The Unfinished Story by Char Marie Adles (best books to read in your 20s .TXT) 📕

after I had drunk the water.
“Thank you,” I whispered. I couldn’t even talk anymore.
He smiled up at me.
And I made friends with him. He told me tales and stories of his life here and most of them were about his time here as a chino. I learned a chino was a boy servant that is use to give the monks pleasure, because they had vows not to sleep with woman. I had made a face the said ‘yuck’ and the boy had laughed. He said it wasn’t so bad. I had learned his name was Yukui.
But my hours of torture still hung over my head. They came every morning and every night at the same time.
Weeks of this passed and then today the head monk came to see me I glared at him as he walked in.
“Well, well look at the pretty little boy now. Not so high anymore are you. You can barely lift your head. I think we’ll let you go to heal for a while, and then you will come to be our pretty little bed-warming toy. Don’t you think?” he asked smiling his nasty smile at me. Showing his blacken and yellowed teeth.
“Take him to the servants’ quarters,” he said leaving.
They unchained me and dragged me the servants’ house. The two that carried me dropped me on the stone floor of the kitchen and left.
Gasps of horror, and fear came from the woman, some of them started to cry. Men shook their heads and looked away. A young woman came to me and put her hand to my forehead.
“Dear Goddess, how could they do this?” she whispered in horror looking at my face. “Juan, Ryrie, take him to my room now,” she ordered.
Two of the men took me gently to her room and she ordered all the men to leave. She told the women to bring warm water and lots of cloth, then to leave.
“Young man, this is going to hurt,” she said.
I shook my head. “I…girl…” I said in a broken whisper.
She just shook her head. I was laying on my front so she started to cut away my clothes and when she saw my back she started to cry. But she still cut all my clothes off. And then she turned me over and did the same. When she saw my chest her eyes widened.
“You’re a girl,” she said in a whisper.
“Secret…must…not…tell them…monks. Or the …others” I begged, wheezing.
She nodded. She cleaned my body and then dressed me in a robe. She laid me in a bed and covered my body.
“I am going to tell Master Shinto about you. You do not have to worry he is a kind man, not like those evil monks. Heal so he can help you.” and on her last words I fell in to a deep dreamless sleep.


*~*~*~*~*~*


A month passed before I could get up and start to walk and heal, that was the first time I met Master Shinto. He had a plan to let me escape the temple.
I had to stay close to the servants’ house and out of the sight of any monks. I walked with a slight limp, but it went away soon. I helped out whenever I could and it wasn’t much, but it gave me peace of mind.
One day on my third week here I saw a small garden with flowers and plants a little ways behind the servant house. I walked around and smelled the flowers. Once again I had found a piece of heaven in this hell. I spent the rest of day just sitting there and blocking everything for my spinning mind. As the sun started to sit an old man came in the garden and sat next to me.
“Hello,” I said, watching the sun.
“Hello,” he said. He watched the sun too.
When the sun sat I looked to him. He was bald and had a kind wrinkled face, like a grandfather.
“Who are you? I’m Ash,” I said with a smile. Though he was wearing robes of a monk his were white not orange. Plus there was no way he could be bad.
“It is nice to meet you Ash. I am Master Shinto,” he said with a smile. So head was the head monk.
“This is a beautiful garden. I love flowers.”
“Yes, yes it is. It was my Master’s a long time ago.”
We talked for a while, but soon I had to go or Kali would have killed me for not coming back. It was almost like having an older sister.
“I have to go Master Shinto, but I hope I can meet you again here.”
“You shall if you wish,” he said with another smile, “Good night, Ash.”
I went back to the servants’ quarters and to my room I shared with kali.
I met Master Shinto every day I could in his garden after that. He would sit among his plants and we would talk of anything that came to mind. Some days I would spend with Kali just to hear her voice and to watch what she was doing. One night I even went outside and walked in a field of fireflies. I stood as they danced around me in circles and lit up the world like fireworks. I lifted out and hand and they danced around it making happy little buzzes.


*~*~*~*~*~*


Another month passed before I was healed completely. All my wounds were healed and only some left scars. But most of my back was covered in them. It was smooth to the touch, but Kali said they were deep looking and angry red colored. I did my best to get fit for the journey I would soon be placed on.
But over those two months I had thought of Leda and Kail. How was he and what had happened to her? Did she die, did they catch her, or was she okay? Then I turned my thoughts, as too what would do after I was safely away.
I found during my time here Kali was a kind and sweet lady. She was only ten years old then I and she was pretty. She was here as a favor to the master, because she was his granddaughter. She worked in a fancy high up brothel in the Imperial City. She took good care of me and treated me well.
Then came the day in my third month here I was to leave. I went to Master Shinto’s rooms and he gave me money and a letter of proof so I would be safe. I tied them into the pack Kali had given me, and then someone came knocking on master’s door.
“Hide,” he whispered to me. I hid in the next room, watching through the bamboo curtain.
“Where is our new chino master? I heard from one of the other chino that he came here. We want to have some fun with the pretty boy.”
“As you can see there is no one here, but me. So you may leave.” master said.
The monk left.
“You must leave now!” Master Shinto told me in a hurry. “Use the window!”
I went out his window and to the back yard. A monk spotted me so I jumped from a box to the top of the wall and jumped to the ground on the other side of the wall. I heard the monks yelling. “He flew over the wall like a demon! Chase him!”
I ran for two days hiding in the woods and sleeping up in the trees. I tried everything, but they still followed me. I hid up in the trees and close to the underbrush. On the second night I was in a bamboo grove and I nearly jumped out of my skin at a croak of a frog. I slumped to the ground and breathed in deep. I rolled over and fell asleep under the moon and stars, to the smell of fresh plants.
On the third day I stopped for a break and heard the barking of the monks’ dogs.
I jumped up from where I sat by the stream and ran. I ran though the forest and across fields. Long grasses flooded around me and fire flies hopping into the air like horses and flying away. I ran hearing their shouts of fury and rage, then I heard one yell; “Let the dogs loose! They’ll get him.”
Barking came closer to me and I was getting tired fast. My breath coming in ragged gulps and sweat soaking my clothes, the breeze making me shiver. And just as the dogs caught up to me, I fell to the ground.
A horse coming running from the woods to the east and didn‘t seem to see me. It stepped on my shoulder pressing it into the ground with a crunch, I screamed as it stepped on me and the first dog sank its teeth in to the tender flesh of my leg. Ripping and chewing.
“Whoa!” the man yelled on top of the horse as it reared back. “Hey Gen! Come here there’s a person on the ground, I don’t know if my horse stepped on him. Come find out,” he yelled over his shoulder.
Another man rode up on a horse as the other dogs caught up and tried to bite me. I hit the first one off weakly, as the man came over and swatted the dogs away. They stepped back glowing and snapping at him.
“Hey can you hear me?” this Gen asked. “Are you hurt?” it pressed a finger to where the horse had stepped on me.
“Yes…” I hissed out in a painful breath.
“Is it a girl?” the other one asked, the one whose horse had stepped on me.
The monks’ yells had caught up to and I saw that they were only a few yards away.
Gen turned to look at them as they came closer. “What is it you want,” he asked them.
“We want our boy back,” the one replied. He was short and fat. His long dingy yellow fingernail pointed at me.
I clung to this Gen with all my might. “I’m not theirs. I was kidnapped. I'm not their slave or servant!” I said between ragged breaths. My hands were covered in sweat and slipped so I grabbed harder at his robes.
“We just want our chino back. He ran away from our temple, you see. And-” I cut him off with my cries.
“NO! I’m not theirs! Save me.” I begged.
This Gen took me in his arms and pressed my face to his chest. I didn’t know if he planned on giving me up to them or not. If