Yu Yu was sitting cross-legged on a perfectly round stone in the Courtyard of Imaginings when Jax and the Abbot arrived. She hadn’t quite made it to the vegetable garden. The Abbot shot her a stern glance, ordering her away with a flick of his hand. ‘Please let me stay, Abbot,’ she pleaded. ‘I can learn a lot from watching, you said so yourself.’
‘Ai… Qu, qu, qu… Go!’ the Abbot said.
Yu Yu sighed, and slowly walked off.
‘She can be a very stubborn girl, sometimes,’ the Abbot said, turning to Jax. ‘Mingzi, come over here and feel the trunk of this gingko tree.’ The Abbot stood under the branches that stretched almost to the edges of the courtyard. He rubbed the massive trunk affectionately. ‘This tree is over one thousand years old and has survived through war, drought and floods.’
‘How can anything live to be that old?’ asked Jax, looking up through the branches.
‘It knows a secret,’ the Abbot smiled.
‘A secret?’
‘Yes. It gathers food from the sun and the soil. But it uses only what is necessary. The rest it stores away. Conserving energy, that is its secret. In order to become a great Peng Master, you must be like this tree and not waste energy on unnecessary actions, thoughts or emotions. A Peng Master must understand that everything in the universe is interconnected. To see things on a much broader scale.
We are connected to the trees, to the sea, to the earth, to the sun, to the moon. Therefore what we do today will affect tomorrow. Every act you perform, no matter how small, impacts on something else. It is like the vegetable garden at the back of the monastery. You must look after the seedlings now, then they will grow and produce a good crop. If you fail to give them water and let the weeds take over, then the seedlings will choke and die. Your mind, Mingzi, is also like a vegetable garden. You must nourish it with only good thoughts and weed out the bad. You must conserve your energy. Do you understand?’
Jax knew he had a lot to work on, especially weeding out the bad thoughts. But his mind was no longer muddled like it used to be. And he felt stronger now than he had ever felt before. He looked at the Abbot and nodded.
‘Good.’ The Abbot put his arm around Jax and smiled. ‘The basic training usually takes years, but you, Mingzi, will have to do it in a fraction of that time. The silver wind is approaching too quickly.’
‘But… but how can I learn that fast?’
‘Have you not felt different since arriving here? Stronger, faster? Can you not feel that part of you is being fed by your connection to this place and your connection with Peng? As long as you work hard, it will be possible. You are destined to be a Peng Master, don’t forget. You have special skills that ordinary boys do not. First we will begin with stretching your muscles and tendons, while making them strong, keeping a balance. We will also make your eyes as sharp as an eagle’s, and your ears as sensitive as those of an owl. But most important of all – your spirit must be strengthened. Are you ready?’
Jax nodded, excited to begin. He imagined walking over flaming coals, or climbing tall cliffs and jumping off them.
‘I can see what you are thinking,’ the Abbot smiled. ‘And discipline by accomplishing difficult tasks is good training. But the hardest part about strengthening your spirit is – relaxation.’
‘Relaxing?’ Jax was puzzled. ‘You mean just sitting around looking at clouds and stuff?’
‘Relaxing means letting go. You let go of all the tense areas you find in your body, then you relax and clean your mind. Remember, just take away the energy from any thoughts that bother you.’
Jax thought instantly of Ma’s gold necklace, and he felt his chest tighten and his heart begin to race.
‘Breathe,’ the Abbot said. ‘Breathe deeply. And relax. Then think of what you can do to solve your problem. If you find you cannot do anything right now, relax that image in your mind, and let it float away. Do not give it any more energy, and it will go of its own accord.’
Jax fought to push the image of the necklace away but it kept stubbornly reappearing.
‘Learning to relax is indeed difficult,’ the Abbot said. ‘We all want to struggle! You will learn to relax, but it takes time. For now, let us do something else.’
He told Jax to jump up and hang off one of the lower branches of the gingko tree, letting his arms stretch and stretch. Then he had to hang from his knees, with his arms held down, to stretch his back. Over the next few hours, Jax learned how to stretch every part of his body, and the Abbot told him that he should stretch every day when he woke up, and again before training.
By the time the dinner-drum sounded, Jax was glad the day was over. His muscles were sore and his mind, exhausted.
Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Yu Yu peeping around one of the pillars, beckoning him over.
‘Hao le, good,’ the Abbot smiled. ‘You did very well today. Get some dinner and we will begin your hearing training tonight.’
More school after dinner! Jax thought. But he had to admit that learning this way wasn’t boring like sitting in a classroom.
Jax bowed to the Abbot respectfully, then crossed the courtyard to meet Yu Yu.
‘I’ve come to get you for dinner. What have you been learning?’ she said.
‘Stretching and breathing and stuff. My whole body aches.’
‘You’ll get used to it. E le ma? Hungry?’
‘Mmm… starving.’
‘Good, then you can try some of my dumplings. I made two hundred,’ she said proudly. ‘Still got floury hands. See…’ She held up a pair of ghostly white hands.
‘I thought you were meant to be working in the vegetable garden.’
‘I was, but I got hungry so I decided to help Cook Fan in the kitchen instead.’
Dinner that night consisted of bean curd prepared in four different ways and lots of different vegetables. Jax thought Yu Yu’s dumplings were the best. They were stuffed with dried mushrooms, young bamboo shoots, water chestnuts and cabbage all finely minced.
Jax was about to put the last one in his mouth when he saw the tiny monk, Lao Tan, nod at him from the other table. Jax looked at Yu Yu. He wasn’t sure who Lao Tan was nodding at, as the little monk was slightly cross-eyed.
‘Lao Tan wants you.’ Yu Yu nudged him in the ribs with her elbow. ‘You’ve got to go with him. I’ll eat your last dumpling.’ She reached over and took it from his bowl before he had time to answer. ‘Off you go then.’
Jax was too tired to do any more training. But then he remembered the vow he had made to himself – to be the best student the Abbot had ever seen. He got up from the table and followed the little monk out of the dining hall to a small room at the side of the monastery. A strong smell of pickled turnips made Jax’s eyes and nose smart. He looked around. Barrels and sacks of rice and flour had been pushed hard up against the walls, and dried cabbages hung from the rafters like withered green hands.
‘Sit down and be as quiet as you can,’ said Lao Tan, pointing to a sack in the middle of the room.
Jax sat down and crossed his legs, wondering what was going to happen next. The door closed, plunging the room into blackness. Jax couldn’t even see his own hand in front of his face. He sat very still, waiting. Where was Lao Tan? Had he locked Jax in there all by himself? He listened for the sound of breathing, but could only hear his own breath and his heart pounding. Just as he was beginning to feel scared:
Whoosh… then Whack!
He felt something soft but solid hit him in the side of the head. ‘Ow,’ he cried out.
He heard Lao Tan giggle and turned towards the sound. But before he could utter a word…
Thwack!
This time it hit him full in the face.
Lao Tan giggled again.
Jax punched out angrily. ‘Lao Tan. Stop. I don’t like it. It hurts.’
But then he realised that if he talked, he couldn’t hear the thing coming. He sat very still, hardly daring to breathe.
From his left side, he heard the whoosh coming towards him. But this time, it was as if everything had slowed down. He ducked, feeling it nick his ear.
‘Hao, hao, hao…’ laughed Lao Tan. ‘You learn fast. For now it’s only a handkerchief full of dirt, hung on a string from the ceiling above you. But as your ears get better, we will make the string into thread, and the bag into something harder.’
Jax was not sure he liked the sound of that.
Lao Tan seemed to be having the time of his life, giggling and laughing every time he heard the whump of the bag hitting Jax in the head. But as the evening grew late, Jax found that without even trying too hard, he could tell which direction the bag was coming from.
‘Hao le,’ Lao Tan said, opening a window to let in the moonlight. ‘That’s enough for now – you are getting tired. Have some sleep. Tomorrow the Abbot will teach you to stand and to walk.’
‘I can already stand, and walk, just fine!’ Jax said under his breath, annoyed at the little monk making fun of him all the time.
This only made Lao Tan laugh even harder. ‘Oh, no, I don’t mean like that. You will learn to move in a new way, a natural way that lets your mind and body move as one. Like the way a cat moves, graceful and strong, with no wasted energy. Go now, Mingzi. You have done well!’
Jax felt himself fill with pride. He stood up and brushed some dirt off his shoulder. ‘Thank you, Lao Tan,’ he said, bowing respectfully.
As they stepped out of the room, a sudden gust of wind blew several tiles off the roof. Lao Tan quickly jumped out of the way, pushing Jax with him. The tiles smashed on the paving stones below.
The little monk looked up at the sky and frowned. ‘That’s strange,’ he said. ‘We never get strong wind like that in Whispering Cloud Monastery. Something very bad must be coming.’
Jax wondered at Lao Tan’s comments. Then he thought, it’s true. Since coming to the monastery he had only felt a gentle breeze, even though there were always dark clouds in the sky above.
‘Quickly, Mingzi. Go and rest. Tomorrow you will need to work hard again.’ Lao Tan’s voice held an urgent note. ‘There is not much time left.’