by Lydia Kwa
Qilan clambered up the height of the bell tower as if her hands and feet could stick to the walls. When she reached the top, she gently tapped her head against the bell, causing it to emit a low hum before she somersaulted back onto the roof. The nuns in the outer courtyard looked up, surprised to see Qilan. One of them exclaimed, “Oh, Sister Orchid! There you go doing your acrobatic tricks again!” The nuns giggled, enjoying the moment.
“How did you do that?” Ling pointed at the snow over which Qilan had run without leaving footprints.
“A spell. It changes the way my body moves so I can float.” Qilan whispered the magic words into Ling’s ear.
Ling mumbled the words under her breath. She felt her whole person grow lighter and her feet lift slightly off the roof. She smiled with pleasure.
“You reverse it by saying the words backwards.”
Their practice completed, they jumped back down to the ground and walked leisurely to the kitchen, then to Qilan’s study. They warmed their hands over the charcoal brazier before sitting down to hot tea and tiny steamed lotus-paste buns. Ling and Qilan ate the buns with relish and drank the tea noisily.
“You did well.”
Ling blushed. One word of praise from Qilan meant the world to her. She wanted to learn as much as she could, but it seemed to her that in the three-and-a-half years since she’d met Qilan, the nun had only taught her a handful of spells. To Ling, these were all minor spells, and it seemed that Qilan deliberately held back from teaching her the bigger spells.
“When you showed me the transformation of the caterpillar and the butterfly, when I first came to Da Fa … that’s a different kind of spell, isn’t it?”
“I suppose you could separate spells into categories, but why do that?” Qilan smiled, a quizzical look on her face. “Mind you, not everyone can succeed in uttering spells. Even with the right words.”
“Why—aren’t the words enough?”
“Ah! Now we’re getting to the heart of transformation.”
“What makes the spell work?”
“A certain inclination of your mind … how you focus your energy.”
“I don’t understand.”
“Spells work only if uttered under two conditions. First, they must be invoked by someone who is an outsider to normal life. Distinct from others—”
“Distinct?”
“Not like others. Hard to explain. One just knows.”
Ling nodded, picking up another lotus bun. “I know I’m different. What’s the second condition?”
“For a spell to work, it needs a certain force. By ‘force,’ I mean strength. Sometimes those involved in the dark sorceries employ violent force. In our case, the spells I teach you have to be uttered with pure intent and clarity. That’s good force.”
“Pure intent?”
“Love and selflessness—not for personal gain.”
“Just now, didn’t you have a selfish motive in levitating?”
“I wanted to teach you. That, my dear, I would consider to be coming from a place of selflessness.”
Ling laughed. Sister Orchid’s mischievousness, her entertaining examples and generosity, made learning so much easier.
“Would you teach me the more serious spells?”
“There you go with your categories, again!” Qilan winked. But her expression changed abruptly, and she looked quite solemn. “Yes, I will. Some day soon, Ling.”
“How about telling me more about yourself? I’ve been here almost four years, and I hardly know anything about you, I mean your past, that is.”
Qilan poked Ling in ribs. “My, how bold and mouthy you’ve become.” She was pleased by how talkative and expressive Ling was now, she had truly blossomed. She could even stomach tea.
“I’ll tell you more soon. But before then, we must make preparations to return to Huazhou. I believe it’s time for me to fulfill my promise to you.”
Ling’s eyes brightened.
That night, Qilan was shrouded in utter darkness as she stood alone in the courtyard outside her study. There was no moon. The water was slightly frozen on the surface of the magic urn. She whispered the spell into her cupped palms and dropped the radiant sphere toward the icy mirror. It cracked the ice and dissolved all of it until the surface once again became the portal through which she could view Xie at his mansion.
Xie lay on a couch in a drugged trance, the lit cannabis resin creating a thick, billowing smoke in the room. He coughed, shook his head, and mumbled.
Qilan reached into her sleeve and pulled out a paper doll. She dotted the eyes and drew a nose and mouth on it, then blew over it in her palm and sent it into the water.
The apparition entered the room and called out, “Father.”
Xie slowly raised his head. The form was hazy, but the voice was unmistakeable. His voice trembled with emotion. “That was you who appeared at the graveyard, wasn’t it, over three years ago?” He coughed and fell back against the pillow, his eyes rolling upwards. “It’s too late. You mustn’t …”
The greenish-blue burn of the demon’s gaze shot through Xie’s eyes. Gui hissed, How dare you take the oracle bone!
“Remember, you must meet me at the temple on the fifteenth day of the seventh month in the new year,” Qilan’s apparition said.
Fool, what do you hope to accomplish?
“A chance to do battle with you. If you win, you will gain the oracle bone.”
A cold mist stretched out tendrils but Qilan’s apparition evaporated just in time, leaving behind the paper doll.
DA CI’EN MONASTERY, SOUTHEASTERN CHANG’AN
Arush of joy passed through Xuanzang.
His work was done. He and his disciples had completed the translation of all sixteen talks given by Shakyamuni Buddha on the perfection of wisdom. With the final rendition of the last line, Xuanzang breathed an audible sigh of relief and folded his hands together in his lap.
He shivered, partly from the cold, but mostly because he knew that his life’s work was complete. He looked out at the rows of monks in the Translation Hall facing him, then nodded to his disciples around him.
The hall was silent, an awe descending on all present. Xuanzang reflected on the immense guidance he had received all these months. A voice, a presence, always, whispering what ought to be uttered, whenever there was some struggle with a dubious passage or wording. He was filled with gratitude.
“Now my mission is fulfilled. The age of living is also finished. No reason to stay longer. After my passing, please make sure you wrap my corpse in a reed mat and bring it to some shady burial spot on a mountain.”
His senior disciple Huili remarked, “Master, how could you say that, at such an auspicious moment?”
“Dying at the end of a life well-lived in the service of Dharma is to be celebrated. But make no mistake; I wish the funeral itself to be without fanfare.” Xuanzang signalled for assistance to rise up from the dais. “Let us go to the Garden of the Buddhas and enjoy a stroll.”
“It is cold today, Venerable Master,” Huili said.
“Don’t be silly. It has stopped snowing and there is a bit of sun. I need to see my Buddha statues.”
A few monks helped Xuanzang bundle up with scarves and a fur hat and put boots on his feet. It took a while before he was ready. Supported on both sides by assistants, Xuanzang slowly walked to the Garden of Buddhas, which lay between the main building and the pagoda recently built to store the sutras.
It was peaceful in the garden. Only a few sparrows flitted between branches of the pines and junipers and the regal willow tree. The Buddha statues ranged in size, positioned in wooden shelters or alcoves, scattered throughout the garden.
Harelip caught sight of Xuanzang from his apothecary and rushed out to meet him. “Venerable Master … you must not be out here—”
“I know, I know. You and everyone else,” wheezed Xuanzang. He paused and leaned on Peerless’s shoulder. “Look here.” He pointed to the small Buddha figure in the fifth alcove.
“This one. It was the first figure I got. After I entered the cave in Kapisa and wouldn’t leave until I was given a vision of the Buddha there. I had to make over one hundred prostrations chanting and praying, before I was given the vision of Buddha, his body and robes of a yellowish red colour. I had this figure carved of sandalwood. How precious.”
Xuanzang lightly caressed the figure and limped on to the next figure. Harelip silently went with the retinue of monks, witnessing the intimate farewell ritual.
“Oh look,” murmured Xuanzang. He bent down to touch a figure. The sandalwood figure of the Buddha Turning the Wheel of the Law had a chip off the left thumb and a long furrowed line down the back of that hand. “How did that happen?”
Silence and shaking of heads.
“We can send for someone to come here to repair it, Venerable Master,” replied Pu Guang.
“I know of an excellent sculptor,” Huili said. “He usually works with his uncle at the Dunhuang caves, but he’s back in Chang’an for the winter.”
“Send for him quickly.”
Xuanzang struggled on—he wanted to pay his respects to the remaining two Buddha figures. By the time he was led back to his private chambers, he was drained but waved away his hovering disciples. “Let me rest. Don’t fuss!”
Later, when he was alone, except for a watchful Peerless lurking in the anteroom, Xuanzang sat at his desk and began a letter to the Emperor.
Most Wise and Supreme Ruler,
I, your humble servant Xuanzang, write this from my private chambers at Da Ci’en Monastery to recount to you our progress in translations at this point. You have been generous in granting us your most brilliant monks from across the land to assist me in this difficult venture.
For the past few years, ill-health has prevented me from maintaining the relentless pace I was accustomed to, in my more robust years. I had been concerned I would not finish my most vital translation work.
But today, I am pleased to announce that our work on translating the Mahaprajnaparamita is complete. Knowing that Your Majesty has made our work at Da Ci’en possible since my return from India, we are indebted for your patronage. You have accumulated merit from supporting this translation project, since this will lead to many being able to hear the Dharma and benefit.
I will make sure that a contingent of monks delivers a copy to you. I regret that I am too weak to accompany them.
I hope Your Majesty is continuing to recover. I humbly request that Your Majesty ensure that this precious sutra will be copied and shared widely with people throughout this land and beyond.
Your Majesty will recall that, upon my return to Chang’an from India, I had asked if I might return to Mount Shaoshi to do the translation work at the monastery there. I felt a need to return to those hills of my youth. Your Majesty had deemed that it would be preferable that I remain in Chang’an, in the company of a team of qualified assistants and be publicly witnessed while conducting this important work. I am indebted to Your Majesty for that decision; it has allowed me to accomplish so much, and to gain from the team of assistants you had appointed.
I have devoted more than half of my life to this work, bringing the sutras back from India and translating as many of them as I could. The Buddhas and bodhisattvas have kept me alive so that I may complete my work. In my final days, my deepest wish is to return to an important aspect of my Buddhist commitment that I have neglected all these years: the practice of meditation.
I long to free myself from the noise of the crowded city, roll up my shadow, and roam where elk and deer are my companions. May I dwell on a flat stone, to rest in the midst of nature.
My end is near. I feel it in my heart. I have left instructions with my senior disciple Huili for my burial. If I cannot fulfill my dream of living out my final days on Shaoshi Mountain, may I humbly request Your Majesty that my wishes for burial be honoured.
Your servant,
Xuanzang
Writing a formal, polite letter—one that showed sufficient obeisance to his Emperor—took a great deal of energy. It taxed him not just physically; it was a drain on his heart—bowing and scraping were tedious duties. This was far from who he really was, or had been—the rogue adventurer who disobeyed the previous Emperor and left for India without permission. Had he turned into a weaker version of his former self? He’d gone to India despite being forbidden to, driven by a greater force, a feeling deep in his being that he couldn’t escape. Loyalty to that deep feeling had been far more critical than obedience to the Emperor.
Why did Li Zhi care about the translation project? Was it simply a political move? An unquestioned gesture, since his mother was Buddhist? He would never know. Regardless, he, Xuanzang, had had to rein in his rebellious energy and remain in the Emperor’s favour for the sake of the Dharma. If not for that, why would he have consented to being imprisoned in this city?
He struggled up from his table and sealed the letter, then summoned Peerless and gave him instructions to have the letter delivered to the Emperor. Having completed his task, he picked up the drawing of the turtle and went to his daybed with it.
His public life had no secrets. But this, he fingered the silk drawing, this had to be kept secret. He thought back to how he had acquired it. That woman in Khotan. She had trusted him with it. This needs to be kept a secret, away from those in power, she had said. Certain ones will abuse their power, and if they possess this diagram along with a certain turtle plastron, they will be unstoppable.
“Why give it to me?” he had asked her.
“Because you are my successor.”
Xuanzang shuddered at the memory. It was such an odd moment, and hence unforgettable. Was she truly a seer? Or had she been deranged? What had occurred between them completely challenged his notion of inheritance. He was raised to believe in inheriting from one’s father and ancestors. When he became a Buddhist monk, he practiced renunciation, the conscious disinheriting of attachments, going against all those rules of inheritance he had been raised with. Now, when he thought about it, didn’t renunciation require the existence of inheritance?
But what of that extraordinary encounter with the woman in Khotan? He sighed at the memory of her soft eyes and warm hands. Her breath smelled of honey and peach blossoms.
That encounter wasn’t like anything he had experienced before, or since. It was a mystery fuelled by subtle meanings, one that defied words and explanation. Xuanzang had felt as if he was meant to receive the diagram, return to Zhongguo with it, and wait. Until the right successor came along.
When he first saw Harelip at the back of the Translation Hall, he had an overpowering feeling that he would be his successor, the next person who had to keep the drawing safe. He had to tell Harelip about it—all the things he’d been told. Yet there were still things no one knew, the woman had said, that none of the inheritors were allowed to know until the time came, many eons from now, when the final possessor of the diagram would know.
A mystery. “A five-sided mystery, to be exact,” she had whispered.
FORBIDDEN PARK, NORTH OF TAIJIGONG
The landscape in Forbidden Park might have seemed barren in winter, but it held an appeal for Wu Zhao. The willows were sadder, she thought. The poplars to the west stood in a row, sentinels against the wind.
Wu Zhao could see the herds of horses as well as sheep in their separate penned areas, grazing and roaming, in the far distance. She gazed out at the scene, deserted and tranquil, from the second storey of the Purple Clouds Hall as dusk approached. The setting sun was a dark orange orb on the horizon. The Serpentine River to the northwest glimmered with the last rays of light. A few ducks and herons were barely visible in the marsh to the right, silhouetted in the dim light.
Twenty eunuch guards were stationed in a circle around the pavilion. Wu Zhao gathered the folds of her coat—made with fox furs and embroidered with gold thread—closer around her neck. The two braziers were filled with red-hot coals, keeping her warm.
She saw Xie r
ide toward the pavilion, dismount, and enter. Soon she heard the stomp of his boots on the stairs leading up to the second floor. He bowed deeply to her, clasping his hands in front of his face with gaze lowered. “Your Highness.”
Of course it was all for show. The guards were below; their peripheral vision would take in the behaviours of the two, lit by the torches placed around the pavilion.
“More than three years have passed, and still no sign of the genuine oracle bone,” began the Empress, turning her back to him. “All kinds of imposters have come forth with fake bones. Fools! I am most displeased.”
“I have received recent news, Your Highness.”
She turned around, her eyebrows arched.
“The scoundrel has sent me a vision. There will be a meeting on the Full Moon in the seventh month. I am sure I will obtain the bone then.”
Wu Zhao shuddered. “Feast of All Souls, when there is no separation between the living and the dead.” She reached out and placed her hand lightly on his chest. “How much do they want?”
“It’s not money they’re after. If the thief had wanted money, he would have come forward three years ago.”
“Well, then, what’s their motive?”
Xie’s face darkened. “They want to destroy me, punish me first with all this waiting then ask me to meet on a date that they believe is auspicious for them, a day that they mistake for my most vulnerable time.”
Wu Zhao grew quiet before she whispered, worry in her voice. “It could be a trap.”
“There is no trap that could hold someone like me.”
Wu Zhao laughed. “Are you so sure?”
“I am the wind. I do not belong to form. It belongs to me.”
“You speak in riddles so much. I tire of it! Why are you so sure it’s a genuine claim?”
“They know the inscription on the bone.”
Her face flushed with impatience. “You exasperate me. You have yet to tell me what the point of that inscription is. I could decide to have you killed, have you tortured, exiled. Must I remind you?”