chapter 5

chapter 5

The tree that had been dead beyond doubt suddenly sprouted a labyrinth of branches. Layer upon layer intertwined until they blotted out the sky, as though the tree meant to smother the entire estate.

Wind shrieked through the gaps in the vines. Withered branches, like ghostly claws, slowly reached toward the baby boy in my arms.

He seemed to sense them. Instead of fear, he reached out, caught the tip of one branch, and giggled.

“Mama!” he called suddenly.

Where his hand touched, slender green shoots burst from the dead wood. Like tiny feelers, they stroked his face again and again.

He rubbed his head against them in answer.

The vines of the towering ghost tree slowly withdrew. Soon it was once more the unremarkable dead tree in the courtyard.

The female fruit ran out.

“Look,” I told her. “The male fruit is so well behaved. He does not seem like the evil thing you described.”

“Just wait,” she said. “His nature is good, but he was born to collect a debt. Once he begins, he will be fiercer than any ghost.”

I returned the quiet baby to Madam’s room and went back to the dead tree.

Its bark was dry, weathered by years of wind and rain until it flaked away in patches.

“Look here,” the female fruit said.

I ran my hand where she pointed and felt deep grooves circling the trunk.

“Scars from the Immortal-Binding Rope!” She ran to the foot of the tree. “Dig around the roots. See whether the Immortal-Fixing Nails are there.”

I crouched and scraped away the loose soil. Three long, rusted nails lay beneath it.

“Pull them out!”

I strained with all my strength, but they would not move.

On closer inspection, each nail held a different sort of root.

The root pinned by the first turned supple at the slightest touch. It wound softly around my finger, yielding to anyone’s manipulation.

The root beneath the second lay meek and frail, as though the faintest breeze could break it.

The third was beautiful in color, so vivid that it scarcely resembled a dead tree’s root at all.

Supple. Frail. Beautiful.

Find those three roots and nail them down hard, and a ginseng-fruit tree could never run again.

“How do we break their hold?” I asked.

“Steel overcomes suppleness, strength defeats frailty, and vigor replaces beauty,” the female fruit said. “Think carefully.”

Steel. Strength. Vigor.

A strong body brings steel. Knowledge brings strength. A broad horizon brings vigor.

I fetched a knife and a staff. The first nail released itself.

I brought a brush and books. The second withdrew into the earth.

Finally, I laid down a pair of traveling shoes and a handful of silver for the road. The third nail shattered.

With the nails gone, talismans hidden beneath the soil emerged.

There were four, one in each direction: east, west, north, and south. Each bore a different word.

Virtue. Beauty. Grace. Labor.

The four virtues demanded of women. Could four weightless words truly imprison a ginseng-fruit tree blessed with the spirit of heaven and earth?

The female fruit and I tore all four talismans apart.

Was the tree saved now?

No, she said. We still had to wait.

“For what?”

“For a group of people.”

At first I did not understand whom she meant.

Summer gave way to winter. The female fruit and I waited year after year.

Strangely, she never grew. Day after day, she remained a tiny baby.

Yet Master and Madam’s hair turned half white, and the young master grew into a man.

He had been docile enough as a child. Master and Madam spoiled him, and as he aged his nature soured. He stole chickens and dogs, cheated and swindled, lied and robbed. There was no crime he would not attempt.

His family paid compensation again and again, but still could not bear to scold him.

His manhood never grew. It remained no bigger than a grain of millet. Perhaps because of that, he lusted desperately after women and hated them just as fiercely.

One day, a disheveled old woman appeared at the house. The moment she saw him, she reached out with a trembling hand.

“My son! My son!”

He kicked her out of the gate in disgust.

When he turned back, he stared darkly at the dead tree in the courtyard. A moment later, he returned with an ax.

He was about to strike the tree when a passerby at the gate stopped him.

The traveler was a monk. He said he was passing through and wished to beg a bowl of water.

Madam ordered me to receive him.

“From where does the holy monk come?” I asked.

“This poor monk comes from the Eastern Land.” As he spoke, he looked up at the dead tree. “Benefactress, to tell the truth, I have seen this tree before.”

“You have?”

“It is a ginseng-fruit tree, imprisoned here. Many years ago, I rested beneath it, and someone tried to sell me a ginseng fruit.”

The fruit seller had told him, “You are only a monk. When you grow old, you will surely be alone and uncared for. Why not eat a ginseng fruit? A taste of its flesh will let you live forty-seven thousand years.”

The monk’s heart was tender. The fruit looked plainly like a child, he said, and he would not eat it.

He wished to free the tree, but he was only a mortal then and lacked the power.

After leaving the seller, he told his eldest disciple what he had seen. One glance was enough for the disciple to recognize that the tree had been imprisoned and exploited for profit.

The eldest disciple went to confront the seller. He could soar to heaven, descend into the earth, and assume seventy-two transformations. Yet the fruit sellers made yearly offerings to Great Immortal Zhenyuan, who protected their trade.

The soil there was harder than raw iron. Even the eldest disciple’s staff could neither pry it loose nor break it.

He returned and told his two younger brothers.

The second disciple had once been Grand Marshal Tianpeng, commander of three hundred thousand sailors of the Heavenly River. He stationed his troops around the ginseng-fruit tree day and night, but even heavenly sailors sometimes let their attention slip. Each time they did, the tree was transplanted elsewhere.

The third disciple had once been the Curtain-Lifting General and governed the River of Flowing Sands in the mortal realm. Though the youngest of the three, he had the widest web of connections.

To find the tree, he called upon bodhisattvas and buddhas. One reported to another, who petitioned someone higher, until at last the matter reached Guanyin. Only then was the ginseng-fruit tree rescued.

“But after my disciples and I departed, the fruit sellers returned,” the holy monk said. “In the end, the tree still withered and died.”

After much thought, I told him the female fruit’s secret.

That night, the female fruit came alive.

When she saw the holy monk, she said, “At last. The ones we awaited have come.”

The holy monk was the reincarnation of Golden Cicada, and so represented metal.

His eldest disciple possessed eyes of blazing fire, and so represented fire.

His second disciple commanded the sailors of the Heavenly River, and so represented water.

His third disciple governed the River of Flowing Sands, and so represented earth.

Only wood was missing.

Wood was the most important of all. Only once they found it could they pull the dead tree out by the roots.

As I listened to the holy monk and the female fruit, realization struck me like lightning.

One piece of wood was still missing…

Forgetting all propriety, I seized the holy monk’s hand. “Holy monk, please tell me. Is the dead tree in this courtyard… me?”