by Lydia Kwa
A narrow beam of light through the one window in the wooden shack caresses Baoshi’s left cheek and tickles the fine hairs of his nostrils. He twitches his face then sneaks a look at Harelip sitting directly across from him. His Master is deep in concentration, head bowed and body showing no signs of slackening since they both began to sit before sunrise. Dust motes suspended in that beam of light are rushing toward him, with news of recent adventures in the magic realms. He smiles with pleasure.
Harelip’s mind wanders through various incidents in his early life at Da Ci’en Monastery in Chang’an, learning from both Buddhist and Daoist medical texts. The meeting with Xuanzang who brought the sutras back from India. Then Xuanzang’s death shortly after his translation project was completed. Two years later, preparations by his superiors to recommend him to the court, where Daoist influence was threatening to overshadow Buddhist sympathies. He was the perfect gambit, a young, intelligent monk who was a gifted healer. Oh, yes, a bit of a renegade but absolutely suited to his superiors’ plans to increase their influence with Emperor Gaozong. That recommendation to the court was to happen at the same time as Gaozong and Wu Zhao’s ascent up Mount Tai for the Feng and Shan rituals. That was the reign year Qianfeng. Well, he turned his back on all that when he didn’t join that procession up the sacred mountain.
He even knows more about the world of Wu Zhao since she has become Nü Huang, Female Emperor. He hears news about the intrigues at court from the villagers below. When they make the trek up the mountain to see him with their ailments, they rattle off what they’ve heard without any suspicion that their hermit healer has his own secrets. Twelve years ago Wu Zhao usurped the throne from her son Li Zhe, and proclaimed herself Holy and Divine Emperor. That fact has been repeated to Harelip countless times, the tone of incredulity surprisingly fresh. These days, the villagers are harping on Nü Huang’s affair with those two half-brothers. Imagine, they would say in hushed tones, in her seventies. Harelip often feels tempted to say to them, “Just how exciting can that be?” The villagers have been especially nervous ever since Nü Huang moved the court back from Luoyang to Chang’an last winter. Rumours are circulating that her health is failing.
Harelip clears his throat uneasily. He shouldn’t let his mind drift aimlessly through such troublesome reminiscences. He looks up and notices that the incense stick has completely burned down, leaving a pile of grey ash. The perpetual lamp confirms the time. The Hour of the Dragon. He’s surprised by growling sounds emanating from Baoshi’s belly. That boy! He bends forward to gather up the pair of tiny bronze cymbals in front of his feet, strikes them together, and waits for the sound to fade away before striking the cymbals together a second time, then a third.
Baoshi raises his head at the sound of the cymbals and frowns. His loud stomach embarrasses him. These days, he never seems to go for very long before feeling gripped by monstrous hunger pangs. Only moments before, his mind had started to fantasize about a pig roasting above hot coals. He listens as Harelip recites the Heart Sutra.
“Whatever is form is emptiness, whatever is emptiness is form …”
Baoshi’s attention drifts back to the idea of the roast pig. When was the last time he had eaten suckling pig? Or any kind of pork for that matter? When he was still with his parents. Sadness lodges in his chest. Before too long, the final words of the sutra penetrate his daydreaming.
Their eyes meet. Together they emit sighs as if one were prompting the other, yet their furrowed brows are plagued with vastly different concerns. Harelip uncrosses his legs from the lotus position and groans. The two small hours of sitting were painstakingly slow this morning.
“Curse of old age! Wooden screws coming undone! How could a creaky wheel reach immortality? Will my body be nimble in that Pure Land?”
He and Baoshi rise up from their tattered cushions and turn their bodies to face the altar. They make their prostrations before the figure of Buddha, a modest wooden sculpture only two hands high whose sensuous red and gold robes are faded and chipped in places. Even Buddha is in need of repair, Harelip notes. He turns to face Baoshi and rests his gnarled fingers lightly on the boy’s shoulders.
“Baoshi, I’ve taken care of you all these years.”
“Yes, Master, I remember and I’m always grateful.” He blushes, the memory still able to flood him with shame. He fidgets under Harelip’s hands. That tone of voice is what Harelip uses when he’s about to launch into a speech or a teaching. How much longer before their morning meal?
“My dear Baoshi, do you remember what I told you about my reason for coming to this mountain?”
“Yes, Master. You said you were fleeing for your life.”
Harelip’s cheeks flush red-hot. Would Wu Zhao have become so enraged by his absence at the Mount Tai ritual that she would have had him imprisoned or killed? Or exiled to Lingnan to the south? He’ll never know for sure.
He nods to Baoshi, appreciating the firm jawline and the elegant cheekbones. What bright, curious eyes! And those lips, as yet untainted by carnal pleasures.
“I had a troubling dream last night. When I woke up, I knew I couldn’t ignore it.” He notices that Baoshi looks somewhat distracted.
Harelip chokes back the rush of feelings and hobbles over to the window to peer outside. A sparrow pecks at seeds on the ground, its hopping movements swift and urgent. He thinks to himself, he’s nothing like this sparrow, utterly focused on picking out everything edible in its path. Instead, his mind is distracted by misgivings about the past. Had he made a mistake, fleeing to Mount Hua, without any consideration of Ardhanari’s feelings all these years?
He can’t answer his own question. He turns around to find Baoshi replenishing the oil in the perpetual lamp.
“Do you know what a novice on a pilgrimage is called?”
“No,” Baoshi shakes his head vigorously.
“A walking boy.”
Baoshi looks at his Master quizzically.
“I dreamed that you left the mountain and found your way to Chang’an. And you met this man Ardhanari. He was a special friend of mine before I fled the city.” Harelip pauses before continuing. “You must become a walking boy for my sake. Leave this mountain, find Ardhanari, and bring him back to Mount Hua to see me.” He means to sound firm, even confident, but his voice wavers.
“When?” Baoshi sits down, elbows on their small table, his hands cupped against his forehead.
“Not for another two or three months. When the ice on the paths has completely melted, and it’s warm enough for easier travelling.” As he finishes speaking, he shudders at the memory of his harrowing journey up the mountain in winter. To think that had been half a lifetime ago, and he has never left since then.
He joins Baoshi at the table and leans toward him. “Do you remember what I called you that first day we met?”
“You said that I’m a miracle of Heaven. I shall never forget.” His ears burning with upset, he asks, “How long do I have to be away then?”
“Until you find Ardhanari and convince him to return with you. Can you accept this, my son? That I would ask you to set off on this pilgrimage based on a single dream? A dream I find so compelling I would sacrifice having you at my side.” Harelip’s body trembles with all the emotions he’s holding in check.
“Master, I owe you my life. I will do what you ask, even though I’ll be very sad to be away from you.”
Harelip inhales loudly, sucking back his own urge to cry. “If you decide to assume a hermit’s life on Mount Hua at the end of the pilgrimage, you’ll be doing so of your own volition. You had no choice when you were placed in my care. You were a boy. Still a boy, really. When you go out into the world below, you’ll be exposed to all kinds of possibilities, and that would allow you to discover what your true path will consist of. I must stay on the mountain for the sake of the villagers. Besides, in the dream, you were the one who met Ardhanari, not me.”
Baoshi’s belly offers another long growl. Harelip laughs. “Come, mira
cle of Heaven! We’re taking up too much time talking about a pilgrimage that will begin many weeks from now, and here I am ignoring your hunger. Let’s fill your belly before you faint from starvation.”
*The Walking Boy, a novel by Lydia Kwa, takes place chronologically after the events described in Oracle Bone. First published by Key Porter Books in 2005, a new edition of The Walking Boy will be published by Arsenal Pulp Press in 2018.
Photo: ©PinkMonkey Studios 2016
Lydia Kwa is the author of the novels This Place Called Absence (shortlisted for the Books in Canada First Novel Award), The Walking Boy (shortlisted for the Ethel Wilson Fiction Prize), and Pulse, as well as two books of poetry, The Colours of Heroines and sinuous. She lives and works in Vancouver as a writer and psychologist. lydiakwa.com