Scene 1. Contamination
Bones snapped into place.
In his left shoulder. Beneath his right ribs. Shattered fragments crawled beneath the skin on their own, groping back toward where they belonged—a sound like stepping on wet gravel.
Crack.
The remains of a crushed door scattered across white carpet. Plaster dust rose like smoke from the gouged-out hinge.
One step. Inside.
A black bloodstain stamped itself down. Something that had seeped from the sole of his foot—no, a thick smear of several people's blood mingled together—spread across the virgin-white carpet like a brand.
The air in the room was different.
The reek of iron and gunpowder smoke from the hallway, the greasy stench of pulverized flesh—all of it severed clean at the threshold. What rushed in to replace it: faint, cool, a fragrance that seemed to plug the back of his throat with cotton.
Every hunger inside his body raised its head at once.
White curtains. White wallpaper. White sheets. The entire room glared at him like a massive wad of bandages. Heat shimmered—not from the ceiling but from his own body. Steam wavered above his blood-soaked forearms, and the instant that heat touched the white air, the smell of something sizzling grazed the tip of his nose.
He saw the bed.
He saw what lay upon it.
A small back, face-down on the snow-white sheet. Shoulder blades jutting thin as a bird's wings, and through the spill of loose hair, the pale line of a nape laid bare.
Saliva pooled in his mouth.
Hot, viscous, sickly-sweet saliva. It welled up from beneath the root of his tongue, seeping between his teeth. His molars clenched and unclenched on their own. The muscles of his jaw twisted as though grinding gravel.
A drop of blood fell onto the sheet.
It had dripped from his own chin. The dark-red bead touched white fabric and bloomed outward like a petal. Beautiful. The thought lanced through his skull, and his stomach turned inside out.
"Found you."
What scraped out of his throat was not a human sound. Something that seemed to resonate from somewhere inside his ribs rather than his vocal cords—a low, wet growl.
The entire room reeked of prey. No—medicine. A pouch of drugs. The same smell as that yellow liquid that dissolved all pain the moment a needle sank in.
One more step.
A second bloodstain stamped itself into the carpet.
Scene 2. Vermin
A shadow moved.
Not behind the curtain. Not beside the door. From the blind spot at the head of the bed—the narrow gap between the wall and the wardrobe—a sharp glint sliced through the air.
A dagger.
Something cold grazed the back of his hand. That was all.
Before the sensation of skin splitting open, a perfume struck his nose. Cold and sweet, buried beneath the blood-stink. The same scent he had smelled in the underground cell.
Lee Soyeon's face came into view. Mouth agape. Hair undone. Beneath the silk nightgown, her shoulders heaved as if seized by madness.
"Shut up."
His hand moved. Not toward the wrist that gripped the dagger—past it, to the throat beyond. Five fingers closed around it. Lifted. Against the wall.
Thud.
Plaster cracked in a spiderweb pattern, white powder cascading down. Beneath his palm, thin bones shuddered and ground together. The woman's feet kicked at empty air. A torn sound leaked from her mouth, but inside his ears it was muffled into something no louder than wind blowing from the far end of the corridor.
The perfume faded. Buried under blood-smell. Erased.
He released his grip. The woman crumpled to the floor behind him, but he did not turn his head.
The thing on the bed moved.
Scene 3. Where It Touches
Every sensation in his body contracted to a single point.
Yeonhwa had sat up. Knees drawn, the sleeve of her white nightgown half-slipped from her shoulder. Eyes long accustomed to the dark looked up at his face—the face caked in blood and flesh and plaster dust.
She did not run.
She did not scream.
That was the most terrifying thing of all.
He took one step closer. To the edge of the bed. His knee touched the mattress. A fresh bloodstain spread across the sheet. He raised his hand. To cradle Yeonhwa's face. Just before his fingers reached her cheek, they slid—beyond his own will—down the line of her jaw, drifting toward her throat.
He stopped.
Five fingers trembled in the air. What would shatter if they touched was not Yeonhwa but himself—and it was not his flesh but his bones that knew this. Yet each knuckle still curled, minutely, toward the pulse beating in her nape. It was not that he wanted to devour. It was that he had to. A massive hook lodged deep in his belly was dragging him forward, forward, forward.
Yeonhwa's hand rose.
Small, cool fingers touched his blood-smeared cheek.
His breath severed.
Not cold. Cool. The temperature of a damp cloth laid over a burn—that kind of warmth. Everything that had been blazing shrank in an instant. The thirst wedged between his molars pressed down below his throat. In its place, the center of his chest clenched as though wrung by a fist.
Yeonhwa's fingers grazed his temple. A flake of dried blood came away. She did not wipe it on her nightgown sleeve. She simply left it there.
A sound reached his ear.
Clear and thin—like a silver bell trembling. There was no bell in this room. Not on Yeonhwa's wrist, not at the bedside. Yet sound rang from the place where her fingertips touched. He felt the torn wound at his temple draw closed. Skin pulling taut, knitting together—regeneration so fast it felt obscene.
Her other hand came to rest on the back of his.
With the tip of her index finger, she traced letters slowly across his skin.
ㄱ.
ㅏ.
ㅇ.
Go.
The hand that had been frozen in midair clenched into a fist. Not around Yeonhwa's throat—around the sheet bunched over his own knee. White fabric, soaked in blood, tore apart inside his grip.
He raised his head. The window came into view.
Scene 4. The Fall
He stood.
Yeonhwa was light. The moment he gathered her up, what his arms held was not weight but temperature. Something cool leaning against a body that burned like an ember. His teeth clenched and unclenched on their own. He swallowed. The saliva. The thirst. All of it.
He walked toward the window. Behind him, the ragged breathing of the woman collapsed on the floor reached his ears, but his feet did not stop. In the distance, a whistle shrieked. Somewhere inside the estate, screams were stacking on top of one another.
His right foot kicked through the window frame.
Glass exploded. Shards poured into the night air. For a single instant the broken pieces caught the streetlamp glow and scattered like stars before tumbling down.
He leaped.
It was not a fall. Not plummeting—more like sprouting wings. Every heavy thing inside his ribs drained away, and night wind rushed in through the gaps between bone and flesh. Cold, briny, free.
In his arms, Yeonhwa gripped the collar of his coat. A small fist pulled at the blood-soaked fabric.
"No one touches you now."
The ground rushed closer. Gyeongseong's night gaped open and waited.
The instant he landed, the taste of blood spread across the inside of his lips.
Before he could tell whether it was his own, his vision blurred to nothing.