I laugh harder, and Ethan joins me. We shush each other. I clap my hand over my mouth, and he presses his lips together. Our eyes meet, and we burst out laughing again. I turn my back to him to get myself under control. I wipe the tears off my face and take a deep breath.
“Okay.” I don’t look at him until I’m sure my laughing fit has passed. “A hard pass on the caviar service, but I’m eating everything on the menu, then sleeping until we land in Korea. I suggest you do the same. I don’t know when we’ll have another chance to eat or sleep once we get off this plane.”
I shouldn’t have worried he might make me laugh again. He doesn’t have a trace of mirth on his face as he nods. “How do we get to the cypress grove from there?”
“I haven’t thought that far ahead.” I do some quick math in my head. “We’ll land in Incheon around five a.m. It’ll be too close to sunrise for me to moon shift us.”
“Moon ... shift,” he says, rubbing his forehead. He looks as exhausted as I feel. “Is that what you did? To take us from Northern California to Las Vegas in ... in an instant?”
I nod, holding back a guilty cringe. Ethan knows nothing about the Shingae and its magic, even though he’s been neck deep in it since he walked into Roxy’s Diner. I can hardly believe it’s only been a little over twenty-four hours. His head must be spinning.
“Beings of the Shingae could travel from one reflection of the moon to another,” I explain.
I don’t mention that you need high magic to moon shift, because I still have no idea howIdid it. My mother said only the Suhoshin can conjure high magic. Besides, thehowdoesn’t matter at this point. I’ll take all the advantages I can get. Doubting my powers will only weaken me.
“In Korea, the humans sometimes fill a bowl with water to pray to the moon,” I say to stop the silence from stretching on. “They might not understand everything, but they sense that there’s magic in the moon and its reflection.”
Ethan is quiet for a while, then asks, “If you can’t moon shift, then how will we get there? Is it very far from Incheon?”
“Only about a hundred miles.” I worry my bottom lip, wondering how much to tell him.
“Well, that’s not too far.” He shrugs. “We can take a taxi.”
“To a certain point. The thing is ...” Oh, fuck it. “The grove is in North Korea.”
“North ...” He clears his throat and asks in a hoarse whisper, “North Korea? How?”
“The Seonangshin have been around for much longer than the thirty-eighth parallel,” I say dryly. “There’s only one Korea to them.”
My old village also lies in North Korea, although there was no North and South back then either. I take a shuddering breath. Reentering the Shingae wasn’t easy for me, but going back to my birth country is something else entirely. My life force is irrevocably tied to Korea—to its soil and its mountains. It will call to my magic, and I don’t know what will awaken inside of me. I shiver and wrap my arms around my torso.
“Hey, you okay?” Ethan grabs a blanket from a storage compartment and drapes it over my shoulders. “They should be serving food soon.”
“Thanks,” I say instead of answering his question. I’m not about to tell him that I’m far from okay.
To distract myself, I focus on figuring out how to get to the cypress grove. Landing at 5:00 a.m. blows. We can’t wait around for fifteen hours until nightfall. Our frolic through the Las Vegas Strip and the plane ride bought us some time, but it isn’t enough to keep the blue assassin and the Suhoshin off my scent for long. We have to keep moving.
After the meal service, Ethan and I head to the lavatories with our airline-provided toiletries and pajamas while our flight attendant prepares the turndown service. When we return, our seats are transformed into fully reclined beds with fluffy pillows and cozy comforters. I lie down and raise the outer partition, and Ethan does the same on his side. I don’t close the center partition, and neither does he.
Once we’re cocooned in our self-contained pod, I whisper to him, “I need to figure out a way to get us into North Korea.”
“How?” he whispers back.
“I should be able to find us a way in using my spirit eyes.” I give a decisive nod. “I’ll try it now.”
“Are you sure?” His voice deepens with worry. “You’re still a little pale.”
“It won’t take long.” I tamp down on the fluttering in my chest. Having someone give a damn makes me feel cherished. It would be dangerous to get used to such feelings. “The plane is probably the safestplace for me to use magic without getting us caught. It’ll be foolish not to take advantage of it while I can.”
“I’ll keep watch, but promise me you’ll stop if it gets too much.” Ethan sits up and shifts toward me, his gaze fiercely protective. My insides melt against my will.
I give him a thumbs-up to avoid making a promise I can’t keep. And before I do something stupid like blush, I shut my eyes and take a deep breath. My spirit eyes burst open with zero finesse—wide and edgy. I see the heartbeat of every passenger. I smell agitation, excitement, anger ... The gi of the people around me thrums in my ears and in my veins.
My breath whooshes out of me.Ethan.His life force is ... There’s another layer of gi pulsating beneath the quiet tendrils of his life force. I don’t understand. Human gi doesn’t have any discernible color—their gi is as faint as a soft breeze—but I can sense ...something. A color. Or ... colors? I can’t make it out. It’s obscured. Whatisthat?
I hunch in on myself like I’m recoiling from a too-bright light. Ethan grabs the partition between us and leans over me, his pulse kicking up in alarm. I feel his eyes skip over my body as his hands hover in the air, not knowing what to do. I force myself to relax and rein in my sight. I’m so out of practice I’m tying myself into a knot over nothing. I don’t know how I managed back in Monterey. Maybe the proximity of the Seonangshin centered me.
I shut out everything else and focus on crossing into North Korea without getting caught. One image after another flashes past my vision—knowledge imprinting itself on my mind. A desolate beach. An abandoned mine scarring the side of the mountain. Endless tunnels deep in the earth. With a gasp, I open my eyes, but my vision is blurred and swimming. I see too much—images layered over each other, obscuring the physical world—and I can’t make out anything.
