I stop to slow my heart rate and examine the imposing trees before taking my first step into the pitch-dark woods. I never thought I'd come here alone.
I pull my phone from my hoodie and scroll through the icons until I land on the flashlight. I shine my phone at the forest floor. With each step into the darkness, the damp scent of fallen leaves gets stronger. I keep my eyes trained on the ground to avoid the full view of my surroundings.
A branch smacks me in the face. I touch my stinging cheek. The skin's raised, and I feel a few droplets of blood. My dream comes rushing back like a slap to the head. In the dream where I scratched my cheek, I saw . . . a noose and a crow. Sweat forms on my palms. Changbin knew this was going to happen.
I point the light in front of me again and force myself through the trees. What does it mean that he knew? That it's fated to happen? If it's fated, how can I stop it? I could just be playing into the pattern, contributing to another century of deaths.
Ahead of me a light flickers. The hanok. I crouch down and cover my phone with my hand. I'm about to shut it off when I notice the camera icon. I press the video option, and my shoes, surrounded by dark leaves, appear on the screen. I pull out Officer Ban's business card from when he questioned me and snap off my phone case. I tuck the card against the back of my phone before putting the case back on. My conversation with Joohyuk about public opinion plays in my thoughts.
"Even if I don't make it through this, I hope that someone finds this video and knows that I tried to stop her. And that I tried to save them," I whisper at my phone.
I creep toward the light and stop twenty feet from the hanok. The shadows on the black, decrepit walls look alive in the moonlight. I study a jagged window for clues of what awaits, but it's covered with vines.
I step forward and crunch a twig. Panic stabs me, and for a brief second, I hold my breath and listen to the rustling wind. If I don't do this quickly, I'll lose my nerve.
I run to the front door and fling it open with a bang. As my feet hit the old wooden floorboards, I take in the large room. It's not empty anymore. There's a single stool in the center and a large wooden table covered with jars, candles, and bowls to the right. The fireplace blazes. Near the left wall are four more stools—standing on them are Hyeri, Wendy, Seulgi, and Soojung, nooses around their necks.
Their eyes are closed as though they're asleep. Is this a trick? There's no sign of Joohyuk's fiancée. Don't you dare fall before I can get you down. High heels click in the nearby hallway.
I stop so abruptly, it's as though I slammed into an invisible wall. A familiar wavy-haired shadow appears on the floor. "Yoomi?"
She steps gracefully into the room, wearing a dark blue dress and a cloak, as though nothing's awry. I shake my head at her, trying to will her to disappear. Her body language suggests that she's in perfect control, the way it always does. In control . . . I gag. No, I don't accept this. I don't want to know this.
I stand frozen, feeling like someone sucker-punched me in the gut. I know you; I live with you. You're supposed to be some awful stranger.
"We were never people to indulge in our emotions. Why start now?" She moves toward the table strewn with spell ingredients, and her dress swooshes behind her.
I stare at the Lineages and bite my lip hard in an effort to stop the overwhelming sadness that threatens to come. There's no good way to get all four down at once.
Yoomi turns to face me. "If you try to help them, you'll regret it." The door slams.
I don't look at her. Maybe I can drag that other stool over and slip the ropes off their necks. I take a step toward them. The stools start rattling and the girls' feet vibrate on top of them.
"No!" I yell, looking straight at her now. Yoomi was never one to make idle threats. I back away, and the stools stop shaking. Yoomi is Joohyuk's fiancée. Yoomi knows witchcraft. Yoomi isn't Yoomi. The idea could choke me. Why did Joohyuk never recognize her? And where is he? Did she do something to him?
Yoomi sorts spell ingredients with the self-assurance that comes through practice.
As I watch her here, in what is dearly her element, my mind struggles to make sense of this. What does it mean for my entire childhood? What does it mean for the time we've been in Manyeo? "Did you cause the rash?"
She nods.
"And you killed Kai?"
She stops breaking apart the dried leaves. "Obviously."
"Now what? You'll kill these girls and make it my fault, too?" I can't hide the hurt in my voice.
" 'Hang ' would be more accurate. And that's up to you."
I dig my nails into my hand to keep myself from having a breakdown. "I thought Joohyuk would be here."
She pauses.
I want to hurt her. I want her to feel just a fraction of what I'm feeling. "Oh, wait. He killed himself to get away from you."
Anger flashes in her eyes. She moves away from her herbs and grabs my chin with her hand. Her nails dig into my face so hard, I'm sure she'll break the skin. "I warned you once—you don't want me for an enemy."
I set my jaw and stare back at her. She releases me with a push, and I land on the floor.
"This is a business arrangement, Suzy. Don't cry. Don't beg. Don't instigate. If need be, I'll mute you."
I stand, and rub my jaw where her hand was.
Yoomi examines the sleeping Lineages. "I'm going to give you a choice." Yoomi wiggles her fingers, and the stools begin to dance, one after the other.
The girls open their eyes. Confusion, then panic, washes over them as they realize they have nooses around their necks. They desperately try to steady themselves. Hyeri screams.
Yoomi looks at me pointedly. "Which one should we hang?"
The word "we" makes me sick. I look at Soojung and immediately feel guilty about it. Wendy locks eyes with me, her fear quickly turning to accusation. When we did the clarity spell, their ancestors were telling me about their hangings. Changbin didn't stand up for them. If I have any hope of breaking this chain of accusation and hanging, I have to change that. "Me," I whisper, and the word sticks. "I choose me."
Seulgi shakes her head. "Sooji, don't."
Yoomi's expression goes dark. "You would hang for someone who threw a rock through your window with DIE written on it?"
This catches me off guard. So it was Soojung. And Yoomi knew?
"Of course, she's been punished," Vivian says, and by the way she flaunts those words I know I'm not the only one meant to hear them.
Soojung's eyes widen. "Punished? Throwing a rock does not equal killing my cousin and paralyzing my brother!" There's a hysterical edge to her voice. What did Yoomi say or do to these girls before I got here?
Yoomi flicks her wrist, and Soojung bends forward in pain. Her footing becomes wobbly as she strains against the rope In a few seconds, she will slip from the stool. My stomach turns.
"Stop! I choose me! Please stop!"
The stools settle abruptly. "Fine, Suzy. If you want to hang, then that is exactly what you'll get." Her voice is angry. I don't understand this at all. What is she after?
I face Yoomi. "That rock wasn't even directed at you."
"Indirectly, it was."
Hyeri sobs, and Yoomi wrinkles her nose. "Continue to make that sound, and I'll tear your vocal cords out." Hyeri's cheeks pale and her mouth closes.
I make eye contact with a fuming Wendy, and Yoomi returns to her spell ingredients. I can't bear to look at Seulgi. Yoomi knows I've been spending time with these girls, and now she's manipulating me with them.
Yoomi lifts a cloth-wrapped book off the table. She unwraps it like it has great value. It's an old leather-bound journal. When she puts it down, I can just make out the feather on the cover.
"When you bring someone back to life, Suzy, you need a personal item of theirs."
My eyes fix on the journal. Joohyuk told me they had a matching set. I thought this was about revenge. This is about bringing him back to life? Did she lure me here to be part of her spell? The moment I think it, the horrifying truth sets in. She didn't drag me by my hair because she must need a willing participant. It's the only way baiting me with the Lineages makes sense.
"This is why we moved to Manyeo," I say quietly. Everything I knew about my world is crashing down around me.
She opens a jar of black powder and pinches some with her fingers. "Don't convince yourself this is personal. This spell took lifetimes to perfect, and you just happen to be the one here for it."
No one spends years spinning a false relationship if any scheme off the street would do. This is about me specifically. But why? Because I'm a Bae? If I'm the key to bringing Joohyuk back to life, I could also be the key to unraveling her plan. "How did you figure out the spell?"
For a split second she looks up at me with curiosity, like I've said something right. She places a few dried herbs into a worn wooden bowl. "I first succeeded by reversing the death of a crow back in the seventeen hundreds. I didn't know then that breaking the barrier of death would give me such a great reward—my eternal life."
It's as though she were explaining the latest fashion. The familiarity of her voice stabs at my thinning composure. "Why didn't you bring him back to life, then?"
"I tried." She stops her mixing.
I move closer to the table to inspect the journal.
She sighs. "It took me centuries to figure out that the reason I could bring that bird back to life was because I was the cause of its death."
But she was the cause of Joohyuk's death, too, at least indirectly. "There's something I'm missing." She watches me, waiting for me to figure it out. The Lineages watch me, too.
She lifts a small knife. "Give me your right hand."
I stick my hands in my hoodie pockets and shake my head.
She raises an eyebrow. "Do you imagine for a moment that I won't make you?"
I reluctantly take my right hand out. My left grips the pendant.
Yoomi places my hand over a small bowl. "Repeat these words: 'I give my blood. I welcome the knife. The soul I took, I call to life.'"
I know I shouldn't. My gut screams at me not to. But if I refuse, she will kill the Lineages. I don't doubt that. I repeat the spell. Yoomi pulls the knife easily over my palm. The blade slices into my skin, and I choke back a whimper. My blood flows in a steady stream into her bowl.
"Do you know what the cause of Joohyuk's death was?" she asks.
I force myself to think through the pain. If Yoomi wasn't the direct cause, then it was the town, it was . . . "The Trials?" I ask through clenched teeth.
She smiles.
She and Changbin couldn't have started the Trials without each other. That's why she needs a lineage from Bae Changbin to bring him back. And I just said the words that confirmed my part in her spell. The room spins, and I look away from my hand.
Why me instead of some other Bae?
All the blood drains from my face. I bet she tried other Baes but it didn't work. Maybe even my grandmother. The past clicks into place at a sickening speed. She dated my dad to build trust. When she figured out he wouldn't willingly return to Manyeo, she put him in a coma. Then I came here willingly. To Manyeo, to this house in the woods. I offered myself in the place of the Lineages.
She drops my hand, and I pull it to my body, trying to stop the bleeding and trying to shield myself from the intensity of the betrayal. My bottom lip trembles and I bite it. I can't get lost in my feelings right now or I won't be able to think clearly. I need to do something she won't expect. I steal a glance at the journal.
Yoomi picks up a jar of red powder and walks toward the center of the room. I pull out the protection knot, hiding it in my fist. She opens the jar and starts slowly pouring the powder out to form a large circle on the floor around the stool. A noose hangs above it.
I wait until her back is turned and slip my hand behind me to find the edge of the book on the table. I attempt to push the pendant under the leather cover of Joohyuk's journal, but it's difficult to do with one hand. Any second, I'll be in her line of vision again.
"You put the nooses in my uncle's store, didn't you?" Wendy asks.
Yoomi glances toward the girls just as I get the pendant securely in place. Thank you, Wendy. I yank my hand away from the journal. With a look, Hyeri sends a silent, teriffied plea for Wendy not to antagonize Yoomi.
Yoomi puts down the powder and takes a step toward the girls. "I thought I made it clear—"
I know that tone. I can't let her hurt them. "What if I tell you I changed my mind about being part of your spell?" I reach for the bowl she put my blood in.
She turns back in my direction. Her eyes are dangerous. I don't break eye contact.
She approaches me so fast, it's as though she flies across the floor. She grabs my cut, outstretched hand and squeezes it. "Then I'd tell you that I can always torture your father until you agree again."
Her nails dig deeper into my open wound, sending shooting pains up my arm. My knees get weak. "Okay. I agree." She doesn't let go. "I agree!"
She releases my cut hand. "I had a suspicion you might feel that way."
She's too angry. What am I missing here? I nurse my bleeding palm. She eyes me for a second before she returns to forming her circle. I hope like hell the protection knot buys me a little time.
Yoomi mutters in a language I don't recognize. The air shifts around her, and her clothes move as though she's caught in a strong wind. Her hair darkens and grows. Her face becomes younger, eighteen maybe. Her brown eyes turn gray, and they widen at the corners. She grew until she's five inches taller than I am, and her curves soften, given her as much slighter frame. She almost appears dainty. Sungkyung.
She shakes her arm and looks at me. I believe she interprets my shock as approval, because she wears a smug expression. She runs her hand through her waist-length waves. She's stunning and vicious. No wonder Joohyuk fell in love with her.