It was magnificent, in a shocking, terrible sort of way. Thousands of knives and daggers covered the surface, packed so close they looked like silver stalks of grass. Mulan couldn’t see their hilts, but the blades were all shiny and clean. Not a smear or speck of blood.
That was somewhat reassuring, she supposed.
Except there was no possible way for her to climb the mountain. Shang could, as nothing in Diyu would harm him. But the knives were staked so close together she couldn’t possibly take a step between them, nor could she step on them…not without impaling herself.
“According to legend, each dagger belongs to a bandit or murderer who is now in Diyu,” ShiShi said at her side.
“So they’re demons?”
“No, they’re ghosts. Even bandits and murderers have some hope of leaving this place. Only those who commit the gravest misdeeds, such as killing one’s family or one’s ruler, become demons. They have to stay in Diyu forever, since there’s no hope of redemption for them. Everyone else becomes a ghost.”
Mulan suppressed a shudder. If she failed to bring Shang back to the real world, did that mean King Yama would change her into a demon? Staying in Diyu forever would be bad enough. But to become one of those monsters?
“We must be vigilant,” ShiShi went on. “The ghosts are known to haunt the area.”
“Great,” Shang said drily. “So if we go up this way, we fight ghosts and demons?”
“The demons won’t follow us. If we can find a way up.”
“And the ghosts?” Shang inquired.
The lion shrugged. “Another reason to hurry.”
Shang didn’t seem to like his guardian’s strategy. He hesitated. “Ping, are you sure you can do this? It’s a steep hike, even without the knives. And your ankle…maybe we should find another way.”
“There isn’t one,” she said, hopping to her feet. It hurt to stand on her injured foot, but it wasn’t bleeding anymore. She’d manage. “I can do it.”
“How?” Shang blurted. “You’re not a ghost. You can’t step on knives.”
Mulan pursed her lips, considering. “I’ll come up with something.” The scraping sounds in the cave still hadn’t stopped. “You go ahead.”
“I’m not leaving you behind,” Shang argued. “We have to make use of our resources. Maybe your armor—”
“It isn’t sturdy enough,” Mulan interrupted. “Not by itself.”
Clapping her palms over the blade, Mulan pulled the closest knife out of the mountain. “But this would help.” She held the blade flat against her boot. Yes, she could bind its flat side of to her foot and bolster it with the armor plates from her shoulders. She’d do the same with her hands. That should be enough to protect her as she climbed. As long as she didn’t fall forward or backward…or put too much pressure on her injured ankle.
Now she just needed something to tie the blades to her feet and hands. She wished she’d kept the rope from the empty well.
Mulan looked around, then stared at ShiShi’s mane. Even after his tussle with Meng Po’s trees, ShiShi’s elaborate braids had stayed intact. His hair was thick and long—it just might work.
She grabbed the lion’s mane and raised her knife. “I’ll make it up to you somehow, but this is going to get both of us up the mountain.”
ShiShi’s orange eyes widened with horror, but he didn’t react soon enough. With one swift slice, Mulan cut a handful of the braids and started tying the armor and blades over her hands and feet to protect her from the mountain.
“My mane!” ShiShi cried.
Mulan cast ShiShi an apologetic look, suddenly remembering how she’d cut her own hair before stealing her father’s armor. Such a simple action, yet it’d changed everything. She’d severed ties with her old identity and gone from Mulan to Ping, from bride to soldier, from obedient daughter to woman who led her own life.
But what if she’d cut too many ties? What if when she went home, her parents no longer recognized her? After all, she wasn’t the same Mulan anymore.
Sometimes, she didn’t even know who she was. She’d thought going to war would show her, but things were never as easy as that.
Mulan dropped the knife, shaking away her doubts. Shishi’s braids felt heavy in her hands. “It’ll grow back,” she told him as warmly as she could. “And when it does, it’ll be even more majestic than it was before.”
She tightened the braid over her foot with a knot and gestured at the lion. “Come on, you’re next. Give me your foot.”
“I don’t need to wear any contraption,” ShiShi growled. “I am a stone lion, the great guardian of the esteemed Li family. These pitiful knives won’t harm me.”
“You’re not stone anymore.”
She started to tie several blades around ShiShi’s giant paws. He opened his mouth to argue, but the sound of the demons’ drums cut him short.
“They’ve found us,” said Shang.
“Go!” ShiShi said, pushing Mulan toward the mountain with his head as soon as she’d finished ShiShi’s blade armor. “I’ll follow.”
Mulan stared at her hands. She’d turned her gauntlets around so they cushioned her fingers and palms against the flats of the blades she’d tied to her hands. “Here goes nothing.”
She took her first step on the mountain, balancing on what had to be the points of half a dozen sharpened blades. Her injured ankle wobbled, and her arms began to flail.
“Focus!” Shang shouted. “Breathe, Ping. Gain control of your breath, gain control of the situation.”
Inhale. Exhale. Mulan expelled her breath. She didn’t sink, and her foot hadn’t been impaled. “That was close.”
Beside her, Shang nodded, looking relieved. “Find your center. There you go.”
She didn’t take time to congratulate herself. She took another step, and another. Shang followed. The knives did nothing to hurt him—he might as well have been stepping on flowers and rocks.
Don’t watch him. Watch the ground. Her balance was precarious enough as it was. If she wasn’t careful, the knives might cut through ShiShi’s braids and unbind her blade-shoes. The key was to pick spots where the knives were staked at a steep, slanted angle, or lay almost horizontal. Mulan aimed for as many of those pockets as she could, stepping on the flats of the blades as if they were stairs and using her palms for extra balance when she needed to.
Even then, it didn’t help that most of the knives and daggers were of different heights and widths. Her armor protected her from pricks, but Mulan could feel the effect of brushing against the knives. The sides of her feet, which the blades didn’t cover, had already received multiple cuts.
So it didn’t help when the knives began to shudder.
Thump. Thump. Thump, pounded faraway drums.
The demons were here. They’d made it through the tunnel, and now, one by one, they burst through the fog. The beat of the drums grew faster and faster, and the demons cackled at the sight of Mulan, Shang, and ShiShi cornered against the Mountain of Knives. They raised their swords and spears, stamping them against the ground as they drew closer.
“Finish the lion and the short one,” one of the demons shouted. “Take the spirit to Meng Po!”
The demon soldiers obeyed. They jabbed their spears at ShiShi, and when the lion was too far up to attack, they started throwing their spears and plucking knives out of the mountain to toss at ShiShi and Mulan.
Mulan gasped, almost falling over as she evaded being impaled by a spear. Shang caught the end of the knife tied to her hand and steadied her.
“You all right?”
She nodded, but her lips pursed tight.
“Kill the outsiders!” the demons bellowed below.
Shang’s jaw tensed. “You and ShiShi go ahead. I’ll distract the demons.”
“No,” Mulan said, taking another step up. “We all stay together.”
“I can’t be harmed. You can.”
“Li Shang has a point,” ShiShi interrupted with a grunt. “Someone need
s to keep the demons busy. Or else we’re not going to get very far.”
“No one gets left behind,” Mulan said firmly.
But below, the demons were gaining on them. Some had already started climbing the Mountain of Knives, using their thick armor as shields against the sharp knifepoints. The rest stayed on the ground, continuing to pull knives from the mountain and throw them at Mulan, Shang, and ShiShi.
Knives bounced and clanged against the mountain, one landing dangerously close to Mulan’s leg.
“Still want to keep climbing?” ShiShi yelled at her.
“Incoming!” Shang shouted. “Duck!”
Mulan and the guardian flattened as much as they could against the mountain, barely dodging the flying knives.
The drumbeats grew louder, closer. More of the demons were on the mountain now, and they scrambled up with knives in their mouths and swords and spears on their backs. At the speed they were climbing, the demons would catch up to them within minutes.
ShiShi shot Mulan a glare.
“We stay together,” she repeated. “No one gets left behind.”
“Stubborn Ping.” ShiShi harrumphed. “There is a reason I am the great guardian of the Li family. And that is to protect you all.” He turned to Shang. “Li Shang, I am sorry I failed your father. I will not do the same to you.”
Without any warning, the lion leapt down the mountain, ripping through the fog and landing in front of the demons as the blades that had been tied to him fell away.
“ShiShi, wait!” Mulan shouted. “No!”
The drumbeats stopped.
There was nothing Mulan could do. ShiShi’s fate was eclipsed by the fog below.
She hung her head, holding in a sob.
She’d barely gotten to know the lion. Much as he teased her for being small and for being unworthy of the great task of saving Shang, she knew ShiShi had a mighty heart. Even in those few hours, she’d come to admire his loyalty to Shang, and his bravery. She’d already gotten used to his companionship, had started to think of him as a friend. And now…
Shang tried to touch her shoulder, but he settled for resting his hand above hers.
She wanted to tell him that they needed to go down, needed to help ShiShi. But she knew what Shang would say. If we do, his sacrifice would be for nothing. We would not honor him.
And he’d be right.
Mulan glanced up. The half-moon loomed over them, shining bright against the crimson sky.
Her mission was to get Shang out of Diyu. She wasn’t about to fail that now. There was no choice but to keep going.
Honorable ShiShi, she thought, swallowing hard, I know I promised that you would continue to be Shang’s guardian. I wish you could have made it out with us, but I won’t let your sacrifice be in vain. I will get Shang out of here.
She turned to the captain. “Keep climbing.”
Sometimes Mulan swore she could hear King Yama’s laugh emanating from above, taunting her and Shang over ShiShi’s loss.
Then she’d realize it was just the pounding of her heart.
She’d lost track of how many times she looked down, sliding her eyes down the slope of the mountain to where they’d started out. Every time, she hoped ShiShi might burst out of the fog with a hearty roar. But he didn’t.
Only King Yama’s warning thudded in her ears.
Should you die here, you stay here.
She grimaced. That warning had been meant for her, not ShiShi. The only thing she could do now was make sure they got Shang out of here.
Shang turned, his bare hands pressed against the tips of the knives, so he could face her. Unlike ShiShi, who probably would have filled the silence by rambling about the glories of his past, the captain had been quiet. He had never been a man of many words, and she caught him opening and closing his mouth, as if he were debating what to say.
“You all right?” Shang asked, finally breaking the silence. His voice was gentle, and it took Mulan a moment to realize he was trying to comfort her over ShiShi’s loss.
Mulan parted her lips. Was she all right? ShiShi was gone, the moon was half-dark, and she still hadn’t told Shang about her agreement with Yama. She needed to, but somehow the Mountain of Knives didn’t feel like the place to have the discussion. Not so soon after ShiShi’s loss. She’d tell him once they reached the top.
“I will be,” was all she said.
Shang’s thick brows knit with concern.
Her chest tightened. Funny he should worry about me when he’s the one who’s dying.
“It was a brave thing he did,” said Shang slowly. “I can see why my father entrusted him to you.”
“He was supposed to be your guardian once we got out.”
“I know.” Shang swallowed. “When my father was alive, he used to warn me that I relied too much on myself and not on others. I thought that was what it meant to be strong—I never saw him ask for help, never saw him need anyone. I wanted to be like him: the great leader of China’s finest troops. I didn’t know he had a friend with him all along, helping him.”
Mulan nodded, touched by the earnestness in his voice.
“Do you have a guardian?”
“My ancestors sent me someone.” Mulan stepped up with one foot, heaved the rest of her body to lift the other leg. Even if her ankle hadn’t been swelling, she’d have to climb slowly. At least the pain was subsiding. “When we get out of here, I’ll introduce you.”
“I’d like that.”
Mulan allowed herself a small smile. Good. He’s talking like we’re going to get out of here.
Shang motioned for her to resume hiking up the mountain. The slope was less steep than it’d been earlier, and in some places, the path was nearly flat.
“Come on,” he said. “If we can’t make it up to the top of this tiny hill, all my hours spent training you will have been for nothing.”
“Tiny hill?” Mulan said. “I’d hardly call this a hill.”
But his words worked. Her determination renewed, she returned to trudging up this horrific Mountain of Knives. Her toes curled against the ski blades as they clanged against the pointed knives. The armor under her hands and feet grew heavy. Sweat dribbled down the back of her neck. But Mulan didn’t stop. Up, up, up.
She couldn’t stop thinking about what Shang had confided earlier, and what a comfort the words had been to her. She’d always admired him as a leader and soldier—someone who always knew what to do in battle. But she was beginning to admire him even more as a person. She doubted he could tell a lie to save his life. The few times she’d caught him not knowing what to say, he had stammered or averted his gaze. He never resorted to bending the truth…unlike her.
Was it wrong of her to deceive him, especially when he trusted her so much? If he ever found out the truth about her…
Stop it. Mulan sighed. Friend or not, he can’t find out the truth.
Strange; it was easier to forget here than up in the real world that she was pretending to be a man. In Diyu, a realm of ghosts and demons and monsters, keeping her guise as Ping was the last of Mulan’s worries.
You can’t forget, she reminded herself. No matter how much you might want to.
“Ping?” Shang said, glancing back and seeing that she still lagged far behind. “Is your ankle bothering you?”
“No.” She forced a throaty laugh, the one she’d perfected to be “manly” enough to pass as Ping. “Stop worrying about me and don’t wait up. I’ve got this.”
Shang didn’t move. Mulan ignored him and kept climbing. Finally, when she caught up with him, he followed.
The higher they climbed, the quieter it became. Maybe ShiShi had exaggerated about the ghosts. They were nearly at the top, and she hadn’t encountered a single one.
She inhaled. That was a good thing. Best to savor one’s luck, not question it, especially when in the Underworld.
Every few steps, Shang waited for her. It was hard not to see the concern creased on his brow. The climb up was far more d
ifficult for her than for him. For her, each step was a highly calculated risk. If she put too much weight on one foot, or leaned backward or forward too much, she could be impaled.
Meanwhile, Shang easily leapt from knife to knife. It almost looked fun, if not for the fact that he was a spirit hovering close to death. Mulan didn’t dare pick up her pace.
They still had a ways to go before reaching the top, but luckily, the path was not too steep. Mulan tried to focus on her footing and not on looking up or down.
Both directions made her nervous. If she looked up, she could see the impossible landscape of cliffs hanging in midair, supported by little else other than the clouds. If she looked down, she saw the thousands of knives staked into the mountain. Every now and then, as they climbed higher, she spotted bloodstains on the blades. She tried not to wonder if it was human blood…or demon blood. It wasn’t clear which would better.
Neither spoke for a long time. The knives on her hands and feet were getting heavy, and Mulan estimated they were almost up the mountain.
She wiped her forehead. “I’m grateful you never made this a training drill. The pole with those medallions was hard enough.”
Shang chuckled. “Climbing a mountain of knives? I’ll keep it in mind for future exercises.”
Mulan groaned. “Future exercises? The war is over.”
“You can never be too careful. China will always face the threat of invaders.”
“That’ll be for you to deal with, Captain Li Shang,” she teased. “After I get you out of here, I’m going home.”
Shang opened his mouth to reply, but the mountain’s summit came into view. Shang shielded his eyes from the light and went ahead to inspect the area. “There are no more knives up here. Just grass. We’re almost there.”
The news made Mulan climb faster. She couldn’t wait to be at the top. Blood speckled the sides of her hands, and she could only imagine the condition of her feet. Every step hurt more than she cared to admit, and even after what felt like hours on this mountain, every time she remembered she was literally walking on knives, her nerves sent a pang of panic to her mind. Her temples pulsed, and her forehead dripped with sweat.
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