“Welcome, Lord Shigeru. I consider it a great honor that your father has entrusted you to my care. I will take you to meet our Abbot and show you your room.”
As they stepped out of their sandals onto the boards of the cloister, Matsuda added, “You are to lead the life of a novice, apart from studying with me. Therefore you will sleep and eat with the monks and join them in meditation and prayer. You will have no special privileges while you are here. If you are to be trained in self-mastery, the more humble your spirit the better.”
Shigeru said nothing, not sure how this humbleness would sit with his awareness of his position as heir. He was not used to thinking of others as superior or even as his equals. His rank had been instilled into him in many subtle ways since he was born. He hoped he was not arrogant-he knew he was not humble.
They walked past the main hall, where lamps glowed around the golden figure of the Enlightened One. Incense filled the air, and Shigeru was conscious of many half-hidden monks in the dimness; he felt the power of their concentration, and something within him lifted in response, as if his spirit had been touched and wakened.
“Yes, your father judged it right. You are ready,” Matsuda murmured, and Shigeru felt his apprehension fall away.
The Abbot was a tiny, wizened man-Shigeru had never seen anyone so old. He must have been at least eighty. Men were considered adults at sixteen, women at fifteen; age twenty-five to thirty was the prime of life, forty already approaching old age. Few lived beyond sixty years. Matsuda must be close to fifty, the same age as his father-and next to the Abbot he looked like a young man.
The old man was supported by armrests, but he still sat erect, legs folded beneath him. Like Matsuda, he wore a plain monk’s robe, woven from hemp and dyed brown. His head was shaved. Round his neck was a string of ivory prayer beads, from which hung a silver amulet with a strange engraving on it, holding inside a prayer written in some distant temple on the mainland-in Tenjiku itself possibly. Shigeru bowed to the floor before him. The old man did not speak but exhaled deeply.
“Sit up,” Matsuda murmured. “The Lord Abbot wishes to see your face.”
Shigeru raised himself, his own eyes carefully cast down, while the other’s bright black eyes studied him. Still the old man did not speak.
Glancing up, Shigeru saw him nod twice. Then the eyes slowly closed.
Matsuda touched Shigeru on the shoulder and they both lowered their foreheads to the floor. A strange fragrance emanated from the old man, not the sour smell of age that might have been expected, but a sweet rich scent that hinted at everlasting life. Yet the old man seemed only a breath away from death.
Matsuda confirmed this as they left. “The Lord Abbot will depart from us shortly. He has been awaiting your arrival. He wanted to advise on your studies. Once that is done, he will be free to leave us.”
“Does he ever speak?” Shigeru asked.
“Very rarely now, but those of us who have served him for many years have an understanding with him.”
“I suppose Lord Matsuda will become Abbot in his place?”
“If the temple and the clan desire me to, I cannot refuse,” Matsuda replied. “But for now I am a humble monk, one among many, no different from any other, except that I have the honor to be your teacher.” He smiled radiantly when he said this. “I am looking forward to it! This is where you will sleep.”
The room was huge and empty, the thin mats that the monks slept on folded and put away in the closets behind sliding doors. On the floor lay a pile of clothes.
“Your own things will be stored away for you,” Matsuda said. Shigeru had dressed in his most formal clothes in honor of the Abbot and the temple. Now he took off the plum-colored silk garment, woven with a deeper pattern of purple, the Otori heron in silver on the back; it was carefully folded and put away, along with his other clothes. In its place he put on the simple brown robe like the monks’-the only difference between him and them now was that his hair was not cut. The material, clean but not new, was rough, unlike the silk he was used to; it chafed his skin and had an unusual smell.
There was a clap of thunder overhead, and a few moments later the sound of rain pouring in torrents onto the roofs and cascading from the eaves.
9
The rain continued without letup for a week. Every day, Shigeru expected his lessons with Matsuda to start, but he did not see the older man; nor did anyone speak to him other than to instruct him, with the other novices, in the teachings of the Enlightened One. The monks rose at midnight, prayed and meditated until daybreak, ate the first meal of the day-a little boiled rice mixed with barley-and devoted themselves to the daily chores of the temple: sweeping, washing, tending the gardens and the vegetable plots, though these outdoor activities were curtailed by the rain. The novices spent three hours studying, reading sacred texts, and listening to their teachers’ exposition. They ate again at the first half of the Hour of the Horse, then returned to the main hall of the temple to pray and meditate.
Later in the afternoon they performed exercises designed to train them in the control of the life force and to make the body and limbs strong and supple. The exercises, Shigeru could see, bore some relation to swordplay-in the stance, the shape of the movements, though not their speed. But the boys never held a sword in their hands. The older men practiced with wooden swords at this time, the clash of the poles and their sudden shouts breaking the silence of the temple, setting the doves into flight.
Shigeru overheard one of the novices whisper that they would be allowed to use poles one day, and he found himself longing for it. He practiced the exercises as diligently as anyone, but he could not see how they were enhancing what he assumed he already knew. When the physical training was over, they ate again-vegetables and a little soup-then retired at dusk to sleep for a few hours until midnight.
The other boys, aged from eleven upward, seemed in awe of him. They sometimes whispered to one another, risking a reprimand from their stern-faced teachers, but none of them spoke to him. Their heads were already shaved. Unless they ran away, as novices occasionally did, the temple would be their home for the rest of their lives. Where would anyone who ran away go? They could hardly return to their families, bringing disgrace and dishonor to them; nor, being cut off from their relatives and clan, could they enter the service of any other. They would become at best masterless, at worst bandits or beggars. The boys seemed quite content with their lot; they studied hard and did not complain. Some of them entered into close friendships with older monks, performed small services for them, possibly shared their beds, certainly formed ties of affection and loyalty.
Shigeru wondered how they could bear to live without women. He had not realized how much time he had spent watching the girls in Hagi castle, always aware of their quiet presence, their soft footsteps, their scent as they knelt with trays of food, bowls of tea, flasks of wine, always offering something. Then his thoughts strayed to the girl who had offered herself to him, until he thought he would be driven out of his mind by longing for her. He slept badly at night, unaccustomed to the strict routine and always hungry. He also missed Kiyoshige, and he worried about Takeshi-who would keep his brother from killing himself if he were not around?
All the boys suffered from tiredness, their growing bodies craving sleep. The worst time was after the midday meal. They sat cross-legged, heads nodding, eyes closing, on hard black cushions in the dim hall, which was airless and heavy with the smell of incense, wax, and oil. Often the priest leading the meditation would walk quietly among the seated figures, his hand descending with sudden force against an ear or a neck. Then the guilty boy would jerk awake, eyes stinging, cheeks flushing.