Dragon Pearl

by Yoon Ha Lee

  The Dragon Pearl’s radiance reflected in everyone’s eyes. I almost closed mine, but I wanted to see what would happen next. Haneul started a chant to the spirits of wind and water, wood and earth and metal.

  The ghosts took up Haneul’s song. Their voices wove together in an intricate harmony. The wind rose as well, and in its howl I heard phantom drums. Captain Hwan’s human soldiers clustered near us, seeking protection from the terraforming magic.

  A false dawn started to brighten the horizon. As the rainy mist eased, I could see a couple of the Fourth Colony’s moons floating. Then all the clouds scudded away until the sky was clear in every direction.

  Next the ground began to shake. I crouched instinctively, not wanting to be bowled over. The tremors didn’t get too bad where we were standing, but all around us gravel and soil geysered up where the old settlement had stood, where the ghosts had once lived and breathed and died. If not for the clear sweet billows of wind that buffered us, we would have been suffocated by the stinging dust and loose dirt.

  My heart threatened to pound its way out of my rib cage. Light from the sky now took on a red-orange tint thanks to all the dirt in the air. I wondered if the ghosts intended for us to be buried with them.

  “Steady, little sister,” Jun said.

  I glanced sideways, and there he was just outside the circle, the pale flames of his face flickering and unaffected by the windstorm. He was smiling. My heart ached, thinking of having to say good-bye to him soon. But for now he stood with me, and I had to treasure whatever time we had left.

  Just beyond Jun, Jang smiled at me as well. We exchanged solemn nods. He was also facing the end. I’d miss him, too.

  The Dragon Pearl blazed even brighter, which I hadn’t thought possible. Within the light I saw a vision. Rather, I saw it in the afterimages that danced behind my eyelids after I shut my eyes to avoid being blinded.

  Volcanoes vomited forth fire, and ash clouded the air. Streams of lava rolled over the old cities with their decaying spires and domes, then hardened into shapes just as beautiful and eerie. Lakes flashed up in lethal gouts of steam, while rivers ribboned in new directions. I could see how the Dragon Pearl, in the wrong hands, could be used to destroy whole worlds and their populations.

  But we were the only living people on the Fourth Colony, and the Pearl was keeping us safe. All the ghosts wanted was rest, a proper burial. The entire world would be their tomb.

  And it wasn’t only destruction we witnessed. Slowly the land stopped churning, and I dared to open my eyes. Trees of all sorts, from pines to sycamores and maples, grew from the mountainsides, and speared toward the sky. Flowers blanketed the hills and plains, and fringed the rivers like necklaces. Grasses swayed in the winds. For their part, the winds grew gentler, caressing the landscape rather than buffeting it.

  The ghosts shimmered, and I could sense their joy. Eui didn’t smile, exactly, but she made a point of meeting my eyes, and she bowed slowly and solemnly to me. Then she and the others began to fade.

  Jang looked longingly at the others, then turned to me. “It’s time for me to go,” he said softly. “I stayed too long. I realize that now. But I want you to do one final thing for me.”

  I nodded, a lump in my throat.

  “I want a proper military funeral,” he said. “I died in the line of duty, after all.”

  “I’ll make sure you get one,” I said. If we got off this planet safely, I would find a way.

  “We all will,” Haneul said. A damp cloud hovered over her head, reflecting her mood. Sujin nodded, their eyes sad.

  Jang smiled back at them, then reached out for my hand. His ghost-wind brushed against my fingers one last time. Then he was gone, and the cold breeze with him.

  Tears streamed down my face. The Dragon Pearl had finished its work. “It’s over,” I said.

  “Not yet,” said my brother’s voice.

  I yelped.

  Jun stood—floated—next to me. The other five ghosts from Captain Hwan’s mission had also materialized. I’d forgotten all about them.

  Hwan, who’d been mesmerized by the Pearl’s terraforming, now snapped back to reality. He took a few steps back as his former crew members bore down on him menacingly.

  “You,” Lieutenant Seo-Hyeon said to Hwan. No sir, no Captain. Her smile split her face grotesquely, as though it was on the verge of cracking open. “It’s time for you to pay for leaving us here.”

  Haneul summoned a bolt of lightning, but it had no effect on the ghosts.

  “Stay back, little sister,” Jun said in my ear. “This is going to get ugly.”

  I almost laughed. After I’d just faced down thousands of angry ghosts, he was warning me about this pitiful group? Still, I moved closer to him.

  Seo-Hyeon and the four other ghosts—all except Jun—now surrounded Captain Hwan. Their hair blew wildly about their faces, and their mouths stretched in ghastly, impossible grimaces.

  Hwan drew his gun and fired wildly, even though he must have known it would do him no good.

  “No, Captain, don’t!” Sujin warned. “You’ll just make it worse!”

  Sujin, Haneul, and I scattered, not wanting to be hit by stray blaster fire. In a shaking hand I held out the Dragon Pearl, hoping it could help in some way, perhaps send these ghosts to their final rest, too. But it was spent. Its swirling had ceased, and it was now just a dull metal-gray color.

  I watched in horror as the ghosts snatched at Hwan’s eyes and hands. Even though their fingers passed through him, his face contorted, and I wondered what visions were tormenting him. He bellowed in rage, then flung the blaster aside as if its grip had burned him.

  Hwan swung his fists in vain at the ghosts. I winced at his wordless shouts. He careened several steps before regaining his balance, only to lose it again.

  Or had he? Hwan’s form shimmered as it lengthened and expanded. Automatically, I froze as his scent reached me. He’d always been a predator, but now he was shifting into his true form, that of an immense white tiger. I stood transfixed by the sharp fangs revealed when he roared. He almost seemed to flow as he circled, swiping at the ghosts with his paws.

  Hwan’s amber eyes met mine for a single moment. No trace of the man remained in them. A tiger looked at me, cunning only in the way that an ordinary animal predator—rather than a supernatural one—is cunning. Haneul tried to approach, to calm him down, but he roared and lunged at her, swiping the air with a huge paw. The ghosts kept him at bay, hissing and howling. He shrank back, snarling, and in this way they herded him away from us and toward the woods in the distance.

  It was the last I would ever see of them.

  Only one ghost still lingered. Jun. I opened my mouth to ask why.

  He anticipated my question. Of course he did. “Every ghost is a different person,” Jun said quietly. “Sometimes we want different things, too.”

  He was going to make me ask. “What is it you want, Jun?”

  “I still want to visit every one of the Thousand Worlds.”

  I hadn’t expected that answer. A traveling ghost—was that even possible?

  I wasn’t sure how to talk about this. “Um, don’t you have, uh . . . limitations? Like only being able to linger near where you . . . ?” I hoped he’d catch on without my having to say it.

  “I could haunt you instead of the shuttle,” he said with a shrug. “If you don’t mind, that is.”

  “I don’t mind,” I said quickly. I’d gotten used to having Jang around; this would be even better. “But won’t you, um, affect our fortunes wherever we go?”

  “Bring bad luck, you mean?” he asked with a gleam in his eye. “Seems to me, Min, you make your own luck.”

  That would have to be enough. He was family, after all.

  “Works for me,” I said with a curt nod. “We can see the Worlds together.” I caressed the orb that was still warm in my hands and whispered, “I swear it on the Dragon Pearl.”

  It pulsed a glow in response, and I knew that
it approved.

  Now that the ghosts were gone—either to their final rest or to exact their revenge on the captain—I had hoped for a brief respite, perhaps even a nap under a tree. But my work wasn’t over.

  The soldiers who had accompanied Hwan looked dazed and disorganized, as if unsure what to do next. The most senior of them, a lieutenant, finally pulled herself together and focused her attention on me. She drew her gun as she advanced.

  I held the Pearl out before me, and she flinched from the way it flared, splashing the entire area with multicolored light.

  “You need to hand that over to the proper authorities,” the lieutenant said. She tried to sound authoritative, but her voice shook.

  The Pearl emitted a piercing silver glare. Ominous thunder crackled above, even though the sky was completely clear. She cowered.

  “The Pearl stays with me,” I said.

  She didn’t argue the point after that. “You’ll still have to come with us,” she said. “Unless you want us to leave you here. Your fate will be determined once we get back to the Pale Lightning.”

  Haneul mouthed to me, Just play along.

  Had she and Sujin forgiven me? I was too tired to care at that point. Or so I told myself.

  I could have used Charm on the lieutenant to make her think I was an ally, but why bother? Instead, I hefted the Pearl and said, “Fine. But don’t try anything stupid. I’m not your enemy. I just want to go home.”

  When the shuttle docked in its bay, the head physician, two medics, and a pair of shamans, all wearing hazmat suits, cordoned off the entire area in case of disease. They eyed the Dragon Pearl warily when we told them what had happened on the Fourth Colony. I refused to let it out of my hands, even when they disinfected us with a spray so acrid that it burned my nostrils. Then they examined us and declared us clean. Haneul and Sujin were taken to Medical for rest and rehydration. A medic gave me first aid for the blaster shot I’d taken in the shoulder.

  I thought I’d be ushered to the brig next, but instead Captain Hwan’s XO, Lieutenant Commander Ji-Eun, requested that I report to her quarters. Jun directed me there, then flickered out of sight.

  Ji-Eun paled when she learned what had become of the captain. “I suppose there’s no helping it,” she said slowly. Her voice sounded strained, and I sensed that she mourned his loss. I couldn’t help but feel a little sorry for her, even if I didn’t miss him. “I’ll have to assume his duties until we’re assigned a new captain.” Her expression softened slightly when she said, “And I’ll see to it that Cadet Jang gets his military funeral.”

  “What will happen to me?” I asked. “And the Pearl?” I gulped hard.

  “From what I’ve been told,” the XO said, “the Pearl has declared you its new guardian.”

  The orb pulsed and glowed a little brighter.

  “That appears to be true,” she added.

  I couldn’t help grinning. I stroked the Pearl affectionately.

  “Given this awesome responsibility,” Ji-Eun went on, “and the fact that you are not a member of the Space Forces, we need to get you back home. Where is that again?”

  “Jinju,” I replied. “But I can just catch a ride from the next station. I don’t want to be any trouble. . . .”

  Ji-Eun burst into laughter. “No, not you, a stowaway who impersonated a cadet, sabotaged the ship, stole an escape pod, and cleared the Fourth Colony of all of its ghosts. You’re no trouble at all.”

  I laughed then, too, more out of exhaustion and relief than anything else.

  The XO pulled herself together and said, “Once we’re fully shipshape again, we’ll take you to Black Locust Station. We’ll arrange transportation for you from there.”

  “Thank you, Lieutenant Commander.”

  She raised her eyebrow at that. “While I’m at it, it would no longer be appropriate for you to bunk with the other cadets.”

  “I understand,” I said, though I was a little disappointed. “I’m not a member of the Space Forces, after all.” I’d completely blown any chance of getting in for real, something I’d been trying not to think about.

  Ji-Eun nodded. “We do have guest cabins. I’ll have someone bring you meals. That will be the easiest way to keep the Pearl safe.”

  Ji-Eun herself escorted me to the cabin and gave me the security code. I suspected she wanted to limit my movement around the ship as much as she wanted to restrict others’ access to the Pearl. I thanked her, then fled inside, expecting to be miserable for the rest of the ride to wherever we were going.

  I set the Pearl gently in the bed and tucked the blanket around it. After I’d finished taking a shower and changing into a clean set of clothes that had been left for me, Jun reappeared in a corner of the room, shedding ghost-light.

  “It’ll be okay,” he said.

  I clamped down on the desire to throw something at him, partly because it wouldn’t do any good, partly because I wasn’t sure how I really felt anymore. How could you go and get yourself killed like that? I wanted to ask.

  “Nothing turned out as we expected, did it?”

  I wished he hadn’t come right out and said it like that. It was going to be impossible to keep secrets from him now that he was haunting me.

  “I don’t know how I’m going to explain this to Mom,” I said, blinking away a prickling sensation behind my eyes. “And I’m going to lose that bet with Bora.”

  “What bet?”

  “I said you’d be home within the year. She said no way.”

  “Well, we can’t have you losing a bet to Bora,” Jun said, with a hint of the old humor I remembered. “You didn’t say I’d come back alive, did you?”

  I choked down completely inappropriate laughter.

  “Let me tell Mom,” Jun said. His smile was wry. “I got myself into trouble. The least I can do is break the news.”

  “We’ll do it together,” I said.

  He didn’t argue with that.

  We spent the next few hours talking. Some of it wasn’t very important. Jun laughed as I recounted the number of hours I had spent scrubbing toilets because I’d used the wrong salute when an officer showed up. He told me about his first weeks on the training cruise, and the buddies he’d made in the Space Academy. He described the pranks he pulled, like changing up the seasonings with Sujin in the galley. His stories made me even more sorry we’d both lost the goblin as a friend.

  We discussed the endless chores we’d had to do back on Jinju, and how we’d taken turns putting the younger cousins to bed—and trying to make them stay there. We recalled the festival days in Hongok, when we’d bought taffy from the street vendors who clacked their scissors to advertise their candy. We reminisced about staying up late at night to tell each other about the constellations and the legends they represented.

  None of it had changed, and everything had changed. It wasn’t just that Jun had died. We had traveled into a world of stars and magic and were bringing some of both back with us, just not in the way we’d hoped.

  Toward dinnertime, a chime sounded. “Let them in,” I told the ship’s computer.

  The door swished open. Haneul and Sujin stood there, their expressions anxious. Sujin held a tray with a cup of green tea, a bowl of rice, and some dismal-looking vegetables.

  “The captain thought you’d like to see some familiar faces,” Haneul said as she slipped in. I had to remind myself that she meant the acting captain—Ji-Eun, not Hwan.

  I smiled, happy and relieved to see the two of them. Best of all, Sujin no longer appeared sickly.

  Sujin followed Haneul and set the tray down on a table. “This is officially what’s available to eat,” they said, nodding very properly at me. “But since you’re a guest now and not a cadet, you could get away with eating something less awful. If you wanted.”

  Even the cold rice and overcooked vegetables were welcome after the ordeal we’d undergone on the Fourth Colony. I wasn’t about to turn down this overture. Sujin didn’t exactly sound friendly, but the o
ffer counted for something. “Yes, please,” I said.

  Sujin conjured me some green tea cookies. Then they turned to Jun. “I’d make some dried squid for you, but under the circumstances . . .”

  “You like dried squid?” I asked Jun, my nose wrinkling. I’d only tried it once, a long time ago, and hadn’t enjoyed the tough, chewy texture. Mom and the aunties, who considered it a delicacy, had been happy to claim my share.

  “Nobody’s perfect,” Jun said, and the two of us chuckled.

  Sujin fidgeted, then looked at me. “I’ve had a chance to think things over,” they said. “I shouldn’t have given you such a hard time.”

  “No,” I said, “I deserved it. I was a troublemaker. You two were being good cadets, following your captain’s orders. You just didn’t know him like I did.”

  I proceeded to tell them what I’d read in his logbook. They both looked shocked, and I wasn’t sure what surprised them more, the captain’s determination to use the Pearl for destruction, or my snooping.

  Haneul was eager to change the subject. She eyed the empty tray and said, “We’d better take that back to the collection point.”

  I must have looked crestfallen at the thought of losing their company so quickly.

  “We can stay for a few minutes,” Haneul said. “We’ll say we were entertaining an official guest.” She winked.

  “Let’s play baduk,” I said, inspired. “There’s a set in the closet.”

  “I’m not giving you a handicap this time,” Haneul said, and we laughed.

  The two of us played a full game, which didn’t last long, because Haneul surrounded and isolated my stones no matter where I placed them. Sujin and Jun took turns giving me blatantly terrible strategy advice. I was having difficulty concentrating on the match. All I could think was that this would probably be the last time we’d play together.

  At last we counted up the score. Haneul won by so much it would have been embarrassing under other circumstances. “I didn’t throw the game, honest,” I blurted.

  Her eyes danced. “No one throws a game by that much, Min!”