A Heart Dug Out

"Ah, holy man, thank the gods you're alive!" cried Granny Hong tearfully, running forward. "We thought you too had perished at the hands of those evil bandits. How did you escape them?"

"Bandits?" Fahai frowned. He gazed at the ruins, the bodies lying in the snow, and closed his eyes, murmuring prayers quietly to himself for the dead.

Opening his eyes, he saw the villagers had gathered respectfully around him, humbly waiting for his reply. He shook his head. "I did not meet any bandits. I am sorry to see there has been violence and death here. May their souls find peace."

Granny Hong wiped a tear away hastily. "We're just thankful you're alive. We have lost too many already to those wicked men. But why didn't you come back earlier? Did anything happen to you?"

Fahai bowed his head. "I lost track of time when I was deep in my meditation. When I came to my sense it was already late in the night. While making my way back to the village I came across something which greatly disturbed me, however."

He paused, and his eyes travelled over the crowd of faces. "Is Madame Zheng present?"

She came forward to the front without saying anything, and stood watching him nervously.

Fahai cleared his throat. "I fear I have found the body of your husband on the mountain, lying near the path towards the village. He is dead."

There was the faint sound of several breaths being released, and Zheng Ziyi said nothing, standing as if turned to stone, as if waiting for the monk to explain himself.

Granny Hong reached out and took Zheng Ziyi's hand, squeezing it silently in a sudden moment of empathy. The two had never been close, but in the moment Granny Hong saw her own loss in the other woman's stricken face.

"We will bring him back and give him a proper burial," she whispered.

Fahai hesitated. "There is something strange about the body." He raised his head and there was a stern expression in his eyes. "He has had his heart dug out, and it is missing."

In the brief moment of petrified silence his words seemed to tingle in the air like electricity, then there was a collective gasp of horror.

"Could it--could it be the bandits?" faltered Huajun unconvincingly.

Granny Hong covered her mouth. "It's a demon," she said faintly. "Holy man, you told us that the demons ate human hearts, didn't you? Was it a demon?"

Fahai nodded silently. There were frightened murmurs as the villagers moved about restlessly, glancing about as if afraid the demon were among them. The word "demon" was like a curse, spreading a cloud of fear every time it was repeated.

Suzhen felt her heart stop. Dazed, she looked up as she felt Xuxian's shadow fall across her. He moved closer to her and put his arm around her, but his eyes were fixed ahead on the monk's. She kept her eyes fixed on his face, memorizing the lines of his features, feeling all the while the monk's gaze bearing into her.

"It looks like the work of a demon. There must be one lurking around here somewhere. I urge you all to be careful." Fahai said quietly.

"First bandits, now demons," exclaimed Madame Liang, and the tightness in her voice threatened to break. "What did we do, to deserve such bad fortune?"

The crowd threatened to dissolve into panic and hysteria as the already shaken villagers dealt with this new fear. Xuxian raised his voice. "Everyone, let's not panic. A few men should go and bring back Haoran's body--I will go. Who else is willing? Holy man, please come with us--your presence will reassure us."

Fahai bent his head in agreement.

Xuxian detached himself from Suzhen and said briefly, "I'll be back soon. Get some rest if you can, and be careful."

She could only nod, unable to say anything, and watched helplessly as he and a few other villagers prepared to accompany the monk up the mountain, hitching up a small cart to fetch the body.

Suzhen stood woodenly watching them go, gripped by a different sort of fear. Questions swam in her mind. Who had done this? It had to be the bandits. Who else? Would Qingqing possibly have--

She pushed the thought away, disturbed. No. Qingqing herself had said she wouldn't do such a thing. But a small nagging voice in her reminded her that the little green snake was not the most trustworthy person. Was this the real reason why she hadn't been in the village so often of late? Or rather, did her fear of Fahai have a darker basis that Suzhen didn't know of?

Turning away from the others, she sat down slowly on the snow and hugged her knees, feeling the darkness enfold her, even though the dawn had broken.

Zheng Ziyi was still standing motionless, glassy eyed and jaw locked so stiffly you could see the bones starting out from her face, containing all emotions rigidly within herself the way she had done so for the last few years. The villagers moved back from her, awkwardly, afraid to say anything to her, unsure what to say. It was no secret that Zheng Haoran had been an unkind husband, but they had only talked about it in whispers behind her back. Her pride never let her betray anything, only the line of her lips got harder and more bitter. In respect to her pride, everyone had played along with the feeble deception, pretending everything was all right--it was a convenient, if cowardly, response to a problem no one knew how to solve. Now that things had come to this, they were at a loss what to do, what to say.

Granny Hong impulsively put her arms around Zheng Ziyi. "It's all right," she said bravely, and that small gesture was all it took to break Madame Zheng's frozen state. Bursting into hysterical tears, she hid her face on the older woman's shoulder and cried stormily, while Granny Hong patted her on the back and soothed her.

"I hated him" she sobbed wildly. "He made my life miserable. He beat me and said cruel things to me, and treated me like a dog. Why am I sad that he's dead? He deserved it. I should be happy. No, I'm happy--I'm happy. I'm glad he's dead. But why did it have to be so sudden? Why did it have to be like this? What do I do now?"

Without any answers, Granny Hong held her and hushed her gently, the way one would hush a wailing child.