Chapter Text
Music was a story. For Rumi, music told of the parts of herself that she often wanted to hide, to secret away into riddles that only she understood. Sometimes, when she listened hard enough, she could even hear snatches of stories from songs that weren’t hers, fleeting rhymes and melodies that told her what a songwriter felt, or what a singer wished for so desperately that it ached.
Furthermore, if she listened even harder, a song felt fuller than that—a forgotten memory. A hidden desire, a transient destiny.
This last year felt like an old song Rumi had heard on the radio as a child, perhaps one Celine had played for her as she drove her somewhere. An old song, yet a song that she could never forget. Because she had heard music like this before.
She knew what this was; she was quite familiar with the feeling, actually. She had felt it her whole life on the days in autumn when Celine would bring her to her mother’s grave for Chuseok, and on the day of her own birth when she had no parents to celebrate it with.
And now, the night was a listless thing, and this was yet another anniversary that had settled into her bones.
Rumi massaged her left wrist, rotating it in her other hand and pressing her thumb into the taut, delicate muscles there. She sighed, draping her hand over the guitar she was using to test out the chords to a new song Zoey had written lyrics to.
She sat on the floor of the HUNTR/X tower’s living room, her legs angled underneath her, enjoying the way the wooden panels cooled her skin. In the summer heat, she needed it.
She leaned against the plush sofa, her back pressing against the seat cushions, and stared at the ceiling.
Everything felt so far away. Distant, like she was floating in a sea and drifting further and further away from a truth she could not name.
She knew why she was here still, but she told herself not to think about it.
She was alone on a Friday night. Zoey, exhausted and jetlagged from her trip to the States, had already passed out inside her bedroom. She babbled nonstop when she arrived earlier that evening about how she absolutely whooped her older brother’s butt in Mario Kart World, specifically in Knockout Tour mode, which she was particularly proud of because they also played against twenty-two other international online players. Somehow, Zoey nabbed the number one spot.
Then, rather unceremoniously, Zoey had yawned so wide that Rumi was sure any lion would be jealous of her skill. And then of course, Mira ushered Zoey into bed and that was that.
Mira then decided that she’d go downstairs and run through some dance routines. “You know I always work best at night,” she said. “I get inspired, and then I knock out.”
Well, Rumi wouldn’t deny it. She could relate to it, even, because she herself worked best at night. Mira did tend to get her best choreography ideas when she was alone in the practice studio with no one else to bother her, and those times typically were at odd times like, for example…2 A.M.
The only problem was that it was 4 A.M., and Mira had returned over an hour ago, ready to shower and sleep.
Rumi knew why she was still awake, and it was ridiculous, and it was stupid, and—
But distracting herself to sleep was only doing so much. Her fingers were calloused and her wrist sore. The tightening sensation had increased as the weeks went on. She had this problem for as long as she could remember—or at least as long as she was training to be a hunter. After all, she used her left hand to play guitar. But since last year, the problem had gotten worse.
Mira had claimed it was carpal tunnel, and Zoey had even brought her back to Healer Han the other day. Rumi drank his grape-flavored potion, but nothing seemed to work.
“It’s been paining you for years, am I right, Rumi-nim?” Healer Han asked in a follow-up call. “Perhaps it is because you’ve brushed sleeves with someone with whom you’ve had a past connection. It is possible that the connection is so strong that it now manifests itself through the ache in your wrist.”
“But that’s just an old wives’ tale,” Rumi whispered to herself now.
When she glanced out the window, she could see how peaceful Seoul looked. The Honmoon with its iridescent strings, shielded the world from chaos. The strings moved with the flow of the wind, like ripples interrupting the surface of calm waters.
Truthfully, what Healer Han told her had angered her because she used to have someone like that—someone who had a strong connection with her. But when she thought too deeply about that person, it was her heart that hurt, not her wrist.
In the distance, Namsan Tower glittered, alight with nighttime splendor. On top of that hill, it looked like a needle shooting into the sky.
She strummed a familiar chord. “Soda Pop” played in her head, and with an acoustic staccato when played on her instrument. As soon as she realized it, she slapped her hand flat on the strings, startled.
She groaned. “What am I doing?”
Stop it, stop it! Focus, Rumi. Focus.
And really, what was Rumi doing? Playing the song the Saja Boys debuted with of all things? It wasn’t like the world remembered them—
A pang ripped through her heart.
“But I remember them,” she whispered. She sighed, placing her guitar down on the floor. “This is dumb.”
She glanced at the patterns that painted her skin, their colors matching that of the Honmoon, pearlescent in hue. She thought they were beautiful now. It had taken time to think this way.
But a year was a long time. Had it really been that long since she had seen him last? Since her life changed forever?
Stars speckled the dark sky, diamonds on dark velvet, and she thought about what it would be like to leap into the sky with them—to be free.
She hummed another tune, a different one.
One she hadn’t thought of for a while, one that hurt her to think of.
And she remembered Jinu.
Rumi’s breath caught in her throat, a small hitch that sounded almost like a gasp, like the beginning of a sob. The memory of Jinu wasn't a sharp wound this time—it was a weight, warm and heavy, pressing against her chest. She exhaled and let the image of him sink in, let it fill the room with its quiet insistence. A year had worn away the edges of grief, but it hadn't made it smaller. If anything, it had settled deeper inside her, becoming part of her.
It’s been a year today, she thought, a year since he left me behind. A year since I learned to accept who I am.
She closed her eyes.
The melody she'd been humming lingered in the darkness behind her eyelids.
Jinu's voice.
Jinu's smile.
Jinu standing beneath a sky full of stars.
I remember you.
The thought came unbidden.
When she opened her eyes again, the living room was gone. The polished wooden floor beneath her knees was replaced by soft, gray nothingness, as if she was sitting atop solid mist. The city lights outside were gone. Even the distant hum of the Honmoon was muted, replaced with a vibrating silence that seemed to thrum through her body.
Rumi immediately pushed herself upright.
“What—?”
The guitar beside her had vanished. So had the sofa, the windows, and Seoul itself was gone.
A pale silver haze stretched endlessly in every direction. The ground beneath her feet looked almost liquid, reflecting colors that shifted between moonlight and the glistening blush of the Honmoon.
Her pulse quickened.
This wasn't the material world. But it wasn't the demon realm either. Wherever she was felt suspended between breaths, between heartbeats, between blinks.
A soft rustling sounded behind her.
Rumi spun around.
A movement caught her eye. Out of the inky shadows, a blue tiger padded forward. The creature’s enormous form looked almost translucent, as though woven from moonlight and memory, and its ears flicked forward when it saw her. Its stripes shimmered faintly, reflecting the gentle light of this in-between place. Gleaming yellow eyes fixed on Rumi, calm but insistent, and the beast lowered its massive head slightly, nudging Rumi gently with its snout.
Rumi let out a breath she didn’t realize she was holding. “Y-you’re…Jinu’s tiger,” she murmured, voice trembling. “But…how?”
The tiger huffed softly.
Before she could move toward the tiger, another shape swooped through the gray mist overhead. A bird with three eyes on each side of its head circled once above her head, wings fluttering in silent, hypnotic patterns. The bird landed on the tiger’s great head, tilting its head as though pointing toward something unseen, the gat it wore tilted with it.
Rumi stared.
Neither of the peculiar creatures looked particularly startled. In fact, they looked like they had been expecting her. But she couldn’t read an animal’s mind.
"Am I dreaming?" she asked instead, feeling rather absurd.
The tiger blinked slowly, grinning wider, its pointed fangs glimmering. The bird chirped once. But neither answered.
Of course they couldn’t.
A strange unease settled over her.
"How did I get here?" she asked, her breaths misting into the air.
The tiger turned, then began walking.
“Wait, what are you—”
The bird glared at her and squawked another time. It turned its annoyed gaze toward the direction the tiger walked.
Rumi hesitated only a moment before following.
With every step each of them took, the fog parted around them.
The silence was immense and it rushed toward her like waves. Like she had to think to breathe.
What was going on? What was happening? Where was she?
Then, as soon as the panic began to overtake her, as soon as she faltered in her first step, the tiger stopped right before a moss-covered carved totem. It stood on top of a hill of silver grass that swayed as if it were made of the wind itself.
The statue was a jangseung, a wooden totem, an ancient guardian sentinel. It was enormous, the largest jangseung she had ever seen, and three times her height. Its cracked surface shimmered with traces of the Honmoon’s light.
But what boundary was it guarding?
Its mouth, carved in that iconic smile, seemed impossibly alive, and from it came a song, low and haunting, like gusts through a hollow shell. The tiger stopped before it, opening its gigantic maw, and grinned.
The melody poured from the totem like water from a spring.
Her heart slammed against her ribs.
"No..."
Rumi's breath left her lungs. Beneath the music, hidden so deeply she almost missed it—
She recognized Jinu's voice.
But it also wasn’t his voice. It sounded like the remnants of him, mere echoes and shades of him, like the very first note of a song or the breath a performer takes before they sing.
A sharp pain exploded through her left wrist.
“Ah!” she screamed.
She grabbed her wrist immediately.
The familiar ache she'd endured for so long suddenly intensified, burning hot beneath her skin.
Rumi stumbled. The pain spread up her forearm.
“What is happening?”
The patterns on her arm began to glow golden, then soft pearl. Then something new appeared.
A single thread. Red. Brilliantly red.
It appeared like a sunbeam crackling across the dawn, a sudden line that shone bright, liquid light. The glowing strand wrapped once around her wrist before extending outward into the mist. Far, far beyond the jangseung. Beyond what she could see.
The thread shivered gently, as though responding to a distant heartbeat.
The burning pain vanished instantly. For the first time in weeks, her wrist didn't hurt.
The tiger let out a low rumble, and the bird landed beside her and pecked lightly at the illuminated thread. The red string brightened, and as it did so, the song pouring from the jangseung swelled.
The tiger padded ahead, turning its head back to ensure Rumi was following. The bird lifted from where it perched, fluttering low, then back up, flying toward a place beyond the jangseung.
And then, impossibly, the statue moved. Not much, but just enough. Its stone lips parted wider. The melody shifted. A voice emerged from within the music.
There were no words, but a feeling carried by sound.
Find him.
Rumi's eyes widened.
The red thread tugged gently against her wrist.
Her fingers itched. Her once sore wrist, the one that had throbbed from too many chords, now felt weightless, almost healed by the air itself. She followed the tiger. The mysterious melody resonated through her chest, pulling her further into the liminal world between the Honmoon and the material realm.
“Find him?” she whispered into the nothingness.
The melody seemed to laugh at her as it trailed her movements through the mist.
The ground dipped and she stepped through a thicker, more viscous fog.
Find him.
The farther they walked, the stranger the landscape became. Massive lily pads floated in midair like islands. Streams of glowing water flowed upward instead of down. Fragments of memories drifted through the fog like lanterns—brief flashes of faces she almost recognized before they disappeared again. Then other faces she did not quite recognize, floating like smudges of washed-out paint in a pool of murky water.
The air felt cooler here, and both lighter and heavier at the same time.
Was she…under a river?
The red string tangled and untangled as she followed its line. She had no choice but to follow it, for the tiger was so far ahead of her that she could not see it anymore. She couldn’t remember when she had lost it.
Her fingers closed around the glowing thread.
The moment she touched the string, she heard a voice clearly for the first time.
“My shame…”
Rumi gasped. Tears sprang instantly to her eyes.
“Jinu?”
The thread blazed scarlet, biting into her skin.