Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Fang Lu led us upstairs to settle our luggage. An awkward situation immediately arose: there were only two rooms on the upper floor. She and Jiang Haoyan would share one, while I would have the other to myself.

While she went to put away the suitcases, I pulled Jiang Haoyan aside for a private word.

“Your mom told me to protect you. Does that include protecting your chastity?”

Jiang Haoyan’s face turned red instantly.

“Qiao Moyu, what kind of nonsense are you talking about? This is our first time traveling together. How could I possibly… you know.”

I nodded, getting the point.

“Alright then. If she tries to force herself on you tonight, just give a shout.”

I dropped my suitcase, stretched, and walked out onto the balcony.

Jiang Haoyan followed me, looking indignant.

“Fang Lu isn’t that kind of person. She’s very innocent, okay?”

The balcony was also made of wood-a small space that could barely fit two people. Standing there, I looked down and saw the inner courtyard of the temple next door.

A lush cypress tree grew in the corner of the courtyard, and beneath it sat a well.

I was a bit surprised. Tibet’s high altitude usually means the groundwater is very deep, making suitable spots for wells quite rare. Since the temple had one, there must be a significant underground river nearby. It was a perfect spot to draw “Yin-Yang water.”

The sun sets exceptionally late in Tibet. Even though it was nearly nine in the evening, the sun had yet to dip below the horizon. The red orb hung precariously, casting thousands of rays of rosy light across the sky.

The mouth of the well was shrouded in the tree’s shadow. I stared at it for a moment, suddenly feeling like there was something on the inner wall of the well.

I rubbed my eyes, thinking I might be seeing things.

“Jiang Haoyan, look at the wall of the well. Is that a hand?”

Jiang Haoyan had once tested to be a pilot in high school and had excellent vision. He squeezed in beside me, looked down, and said in shock, “There really is a hand.”

The hand was gripping the well wall tightly, the back of it arched as if exerting a great deal of strength.

“Hey! Is anyone there? Someone fell into the well!”

I shouted down several times, but the sound of a bell ringing from the temple’s western hall drowned out my voice. The courtyard was empty; presumably, all the monks had gone to the hall for evening prayers.

“Stop shouting, they can’t hear you. Let’s go pull them up.”

Jiang Haoyan and I turned and ran downstairs. The temple’s main gate was right next door. Driven by the urgency of saving a life, we moved fast. I’d bet it took us less than a minute to get from the second floor to the courtyard.

But when we reached the well, I was panting for breath as I leaned over to look. At the bottom was a pool of deep green water, calm and still. The walls of the well were covered in slick green moss, and the moss was perfectly intact, showing no signs of having been touched.

“That’s strange. Where’s the person? Were we seeing things?”

Jiang Haoyan looked down twice and then walked around the perimeter of the well, looking utterly confused.

“What are you doing!”

A stern shout suddenly came from a distance. I turned to see a tall lama running toward us with an anxious expression. He was the heavy-set man with large ears we had seen earlier in the first-floor living room.

“Master Danjia, it looked like someone fell into the well just now.”

Danjia’s expression tightened instantly, losing the calm composure he had shown during our first meeting. He peered over the edge of the well and let out a slight sigh of relief.

“Impossible. Everyone else in the temple is in the hall for evening prayers. No one would be over here.”

“The temple is closed to visitors after seven o’clock. I must ask the two of you to leave.”

With a solemn face, Danjia gestured for us to depart. Since he put it that way, we couldn’t very well linger. We had no choice but to follow Danjia toward the gate. As we reached the entrance, I turned back to look one more time.

There, on the wall of the well, a hand had clearly emerged.

The back of the hand was pale, waving feebly a few times in our direction.

I stopped dead in my tracks. Jiang Haoyan had seen it too; he turned back, his expression just as shocked as mine.