Sengchou

Outside, on the Eastern slope of Song Mountain where Sengchou found himself standing, all was rain and mist. The cold deadened his cheeks and lips. He and his cousin stood at the bolted door of the apprentice gate into the Shaolin Temple, atop steps which were strewn with the detritus of those sad souls who had stood there before them and failed. During the past few months the temple had allowed monastic neophytes to apply for matriculation and training. The smell, and the trash, existed in clear juxtaposition to the rest of the temple, with its new, pristine presentation in every other way.

Sengchou was not a stranger to the temple grounds. He had joined his mother through the public gate, and had delivered geese, vegetables and spices through the vendor gate with his Uncle. But now Sengchou stood, spear-like, facing Huiguang, his cousin, as they bookended either side to the gateway. His cousin had begged Sengchou to accompany him on his quest to be first to join the temple as student monks. He now avoided meeting Sengchou’s eyes. Instead, he stared forward, past Sengchou’s shoulder, to gaze at the foot of the mountain, and the streams there.

As villagers shuffled past, they could hear them sniggering and whispering under their breath. Two water carriers had even stopped to make an impromptu bet about what hour they would receive their dismissal that day. Stories were whispered through the village, and rumors of the exotic and supernatural powers of Huike, Master of the Temple, spread throughout Henan in the marketplaces and taverns.

The new temple, and the mystery surrounding it excited everyone, not simply because of the boon such a pilgrimage destination might bring for the markets in the villages, but also as the legends portended, it promised greater values.

The stories held—in this new place, under this new Master from the south—that there was a unique wisdom that no one could grasp—and remain human.

The first. That thought swelled warmly within Sengchou’s chest, despite the cold. No one had ever entered this gate. Usually, for those who had attempted the same entry, after a day or two of standing outside, an elderly man with dark features and piercing eyes would slide the gate aside just enough to slip his crooked staff through the slit. A wicked cackle would be heard, and he would knock the applicants atop their heads, scold them, and tell them to go away and never return. Always they yelped, dropped whatever they came with, whimpered and raced away, cursing the old man and his temple. Then he would wander out, his back hunched slightly, and his laughter clear and bright on the sharp mountain air. He would whisk up any items of value, or food within reach, and drop the rest down the steps where it added to the pile of trash the rats had already found, and fearlessly plundered. Sengchou had seen this with his own eyes, hiding not far away down the small trail that led here, and it haunted him. He wondered what he would do when it came his turn.

It was obvious why his cousin wanted Sengchou to accompany him here. Sengchou was older. He had been in Zhou Tuo’s province guard for a few months when the raiders from the North had been a danger. Although a young man, he had already gathered some valuables and loot during the battles, which would make him attractive to the young women and the families of the Shang class. One such thing was a unique wristlet, which was not made of any precious metal, but had the shape of a dragon on its surface. He had found it among the dead during his first battle, and he had kept it. His good-fortune bauble. It had seen him through five more battles, unscathed. With this history, Sengchou was already thought of as wise for his age. Huiguang knew that his cousin would make the right decisions, and save them both from humiliation, or worse.

A foreign and complex geometric symbol with concentric, four-sided angles nested within one another was carved on this particular gate, one of four that surrounded the temple. Underneath this shape, it spelled out “Yantra” phonetically in the common tongue. The Jia-Gu Wen shapes Sengchou thought but dared not explain. For the two days they had been at the gate, neither had spoken, and he was not going to lose his place and be knocked-away for such a seemingly simple thing. The legend was that there were riches to be had and great prestige to be garnered should he be selected to train. The austerity was a ticket to a life of learning, otherworldly skills, and respect throughout the land.

Lost as Sengchou was in reverie, a quick inhalation from his cousin brought him back to the cold duty. At that moment, he knew what was coming. Huiguang sneezed, and not an easy, muffled thing. He covered Sengchou with new wetness, and not a small bit of goo.

Sengchou did not move. He stood. He felt his face grow red, and Huiguang’s pupils seemed to dilate as his eyes widened in fear. Not a second later, they heard the latch slide open the inner gate. Huiguang immediately popped into a stiff posture and stared again into the space over his very angry cousin’s shoulder.

There was a creaking as the gate door opened, but neither of the young men turned their heads. Huiguang’s mouth begin to tremble, and Sengchou narrowed his eyes at him, sure that if this oaf did one more ignorant thing, he would surely beat him into a heap himself. Huiguang kept his composure, at least externally.

The wait seemed endless as they froze in place. Huiguang sensed the old man’s staff, knew it was free of the gate door, and saw a shadow in the cloudy light of something moving toward his head and face. He did not move.

That signature cackle echoed from the hall within.

Slowly, a shape, billowy, was gently lowered onto his head. What was this? Then he saw it hung across the tip of the old man’s dreaded staff. It smelled of spices and flowers. White as the remnants of snow on the lower steps, he realized what is was. The staff slowly slipped back through the slit in the door, leaving him with a rather jaunty and out-of-place head cover.

A shǒupà—handkerchief.

He felt his face flush in totality. His cousin was shaking with his need to control the laughter that would surely come. But he did not laugh, nor did Sengchou move. The handkerchief lay, awkwardly across the top of his head. The door creaked wider.

Then, like a wraith, the old man stepped silently between them. He towered, his face toward Huiguang. His robes were roughly worn, yet regal, in black silk rubbed shiny at the elbows and shoulders, with wide cuffs lined by thin threads of gold. He had no shoes, and his feet were a tapestry of gnarled witness to a life walking the far reaches of unknown trails. The figure bent, leaning on his twisted staff, toward Huiguang, and from his vantage, Sengchou could see his cousin’s frightened, but controlled face. He heard a voice, nearly a whisper.

“Who are you?”

Huiguang’s eyes widened even more, and Sengchou was certain he would get them both humiliated, and maybe even beaten or killed. Sengchou pictured himself a beggar, unable to look anyone in the village in the eye ever again.

He met Huiguang’s stare. Shaking his head as the young man moved his lips to answer. Sengchou continued the effort, shaking as much as he could and remain unnoticed by the Master.

“No one!” Huiguang cried at the old man. And he dropped his head. “I am no one. …please.”

The old man stood upright, as if it were a miracle to do so. Sengchou was amazed that he could, and yet, the next thought was that at least it was not himself who would get them banished from life, family, the village and their friends in humiliation.

Laughter began, and at first Sengchou was not certain who was laughing. It was the Master, standing now, a hip cocked to one side, leaning over upon his staff and raising it in the air as his other hand curled and twisted at his long beard. He placed the staff gently on Huiguang’s shoulder, and said, “You may enter. But without these things. You must leave everything else, outside these gates.”

Huiguang looked about, absolutely certain that the Master had been speaking to someone else. Sengchou was flabbergasted beyond meaningful thought. His cousin? Huiguang? Sneezing, picking his nose, lost in the woods Huiguang?

He watched as Huiguang dropped his package of food and extra clothes, and entered the gate, glancing back only once at Sengchou, who was now in the midst of more soul-searching than he had ever done.

The wrinkled, amused face rolled itself into a scowl, and the Master turned to face Sengchou. The old man’s eyes were a crystal whirlwind within their setting. At that moment, Sengchou felt the cold, the ache of homesickness, the loneliness of the mountain, the heartbreak at the deaths of his comrades at war, the loss of everyone he knew, all at once. He stood by his own birth-bed and watched his mother scream as she ushered him into the world. Another second, he watched himself drop his sword, and vomit as he saw his friend decapitated on the battlegrounds. And another, as he stood at the top of Song Mountain watching, beyond care, quietly, as the moon raced, around and around and around the globe, a hundred, and thousand, ten-thousand times. He was not moved. He felt the old emotions leave him like breath.

What was this power the Master had?

“Tell me now. Who are you?”

Sengchou hesitated. He knew that the old man would know if he were lying, or simply copying his cousin. What difference would it make? Who were they, and who would remember them in ten thousand years?

“I-I am…” he swallowed, and met the eyes of this figure, without fear now, but with recognition.

“I am You.”

The smile returned to the old man’s countenance.

The master whispered, “No, you are not…” and he turned to the door.

Sengchou’s heart dropped, but not so much to change his emotional state. He had watched a million years in an instant. For this matter—he truly—did not care.

Pausing, The Master turned and leaned in again with both hands on the knots of the wooden staff, he smiled gently, “…but you will be.”

Then before Sengchou could move, the Master slipped a monstrously long finger, with an even more monstrously long nail to Sengchou’s forehead and, in an instant, drew a small, sharp circle there.

“That’s the first of the Jieba. When you have nine, you will be complete.”

Still Sengchou stood, uncertain what to do. He felt blood trickle into his left eye from the Master’s cut.

“…are you coming? If so, clean up these steps first. It looks like a garbage heap.”

Sengchou nodded and said, “Yes Master.”

“I want my kerchief back…but only after you’ve washed it.”

Having completely forgotten the cloth on his head, he snatched it off and kneaded it like worry-beads in his hands as the Master floated into the gate door as if he were a shadow, and Sengchou stuffed the kerchief into his belt, and bent to gather the trash into his satchel as he climbed down to the first step and began cleaning. Looking up, he knew rebirth. The door was as a huge eye, watching him at his task. Suddenly, there was no cold, nor was there any fear.

The wind had a thousand messages in the naked trees around him; the birds knew secrets and relayed them on the wind. The earth spoke with heavy vibrations through his feet and into his fiercely burning heart.

Around him, the rocks, the mountain, the people, the carts they rode upon, the animals who pulled them, were all alive.

And for the first time, so was he.