Young-hee and the Pullocho

by Mark James Russell

  Mirinae examined the simple elastic like a jeweler with an uncut diamond. “Not bad. These are your hairs caught in there?”

  “Yeah, I think so.”

  “Let’s give it a try then.” Mirinae slid the hair band over the thin lodestone and twisted it around twice to make it reasonably tight. “Okay, hold the chioonchim, and keep this plane level with the floor.”

  Young-hee took the device awkwardly. The lodestone was certainly moving, spinning this way and that. Young-hee relaxed her arms and tried to stay still, to help the needle settle. The spinning slowed, swung in ever smaller arcs, until it came to rest—pointing right at Samjogo.

  “Oh, you’ve got to be kidding!” Young-hee shouted, monumentally frustrated. She had appreciated Samjogo’s help, but he was at least as annoying as he was interesting. And whatever their relationship, it was more like family than anything. It certainly wasn’t her fate or future.

  Samjogo arched his eyebrows in surprise. “Well, now, that’s … uh, well, that’s something.”

  Mirinae looked from the device to Young-hee, then to Samjogo, and back to Young-hee. “I don’t know what’s wrong.” Shrugging, she reclaimed the chioonchim and began fiddling again.

  “Could I try?” said Samjogo suddenly.

  “Eh? You?” said Mirinae.

  “Yes, me. I’ve been traveling with Ms. Young-hee for several days now. She saved me when I was imprisoned, and since then I have fought for her more than once. The pullocho is her quest, but I feel it has, in a way, become mine too.”

  “I thought you said you were some kind of bird thing. How can the chioonchim work for you?”

  “I think Samjogo-the-three-legged-bird is more of an honorary title,” said Young-hee.

  “Most definitely not,” snorted Samjogo.

  “Well, Ungnyeo the Bear called him a bear-son,” said Young-hee. “Maybe he has some mud-world human blood.”

  “Fine. But we’ll need something of yours for the lodestone. Do you have a hairband, too?”

  “No, I’m afraid not,” said Samjogo. “Oh, but how about …” He fished through the pockets of his jeogori, and pulled out—well, Young-hee wasn’t sure what—the remains of a dead, mangy rat, or something just as dreadful.

  “What is that?” she asked.

  “It’s a good-luck charm from a fairy. I’ve carried it as long as I can imagine. And if it has protected me this long, it must have powerful fairy magic. What do you think, Mirinae? Fascinating?”

  “Definitely not,” Mirinae scoffed. “It’s not alive, is it?”

  “No, just a faded memory.”

  “All right. By now, it should carry some of your essence, but I don’t detect any fairy magic, whatever you were told. It’s too big, though.” Mirinae found a knife, and cut a small piece, then replaced Young-hee’s hairband with Samjogo’s charm. Satisfied, she handed the chioonchim to Samjogo. “Okay, keep that plane level.”

  But before she finished that sentence, the lodestone swung back and forth so violently that they all started. “I hope it’s not …,” began Samjogo.

  “Quiet!” Mirinae barked. “Don’t disturb the search.”

  The lodestone swung left and quivered, then right, then spun furiously—and then, just as suddenly, came to a full halt, pointing into the distance. Mirinae held her finger up to her lips, ordering silence. She opened the wooden slat in front of the needle, adjusted the chioonchim, angled the plane up and down, then carefully rotated a dial surrounding the lodestone needle. “Uh-huh,” she said, followed by “Hmm” and “Fascinating.” She spun around, fumbled through a table of scrolls, picked one, and read the indecipherable scratchings. “So that’s that, then,” she said.

  “Wha- What is it?” said Young-hee.

  “I think I know where your pullocho is, dear,” said Mirinae. She pointed to a star low in the sky, in a break in the clouds. “That way.”

  “What way?”

  “Come, I’ll show you,” said Mirinae, hurrying downstairs, with everyone anxiously following. She found what she sought in stacks of scrolls, brushed aside the clutter, and unrolled a map. “There,” she said, jabbing it with her finger.

  Young-hee found no meaning in the purple-green squiggles, almost-but-not-quite Chinese characters in circles and jagged blue lines. The ornate wind rose in the corner featured animals in each direction instead of the words north, south, east, west. It looked more like a map of ideas than actual locations.

  “That is your pullocho,” Mirinae said. “This line is the ridge we are on. This blue line is the Hungry River. And this is where the Sacred City should be.”

  “And the big green shape between the river and the city?”

  “That’s the Great Forest. You’ll want to go around it. It’s a long journey, but the Great Forest is, well …”

  “Great?” offered Young-hee. “Very, very big?”

  “Cheeky,” said Mirinae, not amused. “The Great Forest is very large, but also very peculiar. No path or quest can penetrate it. And it is full of dangers.”

  “She speaks truly,” said Tiger. “It is the home of the Forest Fairies and their unfathomable spirits. Even I know that no one enters the Great Forest. Or, more precisely, no one leaves.”

  “So we go around instead?” asked Young-hee.

  “Yes, although that could take a very long time,” said Mirinae. “Going over the forest might be easier. Can any of you fly? No? So, around it is. Crossing the Hungry River will be tough, too, especially as it is swollen from the rains. But once over it, you can circle the forest in, oh, ten days or so?”

  “Ten days?!”

  “Or so.”

  “And then all the time I’ll need to get back. Assuming we even find a pullocho there.”

  “I’m with you, no matter how far the journey,” said Tiger.

  “Mirinae’s machine and my heart say the pullocho is there,” said Samjogo. “You can trust both.”

  But I don’t trust either, thought Young-hee. Of course the chioonchim directed her right into the Great Forest, undoubtedly the one that Grandma Dol and Boonae warned her about. And Samjogo—well, he was brave, well-meaning, and fought well, but far from trustworthy. But what other choice was there? “Okay, let’s get some sleep, and start in the morning,” said Youngee, without much conviction.

  Mirinae took blankets from a chest, and they all bedded down on the floor. The warmth of the ondol floor soothed the constant rattle of worries in Young-hee’s mind.

  “Young-hee?” said Mirinae, “you need to sleep the other way. If your feet face that direction while you sleep, your soul might walk away.” Lacking energy to argue, Young-hee turned round and Mirinae seemed satisfied. “It’s science.”

  ✴ ✴ ✴

  Dawn came quickly, and when the bright sunlight awakened Young-hee, she felt barely rested. Her grogginess was made all the worse by Samjogo’s excessive keenness as he bragged of lucky dreams.

  Mirinae descended her great staircase. She had been using the clear skies to re-check last night’s observations and, unwilling to give up the original map, had sketched a copy for Young-hee. She wished Young-hee well on her journey and pronounced the weather a good omen. “Science.”

  But all at once the sunlight was blotted out and Mirinae’s house grew dark and—boom! With a huge explosion, fragments of wood and stone rained from above, followed by Mirinae’s precious gadgets tumbling from the overhead platform. Only the great iron armillary sphere protected them being hurt by the downpouring shrapnel.

  Shielding her eyes, Young-hee looked up to see dark storm clouds beyond a newly formed hole in the roof. In the hole stood a bizarre demon. Its head was like a mutant ox, bald save for two wild patches of hair around his ears and unkempt whiskers on his chin. Each foot held a great hammer, and his right hand gripped a long sword, ridged like a bread knife. Cymbals with long ribbons hung off his waist. His two great leathery wings beat against the sky. It was Nwaegongdo, the Storm Lord.

  “Give me the girl!” he roa
red. “Or I will take her!”

  “Oh crap,” said Young-hee.

  “My house!” shouted Mirinae. “What have you done to my house?!”

  Nwaegongdo’s lightning strike had filled the air with smell of ozone and charred wood. A brass ring from an astrolabe fell to the floor beside Young-hee, along with a hail of gears, glass, and other bits of gadgets. The whole observation platform moaned, shuddered ominously, and threatened collapse.

  Samjogo swung his hyeopdo to deflect debris hurtling at Young-hee’s head. “Go, take cover,” he said, pushing her under a row of benches as he brandished the weapon. Tiger danced about avoiding falling objects, his feline skittishness rapidly turning to big-cat anger. Mirinae, sheltered along a wall, continued wailing at the demon.

  The Storm Lord’s beating wings swirled wind and rain through the broken hall as he slowly descended onto a huge iron ring, just overhead. He wielded his serrated sword with menace and thumped the wall with hammers. Tiger growled as he prowled underneath. “Move, little kitty,” the Storm Lord warned. “My mistress wants the bear daughter, not you. Don’t make me clip your tail.”

  “Oh, hush, you ugly, empty breeze,” laughed Samjogo, stepping forward. “I’ve farted angrier winds than you.”

  “And who in the heavens are you? Besides a soon-to-be stain on my hammer?”

  “Your threats mean nothing, but not knowing who I am—now, that hurts. I am Samjogo, the three-legged crow, and one of the mightiest creatures under the heavens.”

  Nwaegongdo’s forehead wrinkled. “A samjogo? Not like any I’ve seen.”

  “The Samjogo, thank you very much,” Samjogo corrected.

  “Well, the samjogo,” scoffed the Storm Lord, “I’d like to introduce the hammer.” With swift violence, Nwaegongdo swung his bludgeon, using his feet as dexterously as hands. Samjogo barely dodged the heavy weapon, which smashed through tables and instruments, sending debris in all directions, then shook the whole stone house as it landed on the floor.

  The Storm Lord next swung his sword, chopping a table in half. Then his other foot swung the second club, destroying more of Mirinae’s precious devices. Parrying, Samjogo swung his hyeopdo at the Storm Lord’s neck, but the demon easily knocked it aside. He raised his blade and charged again, but this time Tiger dove to head off the attack, swerving in that impossible, coiling feline way—he twisted once, then doubled back in the same motion, clamping his jaws hard around the Storm Lord’s thick wrist. With each bellow of the demon’s pain, wind and rain whipped harder. Seizing the chance, Samjogo swung his hyeopdo at the Storm Lord’s body.

  But the moment didn’t last. Nwaegongdo deflected Samjogo’s blow with his cymbal. Then he hammered the ground so hard the stone floor split and cracked, breaking Tiger’s grip. Flapping his wings, he rose out of reach, readying his next attack. In a flash of orange, Tiger bounded up the wobbly stairs, light as a housecat. Leaping off the stairs, he pounced onto the Storm Lord, teeth aimed at the demon’s throat. Tumbling backwards, Nwaegongdo wrapped his immense wings around Tiger and, rolling with the attack, swung his hammer. The blow flung Tiger through two stairs, shattering them. But having twisted his body in the air, Tiger had righted himself before landing in a mess of scrolls, breaking a table, and rolling to the floor, stunned but alive. Wincing, Young-hee hoped he would be okay. Good fighters though they were, Tiger and Samjogo were no match for such a powerful demon.

  “This is ridiculous,” snapped Mirinae, bolting from her hiding place. She ran past her dragon-bone clypsedra and started rooting in a particularly messy corner.

  With boastful and angry cries, Nwaegongdo reached behind his back and pulled out a great drum and one of his hammers. The air crackled as he readied to summon a lightning bolt—and, just then, Young-hee realized that nearly every machine of Mirinae’s was made of metal, including the giant iron rings of the huge armillary sphere for mapping the heavens. Electricity plus metal sounded like a formula for a very bad outcome. “Everyone, get down!” she shouted.

  The Storm Lord hammered his drum with a joyful solemnity, and a huge bolt of lightning shot out with a blinding flash and deafening clap. But in the enclosed hall, full of conductive materials, the electricity went wild. It bounced and ricocheted everywhere, filling the chamber with a vast web of errant forking zips of electricity. It would have been beautiful, had it not been so deadly. Young-hee screamed.

  Luckily, the giant armillary sphere absorbed most of the strike, sending much of it back at Nwaegongdo. He crashed to the stone floor, stunned and smoking slightly. Samjogo recovered quickly, dashed at him, and swung his hyeopdo in a big arc. Nwaegongdo rolled away, but Samjogo’s blade ripped into his large wing. The demon shouted something Young-hee was sure were demonic swear words.

  The rush of battle gave way to a spontaneous lull. Then, with an unceremonious waddle, Mirinae pulled a square wooden cart from the messy corner. Behind its two big wheels were rows of tubes in a five-by-ten grid, each tube with four sharp points sticking out. Young-hee’s eyes widened. It looked like an ancient weapon she had seen once while on a class trip to a museum—a hwacha, a “fire cart” that shot hundreds of explosives and flaming arrows at a time. And Mirinae was lighting it. “This is my house,” she repeated, more pissed off than ever.

  At first the sparks popped and crackled so lightly it was almost comical. But as the burning fuse jumped from tube to tube, the hwacha lit up like holiday fireworks. All at once, the sparks gave way to a roar of rockets, as hundreds of arrows caught fire and blasted out. The first salvo, right into the Storm Lord’s chest, drove him back. The next volley blasted the demon with an explosive fury of flaming arrows.

  It was a brutal barrage, but not only for Nwaegongdo. Burning slivers of wood and roasting wreckage bounced off the walls and rained down. Samjogo heaved and shoved Tiger to the side of the room, away from the worst of the shrapnel. Young-hee pulled her legs under the bench, becoming as small as possible. The hail of burning debris seemed interminable, and the noise so overwhelming that Young-hee couldn’t think straight at first. Then, the hall fell largely quiet—save for the crackle of burning wood and irregular thump of falling rubble.

  “That did it,” said Mirinae, sounding satisfied.

  “Yes, I think he’s gone,” said Samjogo, emerging from a wreckage-strewn corner.

  Mirinae, uninterested in gloating, rummaged through her stacks. “Science,” she said. “Don’t get too happy, though. The Storm Lord is made of sterner stuff than that.”

  Tiger was smoldering slightly from hot ashes that had dropped on him. He had new stripes burned into his fur. Young-hee looked for water and blankets. “You think Nwaegongdo survived?” she asked.

  “Probably,” said Mirinae, still poking around. “But hopefully, not very well. Still, I recommend moving with some haste.”

  “Will you come with us?” asked Young-hee.

  “With you?” said Mirinae, with an incredulous huff and a hollow laugh. “You’re the reason my laboratory and home is so much scrap.” Overhead, the observatory platform—empty of telescopes, desks and devices—moaned and sagged. Mirinae pulled out an interconnected jumble of bamboo sticks, large sheets of paper, gears, and ropes. She carried it through another hole in the wall that had been created by the fleeing Storm Lord to the field outside. The after-storm sun shone bright and piercing. “I’m going my own way, as far from you lot as I can. I would thank you never to come to me for help again.”

  “Not unreasonable,” said Samjogo.

  The bamboo and paper looked like a chaotic mess, but Mirinae began turning and snapping pieces into place, aligning the wood into rectangles, and filling the space between with the paper. After a couple of minutes, Mirinae’s latest device was clear—a large kite, with a seat and controls. A glider.

  She went back into her home, avoiding unstable objects, and returned with a couple of bags bulging with star charts and blueprints. “My machines, I can rebuild, but the science, that I need,” she said. She put the large piece of
red crystal into a bag and half-smiled. “Consider yourself lucky my fire pearl survived.”

  “What is it?” asked Young-hee, not sure why.

  Mirinae huffed again. “It grants farsight. It holds sunlight. And much more.” Then mounting her kite-glider, she waited. A moment later, a cool, gentle wind swept over the plateau, lifting Mirinae high into the air. She headed back toward the Cheongyong Mountains, and in just a couple of minutes, was out of sight.

  “Fascinating,” said Samjogo.

  “She never said goodbye,” said Young-hee.

  “I don’t think we were very good houseguests,” noted Tiger. With a huge boom, the house shook and trembled, and a cloud of dust billowed out. “That must have been the platform,” said Samjogo. “Come on, let’s see if we can salvage anything and get moving.”

  ✴ ✴ ✴

  Young-hee’s path continued from Mirinae’s house down a staircase cut right into the cliff. From the top of the cliff, they had surveyed the land Mirinae described—at the precipice bottom it receded in a rocky slope for several miles, until cut through by the Hungry River, which stretched from horizon to horizon. Across the river lay vast, dense woods—the Great Forest that everyone warned about. And beyond that, a looming ridge of purple mountains, with one peak towering over the rest. Somewhere high on that hill were the Sacred City and the sandalwood tree—and the pullocho.

  The stone stairs were narrow, and time had smoothed some and worn others cracked and fragile. For four-legged Tiger, still shaky from the battle, they were especially treacherous. But the three kept moving, motivated by the knowledge that the Storm Lord and Ghost Queen were out there somewhere, still after them.

  After a little over an hour they reached the cliff bottom. Ahead, a rocky plain rolled from the highlands far in the distance. Samjogo wanted them across the river, for safety, so they headed as straight as they could. The black stone path was visible on the uneven ground, but barely. “When you know where you are going, paths tend to follow your will,” explained Samjogo. Young-hee had heard enough about path science and just looked ahead to the mountain that held the Sacred City. Hope of actually finding the pullocho gave her renewed urgency and relief—along with increased anxiety from the Storm Lord’s attack.