by Brandon Mull
Exhausted from her journey, Yin gave herself over to the sounds of bamboo and the face in the night sky. Slowly, a peace came over her.
In her dreamy state, Yin realized why the Maze was changing.
She imagined a giant panda, as big as a house. She pictured her wandering through the Maze, sitting to snack in the shade. It wouldn’t take long for a panda that big to leave a sizable dent in a bamboo wall. Yin decided that must be why some of the bamboo had disappeared, why the map was no longer correct.
Jhi was here.
Yin smiled at Luan after she thought it. The bird was onto something. If Yin could follow what Jhi had eaten, maybe it would lead her to the Great Panda. Maybe she could save her brother after all.
The next morning, Yu’s illness was worse. It was just as Yin had feared. She was certain her brother would not make it through another night. They were out of time. She had to track down Jhi today if there was any hope for Yu.
Luan flew above to scout a path. When he returned, he hopped along the edges of the map as Yin flattened the fabric out. Luan looked serious, his dark eyes scanning the fabric. Suddenly the bird flapped his wings, excited.
“What is it?” Yin asked him. Luan pecked at the cloth, touching one of the green threads several times with his beak before tearing it loose. “That bamboo was there yesterday . . .” the girl said, and the bird nodded his tiny head. Luan then flew up to lead the way.
Yin picked up her brother. He groaned, but Yin couldn’t tell if Yu was sleeping or awake. His eyes were barely open, and even his breathing sounded painful.
“You’re going to be okay,” Yin promised her brother. Then she hurried to follow Luan’s lead, carrying the sick boy as fast as she could through the Maze.
Yin kept the map handy as she walked, occasionally checking to see where Luan had led them. It wasn’t long before they were approaching a major crossroads. The girl looked down at the map. Three different paths converged at the one spot ahead of Yin. And beyond it, up one of the paths, was where Jhi had eaten.
Yin began to walk quickly, but then she heard a sound that stopped her in her tracks.
Voices. There was a sound, like someone opening and closing the latch on a box. Yin paused to listen. There were three or four men somewhere in the bamboo. She didn’t know what they were working on, but they talked as if they were taking great care.
Yin looked up. She could see the tops of the leaves moving, and not from the wind. One patch of bamboo specifically was shaking. Suddenly there was a clang, and the workers gave relieved sighs, as if they’d finished something very difficult. Or dangerous.
The girl looked again at her map. She could see that the bamboo walls dividing the path were much narrower as they approached the crossroads. The men’s voices were coming from the other side of the wall. But what were they doing?
Yin leaned into the bamboo and listened closely. Luan flew back to aid her.
“Jhi has been here,” one man said. “This patch. It looks like she’s been eating here, doesn’t it?”
“How would you know?” another said.
“If she stops to eat here again, she’ll have a surprise waiting for her,” a third voice said. It sounded like a much younger person, a boy not much older than Yin.
Yin remembered the trap she’d encountered earlier in the Maze. It was deep in the bamboo itself. Maybe these men had put the trap there. But why? To catch Jhi?
All along, Yin had felt like an outsider in the Great Bamboo Maze. She was searching for Jhi, as if the Maze belonged to the Great Beast. But now these men were talking about the panda as if she were the outsider. It seemed like they wanted Jhi for some reason.
Yin didn’t know what the group of men wanted for sure, but she knew she had to find Jhi before they did. If they caught the panda, there would be no hope for curing Yu.
Suddenly her brother coughed.
Yin whispered for the boy to be quiet. She felt his forehead. Yu was sweating, and yet his lips looked dry and chapped. He coughed again, more loudly. Yin worried the sound would alert the workers.
She listened.
“Whoever it is, we’ll get them,” the men were saying. She could hear they were already running her way. She looked at the map. There were bends and curves on their side of the bamboo wall. If the map was right, it would take them a while to get to her. Still, she had to hurry.
Yin ran for the crossroads as fast as she could, her brother coughing painfully the whole way. As she burst into the sunlight, it momentarily blinded her. Luan flew straight for the path to where Jhi had eaten, but Yin couldn’t see which way he’d taken.
Yin felt someone watching her.
She turned around, and a black boar stepped into the sunlight, peering toward her. It snorted and stomped the ground. The girl began to back away, staring in horror at the boar’s sharp tusks and angry eyes.
Suddenly there was a growl so deep it felt like the ground was shaking. The sound made Yin’s blood turn cold in her veins. She turned and saw a white-and-green alligator poke its long snout into the sun behind her. The reptile opened its wide jaws, hissing at the girl.
Each of the beasts would have been a frightening sight on their own. Together, they made Yin wonder if she was in a nightmare: lost in a maze with dangerous predators. Something told her it wasn’t a coincidence that both of these animals had come upon her.
Out of the bamboo came three of the men Yin had heard. Only they weren’t dressed like workers. They were dressed like warriors, soldiers — but for whose army? Yin didn’t recognize their foreign uniforms. These men were not part of Zhong’s military. So who were they?
The black boar circled back to a man in a gray cloak. The alligator whipped its tail back and forth, then backed behind a pale man with red hair. The men looked at Yin as if they didn’t know what to do with her.
“Don’t move,” the red-haired man commanded. Yin froze. Where was Luan when she needed him most? She imagined him watching the scene from a safe perch, high up in the canopy of the bamboo.
Two more men emerged, along with a boy.
“Who is this?” the boy said. Yin recognized his voice from before. He had a spirit animal too. An orange-and-white dhole, as wild-looking as any dog Yin had seen on the mountain. The animal snarled when it saw Yin, gnashing its teeth.
“Grab her,” someone said, and Yin ran. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Luan, flapping his white-and-black wings. She ran toward the bird, down the path he was motioning from.
Yin had never run faster than she did right then, even though she was carrying her small brother, and nearly tripping on the dirt below her feet. At some point she turned back to look, but none of the animals or soldiers had followed her.
Yin noticed that the bamboo around her was different than she’d seen. Dark and old. She could see spiderwebs in the shadows at the base of the bamboo.
“Luan,” Yin whispered. Her legs were beginning to feel weak and clumsy. “Don’t lose me.”
Suddenly the starling flew back to her from ahead. Yin could tell the bird was nervous. The bamboo that formed the Maze was unhealthy looking here; the leaves and stalks were spotted with gray mold. When Yin saw it, she checked the map. She didn’t believe Jhi would eat diseased bamboo. Luan flew up high to check their position. Sure enough, they were headed the right way. In fact, the starling eagerly ripped another X from the map. It seemed Jhi had eaten even more bamboo since that morning.
“What would I do without you?” the girl asked her spirit animal. Luan fluffed his feathers and let out a small song. Then, with pride swelling in his chest, he turned to fly ahead again.
As soon as Luan was in the air, though, something pounced. What had looked to Yin like nothing more than a shadow leaped out of the dark bamboo at Luan, pinning the bird to the ground. Yin screamed. It was a bird spider, a tarantula. The hairy arachnid was as big as Yi
n’s head. The spider hadn’t bitten Luan, not yet. But why was it waiting?
Out of the far shadows stepped a woman in the same uniform as the men Yin had run from. The woman was old. She didn’t look like a soldier, and anyway, Zhong’s military didn’t allow female warriors. She smiled a devilish smile, revealing rows of black, rotted teeth.
Yin stepped back as the woman approached her. The woman reached down and grabbed Luan with both hands, and as she did the spider climbed up the woman’s arm and neck, into her nest of hair. It perched on the top of the woman’s head, fluffing her hair with its eight thick legs.
“Give him back!” Yin demanded.
“The Great Bamboo Maze is no place for children,” the woman said, looking down at Yu asleep in the sling. Yin could barely carry her brother anymore. She was so tired. Too tired to run. But she stood straight as she addressed the woman in front of her on the path.
“I need to find the Healthbringer, Jhi,” Yin told her. “My brother is sick.”
“I can see that,” the woman said, a small smile on her face. She checked behind her and over Yin’s shoulders before whispering, “I want to help you. Perhaps if you just come with me . . .”
Yin’s mouth fell open. She didn’t understand.
The woman held Luan out to Yin, but when the girl reached for the bird, the woman grabbed her wrist, right where Luan went when he slept as a tattoo. Soon she was dragging Yin up the path, back toward the men and animals at the crossroads.
“Who are you?” Yin asked the woman, sobbing. “Why are you doing this?”
“I’m going to help you,” the woman said. “And you are going to help us.” Then she snatched Yu’s sling from her. Yin cried out in protest, but the old woman was stronger than she appeared, forcing her down. Soon she was carrying the sick child herself and pulling Yin behind her.
They arrived at a ragged camp filled with soldiers like the ones Yin had encountered earlier. Most were just sitting around waiting to be given orders. One of them hailed the old woman, calling her Nao. Strangely, every one of the soldiers appeared to have a spirit animal. Yin had always heard that the Marked were very rare.
The old woman pushed Yin forward, and she fell face-first into the dirt.
“Get this brat to work,” Nao snapped at her fellow soldiers. “There are more traps to be made. I want that oafish panda’s talisman in my hands before the invasion begins.”
“What are you going to do with Jhi once you find her?” Yin asked, wiping dirt from her face, but she received no answer. Instead, one of the soldiers tossed her a uniform like everyone else’s.
“If we find her, can I ask the panda a question?” Yin called after the woman as she walked away with Yu. “Please!” she begged.
Nao just ignored her.
Yin was forced to set up traps in the bamboo for the rest of the afternoon, metal jaws that sprang closed when triggered. Since her arms were long and slender, the old woman had insisted the girl would be better at maneuvering around the trigger. But Yin knew it was the most dangerous job. That was why Nao had her do it.
Yin remembered Kuan’s face as she had told Yin she was brave. But the longer she worked, the less brave she felt. The day turned into the early evening, and soon the sky grew dusky.
Yin’s hopes for her brother were dashed. She was certain that he wouldn’t make it another night without Jhi’s healing. Now it was nearly dark, and there was no panda to speak of.
Nao had Yin set one last trap in the dimming light. The girl’s hand shook uncontrollably as she reached in the dark between the trap’s strong jaws and past the metal trigger. She wondered if the traps could hurt the Great Panda. Yin worried what would happen to her brother if Jhi was killed. Or if she were.
Finished with their work for the night, the soldiers disappeared into their tents. Yin had no tent but didn’t care where she slept, so long as she was with Yu, who had been laid in the middle of the camp. Nao returned Luan to Yin before she herself retired, tossing the terrified bird at her. She also gave Yin a half-filled skin of water, barely enough for her and her brother. Yin made sure Yu drank it all, though it stung his throat to swallow.
“I promised you a story, didn’t I?” Yin asked the boy once they were alone. It made him smile, as it always had. She wanted to remember her brother smiling.
“There once was a storm,” Yin said. “It wasn’t anyone’s fault. It just happened.”
Yu grinned weakly at his big sister. The sight brought tears to her eyes.
“The storm came and swept over the village. It blew shingles off the roofs of houses. It plucked flags from the flagpoles and tore shutters off of windows.” Yin watched her brother’s eyes twinkle. They were so bright, it looked like the moon was full in the sky. But when Yin looked up, the sky was cloudy.
Usually, when Yin told the story, she said it all with a happy voice. She described the shrill wind and the echoing thunder. She made Yu laugh with how loudly and lively she’d tell it. It wasn’t really about the story, it was how she told it to her brother that made him like it.
But Yin was sad that night, and her heart was too heavy to tell it the way he wanted. Yu seemed too tired to care which version she told. He was simply happy to hear her speak.
“A bucket on the porch filled with rainwater,” she said. “And then the wind blew all the rain out until the bucket was dry. And then the storm filled the bucket up again. All night the porch shook and lightning crashed.”
Yin glanced down. It looked like her brother was sleeping. He seemed peaceful, at least. She watched his chest, relieved every time he took a breath, until she couldn’t watch anymore, afraid that if she continued, her brother’s breathing might stop.
“But in the morning, it was gone,” Yin said. “All the wind and the rain. All the shaking and the echoes and the crashing. And everything in the village was peaceful again. And everyone was okay. Everyone.”
Yin began to cry again. This time, though, her tears weren’t those of fear. They were of acceptance. She knew her brother couldn’t continue like he had.
“You’re so brave,” Yin told her little brother. “Have I said that? I’m so very proud to be your sister.” One last time, Yu smiled. And then he closed his eyes again, as if to sleep.
“Good night,” Yin said. “I love you.”
She lay down on the path, looking up at the cloudy sky. The bamboo swayed high above her, and her vision blurred with each new tear. It was as if new shadows were darkening the highest leaves. But when Yin looked, it wasn’t darkness she saw, but light. She saw two silver stars, and remembered them from the night before.
Were they really so bright that they could shine through the clouds? Yin wasn’t sure, but she stared into them. She tried so hard to be at peace with her brother dying. But she couldn’t be. She wasn’t ready. She thought of her parents and how they’d lost everything because of her — their son and daughter and title. Their whole future.
Still, a calm overtook Yin’s body, as it had the night before. Suddenly Yin felt like she understood everything around her. She could hear every soldier in his tent, sleeping or trying to sleep. She could see in the dark, even the ill-lit details of the strangers’ camp.
Luan flashed unbidden onto Yin’s skin, just above her wrist. Yin felt a power overtake her. It was like when she accessed Luan’s gifts, only she knew that wasn’t it. She listened deep into the bamboo. She heard the distant rats and closer spiders in their bamboo webs. She didn’t feel sore anymore. In fact, she suddenly felt like she had slept for days.
Yin whispered to her brother.
“I’m going to find Jhi,” she told him, “and bring her back to you.”
Yin didn’t know if she would find the panda, but she had to try. Mysteriously, she felt like she could.
She snuck out of camp without waking a single soldier. And then quickly, a plan appeared in her mind. S
he knew how the traps worked. What if she turned their own traps against them? Yin knew she would have to work quickly and quietly to turn every trap she’d set against the soldiers. But it would be worth it in the morning if the army suddenly found themselves triggering their own weapons.
But could she do it? Yin felt sure that she could. She felt she could do anything right then. It was as if the night had slowed down around her.
Yin approached each trap calmly. They seemed simple now, and somehow she could remember every trap site, even some she didn’t help assemble. It was as if they were all written down on a map in her mind.
Yin worked quickly, until she finished resetting the last of the traps. Finally, when she’d finished, Yin closed her eyes to listen. She believed if she listened hard enough, she’d hear the great Jhi shuffling lazily through the dark. But instead, as she listened, the sounds all muddled together. The clarity she’d found was gone.
Just then, Yin heard a snap, like a stalk of bamboo cracking behind her.
When she turned, she expected to see Nao in her uniform, or another soldier, come to bring her back to the camp. Instead, she saw what looked like a large shadow filling the path. She looked up at the huge creature. A panda, many times the size of any that Yin had ever heard of or seen, sat down with a crunch in front of the girl.
Jhi looked at Yin with curiosity. Silently, the two regarded each other, the huge panda and the little girl. Glittering at Jhi’s throat was a silver chain, and on it a carved green figure that shined as if it were lit from within. The panda saw the girl staring at the talisman and covered it quickly with her huge paw.
There was a loud clap and a scream in the distant bamboo. The sound was followed by another. The traps were going off.
“They’re coming!” Yin warned Jhi, but the panda didn’t look at all worried.
“They want to hurt you!” the girl said. “You have to run!” But Jhi just sat there.
All around them, the soldiers began to appear. First the redheaded man with the alligator, followed by the others. Finally Nao appeared, her spider leaping off her arm toward the girl.
