“I can’t believe we’re alive,” Zhong said. She was sitting up and flexing her fingers like they were still a little stiff.

“Me neither,” I said, fanning my face.

“That was pretty smart, Pahua,” Miv said, who climbed onto my shoulder only to drape bonelessly against my neck. He had the nerve to sound surprised after I’d just saved our lives.

“See?” I said to Zhong, exhausted but thrumming with relief. “We don’t have to kill everything that attacks us. We can survive by bargaining with something they want. We just have to figure out what that is.”

Zhong rolled her eyes. “I’d rather bargain with my sword.”

“Is that what they teach you at your fancy school?” I asked as Zhong began rummaging through her backpack.

Her ears turned pink just as Miv said, “Put your masks on.”

Up ahead, the river was taking us toward the mouth of a tunnel. Zhong found her mask quickly. Getting to mine was a little awkward with my cloak in the way. But I managed to shrug off my backpack and dig it out.

The mask wasn’t the kind you could get at a Halloween specialty store. The material was simple red cotton and looked like the cut-off hood of a sweater, except instead of going over the back of your head, it went over the front and hung loosely over your face. With the mask on, I couldn’t see a thing, so I occasionally cheated and lifted it to peek out.

“They teach us a lot of things,” Zhong finally answered me. She’d shifted on the boat so that we were sitting next to each other. “History, magic, spiritual tools, that kind of stuff. Fighting just happens to be what I’m good at.”

“And you’re not good at that other stuff?” I asked. I hadn’t seen her do any shaman magic, aside from using her qeej to open the gateway into the Echo. While I was curious, I also wanted to keep talking to fill the uneasy quiet. We’d entered the tunnel, and the walls gleamed with clusters of crystals that gave off an eerie red light.

“I know what my strengths are,” Zhong said, sounding defensive.

“I’m not very good at much, either.”

She scoffed, which surprised me. But then I remembered that she was probably thinking about how I was Shee Yee, and he was supposedly the best at everything to do with shaman warriors.

She surprised me again by saying, “You’re good at some things.” She said it grudgingly, though, which made Miv hiss at her. I ran my fingers along his soft fur as she continued. “You did just save us from the guardian of the Crossroads.”

Even though she was complimenting me, she sounded angry about it. Almost like she was…jealous? But that couldn’t be right. Zhong was an amazing shaman-warrior-in-training on a quest to earn the approval of her school’s guardian spirit.

“Thanks?” I mumbled, uncertain.

“But sometimes, the only solution is to fight,” she insisted. “Like against the poj ntxoog.”

“We did manage to get away from them. But I know what you’re saying.” I drew my shaman sword from the scabbard. “It might be a good idea to learn how to use a weapon properly.” I lifted my mask to inspect the new nicks and dents in the blade. I didn’t even want to think about what my mom would do to me when she saw its condition. “Will you teach me? What if we’re in another life-or-death situation, and my Shee Yee Fighting Skills file doesn’t open?”

“Shee Yee Fighting Skills file?” She sounded amused.

My face grew warm. “I’ve been thinking of it like I’m plugging into Shee Yee’s backup files. Or…I don’t know. Like I’m downloading a ‘how to fight’ guide straight to my brain. It’s hard to explain.”

“I guess I see your point. This boat is too small to allow us to do much, but if we get a chance, I’ll show you a few moves.” She pulled up her mask and frowned at the way I was clutching my sword tightly with both hands. “Here, hold it like this.” She withdrew her own sword to demonstrate. “One hand, so you can swing it with your wrist. And your grip has to be just right—if you hold it too tight or too loose, your palm will blister.”

I copied her, swishing the sword around until she nodded in approval.

“Once you can sense your spiritual energy, you’ll need to learn how to control it by focusing it toward a single part of your body—usually your hands. That’s the foundation for most shaman magic. The easiest way to practice this is by using a spiritual tool, like your sword, to hold the energy.” She held up her sword, and the symbols on her blade began to glow.

I bit my lip and nodded. “I’ll keep practicing.”

Our boat glided so smoothly through the river that it barely felt like we were moving. But we were going fast, easily passing the slower elephant guides. I couldn’t help lifting the edge of my mask even higher to check one out as we sailed by. It was the size of a house. Like the altar spirit back home, this elephant had twelve tusks, but these were each as long as a grown man’s height. It was definitely an animal you wouldn’t want to make angry.

The spirit riding on its back was a girl, maybe Matt’s age. She had a dark tangle of hair and sad eyes that made me think of the bridge ghost. My fists clenched as I thought of whatever she might have done with Matt’s soul.

“Put that down.” Miv batted at my hand, and the mask fell back into place. “If the elephant notices you’re not dead, it might try to kill you to fix the problem.”

“Being alive isn’t a problem.”

“It is for mortals trying to enter the Spirit Realm.”

Hard to argue with that. For such big animals, the elephants didn’t make a sound. And whatever liquid the river was made of, it didn’t act like water. It didn’t slosh against the side of the boat or spray our clothes. It smelled a little like incense, and when I dipped one finger into the red water, it didn’t even feel wet. All that happened was a slight tugging sensation, like the river was a drain trying to suck me down. I quickly withdrew my hand.

“We’re getting close now,” Miv murmured. “You should put your gloves on.”

I’d stuffed them into the side pocket on my backpack. Now I pulled them out and slipped them over my hands. Zhong scooted a little closer to me. Maybe with her mask on she couldn’t tell that her backpack was already digging into my shoulder. Or, I realized suddenly, maybe she was just as scared as I was.

That was as difficult to imagine as Zhong being jealous of me. She was one of the bravest people I’d ever met. She’d rushed into fights with demons and dragons without hesitation. Even though she was only here because she needed to complete her quest, I wouldn’t have gotten this far without her. Actually, without her I’d probably already be dead, considering the poj ntxoog I’d summoned with the gong.

A rushing sound interrupted the silence, growing louder and louder. I lifted my mask to see what it was. Zhong did the same. Up ahead, a waterfall spilled red liquid over the mouth of a tunnel that was large enough to fit several elephants.

Where the waterfall poured into the river, the surface remained smooth and undisturbed. It reminded me of the mirror pool in Ntuj’s garden. Maybe that hadn’t been real water, either.

I dropped the mask over my face again. The roar of the waterfall was the only sound. My heart sped up. Without thinking, I reached over and linked my arm with Zhong’s.

I expected her to shove me away, but she didn’t. Instead, her arm tightened around mine. Despite how scary all of this was, I couldn’t help feeling comforted. Like having Miv on my shoulder, knowing Zhong was beside me made me feel a little braver.

We sat perfectly still and waited as our boat reached the waterfall. With a jolt, I felt the strange liquid rush over my head. It didn’t soak through my hair or clothes.

But it did feel cold—the kind of chill that steals your breath. Frost spread across my skin. Zhong and I pressed closer, both seeking any kind of warmth.

The string Zhong had tied around my wrist began to vibrate. It felt…fragile, somehow, like it was about to snap. I slapped my hand over it. That probably wouldn’t help, but I didn’t know what else to do.

Then, all at once, it was over. We were through!

With a gasp, I flopped onto my back, shivering even through my cloak. Frost crystals fell from my hair and clothes. Without the gloves, would I have even made it? The thought chilled me even more.

Then the bottom of our boat scraped land, and I bolted upright again. Flipping up the edge of my mask, I saw that we had reached a grassy shore. A slope rose before us, beneath thick white clouds. Ghostly elephants and spiritfolk had formed a winding line in the large space. Skinny trees and low shrubs created aisles for those who were waiting, like the velvet-rope dividers that theaters put up when a big movie is out.

Sheer cliffs enclosed us on all sides. I didn’t like the feeling of being trapped.

“Where are we?” I asked. “Is this the Spirit Realm?”

Miv jumped onto the shore first. “It’s like the Spirit Realm’s waiting room.”

As soon as we left the boat, it slid back into the river. Then it sank beneath the surface with barely a ripple. My guess was it would return to the bank of the Crossroads, ready to be used by its next passengers. Hopefully, they’d have an easier time than we did.

Miv yelled at me to drop my mask and then told us to follow his voice. I tripped over him twice. Zhong had to hold on to the back of my cloak. When Miv announced that we’d reached the back of the line, I peeked underneath my mask and almost leaped onto Zhong. I was looking straight up at an elephant’s behind. Its tail swished and nearly poked out my eye.

I took a big step backward and didn’t care when Zhong elbowed me for stepping on her foot.

I quickly learned, though, that standing behind a guardian elephant isn’t so bad. For one, they don’t smell. I don’t know what real elephants smell like, but it can’t be great. And two, no one could see when I lifted my mask. Unfortunately, that also meant I couldn’t tell where this line was taking us, especially since we were at the bottom of a hill. I could hear a strange sucking sound nearby, though, like water going down a drain, which made me nervous.

Slowly, we followed the winding line back and forth up the slope until the ground began to level out. If it always took this long to reach the Spirit Realm, no wonder some human spirits chose to just stick around in the mortal realm. As we waited, I tried to relax by attempting to sense my spiritual energy, but Zhong was right that I’d need a lot of practice, because all I could feel was my stuffy breath inside my mask.

How much time had passed since we’d arrived at the Crossroads? What was happening to Matt while we stood here waiting? Was he even aware that his soul had been stolen, or was he unconscious in this realm, too? The selfish part of me hoped it was the former so that by the time I rescued him, he would have learned that all the spirits I spoke to were real. But the protective part of me wanted it to be the latter so he wouldn’t ever have to know how much danger he was in.

Once I figured we were near the front of the line, I lifted my mask again and peered around the elephant to see what awaited us.

The cliffs we’d seen when we arrived were encircling a large pond. It looked like normal water this time, but it was hard to be sure. All I could tell was that it wasn’t red, and it swirled a lot, like it was being stirred with a giant invisible spatula. Water lilies gathered at the edges, where the pond met the granite wall. In one wall, there was a tunnel half-submerged by water. Light shone through it, which meant it was our only way out of here.

A flat rock jutted out at the far-right end of the pond, and on it sat the biggest frog I’d ever seen—the size of a horse. The creature was slick and green, with eyes like enormous marbles. On a smaller rock beside it sat a toad, not as big, with spotted brown skin and warts. The toad sported a hat like the kind mall security guards wear. In their webbed fingers was a leafy tree branch.

“Hurry it up!” The toad whacked the frog’s rock with the branch. Leaves flew off in all directions. “The queue is getting backed up.”

The frog grumbled unhappily. Then they lowered their head to the water to take a drink. Or at least I thought they were taking a drink. Instead, the frog began to suck up the water like a vacuum. My eyes went huge as the frog inflated the more they drank, until I was sure they had to be the realm’s biggest water balloon. Before long, they had guzzled all the water in the pond, leaving behind a muddy crater and a slick stone path that led directly to the unobstructed tunnel entrance.

“Now that’s funny,” Miv said with a dark laugh.

The frog must’ve had super hearing, because their marble eyes rolled until they found the cat spirit. I imagined the angry frog spitting the pond scum at him, and us, like a giant water cannon.

“Don’t laugh,” Zhong said, slapping at the cat spirit. She’d lifted her mask, too, so she could see what was going on. Miv moved too quickly, though, and she hit my shoulder instead. “Don’t you know the story?”

“Okay, move it, move it, move it!” the toad shouted in a deep, croaky voice.

Five elephant guides and a few spiritfolk hurried across the muddy bottom of the pond. The frog, now the size of a pond itself, watched their progress. Their stomach was stretched to bursting. A long, thin line cut across the frog’s stomach, like an old scar.

“What’s the story?” I asked.

I could tell by the way Zhong’s chin lifted that she was going to use her I know more things than you voice. Funny thing, though? I didn’t mind it so much anymore.

“The shape-shifter goddess, Nhia Ngao Zhua Pa, likes to trick mortal men into falling in love with her. She usually targets terrible, shallow boys who think girls are only good for being wives, so I never really feel bad for them.”

“Ooh, ooh, I like this story!” called an old woman with two fox tails and fluffy ears. She was two elephants behind us in line. “Tell it louder, dear!”

Zhong stood a little straighter. Even though she’d let the mask cover her face again, I knew she was smiling underneath. Attention usually made me want to shrink into myself and wish I was invisible. Zhong was the opposite—she knew she had skills, and she liked it when people noticed.

“Once, Nhia Ngao Zhua Pa disguised herself as a beautiful mortal maiden. She waited on the side of a dirt path, pretending to be lost and hungry, until a young man passed by and took pity on her by giving her a meal and a place to sleep. To repay his kindness, she offered to help him harvest his fields. She amazed him by clearing an entire field of rice with nothing but a small sickle in the time it took a single incense stick to burn.”

“It’s a knife in my mom’s version,” the fox woman muttered loudly to a man standing behind her.

Zhong continued as if she hadn’t been interrupted. “The man decided to make her his wife. But on the day of their wedding, the bride didn’t show up for the ceremony. The goddess had instructed one of her servants to claim that Nhia Ngao Zhua Pa was the daughter of a dragon and had been taken to the bottom of a lake.”

“My mom tells it with a river,” the fox woman mumbled.

“Anyway,” Zhong said pointedly, “she’d wanted the groom to dive in after her and drown. But instead, he sat on the shore, crying, as he truly believed that his bride had been abducted. A frog overheard the man’s laments and offered to help him rescue her by drinking all the water in the lake. It gave the man one warning—‘Do not laugh’—and the grateful groom swore he wouldn’t.”

“Let me guess,” I said. “He broke his word.”

“Shh, don’t ruin it!” the fox woman hissed.

“As the frog slurped up the water, it grew so big that the man couldn’t help but laugh. The poor creature’s stomach burst open, and all the lake water flooded back out. Fortunately, the frog survived, and when the man pleaded once more for help, the creature’s kind heart couldn’t refuse him. So the man sewed up its stomach and the frog drained the lake a second time, revealing Nhia Ngao Zhua Pa at the bottom.”

I thought about the scar I’d seen on the frog’s stomach and winced.

“The goddess was furious with the frog for interfering. In punishment, she cursed it to be stuck here forever, forced to repeat its act of kindness over and over.”

“So tragic,” the fox woman whispered, looking way too happy about it.

I’d never liked sad stories. I’d always thought of books, TV shows, and movies as like playing pretend. They were supposed to be better than real life, weren’t they? Otherwise, what was the point?

“Looks like the goddess is punishing everyone else, too, by making the spiritfolk wait for the frog,” I said. Nhia Ngao Zhua Pa had a cruel sense of humor. It was probably best not to say that out loud, though, in case any of her underlings were around. The gods already hated me for being Shee Yee’s reincarnation. Insulting them on top of that wouldn’t get me on their good side.

As soon as the last elephant disappeared into the tunnel, the frog’s mouth opened. All the pond water gushed out in a crushing wave of algae, fish, and mud.

“Gross,” I said. I dropped the mask over my face and pinched the fabric over my nose.

The process repeated several more times until, at last, we were in the group that would go through the tunnel next. The frog dipped their head to the pond and began vacuuming up the water again. Their stomach ballooned and stretched and looked so ridiculous up close that it was kind of funny. I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing.

It wasn’t the frog’s fault. They had only wanted to help someone, and now they were cursed for all time. Harsh.

Once the pond was cleared, the toad shouted, “Okay, folks, keep it moving!”

Miv returned to my shoulder to avoid getting his paws muddy. We hurried across, stepping from stone to stone. They were slippery, so we couldn’t move as fast as the elephants. I was paranoid of getting trampled, especially since I could barely see. I had to keep lifting the edge of my mask to make sure I wasn’t about to step into a mud puddle.

I heard Zhong mumbling something in Hmong. She was having the same trouble I was. When I glanced over at her, though, I noticed something behind her. At the far left end of the pond, almost hidden in the muck and mud, there was a hole in the side of the cliff, like the narrow mouth of a cave. It led into pure blackness.

“What is that?” I asked, nudging Miv.

Miv’s small body stiffened against my shoulder. “I’m not sure, but I’ve heard there are tunnels beneath the Spirit Realm. Probably a good way to get lost for all eternity.”

“Hurry it up!” shouted the toad.

We’d somehow ended up at the rear of the group, and we were only halfway across. The elephants and other spiritfolk were quickly leaving us behind.

“I can’t see with this stupid mask on,” Zhong said, holding it up over her face so that one eye was visible.

The toad began to smack their branch furiously against the rock. I couldn’t move any faster, though. My sandals kept slipping on the algae-covered stones. Then the toad started hopping and looking frantically between us and the frog, whose stomach had begun to tremble.

“Forget this.” I ripped off my mask and started running, but it was too late.

Unable to hold in the water any longer, the frog opened their mouth. Water poured out, throwing up mud and plants. All of it rushed toward us in a terrifying wall of frog-flavored destruction.

Please don’t fall, please don’t fall, I thought as Zhong and I sprinted across the stones. But we had no chance of withstanding the torrent.

Scummy pond water crashed over us, taking my feet out from under me. Miv clawed at my shoulder to avoid getting swept away. I barely even noticed, because I was too busy being terrified. I didn’t know up from down as the waves battered me from all sides. My cloak tangled around my legs, pinning them together.

This was it—I was going to drown in frog backwash. It just figured.