begins to cool.

I release Kenzo’s hands, and his arms fall.

“Thanks,” I mutter, clearing my throat and shifting my gaze away. Now that I’ve gathered my wits, a prickling feeling of embarrassment has begun to crawl up the back of my neck.

Kenzo goes quiet. He leans back, resting his hands on the grass behind him.

“Doesn’t feel good, does it?” he says. I look back at him. The corners of his lips are twitching. Like he finds this funny, somehow.

“I’m fine,” I reply, shaking away the last of my tremors. “I’ve just…never had that happen to me before.”

“Better get used to it.”

I stare up at him, affronted. Kenzo brushes the dirt off his hands and shrugs.

“Eunji, if you keep insisting on doing everything your way…well, this is how it’s going to feel every time your own choices backfire on you.”

Maybe he has a point, though I hate to admit it.

My whole life, I’ve been told just what to do and how to do it.

To study, to stay inside, to dress up, to smile.

Even at Adachi, where I lived outside the confines of my family home, Drill Captain Nari dictated exactly how many blows I was allowed to throw per fight, exactly which moves I was to learn and in what order.

In my craving for freedom, I snuck out at night. Met up with a forbidden boy. Ran from my wedding. Each time I broke the rules, I felt a rush of power, thrill—and shame.

But breaking the rules was easy—compared to making my own. Now that I’m out here, with no rules to break, every decision, every plan on this journey has to come from me. It’s an orientation that’s utterly alien to me. And right now it doesn’t feel quite so free as I might once have imagined.

It feels…terrifying.

“You want to do things your way,” Kenzo goes on. “Fine. But that means you face the consequences. You make your own mistakes? Lead yourself to failure? That’s on you .”

“Failing has never been an option,” I say, rising to my feet. “And it still isn’t.”

Kenzo laughs in disbelief as I walk over to the mouth of the cave, craning my neck to peek inside. “What are you planning on doing? The tiger’s been taken, in case you haven’t noticed.”

“Well,” I reply, “maybe we can find a way to take it back.”

“Eunji, wait—”

I take a step forward into the cave.

The air here is cool and still.

I run my hands over the stone wall as I circle along the edge, stepping deeper into the shadows, struggling to see.

“How’s it going in there?” Kenzo calls from outside.

I don’t bother to reply. I continue to search for something, anything—a forgotten item, a clue, anything that might indicate who took the tiger and where they might’ve gone. The stone lining the inner wall is jagged, unmarked—

Except at the very back of the cavern.

There, in the shadows, on the surface of the cave wall…

Is some sort of painting…

“Eunji…? You there?” Kenzo’s voice sounds a little higher than his usual baritone.

I chuckle to myself, stepping up onto a rock to examine the wall closer. “Jeez, Kenzo, have some patience. Give me a second; I think I found something.”

“I was just making sure—”

Suddenly I hear rustling and the sound of footsteps as Kenzo steps into the cave after me, ducking his head in order to avoid colliding with the jagged roof.

I smirk back at him. “Got spooked out in the big scary woods, huh?”

His face is whiter than usual as he shakes his head, pointing silently toward the entrance of the cave.

I turn—and freeze when I see where he’s pointing.

Less than twenty meters away, Captain Nari ambles slowly, methodically through the woods, flanked by her team of Tiger Slayers. She surveys her surroundings, a small frown etched on her lips.

“What happened to this forest?” she mutters. “Everything’s dying…”

I’m close enough now to see the whites of her eyes.

They float to the left, then over to the right—seeming to gloss directly over the spot where Kenzo and I are standing in full view.

Then she keeps on moving her gaze past us without registering a thing.

Somehow, she doesn’t see us. None of them do.

But how…?

Captain Nari comes to an abrupt stop right at the edge of the greenery surrounding the cave. She looks ahead, confused.

I freeze, staring right back at her. We’re making eye contact. At least that’s what it looks like to me.

But not an ounce of recognition darts over her face, not even for a second, nor any other sign to show that she sees me. It’s as though Nari’s not looking at me—but through me. Like she doesn’t even see that I’m there.

A strange chill passes down my spine.

“Everything all right, Captain?” A soldier catches up to her.

“Yep,” Nari replies evenly. “I just…thought I heard something.”

“Captain!” someone calls out fervently, running to meet the rest of the group. “There’s been an incident near the outskirts of town—a dead policeman in the forest. A sword’s been run through his chest. Tiger footprints were everywhere by the body.”

Nari turns and nods to the soldier in greeting. “Take us there.”

The group of Tiger Slayers marches off as quickly as they came. After a minute, they’re gone.

I shake my head, perplexed.

It doesn’t make sense. A dozen sharp-witted, highly trained Tiger Slayers pass directly by the beast’s very own habitat, and yet…somehow, every single one of them fails to observe it, and the people inside? Is it possible that they simply…couldn’t see it?

And if they couldn’t see the cave, how did Seung and I?

How can I see it now ?

“Well, that’s good news.”

I jump. I nearly forgot Kenzo was standing behind me. I whip around. “What do you mean?”

He leans against the inner wall of the cave, readjusting the top button on his cloak. “If some rebels really escaped with the tiger, that means the empire hasn’t gotten ahold of it yet. So we still have a chance.”

“Whose side are you on?” I raise an eyebrow. “I thought you were dead set against this plan.”

“Yeah, well”—he shrugs—“that was when I thought it was impossible and stupid.”

“And now?”

“Now…maybe we actually have a chance.” He gestures toward the wall of the cave, where the faded painting sits, barely visible. “Since we’ve found this .”

“You mean,” I say, “since I’ve found this.”

I don’t know why I’m trying to take credit for discovering what seems to be a useless artifact. But I lift my chin in defiance regardless.

He ignores my correction anyway. “It’s gotta mean something, right?”

I squint at the mural. I see valleys, mountains, a few towns. It looks like your typical ancient cave art, probably left here centuries ago by some monk.

“It’s just an old painting.”

“Maybe…,” Kenzo says, slowly raising his finger to point up toward the drawing. “Or maybe not …”

I follow the line of his finger, where an enormous mountain has been drawn just outside a series of buildings in the shape of a town that I recognize from my textbooks as the unmistakable Hannam City.

A clear pathway in golden ink has been traced from Kidoh to the peak of the mountain, through the woods.

“Is it just an old painting…,” Kenzo says, “or is it…”

I cross my arms, hesitant.

“A map?”

I frown at him. With the boulder I’m standing on, we’re nearly the same height, eye to eye. Kenzo flashes a smile at me, jolting me to tear my gaze back to the wall.

“You think that’s where they’re headed with the tiger? To that mountain by Hannam City?”

“Maybe.”

“But why?”

“No idea.”

I glance back at the map and trace the golden pathway with my finger. As I do so, it suddenly glows, lit by a bright illumination from within. I step back, gasping.

“It just—do you see that?”