“Tell her about your family names,” Killian said. “You're gonna blow her mind.”
“Family names?” I asked.
“Unless you're being casual with someone, you use their full names here,” Killian said.
“I've been using your full names?” I asked the hunters.
“Yes,” Hunter Park Kyung-soo said. “And we put our family names first.”
“Wait. Your first name isn't Park?”
The female hunters giggled while Killian grinned, waving Park Kyung-soo on.
“No, that's my father's clan. My given name is Kyung-soo,” Not-Park said. “Koreans can trace their lineage back to specific clans through the family name and an ancestor's birthplace. It's very important to the humans of this region, and they're very good at it. Less important to us fairies. We don't keep a jokpo—a family tree book—as they do. But the names are tradition.”
“Hold on,” I said. “Park . . . I've heard that name before.”
“Yes.”
“It's not a fey name.”
“No, it's Korean. The fey of Korea took clan names to blend in. They passed those names down to the younger generations.”
“Ah. I see. So, I would be Sloane Seren?”
“Sloane is your father's clan?”
“Yes, his last name,” I said, an ache filling my chest with thoughts of Ewan, the man who had raised me only to discover I was a fairy king's child. “My human father.”
“Ah. Then yes. That's how your name would be said if you were Korean. You are not, however. So the rule doesn't apply to you.”
“Technically, you aren't either.”
Park Kyung-soo chuckled. “No, I'm not a human Korean man. But I am a fairy from Korea who has a Korean name. Therefore, the rule applies to me.”
I nodded. “It's a lot like the immigrants that came to New York and had their names accidentally written down wrong. They just took those new names and made them their own. They passed them down to their kids too.”
“Exactly. Although the Sidhe of Korea have their mór names too.”
“They wouldn't want to give those up,” I said.
“No, they wouldn't,” Hunter Joo Ji-woon said. “But they don't use those names among the humans.”
“Just as I go by Sloane instead of Firethorn when dealing with humans.”
“Yes. But as I said, we can drop the family names now.”
“So, you're Hunter Ji-woon?”
“Yes, Ambassador.” He inclined his head to me.
“It took me a while to get used to it,” Medea said.
I looked over at her. “So, you moved here to be with your girlfriend?”
“Yeah, we go back and forth between here and America.”
“We don't get a lot of Gorgons here,” Hunter Ji-woon said. “I'll bet you were welcomed enthusiastically.”
