The Fox Demon Came to Repay the Monk Before His Vows novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: The Warden

Jingmo dressed Yanzhi in two breaths, and then he did something Yanzhi did not expect.

He pulled his own outer robe over Yanzhi's shoulders, knotted the sash with his big hands, and rubbed Yanzhi's cheeks hard with both thumbs.

"You are a porter," he said. "You carry water."

"You came with the last wood cart, and you do not speak unless you are spoken to."

"I speak beautifully."

"Fox."

"A porter," said Yanzhi. "Silent. Dull. Understood."

Jingmo didn't smile, but his eyes did something at the corners, and then he took Yanzhi by the wrist and ran.

They reached the front court as the great gate swung open.

Torches flooded the yard.

A red-lacquered palanquin came through on the shoulders of eight men in black and white.

Behind it marched a double line of exorcist monks with bronze bells hung from their belts.

The abbot stood on the top step in his patched saffron, small and calm in front of all that color.

The palanquin was set down.

A man stepped out of it and straightened his sleeves with an air of enormous leisure.

He was tall and spare, in a robe of black and white, with a jade bell at his belt.

He wore a neat black beard that was only now going silver at the temples.

He looked forty.

He had the kind of face that people trust right before they are hurt by it.

"Venerable Cizhao," said Warden Bian Chengzhi, and bowed exactly as low as courtesy demanded and not a hair lower. "Forgive the short notice."

"You are a day early," said the abbot mildly.

"The roads were kind. And I could not bear to miss a moment of this."

He turned, and his smile warmed by about a degree. "Jingmo."

Jingmo stepped forward and knelt.

Yanzhi felt the cold of the flagstones in his own knees.

"Warden," Jingmo said.

"Rise, rise. Three days to your final vows, after seven years of waiting."

The Warden took him by both shoulders and lifted him, and Yanzhi hated those hands at once.

"You look well. You look as if you've been eating."

"The cook is generous."

"I am delighted to hear it."

The Warden's eyes moved across the courtyard, slowly, resting on novices and lanterns and the line of the wall.

They landed on Yanzhi.

He kept his head down and his hands tucked in Jingmo's too-long sleeves.

He felt the look.

"And who is this?" said the Warden pleasantly.

"A porter," said Jingmo, in a perfectly level voice. "He came up with the wood cart yesterday."

"What a lot of hair for a porter."

"He was born with it."

"Look up, young man."

Yanzhi looked up.

The jade bell at the Warden's belt hung perfectly silent.

That saved him, he understood later.

That, and the black bead lying warm against his throat, which dulled whatever a bell can hear.

The Warden studied his face for three breaths.

His eyes were pale grey, very clear, and absolutely kind.

"Beautiful," he said. "How lucky the temple is. What is your name?"

"Zhi," said Yanzhi, which was the first syllable of a very common name and the last thing his mother would have called him.

← Chapter 3 · All chapters · Chapter 5 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend