The Mandate of Heaven (36 page)

‘You do not understand,’ said Teng, desperately. ‘You see …’

‘
Cash
!’ repeated the Worthy Master. ‘How amusing of your father! Please inform him I was suitably taken in. I grant him a complete victory.’

For a moment Teng felt inclined to argue further. Then his resolve collapsed. The Worthy Master’s jibe about merchants filled him with deep shame. Unbearable for the Dengs to descend to the level of mere peddlers! Teng attempted a chuckle. ‘My Honoured Father will be … amused.’

‘And I accept his kind offering,’ said Worthy Master Jian, reaching out for the rest of the bamboo scrolls. ‘Though what use it may be I cannot guess. Yes, and the other books in your bags, I might as well unburden you of those as well. And I do believe you mentioned a translation?’

Soon afterwards, Teng found himself back in the market of grasping voices and eyes and flushed faces. His dignity as a Deng had suffered no compromise. Only now his sack was as flat as his purse. He felt nauseous and his forehead ached. He gazed up at the topmost balcony of Golden Bright Temple, catching a glimpse of priests clustered round a seated figure at a table. Teng had the peculiar feeling Worthy Master Jian was already evaluating the books of bamboo strips – and with more than casual interest.

Eunuch Bo-Bai hurried towards the Temple of Celestial Teachers, his bamboo staff scraping the cracked, moss-stained flagstones of the courtyard. He paused at a steep flight of limestone steps to catch his breath, glancing back the way he had come. The bronze-bound gates of Cloud Abode Monastery remained firmly closed.

He could hear the low, monotonous drone of chanting within the temple and caught scraps of words:
The Dao that is bright seems dull
…
The great square has no corners
…
The Dao conceals itself in namelessness
…

They had only reached the forty-first sutra! Yet he dared not wait until the chant had fully unfurled like a gauze banner floating around the incense-filled temple. The steady beat of gongs and handbells signalled preparations for the next sutra. Bo-Bai slid apart the painted doors and bowed his way into the Temple of Celestial Teachers.

Within lay a complex pattern of brightness and shadow. Dozens of tall candles on bronze holders flickered around a life-size clay statue of a pot-bellied, grinning god in the lotus position. The worshippers stood in precise geometric positions before this ancient image of Chenghuang, the City God. All were female and dressed in gaudy robes denoting their status as Nuns of Serene Perfection. The lesser nuns wore yellow outfits that had once been golden; their superiors wore purple and blue silks, similarly faded and frayed at sleeve and hem.

Bo-Bai sidled over to a young woman in purple at the apex of the geometric pattern of worshippers before the altar. As he whispered in her ear she did not change her expression other than to blink rapidly.

At once Yun Shu retreated backward, bowing herself out of the Temple, all the while reciting a charm to avert misfortune for abandoning a rite. Another of the nuns, older and more care-worn, gave her departing superior a curious glance then occupied the vacant space at the head of the pattern. The forty-second sutra began:
The Dao breeds one; one breeds two; two breeds three; three breeds the ten thousand creatures
…

Yun Shu joined Bo-Bai on the limestone steps. The old man struggled to lower himself to his knees in apology for interrupting her, until she laid a gentle hand on his arm. There was something incongruous, even unnatural, about a venerable man deferring to a woman whose smooth complexion implied little worthy knowledge of this world – or the next.

‘What is it, Bo-Bai?’ she asked, in a distracted voice.

Her eyes widened. She sniffed the air, peering at the twilit sky. Distant plumes were billowing up from the city to the south of Cloud Abode Monastery.

‘What is burning?’ she asked.

‘Lady Yun Shu,’ said Bo-Bai, ‘people have built bonfires all over the city to celebrate a great event. The Buddhist Holy Men from Tibet have brought a relic to Hou-ming.’

She fidgeted with her sleeve, plucking at a loose strand of silk. ‘You interrupted the rite for
that
?’

‘No, no,’ he said, impatiently, ‘the Buddhists claim the relic has spoken to them. It requires a suitable place to be venerated now it resides in Hou-ming. They say it wishes to live beside Chenghuang himself.
Here
,’ he added, forcefully.

‘I do not understand. What is this chattering relic?’

‘The Buddha’s knucklebone.’

Yun Shu laughed at his earnestness. ‘Nonsense, Bo-Bai! Cloud Abode Monastery will always be Daoist.’

‘People in the city are enthused by the relic. See how many fires burn!’

‘Then I shall urge Chenghuang to teach the people better sense,’ she said. ‘We may be sure He will listen.’

Bo-Bai looked less certain. The Mongols were adept at playing off Daoist against Buddhist as a means of diverting opposition to their rule. With this in mind, sects of Tibetan Buddhists had been encouraged to seek followers in the Middle Kingdom. Sects that owed their prosperity and safety to the Great Khan.

Taking off a headscarf woven with divine symbols to reveal glossy, black hair, Yun Shu hurried back to the Temple. She felt uncomfortable when Lady Lu Si led the rite in her absence, fearful the nuns would draw unfavourable comparisons with her own conduct.

‘See what else you can learn, Bo-Bai,’ she called over her shoulder. ‘When the sutras are completed I shall inform the
sanren
of your news.’

The Temple of Celestial Teachers was the heart of Cloud Abode Monastery – and, in a spiritual sense, of Hou-ming itself. For hundreds of years the statue of the City God, Chenghuang Shen, had resided there, flattered and pampered by generations of Nuns.

The Temple consisted of a large rectangular hall with painted pillars on all sides depicting the constellations. Between the pillars were statues, paintings, shrines to demon-officials and numerous useful deities. Wooden doors could be slid open so worshippers in the Temple Courtyard might glimpse the rituals within, but the Temple was usually dark and shadowy, dense with
yin
.

Yun Shu hesitated before choosing it as a meeting place: recently the senior nuns’ conferences had been marred by unseemly rancour. Today would surely be different. Not only was a threat to the monastery’s existence certain to unite the
sanren
, Chenghuang’s presence would moderate hot tongues.

Her appointment as Abbess had occurred six years earlier, following the miracle on Holy Mount Chang. The tale of her victory over the wicked spirit-dragon preceded her return to Hou-ming and, on landing at the harbour, she found herself surrounded by chanting priests and a sizable crowd. Even Worthy Master Jian had noticed her existence, summoning her to Golden Bright Temple and indicating she should tell the story of her victory to the Provincial Daoist Council. She had been carried in triumph through streets lined with curious faces, back to Cloud Abode Monastery and joyous congratulations from Abbess Lu Si and the other senior nuns.

Looking back, it was the last time they greeted her so warmly. Yun Shu sometimes wondered if they would ever view her with fondness again. None of it was her fault. Blame fate, the inscrutable workings of the Dao.

Abbess Lu Si had proudly accompanied her young protégé to the Provincial Daoist Council – and she had every reason for pride. Yun Shu’s triumph would not only bring fresh worshippers but reflected well on the wise Abbess who had taken up Yun Shu when she was a divorced pauper, rejected by husband and family, a starving outcast whose potential only Lady Lu Si had recognised. Now that faith had been repaid gloriously.

The members of the Council, all men in middle or old age, had found Yun Shu interesting. Worthy Master Jian asked many gentle questions, expressing concern that the wicked dragon would cast a spiteful, vengeful curse on her. He promised to respond with potent spells on her behalf, pinning a silver and jade amulet to her chest that guaranteed protection. Yun Shu’s blushes deepened to a crimson of mortification when Worthy Master Jian made his next pronouncement in a voice both firm and touched by regret.

‘As for you, Lady Lu Si,’ he said. ‘I also have a gift. The entire Council is agreed upon it. You are henceforth to be relieved of a great burden.’

Yun Shu and Abbess Lu Si had exchanged confused glances.

‘In short,’ said the Worthy Master, ‘you are freed of your onerous responsibilities as Abbess of Cloud Abode Monastery. Given the great favour shown by the Dao to Lady Yun Shu, she is to be the new Abbess.’

For a terrible moment Lady Lu Si had tottered, on the edge of fainting. Aghast, Yun Shu remembered Teng telling her how the Mongols abused her abominably when Hou-ming fell. Now, it seemed, she must endure another violation. One that threatened all the success she had wrung from a troubled life. Instead of fainting, the older woman cast Yun Shu a sad glance.

‘I see you prefer someone more amenable to your policies,’ she said, with quiet dignity. ‘Someone less loyal to the ancient ways of the Serene Ones. Someone you can mould and shape. If it is the will of the Dao, so be it.’ She had bowed perfunctorily to the Council and left the room.

‘Inestimable lady!’ declared Worthy Master Jian, smiling at the door.

Perhaps Yun Shu should have declined so vast an elevation, except it is hard to deny what one secretly desires.

Since then Lady Lu Si would only speak to Yun Shu on matters of ritual or practical affairs. Though the younger woman tried hard to involve her predecessor in important decisions, these efforts had been met – always quietly, never angrily – with an insistence such burdens lay with Abbess Yun Shu now. She, Lady Lu Si, was no longer worthy.

‘Well, Honoured
Sanren
,’ began Yun Shu, ‘I thank you for your presence.’

Five other senior nuns were present: Lady Lu Si, doddery old Earth Peace, nervous, fidgeting Gold Immortal and Jade Perfected with her benevolent gaze. The fifth, Three Simplicities, younger than the rest by many grey hairs, smiled sweetly: ‘What can we do but obey?’ she asked.

Half an hour later it seemed obedience was the last thing on anyone’s mind.

‘They want to take away our Chenghuang?’ asked old Earth Peace, utterly baffled. ‘Where else would he go?’

‘It is preposterous!’ moaned Gold Immortal. ‘Oh, we must pray every hour of every day. I will enter a spirit trance at once.’

‘What is the Daoist Council doing on our behalf?’ asked Jade Perfected. ‘I have no doubt they are as concerned as ourselves.’

‘Hah!’ remarked Three Simplicities. ‘As long as Worthy Master Jian is snug in Golden Bright Temple he won’t remember
us
.’

Finally Lady Lu Si spoke. ‘My question is similar to Jade Perfected’s,’ she said. ‘How does our Abbess propose to avert this disaster?’

All eyes turned to Yun Shu. She picked at the loose threads of her sleeve, her heart pounding. ‘I don’t know,’ she said. ‘Not yet.’

At once Three Simplicities was upon her. ‘You are our Mother.’ Her tone was wheedling. ‘We beg you to show us the way.’

Silent attention from five watchful faces.

‘I must meditate and pray,’ said Yun Shu.

‘As must we all!’ insisted Gold Immortal. ‘Every hour of every day!’

‘My fear,’ said Lady Lu Si, quietly, ‘is that faulty practise of the rites has led to this. Perhaps Chenghuang himself is angry with us. Such a thing has never happened in all the years the Nuns of Serene Perfection have tended his needs. Let us look to our own impurity.’

At this reproach Yun Shu glanced at the grinning, staring face of Chenghuang. Could Lady Lu Si be right? Had she brought disaster upon the monastery through laxity and poor judgement? The old, secret fear sent by demons to taunt her dreams, the old icy doubts, returned with new force: that she had not truly defeated the spirit-dragon on Mount Chang. That she was not really favoured by the Dao at all.

‘I will meditate,’ she said, rising. ‘Meditate and discover the truth.’

With that Yun Shu hurried from the Temple of Celesitial Teachers, conscious of the
sanrens
’ eyes on her back – and of Chenghuang’s stare, ready to punish her failures in this incarnation or the next.