Lunis groaned. “You have to tempt fate, don’t you?”
She laughed. “It’s a rock tower. How hard will that be? But what do you think happens when I’m done?”
He shrugged. “Only one way to find out, but I don’t think I can help you since this is your soul and your quest.”
Sophia waved him off. “I think I’m good. You take a nap, I’ll make a cairn.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Building the tower wasn’t difficult. Well not in the physical sense. However, as Sophia stacked large rocks followed by progressively smaller ones, the mental strength became more demanding. A seemingly straightforward task was suddenly complex and required all her concentration.
Her surroundings suddenly blurred around her, but for some reason this didn’t alarm Sophia. She kept her eyes searching for the perfect stone, which needed to be a specific size.
Not too big and not too small. She looked without seeing, spurred by her instinct rather than her vision.
Sophia felt like she was working out a complicated math equation. At the same time, it was also like she was working through a complex emotional problem. She felt heavy as a catharsis unfolded in her chest.
Sweat poured from her forehead and her fingers were pinched under the weight of the flat stone she carried. When she slid it onto the top, her heart thumped like it was about to give out and made her clap her hands to her chest.
“Sophia!” Lunis exclaimed in the distance. He was close, but she couldn’t see him. Only the stones. The ones on the tower and the ones around for her to fetch. They were like all the memories of her life. The good ones and the bad ones, and they all stacked onto each other, creating….
“Creating me,” Sophia said aloud.
“What creates you?” Lunis asked.
“Memories,” she answered, then mechanically turned and searched for the next stone. It needed to be smaller. Round. It needed to fit into place, while also offering a place for the next stone.
“That’s how experiences work,” she said mostly to herself.
“I don’t understand.” There was undeniable worry in her dragon’s voice.
“We are an accumulation of our experiences…our memories,” she explained. “And they’re all linked, like stones on a cairn. They stack on top of one another. Nothing about us is separate. It’s all connected to another part of us.”
“Are you okay?” Lunis was still out of her sight, no matter where she looked.
“We’re never okay,” she answered at once, not knowing where the response came from. “We’re evolutions. If we’re okay, by definition we’re satisfied. We’re finished. We’re complete. But there is always room for another stone, it just has to fit.”
“And a particle could fit on the top of a grain of sand,” Lunis offered.
Sophia nodded as her eyes found the perfect last stone. It was crescent-shaped like Buddha’s Temple.
Nimbly she picked it up and held her breath. Putting it in place could be tricky. The tower shook like one false move would bring it tumbling down.
“We are always at risk of crumbling,” she mused. “One experience can put us over the edge.”
“But they can also make us stronger,” Lunis offered.
“They inevitably will, even if we crumble,” Sophia stated, then dropped the stone on the top and watched as the cairn wobbled before standing firm.
Sophia smiled at her work, strangely proud of her accomplishment. She had previously thought it would be easy, but it was quite complicated and enriching. She got a lot more out of the experience than she could have ever imagined.
Then something else happened that Sophia hadn’t expected, and sent droplets of water all over them.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
At first, the waterfall was a trickle that ran over the side of the high cliff towering above them. Then the rush of water turned into a raging force that joined the already present noise.
Sophia and Lunis edged away from the splash zone while taking the gentle mist in the face.
“So that’s where the waterfall was.” Lunis looked up at the torrent that had materialized in a few seconds.
“It’s quite the force,” Sophia observed.
“It is. You know waterfalls represent chaos in feng shui?”
“How do you know that?”
“I watch a lot of Home and Garden Network when you’re not around.” He giggled.
“So, I made my mark.” She indicated her cairn. “The waterfall appeared. Did I do it? Is the mark on my soul gone?”
Lunis looked her over and the expression on his face told her the answer before he did. “No, I’m sorry, but it’s still there.”
“So what am I supposed to do?” Sophia wondered suddenly if they’d made a mistake and maybe they were completely off base. Maybe this wasn’t the place they were supposed to go to lift the curse. Maybe getting away from the killer birds and murderous fireflies and making the waterfall appear were other obstacles, unrelated to cleansing her soul.
“Wait, that’s it,” Lunis said suddenly.
Since she hadn’t said anything, only stood there and worried, she flashed him a confused expression. “What is it?”
“What you were thinking,” he answered.
Sophia brow scrunched up more. She had to trail back to remember what she’d thought. Sometimes she forgot that Lunis was often in her head although he didn’t often do it when they were together and could communicate. The link was also stronger at different times depending on multiple factors.
“What specifically?” she asked.
“About cleansing your soul,” he answered. “You made your mark to start the process of removing the mark.” Lunis slung his head to the side and indicated the cairn she’d made. “Remember why the Warriors and Councilors pass through the Door of Reflection when entering the Chamber of the Tree?”
“It’s to cleanse them of their fears so they can be objective in meetings.”
“And the source of the Door of Reflection comes from here.” He glanced at the waterfall. “What if that’s it?”
Her mouth popped open. “I’m supposed to walk through there? That water will crush me.”
The flow was at full force now and crashed into the shallow basin below it. There was little doubt that walking through this particular waterfall would be potentially deadly for Sophia.
“It’s about facing your fears,” Lunis offered. “If there’s no risk, then where’s the gain? Cleansing your soul can’t be easy.”
Sophia gulped. “Although this all makes sense, what if we’re wrong about this being the way?”
“I think finding ‘the way’ is always about faith rather than logic. Do you feel like this could work? What does your soul tell you?”
Sophia closed her eyes and focused on the inner voices that she’d become acquainted with since coming to Buddha’s Temple. Again, they sounded like a rush of water. They sounded like the waterfall in front of her. But she knew that their voices were inside her and the noise of the falls was outside her. Just like her fears weren’t a part of her, but they did affect her soul. And that was all the information she needed to make the next decisions.