“Enough of this,” Yong said, crossing his arms over his chest. “What will it take to make you leave?”
“More than you have.” She lowered her head to the stone, pressing her huge body stubbornly into the ground. “You’re not the Dragon of Korea anymore. We’re both homeless, so take your mortal puppy and leave me alone.”
Every word she spoke cut my hopes lower. I supposed this turn of events shouldn’t have been surprising. White Snake and Yong never agreed on anything, including apparently what counted as freedom. White Snake was already tucking her head back under her tail, digging her claws into the stone like she intended to stay here for a hundred years. Shaking with defeat, I was turning to my dad to ask if we had a Plan B when Yong said something I never would have expected.
“What if I promised to let you come back to Korea?”
White Snake’s head shot up, her eyes going round with shock before they narrowed in disgust again. “I wouldn’t believe you,” she grumbled. “You might be famous for the strength of your word, but giving me anything goes against your nature. I know I’m fighting your daughter’s human lover tonight. You’re just playing me so you can give your precious Opal what she wants, just like always.” She snorted out a puff of smoke. “You spoil her rotten.”
I took offense at that, but Yong barely seemed to hear. “What if I swore on my fire?”
She snorted again. “What fire? You couldn’t even singe me with that candle flame you’ve got inside you. How do you think you’re going to take back Korea like that? Give the other clans a stern talking-to?”
“I don’t have to take back Korea,” Yong said confidently. “Because I never lost it in the first place. I do not accept defeat as easily as you do, and my mortals do not abandon me. They will defend my lands for me until I return, and I will return. Just because I have been forced to bide my time while I recover doesn’t mean I’ve lost. I am already exponentially stronger now than I was a week ago, and I will be stronger still, for I am the Great Yong of Korea! And I swear on my life and my fire that if you help us, I will welcome you home and take you back into my clan.”
His words rang through the air like golden bells, filling the old salt mine with the scent of fire and the sharp bite of dragon magic. Even among the most treacherous of snakes, oaths made on dragon fire were unbreakable, and my dad had just thrown his down like a gauntlet. Good thing, too, because that bold move was probably the only thing we had left that could have gotten White Snake’s attention. Her eyes had already been closing as he spoke, but now they snapped back open, her huge, wedge-shaped head moving toward us until her snout was level with Yong’s chest, staring my human-sized father eye to giant eye.
“Do you mean it?” she whispered, her voice quivering with something very close to hope. “You will let me come home?”
“I swore it, didn’t I?” Yong replied haughtily. Then his expression softened. “I didn’t know you wanted to come home so badly. I assumed you wanted my throne like everyone else, but I can’t fault anyone for longing for somewhere as beautiful as our Korea. Had I been less proud and more attentive to what was in front of me, all of this might have been avoided.”
His eyes flicked to me as he said that, and then he put out his hand to White Snake. “We have too many enemies between us to waste time fighting each other. I cannot undo the past, but the future is still ours to make whatever we wish. We might just be two weak dragons, but together we can be strong again. I’m willing to try if you are, sister.”
“Then swear,” she ordered, her sea-blue eyes bright again for the first time since we’d come down here. “If you mean what you say, swear again on your fire that I can come home. Swear that you’ll welcome me back as a fellow dragon of Korea, and I swear I’ll help you protect our lands from any who’d try to steal them.”
When my father nodded, White Snake lowered her nose to his outstretched hand. The moment they touched, dragon magic roared through the cavern like a firestorm. I wasn’t even involved, but I could still feel the vow biting down like teeth all over my body. Maybe it was because I was part of their clan too thanks to my connection with my dad, or maybe the ultimate promise between dragons was just that strong. Either way, there was no denying what had just happened. The oath they’d made was dug into all of us as deep as the curse on Nik’s neck. Unlike the Sword of Damocles, though, this wasn’t a deal with the devil. It was a promise between family. Family I was part of, too, because the moment my father welcomed White Snake back, I felt her fire like an inferno. Felt her happiness like my own, the heady joy of being almost home.
Almost, but not quite.
“That was bigger than I expected,” White Snake said when it was finished. Then her eyes went to me quizzically. “But why does the mortal feel like clan too? What have you been doing, Yong?”
“I’ll explain later,” my father promised, his face suddenly exhausted. “For now, though, you have to leave. They’ll be down to collect you for the fight any second, and we don’t want to be here when they do.”
White Snake must have been serious about only wanting to go home, or maybe she really didn’t want to live in a hole for the next hundred years, because she jumped to obey, hopping to her feet so fast the cave shook. “Do you need a ride out?”
That
