(1) Eomma, Appa, Areum, and I will enter the room together, while everyone else waits safely outside.

(2) Eomma will take the potion while Appa and I watch over her body.

(3) If Eomma looks like she’s in trouble, we’ll wake her up immediately.

(4) If at any point there are worrying noises coming from the room, the outside team will enter with expediency.

(5) No one will spend a second longer than they need to in that room.

“Please be careful,” Auntie Okja says to Eomma. “All of you.”

“And remember to call out if you need help,” Sora adds. “We’re just on the other side of this door.”

Eomma, Appa, and I steel ourselves. And then, on the count of three, we all burst into room 44 together, with Areum on my shoulder.

I’m not sure what I was expecting, but whatever it was, it wasn’t this. The plain room has a king-size bed in the middle and identical nightstands on either side, each with a tassel-shaded lamp. The lights are dim, and there’s a weird haze in the air. Except for that, there’s nothing else inside. There isn’t even a bathroom, which is a nightmare of its own. And there’s no dokkaebi to be seen.

We all exhale together, and even Areum looks relieved.

Eomma sits in the middle of the bed with her legs stretched out in front of her. “All right, I’m ready.” She steels herself, looking just like Hattie when she makes her boss face. And suddenly, I miss my sister so much, my stomach aches.

Appa kisses her on the head. “Bring back our daughter, Eunha. We will be waiting for you right here.”

We fan ourselves around the bed as Eomma says a quick prayer to Mago Halmi. Then she opens the vial and swigs its contents. Immediately, she drops onto her back and falls into a sleep so deep it’s as if she has never been awake.

The next ten minutes are the longest I have ever experienced. Appa and I anxiously stand guard around Eomma’s sleeping body, and I don’t take my eyes off her chest to make sure she’s still breathing.

Just when I think I can’t possibly wait a single second longer, she bolts up in bed like a coiled spring and calls out, “No, no, no!” Her eyes are bloodshot and it looks like she’s been crying.

“What happened?” Appa cries, hugging her close.

“Are you all right?” I climb onto the bed to get near her.

She puts her head in her hands and sobs. “I couldn’t do it. I just couldn’t.”

“What did it ask of you?” Appa asks quietly.

Eomma trembles like a leaf. “He asked me to choose between my daughters. To pay for the cost of the last fallen star with one of their lives.”