Chapter Seven #2
“Excuse you, I don’t insult your precious cheesecake,” Yejun said.
He came to a stop in front of the panda garden—a staircase decorated with round plastic pandas for tourists to take pictures with—and sat down next to a particularly chubby panda, waving for me to sit.
I sat a careful distance from him as he unzipped his backpack, pulled out a small plastic tray, and set it on the bench between us.
“Is this a picnic?” I said.
Yejun shook his head, rooting around in his backpack. “I’m showing you the plan,” he said. Then he pulled out a bottle of strawberry milk, peeled back the foil, and poured it across the tray.
I flinched as some of it splashed onto my skirt. “Why does your plan involve wasting milk?”
“Milk is less reflective than water, so it’s better for scrying,” Yejun said, already tracing his signature into the shallow pool. “You don’t want to leave a paper trail, do you?”
“I … guess not,” I said, frowning at the aggressive fake-strawberry scent. I leaned closer as Yejun opened a file and text appeared in the pale pink surface.
Popularize candy corn in Korea
Rescue the dung beetles
Save the MV Sewol ferry
Final shift
I looked up at Yejun for some indication that he was joking, but he was grinning like he expected a compliment.
“What the hell is this?” I said.
“It’s how we’re going to save the world!” Yejun said, leaning closer.
“With candy corn?” I glanced over my shoulder as the next shuttle bus pulled in, seriously considering just taking the cheesecake and going home.
“The candy corn isn’t the point,” Yejun said, shoulders drooping as it seemed to dawn on him that I didn’t share his excitement.
“These are our goals. We’re going to strategically undo some events that are key to this timeline’s stability.
Think of it like … this timeline is a big ship with a bunch of anchors cast into the sea.
We’re going to pull up the heaviest ones. ”
“And how do you even know what these ‘anchors’ are?”
He shrugged. “It’s how they made Timeline Beta, but in reverse. I might have looked at some … sensitive paperwork before I went rogue … Which might have been the reason I got chased out in the first place.”
“So you’re not very sneaky, is what you’re telling me?” I said, raising an eyebrow.
“Hey, I’m still alive, aren’t I?” he said.
I briefly contemplated throwing myself off the tower. What had I gotten myself into? Surely the way to get my sister back couldn’t depend on dung beetles.
But then again, this was pretty consistent with the butterfly principle—never solve a problem at its source. If a ladybug could cause a tsunami, maybe a dung beetle could save my sister.
“And what is ‘final shift’ supposed to mean?” I said.
The grin slid off Yejun’s face. “Once we pull up all the anchors,” he said, “we make one last change, and Timeline Alpha just sort of … clicks into place.”
“And that change would be…”
“Hong Gildong started the entire timeline separation process,” Yejun said, lowering his voice. “He was the first domino in creating Timeline Beta, which means, for us—”
“He’s the last?”
“Best for last!” Yejun said, nodding.
I imagined Hong Gildong on the ground, the look of fear in his eyes as I pried open his mouth and shoved his yeouiju down his throat …
I supposed that I could put up with Yejun for a while if that was the payoff.
“Okay,” I said. “How do we get candy corn into Korea?”
Yejun patted his bulky backpack. “I came prepared,” he said. “But for that, we need to go inside.”
He picked up the tray and dumped the strawberry milk into the grass, then shook the tray out and crammed it back into his bag.
I followed him to the main entrance, where he tried to hold the door for me, but I shoved him through first.
“You can buy me cheesecake, but don’t hold doors for me,” I said. I didn’t want us looking like a couple. Maybe people could think I was his disgruntled foreign cousin.
“Seems a bit arbitrary, but okay,” he said. “Any other rules I should know about?”
“I’ll let you know when you break them.”
But he only smiled at this too, like he thought I was joking. I was glad at least one of us found this whole situation amusing, rather than the scariest and possibly worst decision I’d ever made. I contemplated making a run for it with my cheesecake—I hadn’t technically broken protocol yet.
We approached the main desk, where he loudly asked the woman for two tickets to the top of the tower.
I didn’t want him to pay for me, but the only thing I hated more than him in that moment was the idea of causing a scene by arguing with him.
He wasn’t doing it to be generous—he knew it would annoy me.
I swore that once I found Hana, I would never talk to Yejun again.
I despised how he played the world like a concert pianist, how nothing seemed hard for him at all, how none of it really mattered.
Dragons were always supposed to look at ease while undercover—something that Yejun had clearly mastered, while Hyebin said I always looked like an ostrich ready to jam its head into the sand.
Yejun returned with two tickets and an infuriatingly smug grin. “It’s a good cover,” he whispered in my ear. “The elevator, I mean.”
“Thanks, I’ve taken Time Travel 101,” I said under my breath, hiding it with a plastic smile as we approached the staff member who took our tickets and gestured for us to pass through.
“What did you have to do to make sure we got the elevator to ourselves?” I said as we waited for it to arrive. “Slash the tires on the shuttle bus?”
Yejun shook his head. “It’s an advanced time travel strategy,” he said. “I call it … ‘checking the weather.’” He nodded toward the foggy skyline beyond the windows. “No one wants to pay for a scenic view when the city is covered in smog.”
I let out a sharp laugh. “The staff must think we’re strange.”
“People have thought more offensive things about me,” he said, shrugging and bowing slightly to another staff member as the elevator doors opened.
As soon as the doors closed behind us, Yejun pulled his yeouiju out of his pocket and held out his other hand to me.
“The year 2007, March 5, 15:45:11,” he said.
I stared at his hand as the elevator went dark, the OLED screen on the ceiling lighting up with an image of outer space. What, exactly, did he want me to do?
When I didn’t move, he sighed. “I do wash my hands, you know,” he said, rolling up his sleeve, “but you can take my arm if I repulse you that much.” But now I could see the tattoo with his mother’s note, and that was even worse.
“It’s not that,” I said, dropping my gaze to the dark floor. Above us, the screens played a video from the perspective of a bird—or a dragon—sailing through clouds, dodging airplanes, flashing through the atmosphere. “I’ve never…”
“Oh,” Yejun said, blinking. “You’ve never used your time magic before?”
I glared at the floor, wishing the darkness of outer space would swallow me whole. He made it sound like he’d thoroughly researched me, so I thought he knew this. But once again, I was less than what everyone expected.
“That’s fine,” he said, shrugging.
I looked up. He was smiling again like it truly didn’t matter.
“My magic will reach out to yours,” he said, holding out his hand again. “Do you remember the date?”
“The year 2007, March 5, 15:45:11.”
Yejun smiled and nodded, moving his hand closer. “Remember that. You’ll know how to do the rest.”
The elevator rose higher into the sky, gears whirring, my ears aching from the change in pressure.
Slowly, I set my hand in his.
Time magic rushed through me, nearly knocking me off my feet.
It was as if the sun had breathed me into its core, enveloping me in liquid gold.
Its warmth washed away the tension in my muscles, soothed away my timesickness headache, sparkled across my skin.
Other people’s time magic felt like an unmaking, but Yejun’s was a symphony of light.
His eyes gleamed blue, and I sensed the bright spark of his smile even before it crossed his face.
Do it now, he said. Or at least, I thought he spoke the words out loud. His mouth didn’t move, but the words rang through my blood. The doors will open soon.
I had no idea what I was doing, but Yejun seemed so certain I would figure it out. This was supposed to be a natural reflex for all dragon descendants—it should have been easy to access the vast library of time that my ancestors had saved for me.
But as Yejun’s magic hummed through me, my own magic stayed trapped in the tortoiseshell box. I was filled up with his light, but my own body was a cage of darkness.
The year 2007, March 5, 15:45:11, I thought, hoping that repeating the time would prompt my magic to come out.
Look, I would love to help you out here, but if I use any more magic, the agency will detect it and come running, Yejun said, an edge of panic beneath his words.
The light in his eyes flickered, his grip on my hand growing colder.
What would happen to him if all the time magic he released didn’t go anywhere?
Would he be stuck in between dimensions like at the restaurant?
Or would he go halfway to his destination and be unable to come back without using more magic and alerting the agency?
I closed my eyes and gripped his hand tighter, my other hand clutching the tortoiseshell box as if I could wring the time magic out of it. But all I felt was Yejun’s bright magic singing through my skin, and none of my own.
I don’t know how, I thought, my eyes closed so I wouldn’t have to see the look on Yejun’s face, the disappointment I knew would be there. He thought I could help him find his mother and save the world, but he’d picked the wrong girl. I’m sorry, I don’t know how.
My grip loosened around his palm, his magic growing quieter as only my fingertips brushed against his skin.
But then, another voice cut through the dying embers of magic.
Yes, you do.
My eyes snapped open.
I felt it then, as real as Yejun’s hand in mine—I had done this before.
Maybe in another timeline, maybe in a moment that no longer existed. But nothing could be erased completely, and everything I had ever done—everyone I had ever been—was still inside me.
I relaxed my shoulders, imagining Hana in front of me, her hand instead of Yejun’s closed tight around mine.
You know how to do this, she would say. You’ve always known.
I let out a breath, a white cloud of condensation fogging the air between me and Yejun, washing the world away.
I fell into a frigid ocean, sand scraping my palms, sparks of salt water stinging my eyes. The dark waters rose over my head and filled my mouth, my lungs, my soul.
I was on the back of a turtle racing against the current, years flashing past me in glinting silver scales. I reached my hand out and centuries bled through my fingers. Time was mine, as infinite as the ocean and its cold, devouring expanse.
I was floating in a lightless sea, weightless in a palace of pearls and seashells.
I was a princess of time at the bottom of the ocean.
I was a man on the shore dissolving into dust.
I was the sharp teeth of a dragon god.
I opened my eyes and caught my reflection in the elevator, my irises gleaming violet.
I am a descendant, I thought, as my magic reached out and seized Yejun’s. The colors tangled together into royal blue, darkening Yejun’s eyes and brightening mine. His heartbeat pulsed through me, bright and fast with excitement.
“The year 2007, March 5, 15:45:11,” he said, just as the elevator clicked into place at the top of the tower.
The elevator doors opened, and we stepped out into a wall of light.