I flinched as the light quivered and died, and the gut-wrenching chorus of a hundred screams filled the air.
A flash of red burned through eyelids that I’d shut tight. I blinked and found myself kneeling once more on the veranda of the courtyard, the moon half veiled by a cloud. Judging by the spoiled plums on the ground and the lonely breeze cutting through the rooms behind me, I was back in reality.
Back in the jiangshi’s hunting ground.
The Yuyan I knew stood in front of me, leaning against a wooden pillar with an incense stick in hand. A trail of blood dripped from her open throat down to her black lapels. Meeting my gaze, she dropped the stick and crushed the heat with her slipper.
“Found you, little priestess,” she sang. “I’m impressed you escaped my illusion before I caught you.”
I thought of my mother screaming at me and shoved the memory away.
“You’re a descendant of the Chiu clan,” I rasped. “That’s why you killed the Jings.”
“So you saw my memories, did you? I heard ganshi priests could do that.” Yuyan shrugged, unconcerned about being exposed. “Yes, I’m a descendant of the Chiu clan, who, by the way, ended up impoverished and unrooted after givingGuangli up to the Jings. I saw my parents suffer from anger and hard labor, and that same pain bled down to me. Unable to bear the idea of repeating the cycle, I came to Guangli to end it.” Her smile slit across her face, matching the cut that had ensured her death. “I reclaimed power for the Chius and took back our hometown.”
“You murdered an entire household,” I said, my body going cold. “There were innocents living in the mansion! Where did you bury your victims?”
“You mean criminals?”
It was then that I realized we weren’t alone.
From my periphery, I detected lumbering silhouettes moving toward our place on the veranda. The smell of rot drenched the air, flooding my nose and mouth.
“Liars don’t deserve a proper burial,” said Yuyan, a layer of insanity humming beneath her cavalier attitude. “If you saw my memories, you understand. You understand why I kept their bodies and forced my will upon them, as they’d done to my ancestors all those years ago.” She bared her teeth. “But since you made the foolish choice to wander in here, it’s time for you to join them. Give your qi willingly, and I’ll promise you a quick death.”
I backed away from the mob of jiangshi closing in. My palms turned clammy, heart threatening to shoot up my throat.
I held my staff defensively. “Where’s Ren?”
“What does it matter?” Yuyan’s eyes glittered. “We’ve played enough, priestess, and it’s long past suppertime.”
“Stay back!” I drew out a handful of purification talismans and threw them blindly at my attackers. As I spat out the incantation, Yuyan screamed in fury, her long fingers reaching for me. But I dodged and ran down the veranda, my spell unfinished.
The doors banged against the wall as I slammed them aside to find shelter within the mansion’s many rooms. I didn’t care where I ran—so long as it was away from the heartless horde behind me. Doors, railings, and windows blurred past as I barreled through the house, zigzagging around corners in hopes of losing the jiangshi. Yuyan’s singsong voice echoed from somewhere behind, too close for comfort.
I’d been warned of Yuyan’s power, and yet I’d underestimated the shamaness anyway. Not only had Yuyan’s evil spirit possessed and preserved her own body, but she’d managed to possess the entire household as well. How would I ever win against her?
I couldn’t.
This was a battle I was untrained and unprepared for. I was a ganshi priestess, for heaven’s sake, not an exorcist. My best bet at survival was escaping Jing Mansion before Yuyan found me.
But what of Ren? Was he still somewhere inside the mansion? Was he even alive? I couldn’t leave without knowing what’d happened to him.
My feet hit a colonnade linking the eastern and southern wings. After making sure there weren’t any jiangshi wandering nearby, I dashed across the walkway and slipped through the nearest door.
The room seemed to have been a former storage space, sacks of rice stacked against one wall, while variously sized boxes and jars filled the rest of the room. Near the ceiling, a narrow window with metal grilles allowed slices of moonlight to slip inside. The smell of mildew assaulted my nose as I caught my breath. To my right came the sound of tiny claws tapping against wood. Rats. I clenched my staff tighter, eager to cross to the door on the opposite side.
The wood creaked beneath my weight. I was halfway through the room when the floor splintered under my feet. I gasped. The ground gave way, and I fell down, down, down into unforgiving darkness.
CHAPTER 11
I opened my eyes and recognized the mist-blanketed bridge from my dream. The path to the underworld. There was the undulating brick walkway tapering into the horizon and the sheer, unending drop on either side. Humanoid shadows shuffled in the distance, silent and insubstantial. The clouded sky was muted, more gray than blue.
This time, I stood at one end of the bridge, a silvery forest hemming me in from behind. And there, looking out over the parapet, was Baba, still marked by the inky veins crawling up his neck.
He smiled when our eyes met.
“Am I dead?” I asked immediately. “Are you dead?”
