“I’m all right,” I said. “I think.”
It was only slightly less shadowed in the passageway than it had been in the pit, but to my light-starved eyes, that was enough. I could make out the walls, and Ragtooth’s small body. The fox darted off to retrieve my boots, dragging them one by one in his mouth.
Once I was dressed, I picked him up and we set off together.
“Which way?” I murmured when we came to a fork in the corridor. Despite my efforts to pay attention to the route the ghosts took, I was hopelessly lost. Ragtooth sniffed the right-hand path, then the left. He growled low in his throat. I took the way he indicated.
“Who built these?” I couldn’t help musing, running a hand along the smooth wall of the tunnel. It certainly wasn’t the ghosts. I splashed through a frigid stream—there was runoff here, meltwater from the snow blanketing the surface. Patches of the tunnel were covered in ice.
I was soon convinced that Ragtooth was leading me in the wrong direction. The ground was rubbly, and the tunnel now was much narrower than I remembered. I hesitated, wondering if I should turn back.
The fox bit me.
“Ouch!” I rubbed my arm. “All right, all right. But if we end up right back where we started, making friends with a pile of old bones, I’m blaming you.”
We turned another corner, and I stifled a gasp. Ragtooth had led me to the cavern—not to the threshold I had crossed with the ghosts, but to another, narrow opening concealed behind a pillar of rock. The air was almost fresh here, with a hint of snow. Water dripped somewhere nearby. We were close, so close, to the broad tunnel that led to the surface of the mountain. I stood still for a moment, weighing whether it would be better to make a dash for it and risk immediate detection, or sneak carefully through the shadows along the edge of the cavern. But as I was making up my mind, Ragtooth let out a growl.
I turned slowly. The light should have alerted me sooner—I found myself facing the ghost I had first met, the dark-eyed leader. He stood with his arms crossed, watching me.
“Well,” he said drily, “this is inconvenient.”
Something in his voice made me freeze. I gazed at the tahrskin chuba he wore, at his strong, long-fingered hands. Artist’s hands. And then at his face.
It can’t be.
And yet I knew, as I gazed at him with mingled terror and awe, that it was.
The ghost shrugged, seeming to take no notice of my reaction. “I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised. You made it up the Ngadi face, didn’t you?”
“Please.” My voice was barely above a whisper. “Please let me go.”
He snorted. “Why would I do that? I’m the one who brought you here, you stupid girl.”
“Because I know who you are.” I swallowed. “You’re Mingma.”
The ghost stared at me. His expression softened slightly, some of the bitterness leeching away. “I didn’t think anyone still spoke of me.”
“You’re one of the greatest explorers who ever lived,” I said. “I—I have your map of Raksha.”
“The map.” The ghost looked stunned. “It survived?”
I knew, in some distant corner of my mind, that I should have been planning my escape. The other ghosts hadn’t noticed me yet, and if I could get past him before he sounded the alarm . . . But I couldn’t tear my gaze away.
Mingma.
Looking at him, I thought I could see hints of the man who had helped guide me this far—in the wry tilt of his mouth, the focused intelligence in his gaze. He was Mingma, but what else had he become, in the long decades he had endured in this lonely place? And why had he brought me here?
“Did you look through it?” There was a wistful note in his voice. “I ran out of ink near the end.”
“Look through it?” I frowned, confused.
He shook his head slightly, dismissing the question. “How did you recognize me?”
“I know your face,” I said. “There’s a statue of you in the square of your village—it’s a good likeness. The Elder has it cleaned every day, in sunshine or snow.”
Mingma’s expression was distant now. Something in his bearing had altered, and the unearthly glow of his skin diminished. He looked almost alive. A young man in old-fashioned clothes. “Is the tree still there? The old fir next to Elder’s house that all the children used to climb?”
I frowned. It had been several years since I had visited Mingma’s village, a tiny place deep in the Southern Aryas. “I don’t remember. I’m sorry.”
The ghost seemed to shake himself. “No matter. I barely remember it myself. I’ve been here for so long.”
“What about the other ghosts?” I said. “Who are they?”
“The members of my expedition,” he said. “We came here, and we died here, without ever reaching our goal.”
“And this is what you’ve become,” I said softly.
“Not by choice,” Mingma said. “We were trapped on our way to the next world by a powerful spell.”
“What spell?” I started. “The witches? They trapped you here?”
He gazed up at the distant ceiling of the cavern. “These tunnels are ancient. They lead in all directions—some to the summit, others to the base of the mountain. You could not use them—no human could, unless they had wings, or were more shadow than substance.” Mingma’s gaze sharpened on me. “When the witches abandoned Raksha, they left more than their city behind. To protect it from thieves and explorers, they set a spell upon the mountain that would prevent any who died here from escaping its shadow, binding them to this world and stopping them from moving on.”
I felt cold. “Why? To punish trespassers?”
“More than that.” A shadow crossed his face. “You see, we are not merely bound to this place—we are bound to protect it against invaders. We are the guardians of Raksha.”
I swallowed, unable to look away from him. “Why? Why would you—”
“I have no choice.” Mingma’s hand went to his neck, as if remembering an old pain. “I didn’t die a natural death. I was killed—murdered by my own men. By the ghosts of those who died during a storm halfway up the mountain. They didn’t want to take my life.”
A sickening horror rose within me. “You can’t mean—”
“I have no choice,” the ghost repeated. “The spell is too strong.”
“Fight it. Please.” On an impulse, I reached out to seize his chuba, or perhaps his hand. I remembered myself a heartbeat too late, as my fingers drifted through him.
The dead explorer only looked at me.
Get out of here, a small voice urged. Go. Now.
I took a step back, and then another. I turned to run, but found myself face-to-face with the bodiless ghost, bug-eyed and gaping. I screamed. The ghost swooped toward me, but Ragtooth let out a hiss, and lunged at it, claws out. The ghost screeched as Ragtooth clawed and bit, raking its hideous face over and over again. The ghost finally shook him off, and the fox landed lightly on his paws. The ghost darted away, howling. The other ghosts who had gathered, drawn by the noise, made no move to approach me.