“Does that lead to someplace like Antris?”
Onyu tilted her head. “If you want to be led to a horribly painful death on a bed of jagged sharp rocks…then yes. It’s a lot like Antris.”
Alarmed, Jin took a step back from the edge. “Okay, so this Old Goat?
Where is she?”
Benja’in-su pointed over the hill on the other side of the bridge. “The Silent Temple. You’ll have to climb down to get to it but I’ve made the trek a couple of hundred times, no big deal.” She shrugged, her expression smug.
“I’ll keep that in mind. Is there anything that I need to give her? You…you guys don’t believe in sacrifices, do you? I don’t have to go hunt down a bunny rabbit or a squirrel or a cat and present it to her, do I?”
Onyu offered a look of slight exasperation, her smooth lips pressed together in a line sharp as her retort. “She is aware of everything that happens in Discord. She knows you are coming and she’ll know why you are there. She will help you get home.”
“Neat…” Jin said she glanced at the hill where the bright blue sky met lush rolling green hills. “So…” she turned towards them. “This is it, huh?”
“It seems so,” Onyu said with a smirk. She handed her the spear Jin thought she’d lost with a pointed look. An energy buzzed along her skin as she accepted it, as if the spear was welcoming her home. “Give me your hand.” Jin obeyed without hesitation, placing her small brown hand in the spiritualist’s obsidian one. She turned her hand over. The scar from when Onyu sliced her palm open stared back at both of them. “This scar will never fade. It is first a reminder of everything you’ve learned here, how strong you’ve grown, both in spirit and in mind.”
Jin closed her hand around Onyu and squeezed, trying to relay her affection through touch. The woman wasn’t so bad.
“Secondly, that scar is laced with a link back here. When you meet Aria, she will tell you how to return if you so desire.”
“If I don’t kill her first,” Jin muttered.
Benja’in-su giggled in her hand.
“Well…” Onyu patted Jin’s butt motherly like. “Off you go. We don’t need to make this even harder with a hard goodbye. I’m sure I’ll see your annoying, arrogant face often.”
“Aww, Onyu, you sure have a way with words!” Onyu wasn’t fazed but when was she ever?
“Please go, child.” Onyu pointed towards the bridge.
“Aye, aye, Cap,” Jin replied with a smile and a salute. “Benja,” she looked at the Morg’ah’nee. “Thank you for being nice to me.”
The woman smiled so hard her eyes turned to crescents. “You’re welcome!”
Jin headed towards the bridge. She’d taken only a few steps when Onyu called out to her one last time. “Remember to clear your mind. I don’t want to have to scrap you off of the rocks below because you were being careless. You’re a warrior and warriors are always training! They are always alert!”
“Thanks for the reminder, ye old wise one! I’m leaving!”
Jin employed the same technique she’d used before, imagining a white corner in a white room and was on the other side of the bridge with no troubles, no voices, and no fear. She turned around to wave a final goodbye to Onyu and Benja’in-su, but just like before, they were nowhere to be found.
Clapping her hand on her hips, she turned to face the hill. Her attire today was identical to when she traveled to Madyan. The only addition were hand gloves. The gear made her nervous. Every time they dressed her in anything but pajamas, meant she had to fight someone.
This goat lady…she is old, though…right? Jin laughed nervously. “No way will I have to fight her.”
With a firm nod, she began the short hike over the hill. Memories of Aiden and Zion reaching out to her appeared, the visions causing a feeling like sand sinking deep in her stomach. She pressed on, and the memories faded with each step. When Jin reached the top of the hill, she looked down….
…and down
…and down.
“Oh, for the love of fat Elvis, are you serious?” she yelled. This wasn’t a simple climb down. It was a straight drop, like someone had sheared off the other side of the land and let it sink somewhere! “Great,” she mumbled, kicking the ground. “Just great.” She looked over the cliff and saw a large body of crystal clear water that reached far before taping off and narrowing through a small canal in the wall. She was amazed all of this was contained in Nuh.
Forget the water, Jin. Look at the cliff. Do you hear anything?
“Oh, look who is back.” Jin pursed her lips. “What do I hear other than my impending death if I just so happen to sneeze wrong or my fingers slip? Nothing.”
Stop talking and listen.
Jin closed her eyes and did as she was told. “A rhythm…it’s slow but even.”
Use it as a guide, set your pace to it. Move slow and evenly like it, but most importantly, slow.
“Slow. Even. Got it.” She looked down again. “Slice of cake.”
Piece. Piece of cake.
She lowered to her stomach and rotated until her legs were dangling over the side. “Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god,” she babbled as her foot landed on the first rock jutting out of the side.
Keeping true to AJ’s instructions, she kept her pace smooth, easy and slow, thankful for the gloves as they protected her hands from the rough rocks. The rhythm played in her head, throbbing and steady, like her grandfather banging on a djembe.
She was about three-fourths of the way down when she heard steps against the sand below. “AJ, think I can convince them to catch me if I let go?”
I don’t think they are here to help you.
“What do you mean?”
“HALT!”
Oh. Jin couldn’t see over her shoulder all that well but she did catch a glimpse of a harpoon out of the corner of her eye. “Oh, hi, there!” she said, trying to keep her voice calm and friendly.
Onyu said that they would know who she was and why she was there. “I’m Jin. Onyu sent me to–”
“I SAID HALT!”
“Look at me!” Jin shot back, her patience gone. She repositioned her hand on the rock because it started aching from holding it too long. “I am halted! Stop yelling at me!”
“You are trespassing onto sacred grounds! Leave at once!”
Jin snorted. She glanced down at the “sacred” ground. It wasn’t that far away. “It’s worth a try.”
Jin…
“Don’t worry, I know what I’m doing,” she maintained.
No, you don’t.
“Semantics. I know that if I let go, I’ll drop. That’s knowing what I’m doing. I’m a pretty good runner so we’ll see.”
She has a long range weapon. Running is not bright.
Jin ignored her very wise advice, pushed off from the wall and landed, albeit painfully, on the sandy shore below her. She dug her feet into the sand and tried to take off but stopped when she felt the cool steel of the harpoon against the back of her neck.
“Whoa! Relax!” Jin threw her hands into the air, her body crouched to run, and rolled her eyes at AJ sighing loudly in her head. “Look, I was told to come here so I could go home. I wouldn’t have done so otherwise.” The harpoon didn’t move. “I’m going to turn around, and maybe we can talk about this like two reasonable…whatever you are.”
The person behind her snorted and that was enough of a cue for Jin to turn. She blinked and tilted her head like she was seeing a ghost.
“You?” she screeched.
She was seeing a ghost. From her past anyways. It was a young girl, tanned skinned with a baby face. She looked like she’d been biting back laughter the entire time. Jin didn’t see what was so funny but she was more preoccupied that another person from her past was sitting in front of her without a care in the world.
“I’m surprised!” the girl said, her eyes dancing with mirth. “They told me you’d only seen my face on a photo. I didn’t think you’d actually recognize me!”
&
nbsp; Jin gulped like she was trying to swallow the sun. “Of course I recognize you! How could I forget your face? I kept a copy of your photo on me for years! Whenever I was too scared to testify or too scared to tell the truth, tell your story, I would pull it out of my wallet. You were my courage.”
Eunsook whistled. “I’m impressed,” the young girl said. “With myself, I mean. Never given anyone courage before.” Her hair was different from the photo, brushed up into two twin ponytails that trailed down to her hips, making her look her age. Her hanbok was the same from the photo, except it was all white and made of fancy silk and cotton. The only bit of color was a multicolored norigae, a jeweled accessory that hung from her coat. “I mean here I have. That’s pretty much my job–to give people encouragement before they go see Oti–”
“Okay, wait, wait,” Jin held her hands out, confused and overwhelmed. “One, who is Oti–”
“The Old Goat.”
“Ah,” Jin said, nodding. “And two…why are you here? This…this is a place for souls.” Jin inhaled sharply, fear gripping her throat. “Don’t tell me…”
“Oh,” Eunsook looked down and began smoothing imaginary wrinkles in her hanbok. “I never made it to see you put Mr. Rabbit in jail. I never made it out of the brothel, actually. They stated they were going to close them down during the trial, so a lot of us were very excited. I thought about what I would do. I really wanted to find my family. But until that day, we still had clients. One of them was named Matthew.” She said his name like “Math-thu”, her tongue fumbling the American name with too many useless letters.
“Matthew was a regular and I always told them he was dangerous. Every time he came, I said that Matthew didn’t know his limits. They said just bear it, it’ll be over soon.”
She held her head back and Jin saw the faint dark line marring her skin. “He like to choke you during the…you know. He would squeeze until you turned purple sometimes. He was told he was supposed to use only his hands but in the end, he tied a belt around my throat. I was too weak to fight him off. He was just doing his business, ignoring my silent pleas for air. He never noticed I had stopped moving or responding.”
Jin’s hand flew to her mouth. “Oh, my god, Eunsook. I’m–I’m so–”
“Please,” cutting her off with a small raised hand. “You’re the last person that needs to apologize. You helped save my sister, Gwiboon. At least that’s what Oti told me. I’m not a Morg’ah’nee so I can’t watch over my loved ones but I believe Oti!” Eunsook smiled then and although she’d never seen the young girl before, she knew her smile, while breathtaking, wasn’t the most beautiful thing about her. Her spirit was radiant. “Well, c’mon,” she said motioning in the opposite direction Jin had thought they would go. “Oti is waiting.”
“Sure,” Jin replied easily, then eyed the harpoon. “First step would be you moving the giant steak knife away from my neck.”
“Oh! Yeah! That!” Eunsook lowered the harpoon. “Sorry about that. Thought it would be funny to poke a little fun at ya. Get it…poke! No?”
“No,” Jin deadpanned. “No.”
Eunsook and Jin walked along the shore of the beach for a long time. The water lapped at Eunsook’s bare feet and she giggled, the sound reminding Jin that Eunsook was a little girl, not the woman she’d been forced to be. After hours, the shore ended and led to a small hill. On the other side of it, the landscape morphed into a beautiful hillside path lined with vibrant cherry blossom trees and bushes so green they looked painted. It looked regal and exactly the type of grounds that the highest spiritualist in Discord would live on.
“A word of advice,” Eunsook started as she plucked a blossom from a tree. “I usually offer a word of encouragement on the path to Oti’s Temple but you aren’t like the others who come to Discord. Most come, learn and depart to their final destination. But you are going home.”
Jin sighed happily at the confirmation.
“My advice is,” and Eunsook paused. Jin turned to look at her and was surprised by the seriousness on Eunsook’s face. “Remember your name. Remember why you are here. Remember why you want to go home.”
Jin laughed. “Trust me, I won’t forget that!”
Eunsook didn’t laugh with her. She looked more troubled by Jin’s reply. “Please remember what I tell you.” She grabbed Jin’s hands. “Please?”
Jin looked from her hands to Eunsook, confused. “I…I promise. I will.”
The trouble eased off the girl’s face and they continued up the path. They rounded a corner where a golden statue of a goat stood. Inscribed on the base of the statue were the words:
“All those who wander are not lost.”
Jin looked past the gate, anxious to take in the sight of a temple that would have a golden statue as its welcome…but all she saw was a shack.
“What’s that?”
“The Silent Temple.”
Jin squinted. “That’s the Silent Temple?” She took a quick look around, her eyes falling on the beautiful landscape surrounding it before it went back to the small structure. “It’s a shanty.”
“A hut,” Eunsook corrected. “Go on in. I have to lock the gate behind you. You can’t go back from where you came from. You can only go forward from here.”
“Right,” Jin said, drawing out the word. She heard the gate lock behind her and turned towards the sound. “Hey, Eun–”
She was gone.
“What is with you people disappearing the moment I have my back turned! Damn it!”
The sound of bleat was the only answer to her question. Out of the corner of her eye, she glanced and saw a goat. “Tuh, a goat,” she said, dismissively.
The goat looked at her for a long moment, making Jin turn and face it. The stare off, which Jin couldn’t believe she was having with a goat, ended when the goat turned and walked into the temple. Shrugging, Jin followed it, stepping onto the wooden porch, up to the entrance, and pulling the door open.
To be fair, the inside looked a lot bigger than it did from the outside and it indeed did look like a temple. In the center was a pit dug into the ground, the fire feeding off of sticks and twigs. On the walls, sitting on blocks of wood, were golden animals figurines. Under the figurines were burning sticks of incense, their smoke filling the air with the savory scents of Frankincense and Myrrh. Centered on one wall by itself was a large picture of a grey and black goat.
The goat circled Jin twice before taking a seat next to the fire. It looked up at her and Jin looked at it, her gaze cutting to the picture and then back down to the goat. Jin’s eyes narrowed because there was no way in hell…
“Are–are you the Old Goat?” she asked as she bent down closer to it, staring deeper into its eyes. The goat tilted its head as if it understood her before drawing its head back and head-butting Jin–hard.
A flurry of curses flew from Jin’s mouth as her hands rushed to her head. “Ow! That hurt! Oh, you’re so lucky! Where I come from we eat goats like you in stews!”
“You got in her face like a lunatic. Why are you mad at her? You’re the crazy one here.”
Jin fell back from the goat, landing on her butt with a “hmph”. Her head hurt more than her ass so she continued to rub it, her lip poked out in a pout. “Let me guess. You’re Oti,” she said as she looked over to the new voice.
The woman who looked every bit a temple guardian stood in the doorway. Her dress was long, made of a light almost transparent material that showcased a figure anything other than something an “Old Goat” would have. Her hair was in chunky locs and was multicolored like Eunsook’s norigae. Under her eyes on her fair freckled face were two white triangles, and across her forehead were a row of smaller dots.
“No. I am Oti’s Guardian, Yansá.” Her eyes shifted to the goat by the fire. “That’s Oti.”
“The goat–”
“–is the owner of this Silent Temple. She can speak to you but I don’t think she likes you.”
“No one here does.” Jin stood and dus
ted her bottom. “Okay, what do I have to do? Hug it around the neck, say a goat prayer, pet it?”
Yansá chuckled, the sound husky and alluring. “That won’t be necessary. You could feed her. A good meal turns her attitude around. There is an alfalfa patch that way. A bluish-purple flower. Bring her back a couple of handfuls and she’ll help you.”
“That’s it?” Jin laughed. “Compared to my last couple of trials, that’s a slice of cake! I’ll be back in two shakes of a goat’s ass.”
Oti bleated in response and Jin swore she saw the goat roll her eyes.
“It was a joke,” Jin drawled as she walked away. She jogged through the doorway and crossed the field outside of the hut with ease. It took some time for her to find the blueish purple flower Yansá referenced but when she did, she grabbed several handfuls of it and raced back to the hut.
“Told you. Slice of cake, a slice of chocolate cake,” Jin smirked, “with icing.” She walked the handfuls over to Oti and placed in front of her. The goat bleated happily and went to town on the sprouts. She came real close to biting her finger. “Okay,” she said, still squatting in front of Oti but careful not to get too close to her, “what’s next? What’s the magic word? How soon can you put me on a supernatural jet back home?”
Oti bleated and Yansá nodded. “Oti said when you’re ready to go.”
Jin squealed, stood and fisted her hands on her hips. “Okay.” She filled her lungs with air and let it go in a great big whoosh. “I’m ready for my close-up, Ms. Oti. Or...uhm, my closeout? Down? Whatever, just send me home.”
Oti bleated again, Yansá nodded again, and it looked like she was fighting back a smile. “Oti says you don’t get to determine when you are ready.”
Jin’s smile slipped a fraction. “What?”
“You’re not ready to go home.”
Her smile melted all together. “Yes, I am.”
A Third of the Moon and the Stars Struck Page 42
