Page 69 of Yumi and the Nightmare Painter

“So I’m right!”

“It’swrong,” she said. “You’re not supposed todoanything. But…it’s right anyway, I think.” She peered closer at what he’d done—a painting where he tried to capture a face in as few lines as possible.

“Is that Hwanji?” she asked, pointing.

“Yes,” he said. “It’s an artistic technique for practicing how to see shapes and lines in everything around you. You try to capture a person with only a few strokes.”

“Looks easy,” she said. “Like…you don’t want to do all the work of a real painting.”

“It’s more difficult than it appears,” he said. “It’s like…like poetry written using the fewest syllables possible.”

She appeared skeptical. “It’s pretty, I suppose. But I do think it looks lazy. And it doesn’t seem it would be of much use against the nightmares.”

“It’s not.”

“Then why—”

“Hey,” he said, “I’m trying to meditate here.” He gave her a wink.

The stare she returned could have boiled water.

So of course he did a quick painting of that—her lips, eyes, the shape of her teardrop face. All done with quick flourishes of the brush to evoke the correct image. An artistic shorthand that had become a form unto itself.

She took this in stride. It was the kind of teasing he’d learned didn’tbother her—or, well, it bothered her in therightway. If he wanted Yumi to play along, he had to teaseher, not her station or the spirits.

He continued, and soon moved from faces—he preferred references for those—to his old standby. Bamboo. The more familiar the motions, the better he felt it would be for clearing his mind.

Somehow, an hour passed.

When Liyun arrived, he realized he’d filled the scroll with bamboo. A part of him was slightly disappointed—he’d hoped, contrary to what Yumi said, that painting would draw the attention of spirits. She said that although other arts could do it, painting wasn’t one of them as far as she knew.

Yumi met his eyes, then glanced at the paintings. He could practically hear her thoughts—part of her had wondered as well. You didn’t need to be in a place of ritual for the spirits to come; that was just where the rocks were stacked, where it was easiest. If skilled painting could accomplish the task, an hour spent here should have been enough.

Or perhaps his painting did not count as skilled.

Regardless, it had been relaxing. He smiled, tucked away his disappointment, and turned toward Liyun. “That was perfect,” he said. “I’ll want to paint like this every day, please.”

“Why?” she asked.

“It is the will of the spirits,” he said.

Though Yumi gave him a frown at that, he figured his words were true. The spirits wanted him here and meditating, so they would approve. Together he, Yumi, and Liyun left the shrine and crossed out of the orchard and through the town. At the edge, near the place of ritual, a large tent had been erected. He heard voices from inside—mostly sounding annoyed.

“Those scholars haven’t gotten their machine working yet, I assume?” he said softly to Liyun.

“No,” she said. “Their arrival was a surprise to me. It’s an affront to us—bordering on blasphemy—for them to bring one of those here. I hate the things.”

“Wait,” Yumi said. “Sheknowsabout them?”

“You know about these?” Painter asked.

“It is nothing for you to worry about, Chosen,” Liyun said with a wave of her fingers. “The efforts of the scholars are a novelty, nothing more.” She hesitated. “Still, howdarethey cart one of these to a village where we’re on duty…”

She ushered Painter into the place of ritual, then roosted nearby, as if waiting for carrion. He settled down to practice, and was occasionally distracted by the arguments in the tent.

“That machineiswhy we’re here,” Yumi said softly. “I think we are to stop it, but we need confirmation from the spirits.” She looked at him. “Well, keep practicing! No dallying. Just because you’ve decided to be insolent where protocol is concerned doesn’t mean I’m going to let you slacken under my tutelage!”

He groaned, but went ahead and got to it, working hard on his stacks beneath the light of that strange sun. Why didn’t it burn out? Whattrulykept feeding it?

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