I can’t keep up. The ambassador is gone. Vanishing into the Walled City before I can release my seat belt. Even that’s hard. My right arm bursts with pain. Weakness. There’s a dampness in Hiro’s shirt; my side’s bleeding again. Tears of pain fill my eyes. Make everything dazzle. The lights, the darkness, the flaring red lanterns of New Year’s. Everything is shining. Mixing together.
I feel done. But my sister’s face, her voice, is the clearest it’s been in years. I see her smiling behind the steam-wisps of our weakened tea. I hear the lullabies she sang over me after Father’s thrashings.
I think of Mei Yee and get out of the car. Leave the stink of rich cologne and leather. I’m walking, dragging through the Old South Gate. My walk feels like a twisted dream, into the heart of this unreal city. Through the last two years of my life: The sewer grate where I made my very first camp. The shops I stole from, the stoops I haunted. The window I used to peer into every few mornings to watch cartoons. The alley where I rescued a gray kitten from his vagrant tormentors. The second alley, where I rescued him again. Mrs. Pak’s restaurant and Mr. Lam’s junk store. Mr. Wong’s dentist chair. The hidden corners where I pitched my tarp. And on. And on.
Over soon. It will all be over soon.
The gun hangs heavy in my jacket pocket. All six bullets weigh my steps, make each foot forward seem more impossible than the next. I keep going. Because that’s what I do. That’s what I’ve always done.
Only this time—this crucial, final time—I don’t think I have the strength.
My boots plow over puddles of ice. Step, step, pain. I stop. Lean against the apothecary’s door. Try to focus on the dozens of jars with dried roots and bits of animals through the bars. My vision is double—smears of light and color and dark.
I’m almost there. One more turn and I’ll be at the mouth of the dragon’s den. It can’t be more than twenty steps, but it might as well be a completely different country.
An empty can, riddled with rust holes, clatters down the street. Causes my neck to snap up, alert. I can’t see much. Just the fog of my breath and the dark. Blurring together.
“There he is!” someone shouts, and I hear footsteps.
One by one, I see them. They come from all directions. A ring of boys and rags and knives. Their faces are pale and whittled. Carved by flickering lights. So sharp and bony that I’m not even sure they’re human. Maybe they’re demons. Evil spirits come to swallow me down into the fires of the afterlife. To devour my soul for what I did to the jade dealer. To Kuen.
My hand fumbles, sliding from the doorframe down toward my pocket. Toward the revolver.
But there are more than six of them. Even counting through my double vision.
One of the boys comes into focus. He’s squinting at me, lips screwed to the side. His blade is a sick shade of silver, slashing the night in front of him. “You sure it’s him? Looks different to me.”
“Got new clothes is all. Nice ones, too!” a voice calls from my left.
“Ho Wai’s right,” another boy says. “That’s him. The one that gutted Kuen.”
The boy directly in front of me steps closer. His knife moves with him; its edge hovers dangerously close to my throat. “Well, well, Jin.” A grin splits across his sharp, starved face. “Fancy seeing you here.”