Chapter Text
Autumn had come to the Black Heron School. The air was crisp and was beginning to cool, providing much-appreciated respite from the intense heat of summer. The mountain was abuzz with activity as the students found themselves drawn outside to study and practice in the comfortable weather. Outsiders from nearby villages found their way onto the campus, bringing vegetables to be pickled, salted meats, and the last remains of summer crops. The preparation for winter had to begin early for the mountain sect. The golden red leaves of the ash trees surrounding the campus still clung to their branches, eking out a few more days of life before they would begin to litter the pathways of the school.
It was a twilight time of anticipation. Nestled between the harsh winter and the scorching summer, it was a period where those who called this place home could feel comfort and ease. And the time when it was most important to remain diligent not to slip into complacency.
Yu Wanxi focused his breathing. He had to be careful and measured. Disciplined. But not rigid. In control, but not forced. He stared at the blank sheet of paper unfurled in front of him. The grid on the sheet indicated that it was for practice. It was for improvement. The yellow tint of the page begged for ink to be spilled upon it. The fibers woven together that made up the network of interconnected threads would take the black ink and perfectly display the artful intent of the characters he wrote. It was not just about conveying information. In calligraphy, the characters themselves told of emotion and subtle inference. Each stroke carried weight and importance.
Wanxi, a teenaged swordsman from the Wudang Clan, gripped at the bamboo hilt of his brush. He eyed the inkwell, fresh with obsidian liquid. The inkstick he had just used lay next to it. Smoke soot, compressed into a brick and hardened, was rubbed into the container and mixed with the barest amount of water to create the medium. The ink was waiting to be used. Begging to be applied to the paper laid out in front of him, fearful of drying before it could be used. He dipped the soft goat-hair brush into the well and started his work.
The task at hand was a simple transcription of a famous work from an old master of the Black Heron school. It spoke of returning home after a lengthy trip, greeting old friends and family, finding comfort and sadness in the things that changed and the things that stayed the same. It was melancholic and did nothing to stir the heart of the boy, but he did have to admit that the artistry of the calligraphy was impressive. The thought of returning home and finding it somehow an unpleasant experience was not something that Wanxi wished to dwell on. His tutelage at the Black Heron School, far away from his familial compound, was eventful and useful, but he had no intention of making it permanent. He yearned to return with the strength and skill that it took to take the head of his murderous family chief. The words that he copied were clearly meaningful for those without fire in their chests.
The process of copying wasn’t a simple task. If Wanxi cared exclusively about the text alone, he could transcribe the entire script in just a few minutes. The scroll that he was referencing was less than a meter in length and was quite legible. The difficulty of the task was attempting to replicate the exact method by which the characters were made. Mimicking the pressure applied by the brush, the length of the strokes, the intensity of the ink. It was writing in someone else’s voice. But it was good practice. As Instructor Xia had told him: just as clothing must be fitted and tailored, so too must your words. And, allegedly, by attempting to understand the way this old master wrote, he could articulate his own writing, and self, better.
After many minutes of careful and deliberate effort, Wanxi cleaned his brush and set it down. He scanned the work in front of him, comparing it to the original. It was close! It was seriously close! But how could you possibly recreate something without being there? How could you capture the energy and vitality of the author without witnessing it in person? The words were merely projections of the act. And in a way, this process of transcribing was like trying to piece together the past with incomplete information. Still, he was relatively pleased with his work.
He smiled at the pair of shisa lion-dog paperweights flanking the upper corners. His friend Mitugwa had given them to him a few months back as a gift. Their fierce expressions were meant to both ward away bad spirits and keep good spirits around. The quality of the carving and stylized appearance were striking. But the Wudang boy mainly cared that they were heavy enough to keep the page from rolling up.
Seated just a few tables down in the study hall was an older teenage girl, an upperclassman at the Black Heron school. She was bent over a similar parchment, flicking her brush with an energy and dynamism that reflected a real comfort in her motions. Her black hair was braided and interwoven into a complicated bun that Wanxi accepted he did not understand. (He was more than happy with the simple loop of fabric that tied his long hair back.) Across her face was a semi-translucent veil that covered her nose and mouth. Wanxi stood and walked over to observe.
The girl was copying a different piece by the same old master. The subject was praising a contemporary who refused to serve the royal court and instead lived as a hermit. “Copy,” as a term, indicated a kind of forgery. A lack of originality. If something was just a copy, it was lesser than the original. What this classmate was doing was more akin to duplication. The ink put onto the paper bore the same emotional weight and technical skill employed by the original artist. And the lack of a grid indicated that she was practiced enough to do away with positioning crutches. It was somewhat disheartening to see the ease at which his classmate put ink to paper.
“Tranquil Tranquil,” Wanxi said, “I do not understand how you are so skilled at calligraphy!”
The girl’s name, Tranquil Tranquil, was still something that Wanxi had trouble saying with a straight face. But it was her chosen name after she joined the Quanzhen Daoist School and devoted herself to Daoist study, and Wanxi wished to abide by it! It was supposed to mean tranquility in terms of both a lack of sound and a lack of earthly worry. The Wudang Clan itself was firmly rooted in the Daoist teachings and Wanxi was no stranger to the concepts. Still, he could not imagine taking on such a pious decision as to change his name.
The girl looked up from her desk and smiled from behind her veil. She grabbed a booklet from inside her blue robes and began jotting inside one of the pages.
“I write a lot!” She presented the page to Wanxi. He could tell she was in good spirits about this. Changing her name was not the only consequence of joining the Quanzhen Daoist School: Tranquil Tranquil had also taken a vow of silence.
“I can tell! Still, I am impressed. It seems that you were able to totally embody that work. If it wasn’t for the different paper, I wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.” Wanxi smiled, showing off a gap where he was missing a tooth. “Maybe you should pursue forgery instead of pious study?”
“There’s less money in forgery than piety. If you learn the Dao, good fortune always smiles upon you.” Tranquil Tranquil thumped the pad with the back of her brush hilt to accentuate her point. It was made of ivory and looked to be carved to perfectly fit her dainty hand. Such a brush would have been expensive. But it was probably worth the cost if it was the only way she had to communicate.
“My days are full enough with holy people telling me about ethics, sister. I’ve been forced to attend Great Compassion’s lectures enough times in the last three months to feel like I might accidentally be learning something!” Wanxi shook his head and chuckled.
In the months since he had helped Mitugwa recover several stolen items of hers, Wanxi had been dragged to a handful of Buddhist sutra readings and interpretation lectures. Great Compassion was a monk-in-training of the Shaolin Temple, making him the Wudang boy’s rival by default. But the two had developed a begrudging friendship, brokered by the Ryukyuan girl who always seemed happy to bridge any gaps between them. There were still a million things about Great Compassion that rubbed Wanxi the wrong way. And he still felt the boiling rage of despicable hatred whenever they were alone together. But they had found a mutual interest in sparring together. And somehow their interactions when they were both battered and bruised and exhausted became amicable.
“You will have to befriend a Confucian scholar next. They can call you ‘Vinegar Tasting Hero’ and you can start a brewery.” Tranquil Tranquil referred to a famous painting, a copy of which hung in Wanxi’s family compound. It showed the masters of the three teachings sampling vinegar from a vat and reacting differently. It was supposed to illustrate the differences between the three great philosophies while showing that they were all bound together. Before Wanxi could even come up with a snappy response, the girl had already sketched out a little drawing of three long-haired figures around a cauldron. It was absolutely incredible how quickly she could move her brush!
“I will have to commission you to paint the sign, I see!” Wanxi conceded. He pursed his lips and looked back at the calligraphy work that Tranquil Tranquil had completed. It was remarkable that she could both write so quickly and with such sophistication.
The entire point of studying calligraphy, in Wanxi’s eyes, was to hone his craft with the sword. It was a common truism that mastery of the blade and mastery of the brush went hand-in-hand. The Wudang Clan took great pains in educating the children of the sect in the art. And adults were expected to hone their craft as they aged. It was even the focus of a major event that was held among his family once every other full moon. The adults would gather in the courtyard and try to outdo each other in composing some piece of prose or poetry. The chief would select the piece with the most striking textual composition and display it with pride in the grand hall alongside priceless antiques and relics.
Wanxi had many fond memories of watching his parents compete. Of course, Wanxi never appreciated it while he was there. He would either play or play-fight with the other children. There was always food and snacks to gorge themselves on. The sound of dozens of brushes swiping away mingled with playful banter and respectful appreciation. Now, the thought of gathering with loved ones under the moon and stars and sharing in the joy of writing felt overwhelmingly nostalgic.
Allegedly, supposedly, by improving in calligraphy, Wanxi could become a better swordsman. Instructor Xia had mentioned it on a number of occasions. In fact, the entire exercise was because his teacher had challenged him to improve. According to Instructor Xia, intentionally creating strokes in a uniform and practed way was no different than striking with a sword in a rehearsed set of moves. They would be legible, yes, but easily predicted.
Wanxi had to improve.
“Actually, Tranquil Tranquil, by any chance would you be able to give me some help with my writing?” Wanxi ventured. “I would appreciate some guidance and tutoring, if you have the time.”
The girl’s eyes shone with intensity and passion.
“It would be my pleasure!”
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Permanence. Permanence. Permanence. Permanence. Permanence. Permanence. Permanence. PERMANENCE.
The word had no more meaning to Wanxi, who had written the character for it all day with Tranquil Tranquil. At first it was just writing the character over and over. The mute girl looked over his shoulder, studying his writing like a hawk studies a rabbit. Then she would intervene. It was always in some different way. He would be halfway through the central downward radical and she would clap her hands. Or he would be performing the final right press and she would kick the table. It was all random and Wanxi had no idea what he was even supposed to be learning from this.
He was just starting a new line on the page when his chair was kicked out from under him without warning. He toppled onto the ground with a cry, launching his brush across the hall, where it splattered ink onto a far wall. The wooden chair slid a few feet with a high-pitched scraping sound. He stood up immediately to find the Daoist with her hands over her stomach, her mouth open behind the translucent veil as she silently laughed. Wanxi looked for where he had just flung his writing implement. He saw it rolled up against the raised threshold of the moon-shaped entrance and trudged over to pick it up.
“You know, when I asked for help, I was assuming you could maybe give me some advice or correct my form. I wasn’t asking to be assaulted!” He huffed as he gathered the chair and returned to his desk. “How is this even helping me?”
Tranquil Tranquil wiped a tear away from her eye. It was unusual to see someone recovering from a fit of laughter in total quiet. She clearly took her oath seriously to be able to resist such a fundamental human reaction. She wrote out a few words in her notebook and presented it to Wanxi as he settled back into position.
“Your clerical script is fine. Very legible. But your focus is lacking! There are ten thousand distractions that can happen when you write. And if you lose your place each time, you will never complete a great work.”
Wanxi read the words a few times to try and grasp at what she was trying to say. The older girl leaned her head forward and raised her eyebrows as if to say “Well?”
“I’m not trying to complete a great work! I want to get better at swordsmanship, not penmanship! But everyone tells me that if I can’t improve my calligraphy, I won’t improve with the sword. They seem so different! I don’t get how this is all connected.”
Tranquil Tranquil looked up at the ceiling, craning her neck and tapping her chin with the butt of her brush as she thought of a response. She seemed happy with her reply when she showed her work.
“Try to predict and react to what I do. But always keep writing. If you cannot overcome ten thousand distractions with a brush, how can you overcome ten million distractions with a sword?”
With the barest of understanding of what she meant, the Wudang boy returned to the paper. Many of the characters were splodgy and misshapen thanks to the bizarre learning environment. Some of them were not even able to be completed, such as the one he just attempted to write. It was a different interruption each time and without a clear pattern of frequency, as plenty of the symbols were perfectly formed. If he was to somehow predict what was going to happen, he would have to focus not just on the paper, but also his surroundings.
He started again. He inhaled and exhaled. Dipping the tip of his brush into the inkwell. He listened to the quiet hall, breathing in the musty scent of sandalwood incense that was so common in the study rooms. He allowed himself to write as he attempted to visualize his surroundings to watch for intrusion without needing to actually use his eyes.
Dot. Right. Down. Hook. Lift. Right. Left throw. Lift. Left throw. Right press. Repeat. Dot. Right. Down. Hook. Lift. Right. Left throw. Lift. Left throw. Right press. Repeat. Dot. Right. Down. Hook. Lift. Right-there was movement in the air. He could feel the way the aether around him shifted and he could even catch the beginning of action out of the corner of his eye. In that split second, he reached out on pure instinct to the inkwell with his left hand, contorting his body so that the brush did not leave the paper. Left throw. He lifted the inkwell up. Lift. A fraction of a second later, the hand of Tranquil Tranquil swept under the porcelain container, missing by millimeters and cleanly skimming along the table. Left throw. He set the inkwell back down on the table. Right press. He brought his hand back to his side and completed the last stroke of the radical.
He paused, looking at his work, totally stunned by what just happened. Permanence. Forever. Everlasting. Infinite in age, forward-facing, existing for all time. Wanxi was not one to gloat but this may have been the finest example of calligraphy that he had ever done while at the Black Heron school. It not only conveyed the word and its many interpretations, it also conveyed a kind of kinetic energy and flourish that spoke of deeper meaning. It wasn’t just about permanence. It was about the relationship that all things had not just in the moment, but in the continuation of all moments. The intertwining of life and energy as they are forced to intersect in the future. It was incredible, beautiful. And it had come from his own hand! How could he have possibly created something so meaningful and aesthetically attractive and timeless?
And then it vanished as a flood of black ink rushed over the page. The porcelain inkwell clattered as it rolled about on the table. Tranquil Tranquil had repeated her move and had absolutely connected on the second attempt, resulting in a spill that totally blanketed Wanxi’s crowning achievement in script. He gasped and righted the container, trying to formulate some kind of way to recover the work he had just created. He dabbed at the page with the hem of his robe. That only resulted in his hands and clothes becoming stained. He looked up at his tutor in shock and horror and was about to complain. But she already had something written and right in his face before he could form a single word.
“You did good! But you got lost in the worst distraction of all: self-admiration. Don’t worry, you’ll have plenty more chances to get it perfect. Keep going!”
Her smile was real and genuine and her words were hopeful but Wanxi had to actually take a moment to steady his emotions. He had just fallen in love and then lost it a moment later. And all that remained was a void on the page. That character truly was too good for this world.
But there was still space on the paper. So he kept writing.