It was midday in Fire Tribe country as Yona, Hak, and the dragon warriors waited for Yoon to get back from checking on the villages that had once been their "bandit" territory. The campfire that had been so comforting in the frigid night now melted the very air around it into oily ripples, and no one ventured near it except Zeno, who occasionally sighed as if to say "nothing for it" and went to stir the stew he was making from a hare Yona had shot and a collection of roots and twigs. It smelled a lot better than it looked, although…

"Should we really be letting you forage?" Hak wondered. "I mean, just because something won't kill you…"

"No worries, Zeno can tell," he announced, flashing his sunny, snaggletoothed smile. "If my body neutralizes poison I can feel it. Other things too, like if I was supposed to get drunk or start seeing things, I just kind of feel it not happen."

"Yours is the most tragic power, isn't it?" Jae-ha sighed, lounging on a pack of bedrolls. "That certainly takes the fun out of things." Hak and Kija gave him disapproving looks, which he noted with a lift of his brows before shrugging them off. "What can I say? I believe in drinking deep from the cup of life."

"A few other cups, too. You need to check what's in those," Hak said, a pointed reminder of the time Jae-ha had drunk wine laced with the drug nadai.

"I bring back valuable intelligence and these are the thanks I get…"

"Come again, Droopy Eyes? One of those words sounded like 'intelligence,' but I know that can't be right."

Yona left them to their banter and braved the heat to sample the stew broth. "Mm. The roots are a little bitter, but there's something like a spice that sets it off."

"Doesn't it? Zeno's glad the Miss likes it." He really did know what he was doing when he didn't manage to weasel out of cooking.

Jae-ha still wasn't off the hook, and now it was Kija's turn: "Think of others before you do things like that! You drove us all to distraction worrying about you!"

"I feel so loved," he replied, in an affected deadpan.

"This isn't a joke!"

Zeno leaned closer to Yona. "Say, do you think they're pushing Green Dragon a little far?"

She looked at the others. Jae-ha had taken Hak's needling with good humor bordering on masochistic relish, but now… His posture could still be called "lounging" and his expression a "smile," but he had crossed his arms and folded subtly inward — like a flower in the evening, Yona thought, if a man would let you say that about him. "Hmm, maybe."

Shin-ah had been dipping his finger into one of the waterskins and feeding Ao by drops while he watched for Yoon. Now, he didn't say anything, but he had gotten so absorbed in watching the argument that he only belatedly looked back over his shoulder. "Ah, Yoon is back." Through the sparse scrub vegetation, the others could already see him, too.

"Mother comes to the rescue!" Zeno breathed.

Yona ran out to meet Yoon, asking about how he'd found things in general and various villagers in particular. There had been some accidents, yes, and some people's old illnesses had gotten worse, but overall things were going well — better now than before, with more support from the tribe capital.

"I did hear something scary, though," Yoon said as they arrived at the camp and sat down with the others.

"Something scary?" Yona leaned closer.

"After Kan Soo-jin was defeated, apparently some of his soldiers still believed all of that, about being the true descendants of the Red Dragon King. Some of them got away, and now they're a band of rebels."

"Bandits, in other words," Hak opined. "Self-righteous bandits — the worst kind."

"Should we really be the ones to complain about that?" Jae-ha wondered.

"Did they attack the villages?" Yona asked, anxious.

Yoon nodded. "Tae-jun's people got there before anyone was hurt, and then his brother's soldiers went through after them, but here's the scary part: before they were run off, they were asking about Green Dragon Village."

Silence fell, broken only by the bubbling stewpot. The others looked at Jae-ha. His fingers twitched where they rested on his crossed arms, but other than that, he didn't move or speak. Ao scampered over to him and up onto his sleeve.

"So it's like what the people were afraid of in the other dragon villages," Yona worried. "They're after a dragon's power."

Shin-ah curled up a little and made a soft sound.

"But word about us has been spreading," Kija said. "Surely by now they should know that the green dragon is somewhere else."

"It might not be that," Yoon said. "Heuk-chi didn't think so, anyway. He said that Fire Tribe nobles have an epic song about the Red Dragon King, and toward the end it talks about gifts he gave the four dragon warriors.

"Supposedly he gave the white dragon a necklace of beads and magatama jewels —"

"We still have that in the village. I get to wear it once a year at the Ancestors' Festival," Kija said, a bit gushingly.

"— He gave the blue dragon a silver ring —"

Shin-ah shook his head, but no one had really expected him to know.

"Zeno remembers that. The first blue dragon was really proud of it," Zeno offered. He made himself remember Abi showing the ring off when he had first received it, not just clasping it for comfort beside his king's tomb.

"— And supposedly," Yoon concluded, "he gave the green dragon his jade seal."

A collective "Ohhh" rose from the group.

"That would do it," Hak said. "A bunch of rebels who think they speak for the Red Dragon King would definitely want that. In the wrong hands, it could cause some trouble."

"The song seems pretty accurate, but would he really give something like that away?" Yoon asked, looking at Jae-ha and Zeno in turn.

"I never saw any such thing," Jae-ha said flatly.

Zeno rubbed his boyish chin but shook his head slowly, not in denial, rather admitting that the deep well of his memory had come up dry.

"He must really have trusted the green dragon, if it was true," Yona observed.

"Not more than the rest of us," Zeno said. "But Yoon, you forgot Zeno! What did I get, what did I get?"

"Like you don't know," Yoon grumbled. He flicked Zeno's gold medallion and set it swinging with a ping!

Jae-ha finally shrugged himself into motion. He tried to brush Ao off of his sleeve, but the squirrel nimbly leapt over his hand onto his shoulder, and he couldn't do anything more about it without breaking his facade of nonchalance. "So, either way they're looking for the village. What do you intend to do about it?"

Everyone let out their breath. Yona's shoulders fell. The only thing she'd ever heard about the village Jae-ha had come from was that the people there had chained him hand and foot. That led her to expect something like Shin-ah's village, or worse, and she knew it would be asking a lot of him to go back to that place. But… "We can't just leave the village to be attacked."

"So shall we hunt down those rebels?" Jae-ha suggested.

"Kyo-ga's soldiers are already after them," Yoon said, and glanced at Hak and Yona. "If we ran into them…"

Yona frowned. Thinking about those rebels' situation, she guessed that they must be hurt and confused; asking the dragons to crush them felt somehow wrong, unless they were hurting the people, and the army was apparently keeping them from doing that. Besides, Yoon was right. The last time they'd encountered Soo-won, they'd gotten away unscathed and even cooperated, but Kyo-ga's soldiers might still be enforcing the story that Princess Yona was dead and General Hak stood condemned for killing her and the king. It was better to avoid such an encounter — especially putting Hak in that kind of danger. But at the same time, the army's pursuit raised the possibility of the rebels not just invading a dragon village but leading the soldiers there as well. Even if Yona and the dragons went to guard the village — assuming they would even be welcome in doing so — then if the rebels arrived with the army on their heels, it would only pile her problems and theirs together. But still, she was sure that something had to be done…

"We should warn the village," she said finally. "They've been hiding for two thousand years. Once they know about it, they should know what to do." And if the Red Dragon King's seal was there, the villagers could hide it, too — or she and the dragons could get it before the rebels did.

Kija, Shin-ah, and Yoon all nodded.

Hak looked sidelong at Jae-ha. He'd heard the same sliver of a story that Yona had, and at the time he hadn't seemed to take it seriously, but now… "I'd say a warning's good enough for the likes of them."

Jae-ha put on his practiced smile. "I do admire your magnanimity," he said. "But I'm sorry to say, Yona dear, this is one thing I can't help you do."

"Why shouldn't you?" Kija asked. "You of all of us! You've mentioned how they mistreated you. Don't you want to go back there and show them — show them who you've become in spite of them?"

Yona braced herself. She wanted to agree, but it also sounded like too much for someone who hadn't been there to say to someone who had.

Jae-ha didn't so much as flinch. "At this point, it's not a matter of wanting. Years ago, I made a solemn vow that only one person could bring me back to that place." He looked around at the others. "And none of you are that person."

Yona met his gaze and nodded gravely. "That's fine," she said. "I wouldn't want you to break your word." Jae-ha had been so insistent on maintaining his freedom, that everything he did for her was of his own will, it was actually comforting to see him draw a line and prove it. "It shouldn't take all of us just to deliver a warning, anyway."

Hak shrugged. "We could just tie a note to a rock and have the White Snake throw it."

"What if it hit someone?" Yona objected.

"Kidding, kidding…"

"You do know where the village is, though?" Yoon asked Jae-ha.

"I have a general idea where it was thirteen years ago. Where it is now…?" He shrugged.

"Well, it's what we've got to start from," Yoon sighed. "What a pain…"

Jae-ha pointed to a vague area on Yoon's map, and after their meal the group set out. Kija led the way with Zeno close by, and surprisingly, Jae-ha let the two of them bring him along, near the front.

Further back, Yona matched her stride to Yoon's. "Did you see Tae-jun?" she asked. "How was he?"

"Well —" Yoon stopped to laugh before he could reply. "When I saw him he'd been chased up a tree."

"The rebels?"

"The goats," Yoon said, chuckling. "You know we got one village in the settlement with Sen Province, so he apparently thought he'd do what you did and see what they raised on the same kind of land up there, and he brought back these goats. I heard they can get by eating just about anything, they're good for meat and milk, and in the winter they grow soft, warm hair that makes a valuable cloth."

"Oh, that's good." Yona smiled. The idea behind the Iza seeds she'd gotten might be worth even more than the seeds themselves. So much the better.

"The villagers were really taking to them. The goats taking to Tae-jun, though — yeah, not so much."

Yoon looked ahead to the three dragons walking in front. His face turned more serious, and he lowered his voice. "I wonder, though…"

"Hm?"

"Jae-ha's 'one person.' I wonder who it is."

"Captain Gi-gan, probably," Yona guessed.

"But why would she want to take him back to his village?"

"It doesn't have to be that she'd really do it, it could just be like, 'if it was you I'd even follow you there,' that kind of thing," Yona reasoned.

"Maybe," Yoon admitted, but his mouth twisted, showing him clearly unconvinced. "If it's someone else, though… Maybe we should worry about that person showing up."

Yona took his meaning, but it didn't worry her. "If that happens, I think he'll tell us, and then we can figure it out."

"Mmm." Yoon didn't make any further answer. Tension lingered in his face, but it was more worry than mistrust.

The journey was a long one. It brought them along the edge of Sky Tribe country, and one day they even trekked along forested mountain slopes where the capital, Kuuto, and Red Dragon Castle could be seen far in the distance.

That night, Yona sat awake gazing at the lights of the city and castle shining like orange stars. Perhaps fatigue from the journey led her thoughts into dark places, and she reflected that her father's tomb was there somewhere. Soo-won had covered up his betrayal, so he would have had the old king buried with royal honors as though nothing was wrong. She also remembered Min-soo, who had covered her escape that night. He must surely have died, and likely been labeled a conspirator. She didn't want to think about what might have been done with him. Whatever was there for either of them, she might never have a chance to see it.

She might never even be able to go back to her uncle Yu-hon's tomb. She still didn't know whether to believe Soo-won's story that her father had killed his, that the gentle, peace-loving King Il had murdered his own brother. Despite everything, she couldn't believe that Soo-won would have lied to her. But she also remembered her father's mournful face, the tears in his eyes every year at the new year's eve festival honoring the dead, when they went to Uncle Yu-hon's tomb to burn incense and make the ceremonial offerings. She also couldn't believe that it was guilt she had seen then, just deep, deep sorrow.

I really am too tired tonight, she thought, wiping tears from her own aching eyes.

She whipped around at a rustling of grass behind her. It was Hak — no surprise, but still a relief.

"Princess," he said. Just the simple acknowledgment, and he sat down a little way from her, close enough to talk without raising voices but not too close.

As they both looked out at the city, there was no need for words, but Yona was tired of being alone with her thoughts. "I was just thinking," she said, and her voice seemed to ring loud among the insect songs in the night air. "It's strange… I don't feel at all like I need to live in the castle again, but I wish I could go there and burn incense at some of the graves."

"Mm," Hak agreed. "We will someday. One way or another."

Yona's chest tightened. Maybe that had been meant as reassurance — or maybe not even that, maybe he had spoken from his own determination. In either case it didn't give her comfort but dread, that a confrontation with Soo-won might come someday. She wished, rather, that things could just stay the way they were now, together with Yoon and the dragons in this middle place: not accepting defeat but not seeking victory, not swearing fealty but not rebelling, doing good on this path without the heartbreak that lay on either side of it.

Heartbreak on either side… She was suddenly aware of the hairpin hidden in her dress — the gift from Soo-won. Her hand started toward it, but she curled her fingers and stopped herself. She'd held it enough times to know how it felt without doing it now. She could hardly bear to look at it, but she couldn't bear to throw it away, and so there was nothing to do but stay in the middle place, keep carrying it and all the pain that was attached to it and to even the thought of Soo-won.

Even the thought of him stung, but worse yet was the sight of him. Yona felt herself back on the street in Awa the day after their victory, after she'd fired that fateful arrow at the vicious governor Yan Kum-ji — and then there was Soo-won, appearing from nowhere. She felt it all again, standing there hidden under his cloak: the sunlight filtering in through the pale cloth; the scent of palace incense on his clothes burning her eyes; his voice resonating in his chest barely an inch from her face, impossible blessing and blackest curse all at once —

And the sword at his hip, the rage pounding in her heart demanding revenge. In that moment nothing had seemed to exist beyond the curtain of his cloak. Worldly consequences were all forgotten, and yet she had hesitated, even before he moved a hand to stay her. She had known even as her fingers touched the sword-handle that there was no comfort down that path, only heartbreak, and she couldn't move, couldn't even speak. She could only stand frozen, trapped in that middle place.

Now, on the mountainside overlooking the castle, Yona pulled a deep breath of the cool night air and slapped herself on both cheeks.

"Hm?" Hak looked at her.

"It's nothing! I just need to… It's, it's nothing." She needed to sleep, but she imagined going back to the tent, and then she imagined Hak looking out over the capital alone, and she decided to stay. Before long, though, she gave in to fatigue and curled up on the ground. She heard Hak walking away, but by then she was too tired to get up.

She was just drifting off to sleep when something brushed against her leg, and she felt a blanket being draped over her. She was sure of who was doing it without opening her eyes, and the feel of a broad, strong hand clasping her shoulder removed any doubt.

"Thank you," she breathed.

"Sleep well, Princess," Hak answered.

The next day they set out again, and they walked for several days more. Clearly those rebels must have been grasping at straws if they were asking random villagers about a place so far away, but Yona's resolve didn't waver, and outside of Yoon's habitual griping, no one else questioned it either. Better to deliver the warning than to risk underestimating desperate people.

Jae-ha had nothing at all to say about the mission. If the others discussed it and someone asked him a direct question, he would give a brief, simple answer or deflect, always with his characteristic wit. The others might occasionally hear a note of strain in his voice, especially as they neared their destination, but it was never more than subtle, and by that time they knew that if they tried to point it out and pin him down on it, they wouldn't be able to catch him.

At last they came to a countryside that folded into stark hills, with rocky slopes emerging from hollow sweeps of grassland. Trees were scattered here and there, seldom enough of them in one spot offer much cover. They moved carefully, staying to low ground, until one morning Shin-ah announced, "We're close." He had spotted a green-haired watchman on a nearby hill. The group stopped in one of the rare clumps of trees to plan their approach.

"No point sneaking past him," Hak observed. "In fact, we could just give him the word and be on our way."

"Please, allow me," Kija said. "They may distrust strangers, but they should know that they're dealing with another dragon warrior."

Yona nodded. Kija was right, and his claw was the best way to offer proof. Jae-ha simply wasn't going, and it was never pretty when Shin-ah or Zeno had to prove their powers. But letting Kija go alone… "I'll go with you," she declared.

"There's no need."

Hak also came forward, shouldering his glaive. "There could be trouble…"

"I know! And I know you want to protect me, but I can't come this close and not even meet one person!" Yona blurted it out, but then thought perhaps she'd been too honest and looked over her shoulder at Jae-ha. He didn't meet her gaze, only stood there with his arms crossed, just like when they'd first gotten the news — complete with Ao clinging to his sleeve.

"As I was saying," Hak continued, loudly enough to pull her attention back to him, "that means that if you're going, I'm going too."

"Oh, okay, then. The three of us."

Shin-ah touched her shoulder, hesitating to go with them but also hesitating to let them go without him.

Yona saw it, and she didn't think he needed the possible reminder of what he'd been through himself in the past. Besides… "Shin-ah, I need you to stay behind and watch us. That way you can let the others know if we get in too much trouble. Okay?"

He nodded.

"Well then, let's go," she said. Kija nodded.

Hak waved back to the others as they set out. "We'll try to be back by lunch."

"Zeno's cooking," Yoon called back.

"He is?" Zeno asked. "I hadn't heard about that."

"You heard me just now or you wouldn't be asking." Yoon looked after their departing delegation and sighed. "We come all this way just to turn around and leave again… Well," he admitted, "I hope it's that easy, anyway…"

Silence fell after that. They didn't plan on being there long enough to set up camp, so Yoon just took a book out of his bag and sat down to read. Shin-ah, true to his word, gazed into the distance, watching Yona and the others with his dragon sight. Zeno contrived to look pitiful rifling through the cooking gear and provisions.

Jae-ha sat, perhaps a bit stiffly. He had hardly spoken since they'd come to this countryside, but now he was the one to break the silence as he stood up. This time he did go so far as to pick Ao off his sleeve despite chittering protests, and he handed the squirrel to Shin-ah. "As long as we're here, I'm going to look around a bit," he said. His tone was a measured attempt at "casual."

"Be careful," Yoon said, looking up from his book. "If you jump, they might see you—"

"I don't need you to tell me that!" Jae-ha replied; for the first time it came out as a snap.

Yoon opened his mouth again, but Jae-ha was gone before he could say anything else.

Shin-ah watched, gaping a little in quiet dismay, but he couldn't abandon his lookout.

Zeno watched, too, his eyes turning serious. He maneuvered his pretense at work closer to Shin-ah, and when Yoon had gradually become engrossed in his book again, Zeno leaned around behind Shin-ah's mask and whispered softly. "I'll go after Green Dragon."

Shin-ah nodded gratefully, and Ao leapt onto Zeno's shoulder before he slipped away muttering "firewood, firewood" to cover his escape.

Once he was safely clear of their uncamped camp, Zeno made no attempt at stealth. In fact when he caught up enough to see Jae-ha ahead of him, he broke into a purposefully-noisy loping run until his fellow dragon turned and saw him.

He came up close enough that he wouldn't have to raise his voice. "Zeno believes in the buddy system," he said.

Jae-ha regarded him with narrowed eyes.

"Ah, Zeno also believes in personal space!" he added, with a defensive wave of his hands. Ao, perched on his shoulder, echoed the gesture and chittered agreement. "Don't worry about us, we'll just be around."

Jae-ha finally sighed. "Suit yourself," and he started walking again.

True to his word, Zeno let the space open up between them again and followed at a distance, keeping Jae-ha in sight but not getting close.

Being near his old village was clearly harder for for Jae-ha than he wanted to let on, and Zeno knew very well why that should be. Once, years ago, he'd come to Green Dragon Village in the night and had seen a half-grown boy, chained and bruised. Now as a grown man, Jae-ha still bore the scars of it and didn't want to let them show or have them prodded. A quiet walk alone in these hills might be the best thing for him right now, Zeno thought — as long as he wasn't really alone and knew that he wasn't.

So they just wandered along the grassy slopes. Ao found a patch of sweet clover and stuffed her cheeks with it, and Zeno found some wild onions. He dug them up with his bare hands and spotted a little stream to wash them off in, looking up every so often to make sure he wasn't losing Jae-ha. As he looked while he was going down to the water, he found that Jae-ha was looking back at him — still some way ahead, but just standing and watching him. Zeno washed the herbs and tucked them away in his robes without worry, then stood up and waved. Okay, I'm ready to go now!

Jae-ha had just raised a hand in reply — Message received — when he suddenly whipped around to face one of the surrounding hillsides.

Zeno followed his gaze, hearing a small sound in that direction; all he could see was a slight rustling of leaves where some bushes clung between the slopes. Jae-ha, however, was still tensed and focused on that spot, and a moment later a trilling whistle sounded through the air — too loud and sharp to be a bird.

Jae-ha set off directly away from those bushes and that sound, but he held himself back; Zeno was able to run and catch up with him.

"Was that —?"

Jae-ha confirmed it with a harsh chuckle. "This really isn't funny…"

"You don't have to slow down for me, I'll be fine no matter what," Zeno said, but he got no answer. "Or if I broke my legs we could really go fast."

"That's not funny either," Jae-ha informed him.

Trying to gain as much ground as easily as possible, they favored downhill paths — and the further they went, it seemed, the higher the hills above them rose, and the lower the valleys they followed dipped. At last they found themselves funneled into what could almost have been a dry stream bed, a narrow earthen path with ground rising sharply on either side.

Zeno began to have a bad feeling; if this turned into a dead end, it would be a bad place to be cornered. Indeed, looking up, he thought the path would have to curve sharply not to run directly into a rocky hillside.

As he was thinking it, Jae-ha stopped short in front of him for a moment. "What is this?" he wondered aloud, then moved forward again, more slowly.

Further down the dry channel, the path was flanked on either side with wooden poles. Some were recently-cut, smooth and yellow-white; others had weathered grey with their grain lines cut deep by rain and sun. Clearly they had been put there by human hands. This path was leading to something, and Zeno felt sure that it was nothing good.

They were already among the poles when he caught Jae-ha's sleeve. "Hey, Green Dragon, this doesn't look good. Let's get out of here and start circling back —"

He stopped. Jae-ha had turned toward him but immediately gone wide-eyed at some distraction and looked to one side of him, then the other. Zeno turned to look, too. His arm brushed one of the poles and he instinctively raised a hand to it. Ao jumped across and climbed up it, and as his eyes followed her, he saw that the wood was carved. This one was so weathered that it was hard to make out, but he could guess at the design, and he ran his fingers over a crude rendition of a human face. He looked around to find that all the poles were carved with such figures; he hadn't noticed them until now because they all faced one way — down the path.

The bad feeling deepened, and he knew that more than tactical considerations lay behind it.

"Have you seen anything like this before?" Jae-ha asked.

Zeno nodded. "They're meant to ward off evil spirits. Every village used to have these these facing out from their gates, although you don't see them much now."

"Facing away from their territory…" Jae-ha echoed.

"I think this is different." Zeno couldn't begin to say how many times he'd seen totem poles by ones and twos at village gates, but never had he seen a gauntlet of them like this.

"Well, 'evil spirits this way' still means somewhere they wouldn't want to follow us," Jae-ha reasoned with brittle confidence, and he continued down the path.

Ao gave a questioning "P'kyuu?" from atop the pole.

Zeno motioned her to stay where she was before turning to follow Jae-ha. "'Evil spirits this way' might mean somewhere we don't want to go either!" With each step he grew more uneasy. But then, with each step he began to feel more drawn to follow the path to the end, because he began to sense to exactly where it led. By the time the channel brought them to a fold in the hillside and at last revealed a rough, gate-sized portal in the rock face, the suspicion had grown strong, too strong to turn back from.

This was not a stone-built monument like the blue dragon's tomb they'd encountered, just a natural fissure in the rock that had been widened, the floor built up with dirt and gravel, larger stones only where they were needed to terrace the sinking ground into steps. Just the one chamber, perhaps the size of a cottage or two, and then even before the sunlight from the entrance faded, the cavern ended, closing in around a stone structure something like a well with a wooden cover.

The stones of the "well" were carefully cut and fitted to rise from the irregular floor and walls into a perfect circle. Here and there the sides of it were streaked with a shiny, whitish crust that looked like hot-poured wax, but Zeno touched it and found it hard as rock. Drops of water from the ceiling had deposited a new layer of minerals there.

The well itself must have stood for a thousand years or more, but the wooden cover had been cut recently and bound together with no particular care. At its joints were wooden talismans, roughly carved and in various states of weathering like the poles outside. They were attached with bits of dried grass, and thin cords of the same twisted leaves were the only thing binding the cover over the well-mouth, and yet…

Inside that well was where the ominous feeling was coming from, like claws scrabbling to reach through the gaps in the wood. It seemed like the talismans should rattle. It seemed like the wood should groan and crack.

It seemed like Jae-ha should feel it, too — he'd been sensitive in the blue dragon's tomb — but with one look at him, Zeno knew it was too much to expect that he feel anything outside himself right now. He was still trying to hide it, but his breath was quick and shallow; even when he tried crossing his arms, the next moment his hand unconsciously wandered back to his face.

"It's true, isn't it?" he asked. "This place…"

Zeno reached into one of the larger gaps in the wooden cover, dipping his fingers into the well. As before, the spirits couldn't enter the yellow dragon's body, but it felt like dipping his fingers into charging rapids of seething water — or of dragon blood. That much he felt for certain. "Yes. This is the green dragons' tomb."

Shuten, he thought, I'm glad you're not here to see this —

He yanked his hand back from a sudden sharp sensation as though something had bitten his fingers. It happened so quickly that he didn't know what it was, but he knew at once that he couldn't leave things like this.

"Listen, Green Dragon," he said, "you should go. This isn't a good place for you to be. I'll make sure your way is clear, and then, by yourself, even on the ground you'll be fast. And then it's me, so whatever happens here, I'll be fine —"

"As if I'd leave you here!" Jae-ha snapped. "Stop being stupid!" His hand on his face had begun to shake.

Zeno looked at him. "You're being very blunt today."

"I know that." Suddenly, he gritted his teeth and punched the cavern wall.

In the same instant, the presence in the well surged up stronger. I was wrong, Zeno realized. It's not that he's too distracted to feel it — he's too distracted to know what it is he's feeling. They pulled him here without him knowing it, and now they're feeding off each other and he doesn't realize. This is bad…

"Come on, then," he said. "Let's go together. I can't just leave this place like it is, but I have plenty of time for that. Right now, you shouldn't be here. Not anywhere near here."

Jae-ha didn't seem to hear — or if he did, he'd been pushed so far he couldn't respond. His breath was coming harder; he was almost panting. He gripped the fringe of his hair, pushed even beyond caring how it looked, and Zeno realized something else: even the spirits in the well couldn't have made Jae-ha fall apart like this if he hadn't been halfway there already. That was how severely being spotted by the villagers had shaken him.

Why didn't I realize it was this bad, when I was here before? Zeno asked himself. Why did I just walk away? And now he'd be walking away again, from all the others, but there was nothing for it. I'm sorry. You'll all have to wait a little bit longer. Right now… He touched Jae-ha's arm. "Come on. Let's go."

Jae-ha pulled away from him. "So I'm supposed to run away if those people so much as look at me?" He shook with silent, skeletal laughter, bracing himself with that fistful of his hair. When he spoke again, he tried to cover it over with levity, and his voice half-sang with the strain. "Well, I already started, I might as well keep it up. Apparently that's all it takes for them to keep me on the ground — to get me inside stone walls and chained down —" He punched the wall of the cavern again.

"That's why I'm saying, let's get out of here!" Zeno tried to get an arm around him. He thought maybe he should smash his own hand against the wall hard enough to regenerate it and drag Jae-ha away. He thought maybe he should have done that before now.

For a moment, Jae-ha was willing to be led, but then his eyes fell on the well with its crude wooden seals, and at once he began to laugh — a terrible, uncontrollable, joyless laugh. "And look! If you stay here, they go right on doing it even after you're dead!"

Zeno felt Jae-ha's muscles tense under his arm. Yeah, should have regenerated sooner.

But now it was too late. As Jae-ha started to move, Zeno tried to brace against him, but his normal strength wasn't nearly enough. It might as well have been Ao trying to hold him back.

Jae-ha spun at the well in a kick, lashing out at it with all the power of the green dragon's leg.

The impact sounded like a close clap of thunder. The loose-bound wooden well cover splintered, shot into the cavern wall and splintered again, the wooden talismans scattering. The ancient crusted stone of the well itself broke and flew apart.

Before the thunderclap was even past, another sound welled up around it and overtook it — a roar like storm-surge breaking on a beach, like water bursting through a broken dam.

Jae-ha gasped and took a step back — he heard it, too. He saw it, or saw something. Zeno braced his shoulder against him and tried to run for the cave mouth. He glanced back and saw black, ghostly energy surging up from the broken well. He saw it for one instant before the wave of it broke over the two of them.

Untamed power spun around him in every direction. It was like being caught up in the waves of an angry sea, but where it flowed over him he felt not water but scales, claws, teeth, gritty and black like a torrent of ink trying to form itself by blind primal force into an image — trying to paint itself into raging dragons.

Zeno couldn't hear anything over the roar and howl of it. He tried to call out to Jae-ha but couldn't hear his own voice. He tried to cling to him but the surging energy tore his friend from his hands and dashed him about. The spirits couldn't enter him, but now that only meant they could crash up against him. He couldn't tell if he was hitting them or hitting earth or stone, if he was still in the cave or down the well or outside in the sun — they blotted out the sun —

And then, like a wave rushing back out to sea, they flung him down on the ground and were gone.

The sun returned, but a black blot remained in the center of it and Zeno still lay in its shadow. He tried to pick himself up and gather his senses. He made out a voice somewhere above him…

"…They never listen to me…" It was a man's voice, familiar, but at first Zeno couldn't place it.

He blinked and squinted. He was back out on the path. The totem poles were flung about and skewed and broken. A tall figure was standing over him with their back to him, facing further up the path where the "wave" of ghosts must have gone.

Zeno managed to look up at the human shape framed against the sun. It began to turn toward him, and he caught the silhouette — long hair tied back in a thin, high topknot; a short, unruly fringe of forelocks…

His eyes widened despite the burning of suddenly letting in the light.

The figure grinned at him — or snarled, or both at once — with a gleam of jagged teeth. "Well, you sure took your time stopping by."

Chapter 1 - END