Chapter 22 The Temple #2
Wet walls drip and shimmer in the faint light.
The rock is layered in striations of red and brown, the color of blood at different stages of freshness.
Not all of it is enclosed; the wall behind you is partly open, with a large hole facing out toward the sea.
Like an enormous window set into stone. Technically accessible by land, but you understand why Sea Sister did not take you that way.
Although it has a good view of the horizon, the cave’s “dry” entrance is treacherous: there would be a sheer climb to get in or out, and on the other side a maze of whirlpools and sharp rocks, which one would have to edge around to reach safer terrain.
The ceiling is high and rent with gaps. Sunbeams pierce the darkness, creating odd refractions and shadows. In heavy rain, this place becomes a forest of waterfalls, all dribbling and rivuleting away.
It is the Jiaoren Cavern, you realize with shock. Whose sea-facing entrance is difficult to access. The one containing a shrine to Kwun Yam, or possibly Ma Zu.
Slowly get to your feet in that chest-deep pool. Slowly turn around, half knowing already what you will see.
A stone temple rises at the far end of the cavern where the water is shallowest, carved straight into the rock itself, and illuminated by faint light, which trickles through gaps in the stalactite-riddled ceiling.
A thousand details catch the eye, all of them coalescing into a strange and surreal picture.
Rough-hewn walls rise from the water. A pyramid roof protrudes outward, edges curled up like ancient pagodas, with a spike at the top.
The entrance is open, no door in it, and within you can see something that looks like a statue, with a low-lying table—altar? shrine?—in front.
“Amazing,” you whisper aloud, and the sound reverberates in a multitude of soft echoes.
There is no one else here, yet the cave is noisy as a crowd.
Every drop—and they are legion—seems to echo and reverberate; every lapping wave is a ringing slap.
As you stumble forward, relieved to be in water shallow enough to stand, your sloshing is cacophonous.
Sound cannot escape this place, bouncing and snagging on every surface.
Sea Sister stands up, comes to walk beside you. Water sluices off the bony angles and flat planes of her form. She doesn’t instantly burn or dry when out of the water, and that’s either from lack of direct sunlight, or something about the cave is special. Perhaps both.
She drifts to the side of the cavern, where there is a sort of crevice in the rocks, and wedges your glass bottle gift into it, very carefully. Preserving it where she can see. It’s rather sweet.
“It’s beautiful, this cavern.” The words boom and echo. “But why did you bring me here?”
This place is special to me. Her voice is the same as always, yet for the first time it strikes you that it doesn’t sound … quite right. Go, Siu Yin. Step within the temple. She lifts one hand, and points.
Cloudy water stirs with each step. At no point are your feet dry. Even in low tide, the ocean flows into the temple itself; the entire floor stands in several inches of salt water.
You hover just beyond the archway, unwilling to venture farther. The cavern isn’t well lit, and the interior of the shrine has no light at all, beyond what seeps through the archway.
A commanding statue waits within, and you recognize the figure at once.
The peaceful face, the modest half smile.
The multitude of arms and eyes, to reach all living creatures on earth.
Long robes flow from head to toe. One hand holds some kind of relic, though time and tides have crumbled it to dust. The hat and clothes and relic remind you of Ma Zu, and you remember what your mother said about the villagers: that they viewed Ma Zu as simply an incarnation of Kwun Yam. An interesting belief, if unorthodox.
Step closer, peering into the temple. You have always known Kwun Yam as a lady goddess, but older texts sometimes portray them as a man.
This statue is somewhere in between, the gender indeterminate and the features neutral.
Kwun Yam transcends gender, and can be either. The statue is stunning regardless.
Curiously, you feel starkly different in here, in a way that is hard to explain. Cleaner, almost; as if your mind has been sinking into sand from the moment you arrived at this island, and something has rinsed it all away. You’re more awake.
Yes. Definitely more awake. The days on Shek Ham Chau have been congealing together like soup left overnight. Standing in this temple is a cold slap of clarity.
“Why are we here?” you say, out loud. “Is this where I can become a jiaoren?”
You turn around, or try to, but Sea Sister grips your arms, keeping you facing forward.
Keep moving.
Is she even speaking? You’d think that would be an easy thing to determine and yet, for the first time, you’re unsure whether she is actually, physically talking, or you’re just … hearing her. Inside your head.
Keep moving, she says again, insistent, and points. Go into the temple. Go see.
You do as she suggests, stepping beneath the archway with extreme reluctance.
Carvings are etched into the stone walls, beautifully done but—like the statue—suffering from the erosion of centuries. Most are barely discernible, now, which is why you did not see them straightaway in the half-darkness. The closest one looks more like someone has attacked the stone with an axe.
Hesitant, reverent, uncertain, you edge a little farther into the temple, trying in vain to get a glimpse of the stories depicted within.
Against the far wall is a shrine, on which a collection of pearls and shiny ocean rocks have been piled by unknown hands in ages past. A curious and unconventional offering, but you suppose incense wouldn’t work well in so damp a place.
The carvings are easier to see from here.
Most are ruinous beyond deciphering, but three of them stand out.
The biggest mural shows a scene you don’t recognize: of Kwun Yam descending to an underwater world, while strange beings surround her with offerings.
They have fins and scales and fish-like faces with lidded eyes, their appearance closer to aquatic than human. Tails instead of legs, too.
Jiaoren. Flood dragon people. You touch the carvings thoughtfully, entranced by the depictions. Again, this is a story you’d associate more with Ma Zu, and the bleed-over with Kwun Yam is as weird as it is confusing. You take another step forward, and something crunches beneath one foot.
Glance down.
And almost retch, despite yourself. For here on the temple floor are the long-rotted remains of a girl’s corpse.
Mami’s story flashes through your head, mixing with the strange ghost dream you had some weeks ago. A little girl, thought to be unlucky. Chased to the headland where she fell into this cave, and then left to die.
It should be impossible. A body in this damp, ocean-washed place would have disintegrated long ago. Yet somehow, you sense innately that this is indeed the sister that Mami spoke of, and whom you dreamed of. Preserved by some supernatural influence.
A hideous suspicion is beginning to creep over you.
Hesitant and slow, you walk back out into the echoing cavern. For the first time in months, your brain is alert and sharp as the rocks underfoot, your senses unfogged by the island’s strange, dreamy atmosphere. The temple has that effect, its divinity cutting through like a knife.
There in the dim light of Kwun Yam’s sacred temple, Sea Sister stands revealed.
Gone is the heady aura that made her seem alluring. You perceive her as she truly is: the starved ruination of her body, bones sketched beneath graying skin. The ragged claws and serrated teeth. Her eyes are not divinely white, but dead and filmed over. Like that of a corpse.
“You … are not a jiaoren,” you say, swallowing. “This temple to Kwun Yam depicts her as Ma Zu going beneath the sea. She extends her compassion to all creatures, above and below the waves. But you are not like the jiaoren she met.”
No fins, no gills, no scales. No fish tail.
No magic, only horror.
Please, Sea Sister says, except she really isn’t speaking in the physical sense. Her words are a whisper inside your head, watery and echoing. Please, Siu Yin. Don’t run.
“Sea Sister,” you say, shakily, “tell me who you are.”
You need her to say it. The truth matters.
She inches closer, holding your face with her long, clammy hands. Let me show you, she says, and presses her forehead to yours. See for yourself.