Page 49 of The Last Tiger

“You happy now?” His lips move, and I pull my fingers away.

“No. Tell me something only Seung would know.”

An exasperated sigh. “Seriously?”

“Seriously.”

“I have a little brother named Hoyoung.”

“A spirit could easily figure that out. Something else.”

“We met almost two years ago, on the night of the Tiger Slaying Ceremony. You were wearing a silk cloak out in public, and I made fun of you for it a few weeks later.”

“Better, but I’m not convinced.”

“Sure.” I can practically hear him rolling his eyes.

“Okay. Fine. How about these? You have a freckle on the underside of your chin, but it only shows when you crane your head to look up at the stars. You find the sound of cicadas in the summer oddly satisfying. The inside of your room in Kidoh smells like cherry blossoms and green tea. That’s how you used to smell too. But you don’t smell like that anymore.”

I frown. “How do I smell now?”

Judging by that pause, the answer can’t be good. “I mean…assuming that you’ve been traveling without access to a bathhouse for the last few days—”

“Hey.” I slap his arm in the darkness.

“OW!”

“I barely hit you.”

“Eunji, did you forget that not everyone around you has super strength ?”

Oops.

“Sorry.” I cough awkwardly. “Well, for what it’s worth, I believe you now.”

“Great.” His tone is full of irritation, but I hear the smile in his voice too. “So are you willing to talk?”

I guess now is as good a time as any. Better when I can’t see his face. Or he, mine.

And it’s not like I don’t have questions. A lot of them.

“Where have you been , Seung? What happened to you over the last year…?”

Seung pauses.

“A lot,” he says finally with a soft chuckle, and for some reason, I find my lips twitching too.

And then he tells me—

Everything.

He tells me about the mysterious powers he experienced after we found the tiger in the woods.

His life in the gold mines after he failed the Exam.

The moment he decided not to let Hoyoung grow up in the world he himself experienced.

The anger he felt, knowing that the Dragon Empire had always intended to set him up for failure.

Meeting Jin. The Tiger spirit in the cave. Their journey across the colonies.

By the time he’s finally finished, I’m not sure what to think. Not for the first time, Seung has me equal parts skeptical and inspired.

“You’ve changed,” I remark.

“So have you.”

“Maybe it’s the ki powers,” I say. “And everything that came with them. And…the sense of direction. Purpose. Never had that before.”

“I get that. I really do, Eunji.”

For some reason, I feel bolder when I can’t see him. Everything in the dark seems a little less real. Actions. Consequences.

“What I don’t get,” Seung goes on, his voice darkening, “is why are you hunting down the tiger?”

I stiffen. I really don’t feel like justifying myself right now. “I told you. Governor-General Isao sentenced me to death. And if I don’t bring it to him, he’ll kill my family too.”

“So you just gave in.”

“No.” I push back. “Not at all. The opposite of that, really. I decided to find my own way to change their minds.”

“Your own way that happened to be exactly what they wanted you to do.”

I clamp my mouth shut. This is not what I want to be—

“Did you ever consider fighting back?” Seung says. “You could join us.”

“Fighting back ? Against the Dragon Empire?”

“Yeah.”

“Are you crazy?” I scoff.

Perhaps it’s not very understandable if you’ve never been through it, but when the governor-general murders the woman who raised you and places a death sentence on your head, I have to say, the first instinct is not to fight back .

The first instinct, in my experience, is run .

Run, and try to rid yourself of the death sentence any way you can.

“There’s no such thing as fighting back against Isao, Seung. No one can resist him.”

“There is,” he replies. “That’s exactly what Jin and I are doing.”

“Well, you’re making a mistake.”

“ I’m making a mistake?”

“Your plan is never going to work. It’s going to end in disaster.”

“And yours isn’t?”

“What awaits you at the top of this mountain, anyway?” I demand. “What do you think is gonna happen?”

“The Tiger spirit said…a great power,” Seung replies. “The only one that can defeat—”

“The Tiger spirit?” I interrupt. “You mean the spirit whose kind has been wiped out by the empire? You can’t fight strength with emotions , Seung. What are you going to do when it’s you versus a thousand Dragon soldiers? Anger the governor-general to death? Sadden him into defeat?”

“I dunno, maybe!” Seung cries, frustrated. “I’ll figure it out. But I have to try .”

“Even if it kills you?”

“Yes.” He pauses. “I have nothing to lose.”

“What about your brother?” I shoot back. “Your mom? And—” I don’t say me . “And if you lose, who’s going to take care of them? Who’s going to feed them?”

“What’s your grand plan, then?” Seung says. “After you get the tiger. The glory, the honor, Isao’s favor, and his blank-check reward. What then? What will you do?”

“I’ll do…” I pause, thinking it over. “Whatever I want.”

“Wow. That’s really selfless.”

It sounds so much worse when I say it out loud.

Especially now, knowing the true cost of the tiger’s life.

But is it so wrong to crave autonomy?

“This wasn’t just for me,” I whisper so softly that he might not even hear it. Which maybe wouldn’t be the worst thing.

“Huh?” He sounds puzzled.

“You were in such a dark place that night,” I blurt out. “After your dad died, and—the Exam—and then—when you told me how you felt. About me. About…us.”

“Us.” His voice comes out strained.

“I don’t know if you remember this, but that night you told me something. You said that only the powerful have the privilege to live life on their own terms. You said neither you nor I had anything close to that kind of power—and that we never would.”

I close my eyes. It’s barely any darker, but doing so still brings me some comfort.

Come on. Just say it. I might as well, while I have him here.

Who knows what’ll happen after tonight? This might be the last time I see Seung ever again.

“I thought maybe, if I could achieve that power you were talking about…” I force the words out. “Maybe…you’d believe in us . The way that I believed in us.”

I wish I could see his expression. Feel his emotions, the way Seung can feel mine. I could reach out with my hand and touch his face. But I don’t dare.

“Seung? Seung! ” Jin’s voice rings out suddenly from way in the distance. “ Where are you? She’s gone—”

“We’re here,” Seung calls back steadily. “Don’t worry.”

“Where is she?”

“She’s with me. She’s right here.”

Jin clears her throat, shifting in tone, instantly calmer. Her voice becomes eerily sweet as honey. “Well, tell her for me—Lover Girl, if you don’t get back here right this instant, you and your Dragon boy toy are as good as dead. You hear me?”

Sighing, I place my hand on Seung’s shoulder, letting him lead me back to the ledge.

It takes my eyes a moment to adjust to the moonlight.

Jin stands there beside Kenzo, who remains lying like a rag doll on the ground, Jin’s knife to his throat.

With one tied hand, he waves half-heartedly, wiggling his fingers.

“Thought you abandoned me,” he says weakly.

“I couldn’t,” I reply flatly, my guard still up against him.

“Where were you?” Jin demands. “What were you doing?”

“Just having a chat,” Seung replies.

“A chat?” She wrinkles her nose. “ Spirits below , what is that rancid smell?”

“Unfortunately,” Kenzo says groggily, “that would be me.”

Oh. Oh no. I bend down, unwrapping the cloth tied around Kenzo’s shoulder.

I immediately lurch back at the sight of the horrible infection. It looks…really bad. In the chaos of the past day, I nearly forgot about his injury.

Kenzo groans, looking pale. “I…feeling weird.”

The four of us pause, unsure of what to do.

The tiger rises and pads over to Kenzo. He struggles, through bleary eyes, to look away as it lowers its nose toward his shoulder—then there’s a bright white light and a strange sound, almost like a woman singing—

When the four of us awaken, it’s morning, and the fog has long past lifted. I can see clearly down the side of the mountain to the golden leaves of the trees in the clearing below. I can see the stone gate down there, closing off Mount Tangun from the rest of Hannam City.

Outside the gate, swarms of Dragon soldiers have set up camp. I recognize their crimson uniforms from all the way up here. It looks like they can’t enter, for now. But we’re going to have to deal with them somehow when we come back down.

Kenzo rolls awake, blinking. I bend down to inspect his shoulder. His gash has healed completely—his skin is pure, like a baby’s, as if he had never been hurt—by the magic of the tiger.

Seeing the creature up close again, I’m struck once more by its beauty. Its bright fur bristles with stripes; its vigilant ears twitch intelligently at the morning sounds of the forest around us.

Now that I’ve heard Seung’s side of the story—now that I know what will happen if the empire gets its hands on the tiger—I’d be lying if I said that I haven’t seriously started to doubt my own mission.

But his plan is worse than foolhardy. No, more than that: It’s impossible. As long as the tiger is in Seung’s hands, it’s a death sentence for him, his family, anyone connected in any way to the scene of the crime.

The sun rises on us; the wind passes through my hair. Whatever waits for us at the top of the mountain, it isn’t far now.

The truth is, I’m torn. I don’t want Seung to die. I don’t want Kenzo to die. And—though I suppose the feeling is not mutual—I’d rather Jin not die too.

I have to think carefully now. The Dragon Army is waiting for us outside those stone gates.

There’s a world in which no one makes it off this mountain alive—whether by the Dragon Empire’s hand, or our own.

I’m keenly aware that Kenzo and I are one wrong move away from feeling the steel end of Jin’s knife.

The air hangs heavy around us over the spirit forest, as if it, too, knows that every move we make now means the difference between life and death.