In my mind, I saw a group of ancient Chinese houses. Rice paddies. Beautiful mountains in the distance. But the houses were on fire. I heard the sound of anguished cries.
There were other pictures flashing before my mind’s eye. A baby that looked still as a stone. Another baby – no a child – being held by a gentle looking man. The child didn’t move either.
I saw men and women dying by the hand of a sword and felt the anguish of a heart that had known considerable loss. And great anger. I saw an old woman finding her way through the mist of the portal and into the Netherworld. I saw her struggle with the lessons that I too struggled with. Of letting go of anger and of sadness. Of finding peace and happiness.
All this was a flash in my mind, like a movie being shown at super high speed. It was more like a knowing than a seeing.
Madame Wong. The tiny woman holding me had known enormous suffering in her human life. And she had come to the place of mist and fog and learned how to forget.
“No, Miss Emily. Not forget. You never forget. If you live to be as old as Madame Wong, you never forget.”
“Then why did you choose to live so long – to allow yourself to go on – when you had such immense pain inside?”
“Ah, yes, choice. I chose to let ghosts stay in past. Past is history. Living is now. I sat. I breathed. I let past go. I let future go. I am. That is all.”
“But didn’t it take you many years to learn how to do that?”
“Have you not understood yet? Time here – it is slippery, no?”
“It seems not to exist at all, and still … It’s odd, in some ways, I feel like I’ve been here my whole life, but it also feels like I just got here.”
“It is difficult for humans to stay in Netherworld because no watch, no rising sun, no setting moon. No markers for human mind to gauge its ever present need to know time.”
“So if there is no time here … ”
“It is eternal.”
“Then what is happening back in my own dimension? Has a great amount of time passed?”
“Miss Emily, you need only know that you need not worry about time. That is one you must let go like the ghosts of your past. Plenty of time to sit. To breathe.”
Back to sitting and breathing.
I sat on my chair again and got comfortable, closed my eyes, and began again to breathe. I thought only of my breath. I opened my eyes briefly, and Madame Wong was back in exact same statue pose I’d seen her in before. It was like she had never moved. Did I dream it? When she comforted me, was it a vision?
But I let those thoughts go too and paid attention only to my breath like the waves of an ocean. Tide coming in. Tide going out. My breath was like the gentle roll of the waves, up and down my body.
I sat in meditation for a long, long time, reckoning as best I can about these things in a place with no time. I had more visions come to life, but they weren't as frightening or as momentous as Muriel or the hospital room.
Eventually I found that I was fully in control of my mind. Mostly I thought nothing at all, which I hadn’t thought possible. For long stretches of time, known to me by the large amount of breaths I had followed like a wave through my body, I thought nothing at all. At other times, there were small thoughts that popped in, like the little birds Madame Wong had talked about. I told them to take flight and they did. It became easy to have a mind free of the distraction of a thousand thoughts and ideas crowding all at once like a busy market filled with people. My mind was instead like a vast, still meadow, waiting to see what would appear.
After immeasurable breaths into and out of my body, my long meditation was broken by the sound of Madame Wong’s voice.
“You ready to become warrior priestess now,” she said. “But first, Miss Emily sleep.”
I opened my eyes and felt underneath me the rustic bed of Madame Wong’s cottage. It took me no time at all to drift off to a dreamless sleep, my mind already so empty that it didn’t have the material left to create dreams.
But just before waking I had one dream – or was it a vision? I couldn’t be sure. In the dream I stood before a dark haired man with eyes like two lumps of coal in his skull. He was gaunt, his fingers bony, and his body was like a skeleton covered in thin skin. He looked smug and satisfied with himself.
The man’s face was menacing and I knew instantly that he’d do me harm. I thought, “I should be scared.” But I wasn’t scared. Instead, I felt pity. Why would I pity him?
My eyes fluttered open and the dream faded. But I recalled the image of myself that I’d seen in the dream. At first I didn’t think it was me. The girl seemed strong and powerful. She had a halo of buttery yellow light that glowed around her. Her face was determined with no hint of fear or smirk about it, just calm self-assurance. And in my dream the girl held a dagger in her hand. Can this be me? But I don’t own a dagger, and I never look that confident.
I rose from the bed, ready for a new day with Madame Wong in the place of mist and fog, of dreams and shadows. I had a vision in my mind of a girl with a dagger that I wanted to meet.
31. WHY I HATE BAMBOO
I found Madame Wong in a perfect headstand in her spot under the large maple tree in the garden. I sat in patient mediation in front of her, waiting for her to start my lesson for the day. I listened to the burbling brook that tumbled past her small meadow, and I drifted off into a state of deep relaxation. It was a shock to the system when Madame Wong finally spoke, her high-pitched croak interrupting the perfect stillness I was becoming accustomed to.
“Miss Emily ready to become warrior priestess now?”
“I don’t know if I’m ready for it, but I’ll try.”
“Only do or not do. Which is it?”
“Okay then, I choose do.”
“Ah, good choice. Come.” She gracefully exited her headstand and walked across the garden. I followed respectfully behind her a few paces as we walked through intense fog and mist to the babbling brook.
“Miss Emily has learned focus, yes?”
“Yes, I suppose so.”
“NO, NO, NO! No suppose. Focus or no focus – which is it?”
“Okay, yes, for God’s sake, I can focus! Jeez, no need to scream at me.”
“Don’t suppose. Don’t guess. Know the answer and say it. A true warrior is sure of herself. Right or wrong does not matter.”
“Well see that’s the point now, isn’t it? I’m not a 'true warrior'. And about the only thing I’m sure of is that I’m not sure of myself.”
I looked down into her eyes. She stared up at me evenly. Stalemate.
“You know focus. Time to learn awareness.”
I rolled my eyes, a knee-jerk reaction to the thought of spending more time sitting for days on end breathing. I was ready for action, not more doing nothing.
“Oh, you will have action, young one.” Her lips curled into a sly smile.
“I’m afraid to learn the answer to this, but I’ll ask it anyway. How do I learn ‘awareness’?”
“By doing laundry,” she said. Out of the nothingness appeared an enormous pile of clothes just like the ones Madame Wong wore. There were black linen pants with wide legs and a drawstring waist and long-sleeved dark blue linen shirts with cloth buttons up the front and a mandarin collar. There was also a large, metal washbasin, bar of soap and a washboard.
“I become a warrior by doing your laundry?”
“You become aware, alert and ready by doing laundry.”
“So how long do I have to stand here scrubbing your clothes until you decide I’m sufficiently aware?”
“Until all clothes are washed and hung to dry.” She pointed to a clothesline hung between two large oak trees.
“Then what?”
“Then cut the fire wood.” She pointed to a pile of logs and a hatchet that I hadn’t noticed before on the edge of the meadow. “Chop wood. Learn to be aware and alert.” Madame Wong vanished into the misty air.
I wanted to rebel. I wanted to sit down on the
ground and refuse to do anything. I wanted to be back at my house, even if Muriel was there.
But I caught myself and stopped thinking about Muriel before she reared her ugly head again. I picked up a shirt and began washing the old gnat’s laundry.
I dipped a shirt into the stream, rubbed soap on it. Up and down until it was well lathered, then I swished it in the water and hung it to dry. Shirt after shirt, pant after pant, all the time trying to be ‘aware’, whatever that meant.
My mind was in a stupor then it wasn’t. I was on my knees in pain, a burning sting surging from my calves and up the backs of my legs. There was a moment when I thought that the hatchet on the edge of the meadow had flown into the backs of my legs.
“What the … ” I turned and Madame Wong stood behind me with her cane, her face wearing a smirk.
“Did you just beat me with that cane?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“Test. See if Miss Emily aware.”
“Well? Am I?”
“Welts on the back of your legs. What you think?”
“That’s not fair. I didn’t know this was a game. You didn’t tell me that you’d materialize and beat the crap out of me.”
“If aware, you know it coming. If alert, you stop me.”
“Well I’m alert now.” I towered over her, challenging her with my look to try it again.
She stood stone still and eyed me just as I eyed her. We stood locked in a death stare for countless minutes. I felt focused and aware.
Suddenly, CRACK! That cane swung out of nowhere and bit into the flesh of my left thigh.
“Son-of-a-kraken. You did it again!”
“Miss Emily not aware.” She disappeared again into the nothingness.
I flopped myself down and let flow the tears that had sprung up in the corners of my eyes. Caning is a barbaric punishment but it’s still meted out in some countries. I know why they still use it. Only two swats with that little piece of bamboo had left me with the most painful welts and bruises I’d ever had. The pain, the fear, and the worry about my dad and Jack and Fan made me feel hopeless and beat down. I wanted to give up.
I heard a faint voice from somewhere beyond the mist say, “No think. Do.” The voice was right. If I dwelled on negative stuff, bad things would happen. I had to get up and do something – anything – to end my negative thinking.
“Your lessons suck, Madame Wong!” I yelled into the nothing. Screaming that out made me feel a little better.
More laundry. Wash, rinse, and repeat.
It seemed like I washed clothes for days. Every now and then, without any warning, the old bat would appear out of the fog and beat the crap out of me with that cane. I tried my best to focus on what I was doing as I finished the laundry then moved to the woodpile.
I can’t tell you how many swats with that cane I got over the endless time that I did Madame Wong’s chores. And I can’t tell you how long it took me to figure this out, but eventually I realized that I could focus on what I was doing but at the same time be alert to my surroundings.
I chopped wood (not as easy as it looks), swinging the axe high then down into the center of a piece of wood. I split it clean in two. I felt a slight breeze to my left. I had my feet planted, but I swung my upper body to the left and held my axe in both hands, ready to deflect the coming blow of her cane.
But as I turned to my left she wasn’t there. Just empty space. Then SMACK! The cane blow came across my legs to my right. I swung myself around and there she was, standing still and holding her cane like she hadn’t just beat me with it.
“Aw crap! I heard you that time! You switched sides on me.”
“Progress, yes. Alert. Aware. But too focused on what you thought was going to be. Don’t think, just do.”
“But if I hear something on my left, then I should think you’re going to be on my left, right? I mean, that’s logical.”
“Don’t think! Logic not relevant. Feeling is way. Be in the flow of things, Miss Emily. Let go. Just be.” She vanished again.
I’d come so far yet felt so frustrated.
But one good thing came out of all that wood chopping. I had long ago abandoned my long sleeved shirt and stripped down to my black tank top. I’d never been muscular. But I noticed that my shoulders were cut. I had deltoids and shoulder muscles. My arms were strong, not skinny and lacking any semblance of muscle tone like before.
I don’t think that building muscles was part of the old woman’s plan, but it made me feel good about myself. I was beginning to look like a girl that was strong enough to take care of herself. Maybe I could even stop that Dughall guy.
Back to chopping. Sweat poured down my back and my tank was soaked. The pile of wood grew. Focused but alert. “Into the flow Emily,” I told myself. Swinging the axe.
I felt a ripple of air move. “Don’t listen, be,” I told myself. The air around me moved. The hairs on the back of my neck were on end. I swung my upper body to my left, holding my axe out and this time, it connected.
THWACK! I blocked her blow. My axe and her cane were locked together, each of us maintaining our stance and our stare.
“Miss Emily ready for combat,” she said. Madame Wong backed away and bowed her head slightly.
32. SLICING AND DICING
When she said, “Miss Emily ready for combat,” I almost wet my pants. It’s one thing to fend off a blow from a cane, it’s another to do battle. As always, Madame Wong kept me unsettled. Just when I thought I’d mastered something and felt balanced, she threw something else at me, and I felt like I’d topple.
“Come.” She walked away from the stream and through the meadow to a path I’d never seen before. Before long a building appeared out of the fog. It was made entirely of wood and looked like it had been there for hundreds of years. Instead of a thatched roof like her cottage, it had a pitched roof covered in weathered tiles. I followed her as she walked up the steps to a wide wooden porch the length of the whole building, and then into a door opening (there was no actual door).
Inside was one large room, open to the rafters above. Windows from the second story rafters let a little light filter into the otherwise dark, cavernous room. To my right and to my left were walls filled with racks of weapons. There were broadswords, spears, daggers, lances and other sharp, pointy things that I had no idea what they were called. It looked like a weapon cache for a small army.
“What is this place?”
“My training room,” she said quietly.
“But where did it come from? It wasn’t here before.”
“Building from my childhood.” She walked to the right and inspected a row of swords. Madame Wong picked up one and swung it around gently a few times, then replaced it and chose another. She did this with several until she picked up a sword with a handle that looked like it was made of ivory and a thin blade that had lost its sheen, weathered like so many other things in Madame Wong’s world.
“You trained to be a warrior as a child?”
“No, of course not. Girls not allowed. Madame Wong snuck in and watched her brothers train.” She continued swinging her sword around in wide arcs and practiced thrusting her blade forward.
“Choose your blade,” she said. She gestured to the wall opposite her, also filled with weapons of all kinds and shapes.
“Oh, I don’t think so. Hindergog told us of your fighting skills. I’m not fighting you.”
“How learn if not try? Come Miss Emily. I teach you ways of the true warrior.” She had a mischievous glint in her eye. “Yes, long time since Madame Wong teach a warrior. This will be a good day.”
She’s excited to kick my butt!
I didn’t know what kind of weapon I needed or how to choose. I inspected them all and finally settled on a broadsword. Its handle was wrapped in black leather and it had a curved, shiny steel blade with intricate carvings of a dragon etched into it.
I picked it up, and despite the fact that I’d built up quite a bit of upper
body strength wielding an axe at the woodpile, it was so heavy that I almost dropped it. I teetered a little as I tried to hold it out in front of me, gripping the handle with both hands.
“That one too heavy for Miss Emily?”
“I’ll be alright,” I said. “Just need to get used to it.”
“Best to be used to it now.” She sprung into the air, did a somersault and landed in front of me, brandishing her ancient looking blade. I reacted as quickly as I could and tried to use my sword to deflect her, but her blade caught a bit of flesh at my ankle.
“You should block my attempt to cut you,” she said.
“Really?” I gripped my ankle. My hand was covered in blood. “Son of … You cut me!”
“Real warrior fights through pain,” she said.
“Yeah? Well I’m not a real warrior now, am I? I’ve got to do something about this wound, or I’m going to bleed to death.”
“No need worry about blood. Ready for battle.” Madame Wong held her sword horizontally in front of her face, her legs planted and ready to go again.
“Look, I’m not like you, okay. I’m a real person – flesh and blood. So yeah, I’ve got to bandage this cut up so I don’t bleed out.”
“What cut? Miss Emily not bleeding.”
“What … ” I looked down, and my ankle was fine, not a scratch on me. It wasn’t even covered in dried blood. It was like Madame Wong’s blade had never touched me.
“What the heck? You cut me. I know you did.”
“Cut? Maybe. Wound no more.”
“But how?”
“This is Netherworld. Now ready yourself.” She backed up a few paces, planted right foot in front and left behind, then raised her sword in her right hand above her, her left hand out straight in front.
I moved out from the wall and toward the center, all the while keeping my eyes on wily Madame Wong. When we were about twenty feet apart from each other, I planted my feet like Madame Wong’s and put my arms in the same position. The blade I had chosen was super heavy. My arm wobbled as I tried to hold it above me as Madame Wong was doing.
The Akasha Chronicles Trilogy Boxed Set: The Complete Emily Adams Series Page 15
