“Nam-yeh!” Erek shouted, cupping his hands so his words echoed across the mountainside.
At his voice, the red dots jumped up and down and waved back.
“Nam-yeh!” they shouted.
The party strode on, forgetting their sore legs and sunburned necks. At Ode’s side, Arrow began to trot, his pink tongue lolling from side to side as he panted in the heat.
The next mountain had stone steps cut into it, which twisted up the slope. Running from the top to the bottom were what looked like little barrels set on poles. Ode wanted to ask what they meant, but the Kins were too busy storming up the steps to focus on anything but the temple. Ode followed them, sweat trickling down his back and darkening his tunic. His stomach was strange and tight, and he was not altogether sure how he felt about finally reaching their destination.
The party stopped at the top, gasping for breath. In front of them stood the temple in all its imposing glory, and out of its doors poured a gaggle of Kins and Kinesses in bright red cloaks with big grins.
Beside him, Erek turned and patted his shoulder. “This be your new home,” he said.
CHAPTER TWENTY
The Temple on the Mountain
On closer inspection, the Castle Temple was colorful and worn. To his surprise, Ode discovered that he liked it almost instantly. The red painted walls were cracked and peeling, while the carved wooden pillars were chipped and scuffed. Mismatched, faded rugs spread across the floors of the galleried hallways running between dusty flagstone courtyards, and cobwebs clung to every corner. The rooms smelled of incense and cooking and echoed with prayers and laughter. It was welcoming, friendly, and not what Ode had expected.
He felt his unease slip away as the Kins and Kinesses fussed and cooed over him, taking his heavy pack off his shoulders and pointing and exclaiming at the gray wolf that stood at his side. He could tell that they assumed he could not understand their language since they discussed him loudly with one another.
“It be a Wildlander, finally! Our prayers be answered, and we be blessed.”
“He be frightened, poor boy!”
“Will he be making himself one of us?”
This last question was directed at Erek, who smiled and put a reassuring hand on Ode’s shoulder.
“Quiet now, my brothers and sisters. Our guest be knowing everything you say, so watch your tongues.”
There were some gasps of shock and a few reddened faces. Ode was stunned to hear a collection of murmured apologies.
“It’s … no matter,” he stuttered in reply. “It is nice … to meet you.”
The crowd stared at him with open fascination.
“We be weary from our travels,” said Erek. “And I think it best we speak to the High-Kin now so that rest be soon after.”
Nods of agreement followed and they were led down hallways and across a courtyard to a tall, separate building with a heavy red curtain in place of a door. This was held aside and Ode entered a dim, colorful room strung with prayer flags that wound across the beams and around the pillars. Erek told him to kick off his shoes at the entrance before they padded over the worn, stained carpets. They passed benches set out in rows and fading murals painted on the walls. In front of them stood a huge golden statue of a cloaked figure, and beside it knelt an old man with a long black beard.
“High-Kin!” bellowed Erek.
The old man smiled and struggled to his feet with a wooden cane. “My returning brothers,” he said. “The gods be blessing me with your homecoming. You be the last missionaries to return, but nay the least.”
“How fared my other brothers and sisters in their trips?” asked Erek.
“Good, good. Spreading the message of the gods in new lands is nay easy.” The High-Kin’s brown eyes fell on Ode and Arrow.
“High-Kin, this be a Wildlander that returned with us,” said Erek, standing aside. “He be speaking our language, and he be here to join us.”
The High-Kin nodded and turned to Ode.
“Where did you learn to speak like us?” he asked.
Ode fidgeted under his gaze. “I don’t know,” he answered at last.
There was a pause.
“Do you wish to be a Kin?” asked the High-Kin.
Ode glanced at Erek, then at the other Kins behind him.
“I don’t know,” he said again.
Erek looked disappointed.
“To be a Kin is nay a simple choice,” said the High-Kin. “But the gods be bringing you here for a reason, boy. It be right that you unsure—Kinhood be a big decision. Until you decide, you will live and work with us. You will spend time with the gods and they be telling you what to do. That be acceptable to you?”
Ode nodded.
“About my wolf …” he began.
“Do it bite?” asked the High-Kin.
“Not unless he’s made to,” replied Ode, resting a hand on Arrow’s head.
“Hmm. It be staying as long as nay harm come. It may even be of use.” The High-Kin smiled and tugged on his long beard. “Erek, you done a great thing bringing this boy to us. He be a gift from the gods, and I be expecting we learn plenty from him.”
Erek bowed his head in thanks.
“And now it be time for your resting,” said the High-Kin. “Let me greet all of you, and then we shall prepare you a supper.”
One by one the Kins approached the High-Kin and he hugged them, whispering a welcome in their ear. While he waited, Ode could not help but notice that the High-Kin’s eyes strayed to him often between greetings and their edges were tinged with curiosity and something a little like fear.
Later that evening, the whole temple met in the eating hall: a vast, bare room with a tall ceiling. The High-Kin called Ode to the front and introduced him to the High-Kiness—a smart, older woman with a tightly wound headdress, who greeted him with a nod. The High-Kin explained to everyone that Ode was to join the Castle Temple and work with the yak herders in the valley. Ode looked out at the sea of red cloaks and felt his cheeks flush. Kins and Kinesses of all ages sat in rows on cushions placed on the floor, balancing their bowls in their laps. They stared at him with polite curiosity, but when the High-Kin had finished the introduction, they began chattering and laughing with one another.
Ode listened quietly to their conversations, sipping his rice and broth, from his seat in the corner of the hall next to Erek and Molash. He noticed other men and women who did not wear red cloaks and he assumed they must be like him—undecided about the gods. Erek explained that many were failed Kins and Kinesses who had not passed their exams and who had lost their faith. They lived in the temple community until they decided their future with the gods.
After supper, Ode met the other yak herders he would be working with. The group of boys looked him over with undisguised resentment, since he was the first Wildlander the temple had seen and everyone was making a great fuss. They greeted him sullenly and led him back to the tall building with the cloaked gold statue that was called the Room of the Gods. Inside, all the members of the temple were gathering, cramming themselves onto the benches and crouching against the walls. Ode took a place at the back and watched the ceremony with interest.
The younger Kins and Kinesses pinched and teased one another, while the older members prayed and sang together. A golden gong sounded each time a new part of the ceremony began, and Ode noticed a group of girls giggling, their covered heads bobbing as they whispered to one another, while an old man sat in the middle of it all picking his nose. It seemed that ceremony participation was not mandatory.
That night, Ode followed the other yak herders down the steps of the mountain to the valley. The boys held out their right hands as they descended, turning the barrels Ode had noticed earlier that ran in a row from the top to the bottom. As the barrels rotated, a little bell inside chimed, so their descent was accompanied by a chorus of silvery tinkling that rang across the valley. When Ode asked what they were doing, the boys mumbled that the barrels were prayer wheels and if you
passed down, you were to turn them in the direction of the moon and think of the gods.
“But we don’t think of them,” sneered the oldest boy, and the others snickered.
After passing herds of goats and sheep in the darkening valley, the boys led Ode to a small hut nestled between the rocks. They begrudgingly explained that they took turns watching over the yaks to keep them safe from wolves and beasts, their eyes flicking to Arrow without comment. Inside, the hut was sparse but clean, and Ode took a free bed in the corner. The light was fading quickly outside and he was weary. One of the boys disappeared to relieve another from his night shift on the mountainside, while the rest climbed into the beds. As Ode drifted off to sleep with Arrow on the floor beside him, he heard the boys whispering cruel jibes and insults at his expense. He shut his eyes and told himself he did not care.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
The Killings
Despite his unfriendly peers, Ode found that he settled into the daily patterns of the Castle Temple. The day began when sunlight reached the valley, and if he was in the hut, it streamed in through the shuttered windows, rousing him from sleep. If he was on the mountainside tending to the yaks, then he watched it spill over the rocks, bathing them in buttery gold—one of the most glorious sights he had ever seen.
Yak tending was not difficult, and he soon felt comfortable perched on the rocks watching over the stocky, horned creatures. Before entering the mountains, Ode had never seen a yak before. He thought them similar to buffalo, but with a thicker, shaggier coat. They were peaceful enough and did not make much fuss as long as Arrow stayed at a distance. In the mornings, women would come from a hut farther down the valley to milk them, and if Ode was on duty he would help them carry their pails up the mountainside, trying not to spill any on the steps.
Breakfast was always at the temple and a golden gong announced its arrival. Then Ode and the other yak tenders, along with the sheep and goat herders in the valley, would hurry to the eating hall. At mealtimes, Ode always sat next to Erek or the other Kins who had accompanied him on the journey from the Wild Lands. They welcomed him with smiles and chatter while they ate, before disappearing into the temple hallways after their meal to pray and complete their chores. Ode would watch them leave with a heavy heart, wishing he could follow.
Instead, his day would be spent either with the yaks or working on the crops in the valley. He was glad it was springtime since the bright weather made the work almost pleasant. His life at the temple was not too different from his days with the Taone, though Ode looked back on those seasons as if they were distant dreams. Sometimes he would be reminded of it—he would remember Blue Moon’s playful taunts or would think of Cala’s comforting, peppery scent. Sometimes he would wake in the night and lie in terror of what he had left behind. If he was not a member of the Taone, what was he? If he was not the freakish birther, then he was just a boy.
Often the yak tenders would ask him questions about his past. Ode was so afraid of revealing something that he would always reply, “I don’t remember,” until they began taunting him with the phrase. They hissed it in his ear at night and shouted it across the mountainside during the day, throwing pebbles at him as they passed. Their taunts would make Arrow snarl, but Ode held him back.
After Ode had been at the temple for one moon cycle, the High-Kin asked to see him. Ode went to the meeting with mounting trepidation, worried that one of the yak herders had reported him for some imagined crime. Unlike the rest of the Kins, who slept in dormitories, the High-Kin and High-Kiness had their own rooms away from the distracting noises of the temple, and it took Ode some time to find the right place in the maze of hallways.
Inside, the High-Kin’s room was much like every other room in the Castle Temple: red and dusty. There were chests bursting with scrolls, and scripture copied from the originals in his own neat handwriting lined against the walls. The High-Kin sat cross-legged on his red cloak, which was spread across the layered rugs, with his head bowed.
Ode had come to covet those red cloaks. Sometimes a number of them would hang in one of the hallways, waiting to be washed, and if Ode happened to pass, he would hold out his hand and let the rough cotton whisper through his fingers as if he were descending the steps of the mountainside and turning the prayer wheels. The cloaks represented true acceptance into life at the temple. The Kins were kind and loving toward him, but he knew that without the red cloak, he would always be separate. He wished he could announce that the gods had chosen him that very moment, but he did not want to deceive those who had been so generous to him.
Trails of smoke from burning incense curled around the edges of the room and made the air hazy. Its rich, spicy scent reminded Ode of the fires the Taone would dance around in the summer while singing to the sky.
“You be waiting long?” asked the High-Kin, catching sight of him. “I never be hearing you enter the room.”
“I would not be a Wildlander if you had.”
The High-Kin smiled.
Ode sat on a cushion opposite the old man with Arrow at his side and watched as the High-Kin climbed shakily to his feet, leaning on his staff. Slowly, the High-Kin picked his cloak off the floor, shook it out, and shrugged it onto his shoulders, tying the cords in place as he settled himself back on the floor.
“I called you here to ask how you be faring in your new life,” he said.
“It’s hard sometimes, but—”
“Hard?”
“Different. There are so many things to learn.”
The High-Kin tugged on his long dark beard, which fell in curly waves and pooled in his lap. The midday spring sunshine from the open windows made his bald head shine.
“What be making it hard?” he asked.
“Just the new ways things are done,” Ode replied, but he could feel the High-Kin’s brown eyes searching his own.
“If there be a particular something or someone making it harder, you be telling me, yes?”
Ode nodded, but he did not want to talk about the yak herders. He felt almost sure that the High-Kin knew and Ode was ashamed. He wanted to be gentle and humble like the other Kins and Kinesses; he had seen how they loved one another and he had rarely heard an angry word shared between them. Besides, the yak herders had warned him that there would be repercussions if he attempted to snitch.
“There be nay more to say on that subject then?” the High-Kin persisted.
“No,” said Ode.
“If you be saying so. But how are you faring overall?”
“I like it here,” Ode replied truthfully.
“So much that you be thinking of saying the vows?”
Ode looked down at his hands, brown from a morning of work on the mountainside. His nails were lined with dirt and no amount of washing before meals seemed to change that.
“I want to take the vow,” he answered truthfully, “but no gods have spoken to me.”
There was a pause.
“At least you be speaking the truth. How you be finding the ceremonies?”
“They are nice but … I don’t feel anything.”
The High-Kin nodded. “There can be nay forcing it,” he said. “Keep your heart open, and if the gods be wanting to take you, they will soon.”
“I hope so,” Ode muttered, and the High-Kin hid a smile.
“Anyway, I be calling you here with a task in mind,” he said. “I be hearing how well you be working in the valley. Many be impressed with your willingness and your skill.”
Ode could not help the flush in his cheeks that overtook him.
“They are?” he said before he could stop himself, and then quickly added, “I’ve been trying hard. I’m very grateful for all that you have done for me.”
The High-Kin nodded and studied him for a moment.
“You be an interesting boy,” he said. “You be almost nay a boy now.”
Ode felt himself blush further. It had not escaped his own notice that he had grown recently. Throughout his wanderings in the wil
derness of the Wild Lands he had become thin, and there had been no opportunity for him to fully regain his strength during his journey to the mountains. Now, with three meals a day at the temple and the bright sunlight warming his back as he worked in the valley, he knew that he had surpassed his original weight. He was the tallest of the yak herders by far, and the broadest, also. His legs were knots of muscle and his shoulders were wide and strong. He had recently caught sight of himself in a drinking trough and not recognized his own reflection.
“You say we been good to you,” said the High-Kin. “But you been good to us, too. You been working your hardest and the yaks been the safest they been in many moons. There be nay killings from the mountain wolves or the lions when you been around.”
The High-Kin glanced at Arrow, who was stretched on the floor, watching the conversation with his calm, green gaze.
“But there be problems with the sheep,” he added.
Ode nodded. He had heard of such things at mealtimes. He knew the temple expected to lose some livestock to the beasts in the mountains, but the harsh winter had made many predators hungry and bold.
“We be losing a high number of sheep and many be saying there be a pack of wolves that be taking them. Since you proved yourself with the yaks, you be willing to tend to the sheep for a time?”
The High-Kin had barely finished speaking before Ode heartily agreed to do everything he could. He was flattered and knew this would mean some time away from the yak herders. He tried not to wonder whether that was the very reason the High-Kin was suggesting it.
Following their meeting, Ode hurried down the mountainside, the tinkle of the prayer wheels pealing after him as he went. He strode across the valley, past those working in the fields, some with red cloaks slung over their shoulders out of the mud, and past the women milking the goats, who called a cheery greeting to him as he went.
“Nam-yeh!” he shouted back over his shoulder.
On the other side of the valley, Ode picked his way up the mountain slope, following a well-used track to the shepherds’ hut. He knew some of the shepherds, but when he entered, they were not pleased by his announcement that the High-Kin had sent him. Ode sighed quietly to himself and wondered if it would be like the yak herders all over again.
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