CHAPTER 1
REN
East of the Haebaek Mountains
THE DRUM BEAT faster and faster as Ren tumbled into the center of the circle, cartwheeled into a handstand, and walked with her feet lifted toward the sky. Sensing her mask slipping from her chin, she quickly slid it back into place, careful to maintain the illusion that she wasn’t a girl but a pink-faced demon.
Gales of laughter erupted from across the circle, where Little Uncle was sashaying his hips for the crowd, his chest bare beneath his short jacket. Like Ren, he wore a mask, though his was painted white with blue dots on the cheeks. With a flick of his wrist, he flipped open his paper fan, fluttering it coyly. A few older women yelled out bawdy comments while some of the young men blushed and jostled among themselves for a better view.
Ren began to make her way toward Little Uncle, hopping on one hand, then the other, swaying her legs to keep her balance.
The crowd was smaller than it had been the year before, but they made up for it in enthusiasm. Some of the villagers had rolled barrels to the edge of the circle and were smacking their palms against the sides, adding texture to the rhythm set by Big Uncle’s drumming.
Her troupe had been performing for the past half hour; Ren would have kept on for longer, but the caravan had to depart at noon if they wanted to make it to Gorye Village by week’s end. Big Uncle beat both sides of his hourglass drum in quick succession, a signal to hurry up and conclude the performance.
Ren sprang back to her feet, her gaze sweeping the crowd. She caught sight of a young girl, perhaps seven or eight, sitting cross-legged in front of a group of older boys. The girl paid them no mind though they bumped her from behind, staring at Ren with awestruck eyes.
Ren’s heart stirred with recognition—she’d been the same way at that age. When Auntie performed, she didn’t want to blink, for fear of missing a single flick of her wrist or tilt of her head. With just her body, Auntie conveyed entire worlds and characters. She was a deer, racing swiftly through a moonlit forest. She was a sailor lost at sea, pulled beneath the waves. Ren would laugh when Auntie was a wily fox, outmaneuvered, running with her tail between her legs, and she would weep when Auntie was a widow on a mountain, crying out for a lover that would never return.
Through Auntie’s storytelling, she lived a thousand lives, fought demons, and outwitted gods.
The girl looked at Ren as if she was capable of the same wonders.
Ren and Little Uncle were supposed to be pantomiming a story about a demon who tries to trick a nobleman, only to be thwarted, but they had lost the threads of the plot some time ago. They would need to regain it if they wanted to end the performance, but not before one final trick.
Running across the circle, Ren leaped onto the closest barrel. She turned to Big Uncle, but he was already waiting to see what she’d do next. He thwacked the left side of his drum twice with his mallet, letting out a staccato, thudding sound, then the right side once with his open palm.
A leap and turn in the air would be enough to impress the crowd, and yet …
Ren closed her eyes. She could feel it—the Light that always lived there, like a perpetual flame that grew and diminished with the racing of her heart. She drew on it now, but only a spark, the heat of it spreading outward from her core, up her arms, before releasing from her fingertips.
It was a windless day, but the Light stirred the air. A strong breeze swirled beneath her, sweeping up the barrel and billowing her pants. She leaped backward, letting it lift her into the sky. She had a moment of panic—she was high, too high—but then she twisted her body in midair, somersaulting before landing on the packed earth.
A beat of silence passed, then the crowd burst into raucous applause.
Little Uncle rushed to her side. “You’ve really done it now,” he said, but she could hear the grin in his voice.
“Do you think Auntie was watching?” Ren asked. The adrenaline had worn off, and now she felt anxious. Auntie warned her not to use her magic, and never in front of strangers. Ren could argue that she’d done it to invigorate the crowd—a happy audience was a generous one—but she knew deep down that wasn’t the truth.
“Let’s hope not,” Little Uncle said cheerfully. “Here we go!”
He grabbed the ribbon at her waist. Just like they practiced, he pulled while she spun out in the opposite direction. The ribbon unraveled between them, red from the safflowers Big Uncle had used for dye. She fell backward onto the ground, then lay still, limbs splayed.
Like when a rock is removed from a stream, the villagers poured over her, thrusting gifts of foodstuffs and coins into her arms. She jumped to her feet to accept them, laughing with the children tugging at her pants only to look disappointed when wind didn’t leap from the seams. It was another few minutes before she was able to disentangle herself and go in search of Little Uncle.
She found him sitting on a wooden platform at the edge of the village, tallying the earnings from their performance. A pine tree bowed over him, as if peeking over his shoulder.
He’d removed his mask, revealing his handsome, flushed face. Though she called him “Little Uncle,” as he was Auntie’s younger brother—to differentiate him from “Big Uncle,” who was her husband—he was only eighteen to Ren’s seventeen years. Almost seventeen years. His hair stuck up in messy tufts, resembling a sprout. Ren resisted the urge to smooth them down, to fuss over him like Auntie would.
She sat beside him, slipping off her sandals and pulling her legs up onto the wooden platform. She added the items she carried to the pile—a covered basket of soybeans, a small pot of soy sauce, and a block of fermented bean paste. This village was known for its soybean production. She emptied her pockets of coins, tossing them onto the platform where they clinked and spun before settling.
Shoulder to shoulder, Ren and Little Uncle leaned over the assortment of goods and handfuls of coins. The offerings were meager, totaling less than a quarter of what they’d accrued in previous years. It had been the same in the other villages, though it was still a shock to see; Ren had hoped for more after the liveliness of the crowd.
“Well,” Little Uncle said, following a lengthy pause, “I am quite fond of beans.”
“There was a blight this past harvest,” said a grave voice behind them, and Ren and Little Uncle both jumped.
Auntie had come soundlessly down the short path from the village—an impressive feat, as she had twisted her ankle two days before and was using a walking stick to move about. Strands of her dark brown hair fluttered about her severe face. Her gaze didn’t linger but moved past them toward the empty fields. “Something is ill with the earth.”
Ren shivered at Auntie’s words. The people of the caravan had noticed the changes as they’d traveled first east, then north from the small villages that dotted the river valleys to the larger seaside towns scattered along the coast. It had gotten worse the farther they’d headed inland, west toward the mountains. Their hunters described too-quiet forests, where an arrow shot into a thicket wouldn’t release a single bird, with lakes so still they appeared like glass, and withered glades where once wildflowers flourished.
The people who lived in the villages closer to the mountains were superstitious—a difficult harvest was blamed on disgruntled spirits, a child’s sickness on the work of demons. Gorye Village, the last village on their trail, was the remotest of all, nestled at the foot of the largest mountain.
If it were up to Ren, they’d forgo their visit entirely. The people there were dour and ill-humored. But Auntie and the caravan leaders insisted they return every year. The Gorye villagers depended upon their trade, and there were rare plants that only grew deep within the mountains that the elders of the valley needed for their medicines.
Guarding the mountain is a difficult and thankless task, Auntie would say when Ren complained, as she often did. We are honored to ease their burden.
Guarding from what? Boredom? Ren would grumble.
It would take the caravan five days to reach the village, the Haebaek Mountains looming ever closer until they awoke one morning to find the daylight gone and the forest entirely engulfed in shadow.
“You disobeyed me,” Auntie admonished, and Ren flinched.
Copyright © 2025 by Axie Oh
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