Novel Excerpts

Chapter 2 – Secrets

132.1400. Ming Dynasty, Gansu Province, Five Springs Mountain. Secret Dojo for Girls.

This excerpt is from the end of the Chapter. Tamakei is the Grandmaster of the hidden Dojo and discovers that one of the girls in the Dojo is pregnant and the would be father is looking for her to put an end to the pregnancy. After some discussions, Tamakei (who recently had a miscarriage) agrees that Agamem (Tamakei's lover and Dojo instructor) should go with the student to discuss the matter with the boy, who's searching is placing both the Dojo and the well being of the student and expectant mother at risk. Escorting the student, Agamem is forced to engage the boy and his friends in a violent altercation where the student witnesses Agamem's secret. She suspects that Tamakei is well aware of Agamem's true nature. The following sequence occurs the night Agamem returns from the city with the student. Tamakei knows that Agamem will soon disappear in the same manner with which he appeared. Agamem knows this as well.

..."Why do you never speak of your past?" Tamakei says, laying naked with Agamem under the blanket in their modest bed.

"Because it is unwritten," Agamem says.

The moon peeks through the trees through the window in the rear of the Dojo. The light from the candle’s flame flickers on Tamakei’s oval face, gleaming on her rounded cheeks. Her long, unpinned hair, spreads natant across the pillow, as she stares into the ceiling.

"Why must you speak in riddles?" Tamakei asks. "Then speak of the future."

"It is unseen."

"Then what is left?"

"The present."

"Then speak of it."

"I believe I did."

Puzzled, she looks at him. He rolls back on top of her.

"If you will listen, I will speak again," he says.

She giggles.

"Giggling is unbecoming of a Grandmaster," he continues.

His head descends down underneath the covers.

"I am more taught then learned," she says.

The blanket bulges as his head pauses at her breasts." It is a long journey, I require provisions."

She giggles again and starts playing with his hair. The bulge slides further down. "You need not ask for that which is yours," she says."You will outlive me. My tomb will weep."

The bulge stops moving.

"Yes, but I’ll never leave you," he says. "Death shares its bed with the past and the future. It is only the present who sleeps alone."

"More riddles, my sweet Boy?"

The bulge continues to move.

"I am ashamed that, as you lay now, I grow jealous knowing you have done so in another bed," she pauses, thoughtfully choosing her words. "And shall again. You are kind, gentle, dutiful, and a loyal lover. In a school of girls, you never strayed. Why can’t you remember any other lovers? You are too good."

The bulge stops.

"You would complain of my goodness?" Agamem says.

She runs her fingers through his hair, the tips whispering her seriousness to his nearby ear.

"I am not good. I have simply had a thousand years to make it true. I think I was very bad once," he says. "I fell in love with pain. But that affection was unreturned. Or it loved me like no other. Like the mist in these mountains, my impalpable rage became limitless, As is my affection for you."

"Impalpible?"

"Limitless."

"And what of your love?"

"It speaks to you. Not of you. And in turn exposes us both," Agamem says. "It knows only of the present."

She guides his head down.

"Then speak some more, so we may both weep. When tomorrow comes."