The boy looked up at her with large, innocent eyes the same color as axinite. Although he seemed surprised to see her, he didn’t appear to be alarmed. “I’m playing,” he said.
“All alone?”
“My brothers don’t like me, and A-Ma is sick.”
Yue tilted her head to the side, amused by the boy’s unfiltered honesty. Weren’t human children taught not to speak with strangers? “I can play with you, if you’d like.”
His face brightened. “Really?”
“What’s your name, little one?”
The boy beamed proudly. “You can call me Sonam.”
38Sonam
Hunting Log #398:
What is this pain in my chest when I look upon her?
Why does my heart race when she draws near?
Demons ahead,Sooah informs us.
We’ve got our backs pressed up against the outer wall of the sixth Court of Hell, peeking out from around the corner to get a better view of what lies ahead. Unexpectedly for the pits of hell, only row after row of stone houses sit before us, their windows and doors all boarded shut with planks of wood. A ghost town. I wonder where the path we seek is within these empty houses.
“Are you sure this is the way?” a snake demon hisses, a porcelain mask of a young man’s face tied to the side of his head. “How did we lose the others?”
“It’s because this moron thought he smelled a human,” grumbles the ox demon standing just beside, snorting angrily at the monkey rounding out the group. The strap of his mask, one of a little girl, is tied around his thick forearm.
The monkey, whose mask of a feeble old man hangs from around his neck, scratches his head, turning around to inspect thearea. We duck out of the way before he can catch sight of us. “But I could have sworn—”
“We have to catch up,” the snake insists, already slithering its way down one of the rows. “Who cares if there are stray humans around? There will be plenty to eat soon.”
When the trio finally walks off, I exhale as slowly and silently as possible. If it had come down to a confrontation, we might have been able to hold our own, but I’d rather not risk putting Yue in harm’s way. Not now that she’s so intensely vulnerable. What she needs is a place to lie comfortably, get a few hours of deep rest. If there are demons lingering around, it means the Maskmaker can’t be too far ahead of us. We’re catching up, and soon, we’ll be able to sneak around and get ahead.
Everything’s going according to plan.
What if it doesn’t?asks a tiny voice in the back of my skull.
Doubt is nothing to despise. In fact, it’s a huntsman’s greatest tool. To always be on guard, to always be thinking of alternate plans—it’s the thin line that differentiates between those who survive and those who end up buried.
But this time, there is no room for error. Not with the fate of the mortal realm, and perhaps even the Heavens above, hanging in the balance.
“See if you can pry those boards off the window,” I tell Sooah and Wen. “We can’t stay out in the open. They might double back.”
We waste no time. Sooah and Wen rip the planks off, the rusty nails holding them in place offering up little resistance. Wen’s the one who pokes his head in through the gap in the window to take a look at the interior.
“Is the coast clear?” I ask.
“Er… sort of,” he replies, sounding heavily unsure. “Come see for yourself.”
Cradling Yue in my arms, I step forward and peer inside thestone house. It’s plainly furnished, the tables and chairs crafted from light-grained wood. A thick layer of dust coats every available surface, an uninterrupted field of snow. For the most part, the house looks completely abandoned.
And then I notice the strange beings huddled together in the corner.
A family of souls appearing to watch us. Unlike the human souls we’ve encountered, these are nearly shapeless and lack any distinctive features. I can discern the outline of heads, and maybe arms, but they otherwise resemble shadows. I can tell that they’ve been here a long time given that they, too, are covered in dust.
I don’t get the sense that they’re hostile. Then again, I don’t get the sense of much of anything from them. They’re just… there. Defeated and fearful.
