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monastery is protected first of all by piety, the teachings say. Every wall of Silver River Shrine is hung with a banner of rice paper, upon which black calligraphy strokes offer wit or wisdom for those seeking enlightenment. Every room smells of incense, even when the incense burners are empty. And every morning and evening, the monks' prayers to the ancestors, to the five elements that govern the world, to the gods in their inscrutable knowledge, fill the halls. Second of all it is protected by custom, for violence taken against the enlightened ones is punished by the gods. In his years at the shrine, So Fooyan has only twice heard voices raised in anger: once from a drunken farmer who had lost his way home, and the second...ah, the second. For the second time, the last protection was breached. The last protection: the monks' own discipline and mastery of their passions, their bodies. *Only in self-defense and defense of others,* So Fooyan was told by every teacher in the mystic and martial arts. He grew up with tales of Avro, who used his powers to kill a hated sister and went mad, bursting into fire with his own excess. Or tales of the wraith who appeared one day and smote silent Vrini, for a crime yet unknown, so well had she hidden it. No wonder the monks were slow to recognize the threat, slow to act against the Ezinen soldiers who appeared in force...who claimed the monastery for their own territory. As if anyone could own a monastery, when the whole of the world was created by the five elements' dance and the gods' grace. By the campfire, So Fooyan shivers. "Go, young one," Haddan said to him as he nodded toward the door to the garden...and escape. "We are old, and we will defend this place. But go you into the world. It is a sign from the gods that we have kept you so long." And so he went. But here, alone and with only the few supplies he had the presence of mind to grab (strange, how clearly you can think when there are soldiers with scimitars about), he wonders. For an hour he has rested, tensing at every sound, every rustle, every birdcall in the woods. Once a friendly place, the nearby woods. Now it's a place of danger, for having lost his way in his flight, he doesn't know where to go next. And now, as the fire dwindles, he hears the stealthy tread of footsteps approaching--a single man or woman, perhaps. A friend--or not? "He who would find a friend, must first, in turn, allow himself to be found." Fooyan allows the person to approach.
Forward: So Fooyan's Prologue 2 Yin-yang image courtesy of Magickal Moon Graphics.
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