Sage Moonwater wanted a dragon for a familiar, but she had learned witchcraft from library books and phone apps. Tonight she planned to bind the beast sleeping under Dragontree, and she had no idea if her spell would work or kill her. She knelt on her loft floor, candle wax dripping onto salvaged wood. Vines pressed against the tall windows. Her tattoos itched under the candlelight. She had drawn the binding circle in chalk, copied from a printout, and she prayed the ancient thing would obey modern rules. "You can't do it like that." The voice came from the orchid bush by the window. A tiny fairy climbed out from the pink blossoms, black-skinned, pink dreadlocs swinging, wings patterned like stained glass. Sage had bought the plant at a market and never noticed the fairy living inside it. "That circle is for house spirits. Little things. You're calling something older than the ground it sleeps under." Sage sat back on her heels. Her piercings caught the light as she stared. "You've been in my plant this whole time?" "Watching you botch simple spells for weeks." The fairy landed on the rim of the pot and crossed her arms. "Your books don't cover old blood. Ancient creatures test you. Get one word wrong and the binding turns back on the witch. I've seen it. Ash. Just ash." Sage's stomach tightened. She looked at her chalk circle, then at the fairy. She had no teacher. She had never had one. Every mistake had been hers alone, and none had ever threatened to burn her to nothing. "Then teach me," Sage said. "Right now. Before I light the last candle." The fairy hovered over the circle. "Change the anchor. You bound it to your will. Wrong. A thing that old won't take a leash. You bind it to a promise instead. Something you owe it." She pointed at the outer ring. "Rub that out. All of it." Sage hesitated. The printout said the ring held her safe. But the fairy's voice carried certainty no app ever had. She wiped the chalk away with her palm. Her hand shook. "Now speak the promise," the fairy said. "Out loud. Mean it, or don't say it." Sage lit the final candle. She spoke the words the fairy fed her, one at a time. The flames bent flat, all pointing toward the floor, toward the earth, toward the thing far below. A low sound rose through the boards. Not a roar. A single, waking breath. The candles snuffed out together. In the dark, Sage felt something answer her. It was awake now. It had heard her promise, and it expected her to keep it. The fairy's wings glowed faint pink beside her. "Well," she whispered. "You didn't burn. But you just made a deal with a dragon, and you don't even know what you promised."