***WARNING****
*This sneak peek includes major spoilers for the Changeling Sisters Series #1 - 3*
~Miguel~
The labyrinthine subway network beneath Seoul was impressive. Subway trains hurtled like screaming silver bullets down dark tunnels, ruthlessly intent on reaching their destination. They were the reason I'd reluctantly stopped driving my jeep. Two hands were necessary when trying to herd my girlfriend's son Young Soo to his taekwondo class. However, not even a subway ride was fast enough to outrun a Young Soo tantrum.
"Jeonhwa," he insisted for the umpteenth time, pulling my sleeve.
"Yah," I growled, trying to sound as stern as Yu Li when the little brat refused to finish his kimchi. "You ate injeolmi." I held up his hands where they gleamed with powdery sweetness from the rice cake. "There is no way in hell you are touching my phone."
"Jeonhwa juseyo!" Young Soo cried and had the nerve to dive for my pocket.
I pinched his bony fingers and was about to teach the punk first grader the meaning of a right angle, when I saw a nearby ajumma glare at me. Yes. Foreigner abuses cute schoolboy on train would make a catchy headline.
I settled for giving Young Soo a friendly headlock until he twisted out of it and huffed, staring off at the blurred stream of neon-lit advertisements. I sighed and scrolled through my messages, trying to remember what my parents had done with five hyper-charged Alvarez kids before the invention of smartphones.
Yu Li was calling. I slid the bar to answer, but all I heard was static. Then the call dropped. No bars. We must be farther underground than I thought.
Young Soo's hand crept toward my pocket again and tugged. Wishing I could transform right then into a demon wolf like my sister, Citlalli, or hell, a lightning-breathing dragon like my half-sister, Raina, I whirled around, preparing to unless Miguel Madness.
Until I caught a glimpse of his pale face staring dead ahead. Slowly, I looked up.
The cheery commercials advertising Sugar-Free Aloe Vera Juice had vanished. In their place were disconcerting black screens, which were somehow darker than the subway tunnel. All at once, every channel up and down the train turned to static.
I leaned closer to the TV. Something moved behind the gray fuzziness. Abruptly, all of the screens went blank, and then a stream of characters ran across:
Welcome to the Red Night.
The screens dissolved into static once more. Yet the thing behind them moved closer.
Shouts of alarm began to ring up and down the subway. I turned and saw one businessman get to his feet, pointing at thin air.
Another message:
Scurry, scurry, little mice.
My hand closed around Young Soo's. "Vamonos," I whispered, so rattled that I switched back to my first language. Young Soo got the drift. We inched, slowly and cautiously, toward the emergency door release ring. I heard a faint screech that sounded like braking. I realized we were slowing down.
More screams. A group of women recoiled from a window at the far end of our car, crying about a ghost, and the dread in my heart deepened. My hand closed around the cord.
A final message:
Wait too long and the Lords of Walking Death shall find you.
The curtain of static parted. I covered Young Soo's eyes and averted my own gaze.
Staring at the window reflection, I watched passengers rise like a great tide to pound on the doors. There was an odd ring of space around the businessman in the center. On his back was a strange creature. It was a naked, emaciated thing, wrapped around the man's chest like bandages. Black hair, as thick as a horse's mane, concealed its face. It bent over the man's shoulders, squeezing him tighter.
I whirled around. There was no one on the businessman's back, and yet, he had begun to gasp for breath. Passengers milled around him in fear. Suddenly, the man fell to his knees, clutching his throat. The train lurched, and people stumbled, blocking my view. However, the man's wheezes still echoed in my head as he fought for air that had unexplainably vanished from his lungs.
"Time to go." I pulled the release ring. The subway screeched to a halt, leaving us facing a concrete wall. Young Soo's eyes were wide, and we exchanged a glance. Looking at the slender gap we had to inch along, I knew we both regretted eating that tray of rice cakes.
Another wave of screams started. A chill ran down my spine as beneath it, I heard a deep, animalistic roar. Then from amidst the crowd, three full-grown adults went flying. Something was coming, clawing its way through passengers as if they were cushions.
"Go, Young Soo," I hissed.
Thankfully, the boy was thinner than a pair of chopsticks. He split his knee when he landed, but he didn't complain. Sucking in our bellies, we slid our way along the subway car with the wall inches from our faces.
We were halfway to the subway platform when the electricity went out. A deep shudder reverberated through the city's foundations. Young Soo gripped my hand so hard that he almost cut off my circulation.
"?" he whispered. Terrorist?
"Ani," I told him no as the subway car behind us shook. Something large and heavy crashed into the window above us.
Young Soo understood. "Vampyre." He spoke it in English.
I closed my eyes. Those bloodsuckers and their court were nasty, but I had never seen anything like this before.
But then I remembered Jeju Island. I'd been out at sea, but as we'd approached the island, I'd heard the deep, powerful laughter of something rising from beneath the earth.
"Worse," I replied. I'm not a fan of sugar-coating things.
"Worse," Young Soo agreed. We crouched below the platform as the subway doors above were busted open—by someone's head. An avalanche of passengers tumbled out, struggling to flee. Suddenly, a hand far too large to be a normal human's shot down. It grabbed Young Soo and yanked him up quicker than I could blink.
"Kid!" Only fear for that devious miscreant could make me leave the safety of the rails—fear of what Yu Li would do to me if I lost her son. The thing holding Young Soo was six feet and counting with bones bursting free from its skin, and its clothes were in tatters as if it had grown too fast. Its skin was bleached so white that it almost glowed in the dark. Strange crimson lashes carpeted its body, and its eyes were puckered rings of flesh.
A lady's bracelet glinted among the strings of skin in its teeth. The thing threw Young Soo to the ground, and I charged from behind. My switchblade clicked open, and I stabbed it three, four, five times in the side. My knife slid in and out of its bloodless skin like cutting through butter. So I leaped on its back like I'd seen that weird creature do. I wrapped an elbow around its throat and forced its jaw closed.
Young Soo scrambled away. But the monster freaked out; its arms turned inside out and clawed at my face like the blades of a windmill. Desperate, I stabbed it through the top of the head, but its cranium was solid. I twisted my blade free and leaped off.
The thing's bones clicked as it stitched itself back together. It grew even taller, if that was possible. And its appetite grew with it.
Panting, I rolled up next to Young Soo and hoisted him onto my shoulders. "Put this on," I whispered, holding out the Dokkaebi invisibility cap. Young Soo jammed the bowler's hat down over his ears, and we ran.
The flood of people intensified on either side as we sprinted for the exit. We were somewhere near Dongdaemun judging from the number of abandoned shop stalls in the underground marketplace, their contents strewn. More tunnels funneled into ours. More bodies. I realized we were racing a hoard of rats ascending from the depths. Above the shouts of panicked civilians, I heard the roar of more undead monsters on our heels.
Finally, a breath of fresh air washed across our faces. I heard car horns and squealing tires. We were close to freedom.
A police whistle shrieked. As our frenzied mob charged toward the surface, I saw boots hustle toward a manual crank. I heard a distinctive groan, like that of a gate being lowered.
"Yah!" a hoarse-voiced ajumma screamed in my ear. "They're locking us in!"
The crowd dissolved into a vicious mosh pit, and I smacked against a wall. Young Soo grabbed at my nose; my eyes—anywhere he could find a handhold. I swung about deliriously. There was a white dog watching beneath the street lamp with knowing blue eyes. No. That was no dog.
"Umma!" Young Soo tore off the invisibility cap. "Umma, we're here!"
Yu Li attacked the policeman cranking the gate with no mercy. The squad stumbled back in shock. One pulled a gun, and then he realized he was aiming it at a beautiful young woman pulling on a shawl. A red scar ran down her face.
"Choesonghamnida," he apologized.
Yu Li regarded him coolly and then dashed to help us roll under the gate just in time. I heard a resounding boom as its metal jaws crashed down. A wall of wails hit it; in a single moment, hundreds of passengers had been trapped underground.
"What the fuck is going on?" I gasped, falling back against a spray-painted wall. My shoulder came away red and sticky, and I realized it wasn't paint. High above me loomed eerily dark skyscrapers. Bodies scurried back and forth like ants behind their drawn windows, illuminated briefly by the sweeping helicopter lights.
"The Yeouiju is broken. Red Night has come to Seoul. Yong Heesu, the Celestial Dragon, is dead by treachery, and her father, the Dragon King, is missing. This will be a war against the undead like none we have ever seen." Yu Li ignored my slack-jawed look and took our hands. "Come. We must get to Namsan Tower. Your sister is there."
A figure emerged from the car fire smoke. I grabbed my switchblade, but Yu Li stopped me.
"Namkyu. Report."
The brawny werewolf spared a contemptuous glance at my blade. He raised his two-way radio and bowed shortly. "Alpha. US troop withdraw to sea. News say bad plague here. World want no part. Our government say no one enter until problem contained."
"Can you get us into Yongsan Garrison?" Yu Li demanded.
Namkyu hesitated, glancing at Young Soo and me. "Yes. But we will not be only ones going there. Less is better."
"Whatever is fastest," Yu Li said. "We need to secure those weapons before..."
Her voice trailed off, and we knew it was because none of us knew what we were up against.
"Namsan Tower is on way," Namkyu said. "We get Weres and go. Half stay in Yong Enterprises. Half with me to get weapons."
"How well do you know Yongsan Garrison?" I asked.
Namkyu regarded me again. "Well," he said curtly. "All Korean men serve military two years."
"Thank the bloody saints for that," I swore, and Yu Li raised an eyebrow. I held up the switchblade. "Yu Li, there were freakin' zombies in the subway. We're going to need something a hell of a lot stronger than this."
A sudden rumble shook the earth. We dashed to hold onto something as the concrete bucked like a beast's backbone. A burning subway car shot from the tunnel like a bat out of hell and plowed into the sea of honking cars. I spun around to hide, but was caught, transfixed, when I saw It.
The ghost's back was turned with Its black hair blowing in the wind over Its vest of bandages. It stood quite calmly as bombs replaced shooting stars and the towering skyscrapers that never slept became tombs. A white insect fluttered by Its head, and then It turned.
It had no face.
I heard Yu Li scream my name. Then a wall of squealing metal hit me and the world went dark.