Page 5 of Two Thousand Promises

“Come here, Huli. I need to check that you’re not injured,” Xiao Dan pressed. He only wanted to hold his sweet fox. The rest could wait until Huli had time to calm.

“I…I can’t. Not yet. I need time.” Huli ran off, using a different path across the tree limbs to surmount the wall.

“Huli!” Xiao Dan shouted, but the fox spirit didn’t slow a single step.

“What the hell is going on?” Xiang demanded.

“Just what we needed. Another huli jing,” Chen grumbled only to have his words followed by a loud smack. “Ow! Why’d you hit me, baobei?”?3

“Because you’re being an asshole,” Moon snapped.

“What?”

“Read the room, Er-ge,”?4 Meimei?5 chimed in. “You’re being a prick to Shixiong.”

Chen cleared his throat. “Forgive me, Da-ge.”?6

Xiao Dan ignored them all and hurried to Kai’s side. “Could you follow him?”

“Do you want me to bring him back?”

“No. Make sure he’s not hurt. If you get the chance to talk to him, tell him I’m not angry. Only worried about him.”

Kai nodded. “I will find him and watch over him until he returns to you by choice.” The dragon had barely finished speaking when he disappeared.

Xiao Dan could finally breathe a sigh of relief. He wasn’t worried about this Min or whatever nonsense deal Huli might have struck with her. His one concern was for the safety of his fox.

1 Narrator Note: Min (?)

2 Shixiong – elder martial brother

3 Baobei – baby

4 Er-ge – second oldest brother. A term of endearment. Referencing Chen Bo Cheng here since he is the second oldest behind Zhang Xiao Dan (a.k.a. da-ge)

5 Meimei – younger sister

6 Da-ge – senior older brother, a sort of respectful endearment

Chapter 2

Huli

No.

No. No. No. No.

This wasn’t supposed to happen. How could she travel all the way to the other side of the globe just for this stupid agreement?

How could she still be alive?

He’d not seen a single sign of her in more than three hundred years. He’d been sure she was dead already and that his stupid promise was now null and void.

Huli stopped running from the Zhang manor when he’d traveled for well over a kilometer, but he didn’t stop moving. He paced the forest, bare branches scratching along his side and dead leaves crunching under his paws as panic poured through him in hot, ugly waves.

Xiao Dan must hate him.

All his clan mates had to be telling Xiao Dan to kill Huli and be free of him once and for all.

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