Year of the Dragon (Changeling Sisters Book 3) (47 page)

At the sight of the ugly gash on his shoulder, I gave a low whistle. “That is quite the heartfelt gift from your brother.” I reached out to brush back his hair to see the extent of the damage, and Khyber flinched away. He gazed out at the brightening pink horizon, scowling.

“It is none of your concern, Alvarez.”

I stared at him for a moment, frustrated. Then a slow smirk crossed my lips. I adopted an imperious tone: “Do not be absurd. That is a wound from a Toledo blade. You know Santiago only cleans his weapons with the blood of his enemies.”

Khyber turned toward me with a raised eyebrow. I grinned and put my hands on my hips. “I’ve had my bare butt on display for every lecherous vampyre prince to see. You can put up with taking off your shirt for five minutes. Unless”—I leaned forward—“could it be that Crown Prince Khyber, the sole vampyre to ever find his soul, is afraid of me seeing him…paler than usual?”

It was a strange dawn indeed that heard the Prince of Sorrow laugh along with the twittering spirit birds and the mortal gulls. The different flocks intermingled in a colorful dance of wings above our heads as we departed the summit.

“Some god must truly love you for you to have survived for so long,” he told me.

“Are you kidding? The Lady of Eve cracks up over every one of my jokes,” I replied, and together we descended into the safety of shadows.

Chapter 56: A Mother’s Choice

~Citlalli~

My bed had never felt so good against my face. It was where I planned to reside the rest of my adult career, skillfully dodging calls from Ankor about returning to work, but Raina finally hauled me out by the tail.

“Raina,” I protested, “if it’s Yu Li, then tell her we should postpone the memorial for another week. There’s still a chance Bae will be found.”

My sister looked at me in pity but refused to let go. “Dani’s video chatting from America,” she said, dragging my reluctant ass down the hall. “She has big news.”

“She discovered she’s a shifter, too?”

Mami muttered a prayer at that and crossed herself before fiddling with the computer.

“Miguel!” she called. “Why is my image upside down?”

My brother calmly flipped the webcam right side up and then looked at her with a superior air. Mami
tsk
ed and shooed him away. “Go on, get! I want to see my daughter.”

“
Hola!
Cómo
estás
?” Daniella’s image fuzzed out and then cleared on the screen, enough for us to make out the radiant ring on her finger.

Mami gripped the screen and screamed. Miguel winced as the china rattled, and Mami screamed again.

“Hosuk didn’t!” I exclaimed, shoving my face close.

My normally calm and collected sister’s face flushed, and she tucked her chestnut brown hair behind her ears. “Last night. We were camping in the Jemez Mountains. He pretended we were down to the last s’more, offered it to me, and said he hoped I would remember it for a lifetime. And inside…”

Miguel gawked. “Seriously? Stashing a diamond ring in a
marshmallow
worked?”

“I wouldn’t recommend you try that on Yu Li,” Daniella said, and we all laughed.

“Everything was so pretty!” my older sister continued to gush, light glinting off her glasses. “The moon was out along the river. When we returned to the campground, Papi had decorated our tent with these little lights and then offered us a bottle of wine with his congratulations…”

“Hope you looked carefully before consuming something else that might be a choking hazard,” Miguel muttered.

“How did your father take it?” Mami demanded.

Daniella hugged her knees. “I think he helped Hosuk plan the whole thing. He’s getting better, Mami.”

“I get to be maid of honor,” Raina and I uttered at the same time.

“So where is the wedding going to be? Here or there?” Mami cut in, her voice sharp.

“I think Hosuk’s family would hunt me down if we didn’t have it in Seoul,” Danielle said dryly.

“You’ll be living over here, too,” Mami said, and it wasn’t a question.

Daniella rolled her eyes. “Sí, Mami. Don’t worry. We won’t spend much more time on Papi.”

Miguel clapped Mami on the back. “Hey! We can have a double wedding! Dani and Hosuk, the nice, normally functioning couple, and then you and Mun Mu, the scheming, power-hungry duo!”

Raina blanched, and she wasn’t the only one. I had warmed up to the idea of Heesu and even Sun Bin becoming my stepsisters, but the idea of being legally related to Ankor was mildly alarming.

Dani placed her chin on her palms, and the ethereal ring cast a mischievous sparkle upon her brown eyes. “Mami, have you been dating without asking my permission?”

“Where has good old Mun been, anyway?” Miguel added, hopping up on the counter and tossing a sweet potato from hand to hand. “I thought he would have bought you a bigger house by now.”

Mami lowered her spectacles to give him a pointed look. “He is away on business, Miguelo. I am sure he will return soon. Now, get off the counter.”

I was wondering why Raina kept turning into a nervous mess whenever the CEO of Yong Enterprises was mentioned, but my brother shrugged, refusing to be deterred.

“I mean, I heard his children were in a bit of a predicament on Jeju Island lately. Kinda odd that he didn’t check in on them to see if they were okay.”

“Oh yes, I heard about that,” Daniella’s image said, and we all tensed.

My elder sister nodded her head toward the TV set in the background. “I saw the reports of missing villagers happening near the world heritage site of Seongsan Ilchulbong. Of course, the media is already blaming it on the North Koreans. Maybe it’s a good thing you are going away to Mexico for a little while, Mami.”

“Hang on—what?” We all stared at our mother. In our entire childhood, Mami had never mentioned Mexico, unless to scold Papi for teaching us Spanish.

“That is another reason I gathered you all here tonight.” Mami took a deep breath and attempted a small smile. But her hands had begun to tremble, as if remembering the things they had done. “I will be leaving tomorrow for a trip to
México,
nos niños
. There is some unfinished business I must attend to.”

Miguel vaulted off the counter. “Bullshit. I tried to visit Nana’s former village my senior year of high school, and you all but barricaded me in my room as if I were talking about going to the Gaza Strip! What the hell happened there that you are so afraid of?”

“
Who
are you afraid of?” Raina asked more softly.

Mami attempted another smile and then settled for polishing silverware that was already clean enough to see our suspicious faces in. “Your imaginations are running away from you. My parents’ murderers are long gone, most likely shot up by some other street gang. However, I still own Nana’s old home, and there are some things there I must take care of. Miguel, you will run the restaurant in my absence. Look after your sisters.”

We wished Daniella many more congratulations. Then Miguel and Raina retired to the living room, bickering about what to watch on TV. Mami glanced over in surprise as I sidled up to help her do the dishes. After a moment, she made room for me. She kept glancing at my raw, red arms every time they surfaced in the soapy suds.

“I want you to go to church while I’m gone.”

I blinked. Mami picked up the abrasive sponge and began scouring the iron cast pan as if on a personal vendetta to peel away years of oil splatters.

“Mami, if it’s my soul you’re worried about, then Mun Mu offered for me to participate in Project Icarus—”

Blowing out a string of hair, Mami jabbed the ladle at me. “No. Do not trust men to do God’s work.”

“Mami,” I said, softer, “there are monsters out there. And this…
demon
inside of me…sometimes it’s the only thing that makes me feel strong enough to fight them.”

Mami grabbed my shoulders. I felt soapy water run down my arms. “Mija,” she said fiercely, “always remember: there are worse things to be afraid of
in here
.”

Abruptly, her grip turned to steel. “You foolish girl,” she whispered in my ear. “Why did you do it? Why the wolf bite? I wasn’t supposed to lose you, too.”

I pulled away as if struck. “What do you mean, why did I do it? I needed to save Raina, Mami! I was the only one who realized the truth about the spirit world. Except for—”

The gravity in her eyes pulled me down a deep, dark hole.

“Did you always know they were going to come for her, Mami?” I asked, my voice strangled between disbelief and horror.

She seized me before I could move and pressed a kiss on my dark curls. “When I go back, I will fix things, ’Lalli,” she murmured, rocking my stricken frame. “Don’t worry, mija. Everything will turn out all right.”

Later, I found Raina in our shadowed bedroom. Without a word, I crawled onto the bed and hugged her. Finally, she shifted to open her hand. A faded sun charm bracelet slipped out and hit the hardwood floor.

“What happened during the Final Trial, Raina?” I whispered as the night closed in around us.

She clammed up like a statue, but her eyes betrayed her. They were full of glittering, pale secrets that fluttered to hide from the moonlight. Then she said: “I saw the Yongs’ mother, Citlalli. After all this time, Sun Young is alive—sort of. She became the Fourth Spirit Guardian after her mortal body died. And she told me things. Many dark and unsettling things, about gods and life spirits who do wicked things. I’m still not sure what she means.”

I sucked in my breath. “You know what has become of Mun Mu, don’t you?”

My younger sister bit her lip. “Not exactly. But I promised Heesu it would be her secret to tell. After all, he is her father.”

“He’s your father.”

“No,” Raina said softly. “He never claimed me as a daughter. I failed Eve, Citlalli. I’m not from there. You are.”

Scowling, I leaped from the bed and scoured through my dirty laundry. Finally, I found it rolled behind a desk leg: a half-made soil box lantern, with twigs and frayed twine sticking up from the ends of it.

I stuck the atrocious thing in my sister’s face. “Raina, this is the garden lantern I tried to make for the Garlic Spirit. That other lantern the Greater Dark Spirit swallowed, the one which made it grow tall enough to touch the skies, was the lantern
you
made. Not me. So tell me how you’re not from Eve.”

At long last, she began to talk. She told me of the Trials, of betraying Ankor, of fighting Sun Bin, of combining forces with Heesu. She told of a silver dragon sleeping beneath the sea, whose dreams were endarkened by the past and the future. She whispered of the strange and powerful vision that the Dreaming Dragon had shared with her. Then Raina wove a picture about the night the stars fell; amongst them, a black pearl to inspire the world.

And it would never be hers.

“Good,” I told her, snuggling close. “Otherwise, you’d go off to save the world and forget about me. There will be other pearls, Raina.”

She smiled sadly but leaned her head against mine until we both fell asleep.

Chapter 57: Custody Battle

~Miguel~

My younger sister Daniella was getting hitched to a guy who appreciated the Dallas Cowboys, and I was the interim manager while Mami finally dealt with her issues in México. A couple weeks without the Dragon Lady breathing fire down my neck? I had a few menu change ideas. I still couldn’t believe she’d nixed my dessert tacos idea.

The courthouse was brimming to the lip. Everyone was eager to see my girlfriend, Yu Li, go toe-to-toe with Kang, Ae Cha’s ex-husband, in defense of Ae Cha’s children. The kiddies weren’t present, but Young Soo was in the back row with me, scuffing up the floor with his heels because his Smartphone wasn’t allowed in here.

“Kid, you are lucky. When I was your age, we only had spitballs and glow-in-the-dark yoyos to entertain ourselves,” I told him.

Young Soo glared at me. His sharp black eyes were so frightfully similar to his mother’s that I began to feel like this was all
my
fault.

“I don’t like you,” he said in a short rush of English. Perfect pronunciation.

Yu Li waved to me from the front and then tilted her head toward her pouting son. I swallowed and tried to put a reassuring arm around Young Soo, which he promptly threw off.

“I know, I’m the ugly American who can’t help you with your homework. I don’t know why your mother puts up with me, either.”

Young Soo shot me a dogged look. “I don’t want you to be new Appa. I want him to be Appa.
Rafa
.”

Fuckin’ Rafael Dominguez. I didn’t get what women saw in him. He wouldn’t have lasted a week as a line chef.

Young Soo wasn’t done. “Umma has hurt because
you
.”

I knew what he was trying to say. It was my sister who had accidentally scarred Yu Li’s face. Yu Li had experienced little peace since getting involved with my crazy family.

I patted Young Soo awkwardly on the head, which earned several annoyed looks from our neighbors. I quickly retracted the hand and tried to pretend that Young Soo’s sneaker tapping against my foot didn’t bother me. The head was sacred, a direct portal to the soul, and one did not simply
touch
it without permission.
Rafa
would have known.

The proceedings started. Kang was sober for once, but his attorney spoke in a tedious drawl as if he were as bored of being here as Yu Li’s son. A drink might have livened him up.

Then Yu Li stood up, representing Ae Cha’s parents. She demolished Kang. It was scary, really. I didn’t understand the full power of her words, but even Young Soo quieted to hone in on his mother. She was a damn fine natural Alpha, and no mortal could take her pack’s pups unless they were family. When the custody ruling was in the grandparents’ favor, the entire courtroom erupted in applause.

Kang’s goons immediately flocked to him, and they shot Yu Li several Medusa-cold looks before departing. Yu Li opened her arms so Young Soo could run and greet her. I sidled up and brushed a kiss against her ear.