He chuckled. “Neither of us are yet. Your body is unconscious, and your soul has wandered here, like before.”
“I was in Jing Mansion,” I murmured, fingers brushing my brow. “I was being chased, and then I fell…”
“Chased?” Concern tugged down the corners of his mouth. “What trouble have you gotten into, daughter?”
I dropped my eyes, ashamed, remembering the cruel illusion I’d endured and the vengeful jiangshi hunting me. This all happened because I’d insisted on entering Yuyan’s lair. What nightmare was Ren experiencing? How would my failure affect my father?
“I’m sorry, Baba,” I murmured. “I fear I’ve overestimated myself, and I seem unable to make things right.”
“Oh, Siying.” He stepped toward me and placed a gentle hand on my head, a familiar gesture of comfort. “As humans, we’re all prone to mistakes. What matters is how you face them. You’ve made a choice; now you must be the brave girl I know you to be.”
“What if I’m not brave?” I asked, indirectly confessing one of my greatest fears—the fear that no matter how hard I fought, it would never be enough. “What if I fail again? This problem”—I couldn’t name Yuyan, or else my father would worry—“is greater than I anticipated. What happens if I can’t overcome it?”
Baba paused, considering my question seriously. At last, he said, “We’re all born with our own paths, Siying. Each path will come with its challenges and triumphs, and you may even become lost at times. But remember this: Every path ends the same way. That is a fact of mortality.” His hand cradled the side of my face, his palm rough and dry. “The only question that matters is, how will you walk yours?”
“I… I want to walk it bravely,” I said. “But I’m still afraid.”
He patted my shoulder. “We all are. The good news is you don’t have to walk your path alone. You have your family, friends, community. You even have your mother by your side, guiding you.”
I glanced around, searching for my mother. Not the monstrous illusion that had attacked me, but the mother who’d stroked my hair and sung childish lullabies by candlelight. “Mama is here?”
“No,” my father said with a melancholic smile. He tapped my chest. “She is here, and she loves you more than you know. When you’re afraid, just remember that her strength lives on in you, a strength you can use to help yourself and others.”
I remembered the illusion’s anger, her accusations that I’d killed her. I knew I was innocent, and yet part of me still felt guilt for surviving when Mama hadn’t.
“What strength, Baba?” I clenched the fabric of my collar. Perhaps the illusion had been right to curse me. For all my stubbornness and self-assurance, I’d done little to make a difference in the lives of the people I loved most. “How do you see Mama’s strength in me?”
My father gently took my hands and held them palms up. “These hands can do more than carry a staff or write talismans in blood. They can offer support and tend wounds, perhaps even save a life. You need only call upon the strength inside you to do so.”
“Baba, I asked for an answer, not a proverb—”
My surroundings wavered, scattering my thoughts. My body was regaining consciousness.
“You must leave,” Baba said. “Whatever danger you’re in, you must wake and find safety.”
“What about you? Why are you still here, Baba?”
He shook his head. “There’s no time, Siying. Wake up. Be brave.”
“It isn’t that simple. Ren—”
Before I finished speaking, a black curtain overshadowed Baba and the bridge, swallowing my vision.
I woke to utter darkness. I lay on my back, a fractured floorboard digging into my left shoulder blade. The painful pressurewas only a single part of the ache that seemed to encase my entire body. I’d become a human bruise, my pulse thumping from every inch of my being.
With a groan, I rolled over and pushed myself up, feeling the pricks of splintered wood and grit against my palms, still tender from my encounter with Chunhua. I coughed from the dust that coated me inside and out. Once I could breathe steadily, I examined my surroundings more closely. Or rather, attempted to.
I’d fallen through the storage room, down into a lower, windowless level. When my eyes adjusted, I could make out the hole overhead, the result of my weight on rotting floorboards.
I shoved myself to my feet. Miraculously, nothing seemed broken. Shuffling with my arms outstretched, I brushed against shelves bearing round, smooth jars. The Jings’ wine supply, I guessed. And if this was another storage room, that meant there had to be stairs leading outside.
I moved away from the shelves in search of the exit. My foot knocked into something solid, and soft ringing echoed through the pit. My staff. Relieved, I bent down to find it. Its familiar shape in my hand reminded me of Baba’s demand to find safety.
But I couldn’t escape Jing Mansion without Ren. I’d brought him here, and I refused to leave him behind. So, as I stumbled around the room, leaning on my staff for support, I mentally plotted out a plan for overcoming Yuyan and her army of jiangshi.
A simple offense wouldn’t suffice. I needed to match Yuyan’s craftiness.
Ren had been carrying the candles we’d purchased in Guangli, so the paper lanterns in my bag were useless. But I had matches, purification talismans, and sticky rice grains. All useful tools against an evil spirit. I just needed to use them wisely.
