Текст книги "Bone Mountain"

Автор книги: Eliot Pattison

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Текущая страница: 35 (всего у книги 39 страниц)

Lhandro stirred from the paralysis that seemed to have gripped those at the dig. "It is dangerous for that professor," the rongpa headman said in a low voice to Shan. "He doesn't know what kind of monk that Khodrak is."

"He senses something important here," a soft, worried voice said at Shan's shoulder. It was Ma's assistant, the young graduate student who had been finishing the report. In her hand was a large brown envelope. "He must go. I keep trying to take him home.

"He was supposed to be the head of the entire university. He was so adored by his students that they would ask him to give extra classes, at night, unofficially." She spoke the words quickly, as if she had been storing them, anxious to tell Shan and his friends. "Five years ago he was ready to be installed as the chairman of the university, but someone from Beijing visited a class and discovered that he was not using the approved history text." She paused to watch a procession move out of the army encampment, a small knot of officers, with Lin at the center wearing a clean uniform. "The professor laughed and said that history was a rich tapestry and the party's history book made it seem like an old grey rag. His students laughed, too, and applauded. But the visitor didn't laugh. They made another professor head of the university, and took away Professor Ma's classes. He is only allowed to do research now."

Shan studied the old Han, who seemed to have recognized something in Khodrak that bore closer inspection. What was the professor doing? Lepka had said he was a good man. In another lifetime he might have been a Chinese monk, trying in his own gentle way to bridge the gaps between peoples.

Although out of earshot, Ma seemed to be speaking affably with the chairman of Norbu gompa. But his eyes roamed over Khodrak, studying his elegant robe, his finely worked leather sandals, the pearl rosary that hung from his belt. After a moment he gestured toward the mendicant's staff, and Khodrak hesitantly extended it toward him. The professor ran his fingers along the fine scrolling of the metal head then, strangely, the two men seemed to struggle for possession of the staff until Khodrak jerked it from Ma's grip and peevishly stepped away, the professor watching his back with an oddly disappointed expression. One of the howler guards rushed to Khodrak's side and leaned into his ear. The chairman looked toward the dig, and his eyes suddenly glowed. They had found Jokar.

The music faded, and Jenkins appeared by the microphone on the platform as though to speak, but his eyes were on the odd drama unfolding by the dig. The crowd seemed to follow his gaze, and gradually grew silent.

Suddenly Ma hurried past Khodrak and stepped in front of Jokar as though to defend him. Another figure materialized beside Ma. Lepka had joined him, as if Jokar, Ma, and he, the three oldest men present, suddenly felt an obligation to resist the chairman of Norbu. Khodrak frowned, then glanced pointedly at Colonel Lin, who stood twenty feet away, as though to will the officer to intervene. Lin reacted by taking a single step toward the professor, so Khodrak stood alone, facing the old men in momentary confusion. He seemed about to gesture toward his white-shirted troops when the professor swept his arm around the site of the dig.

"Tibetans did a terrible thing here a hundred years ago," Ma said loudly.

"Not Tibetans," Lin shot back irritably, and though he seemed about to say more, the words choked in his throat as a look of surprised disbelief crossed his face. He looked at Shan as though for help. Again Khodrak pressed forward. He seemed unable to contain his anger, and his greed, even in front of those who had come to fete him. Or perhaps not, Shan thought. Perhaps Khodrak had decided he had already been anointed by the government, that everything for him had become part of a performance for the dignitaries, a demonstration of new powers.

"This old Tibetan is a criminal!" the chairman of Norbu gompa shouted to Lin, stabbing an accusing finger toward Jokar, then he repeated the words in the direction of the officials seated on the platform.

Shan stepped in front of Jokar, beside Lepka and Ma. Khodrak answered the movement with a sneer. "A master criminal of the Dalai Cult," Khodrak continued in his loud, public-address voice as he pointed at Jokar, "surrounded by his criminal henchmen! Fomenting regression!" He shot an impatient glance at Lin and his troops, looked back at the officials, then straightened and smoothed his robe as he turned in the direction of the platform, his staff at his side.

"Great things will be said about this day," he boomed, "about how the new China routed out the last of the bad elements in this region with the forces of economic development and prosperity!" The chairman of Norbu had apparently rehearsed a speech, and had decided now was the time to give it. He had not counted on Jokar wandering freely, and he had to be sure the world knew Jokar was his. For Khodrak had clearly decided that the day should not be about the oil well, but about his personal victories.

"It is a day of reckoning for this valley, for this region, a day of history for the Bureau of Religious Affairs and Norbu." He pointed to the long single file of figures being escorted at gunpoint down the valley, then to Jokar. "Today we wipe out the criminal elements who have kept this district in the feudal age. Today we start a new life! A new age! They will hear about this in Beijing!" He cast a yearning eye toward the microphone that had been installed on the platform, and one of the white-shirted men leapt to the platform, pulling the microphone from its stand and handing it down to Khodrak, who pointed at the medicine lama again.

Jokar seemed not to notice. He was staring at the top of Yapchi Mountain now, as if he saw something there not visible to anyone else, staring toward the snowcapped peaks with a weary, serene smile.

"A leader of one of the most feudalistic institutions in all of Tibet, one of the most dangerous instruments of repression!" Khodrak's voice boomed across the valley now, and the chairman raised his ever-present mendicant staff in the air as though to punctuate his point. "A conspirator with the Dalai criminal himself! An agent sent from India to subvert the new order!"

A figure swept by Shan in a blur, rushing toward Khodrak. It was Dzopa, his own staff raised in the air now. Khodrak's lips curled and he lowered his mendicant staff, holding it with both hands, its metal head aimed at the dobdob like a spear.

The metallic crack of a gun split the air.

Dzopa spun about, groaned, and crumpled to the ground. The soldiers behind Lin spun about, weapons raised. In the same instant Padme darted to Khodrak's side, and Winslow ran into the crowd of Tibetans. One of the howler guardians held a pistol, still extended, its barrel smoking. Lin furiously pointed at the man, and the nearest soldier lunged and slammed his rifle butt against the pistol, knocking it to the ground, then rested his boot on the weapon.

Dzopa twisted, holding his left calf, which was bleeding profusely. Lhandro darted to the man's side and pressed a scarf against the wound. Jokar took two steps toward the dobdob then was restrained by Lepka, whose hand appeared on the ancient lama's shoulder. Tenzin stepped forward and knelt by Lhandro and the dobdob, Khodrak watching Tenzin with a victorious smile.

Shan's eyes shot back and forth from Lin to Dzopa. Then his gaze locked on the mendicant staff in Khodrak's hands.

"Arrest them!" Khodrak shouted at the guards. "You saw what that man with the staff did. Now his companion reveals himself, that one with the chig! And that Han who conspires with them!" he shouted in a victorious tone, pointing at Shan. "Arrest them all! Traitors! Murderers!"

Chig. Shan looked about in confusion. It meant the number one. He looked back at Lhandro, still on the ground beside Tenzin. The simplest, oldest form of representing the number one in Tibetan writing was an inverted U, slanted slightly to the right. Like the birthmark on Lhandro's neck. His eyes moved from Khodrak to Lhandro. The one with the chig.

Shan became aware of Tenzin moving his arm, drawing something in the earth with his finger, then looking at Shan. A shape of curves. It looked like the Arabic number three, slanted to the left, its bottom extended like a tail. It was a shape Shan knew well, the shape of the curved scar on Drakte's forehead. In Tibetan the symbol meant nyasha. Fish. Once the chairman had been looking for a man with a fish.

Khodrak's smile faded as he saw the figure in the dirt, and he turned his back on Tenzin and the dobdob. "Murderers!" he called out again. "Seize them!"

"Murderers?" A voice called out from behind Khodrak. Several of the officials were standing at the edge of the platform now. One of them, a lean older man wearing a grey uniform, examined the chairman of Norbu gompa with a puzzled expression. "You order an arrest?"

"The Religious Affairs officer in Amdo town." The announcement left Khodrak's lips slowly. "It will be written that he was a hero who died for our true cause, who died for the Serenity campaign, who died as an example of how Norbu leads the new order."

It will be written. Khodrak had written lies to win his newfound power. Drakte had written the truth to stop him, and died for it. Shan sensed his legs move and suddenly he was in front of Khodrak, blocking his path to the platform. Khodrak glared and made a shoving motion with his staff. Shan stared at the staff, his gaze fixed now on its head.

"I know the hero who died for the truth," Shan declared.

Suddenly the truck escorting Larkin and the Tibetans began honking its horn as if in celebration, and those on the platform looked away, toward the line of prisoners. But Khodrak and Shan kept their eyes locked together, until abruptly Khodrak lowered the staff, its head leveled at Shan's abdomen, and lurched forward with it. A hand shot out as Shan felt the cold steel touch his stomach. Ma was at his side, hand on the metal shaft head, pushing it back. The horn stopped, and Khodrak withdrew the staff with a satisfied air and stepped around them.

A strange stillness fell over Shan and the professor as they watched Khodrak, then slowly Shan turned to see Ma standing looking into the palm with which he had seized the staff. The professor's palm was sliced open. Blood dripped down his fingertips onto the soil.

It was said by the old Tibetans that sounds accompanied enlightenment, not human words but sounds the spirit somehow knew to use when it was in contact with deities. Perhaps the sound that escaped Shan's lips now was such a reaching out, a strange part-groan, part-exclamation of discovery, part cry of pain.

The professor, who seemed oblivious to his wound, looked at him with sudden worry. "Are you ill?" Ma asked.

Yes, Shan wanted to reply. Ill with the truth. Ill with the heavy knowledge of what Beijing's years of occupation had done to all of them.

But instead someone shouted out in a loud, steady voice. "One yak," the voice said sternly. "Only one yak. Lamtso Gar has one yak." Shan almost began looking around before he realized it was his own voice. "Eighteen sheep. Five goats," he said, remembering the way the woman at the lake had proudly pointed out her entry in Drakte's ledger. "And two dogs."

Khodrak halted. The color of his face shifted, pale at first, then flush with anger. The chairman of Norbu was suddenly in front of him again, raising his staff, now slamming the butt end of it into Shan's belly. Shan collapsed onto his knees, holding his belly, fighting for breath. But not taking his eyes off those on the platform, turning as though trying to address the dignitaries, the Tibetans, and the soldiers all at once.

"Last year," Shan shouted, gasping, looking at the platform, "a child died of starvation there."

"Coward!" Khodrak snarled. "We are the examples of the new way. We came to be celebrated." He turned. "Tuan!" he snapped, and the Director appeared, followed by four white shirts who seemed eager to close on Shan. But then Shan pulled a piece of paper from his pocket, and unfolded it: the photograph of the cottage by the lake he had taken from Tuan's office. He extended it like a weapon. Tuan, only ten feet away now, halted, the color draining from his face.

Lin uttered a sharp syllable and soldiers flanked the white shirts, making it clear they should go no further. It was a little thing, Shan thought, of minor consequence to Lin. He was just allowing Shan to hang himself in front of the dignitaries.

If Khodrak was not certain whom his audience should be, Shan at least knew who his was. He struggled to his feet and stepped closer to the platform as Khodrak glared, first at Shan, then at Lin. "The people of the district compiled their own report of economic activity. A report based on the truth. The people must have a voice, too. When they sought to present it to Deputy Director Chao in Amdo town, Khodrak killed Chao, then killed the Tibetan who brought it."

Incredible as it seemed, Shan realized the only audience that would listen to him was the one before him now, an audience of soldiers who distrusted knobs, and howlers who distrusted knobs, and knobs who distrusted both; an audience in which those not form Lhasa and the Ministry feared those who were, who would tolerate his accusations because they were all seasoned in the language of accusation, and had been taught that suspicion and fear and blame were the foundations of power. Most no doubt assumed Shan would be in manacles after his speech, but just as certainly everyone was wondering whether they might hear something that might enhance their own power.

"Killed them with the very staff he carries. Measure it and you'll see it matches the wound that killed Deputy Director Chao." Shan had no doubt now that it matched another wound, one he had seen, the terrible gash in Drakte's abdomen that the purba had tried to mend with coarse thread and a tent needle. Drakte had fled Khodrak, had fled from Amdo town, but the blow Khodrak had inflicted had finally killed him at the hermitage. And killed their sacred mandala.

The line of detainees from the end of the valley was closing, and would be at the camp in five minutes. Melissa Larkin would be there, face to face with Zhu.

There was movement behind Shan. Professor Ma was there again, with Shan; two Chinese against the Tibetan chairman of Norbu gompa. The professor said nothing, but turned his hand outward, where the officials form Lhasa, in the front row, could plainly see the blood dripping from his hand. One of them, the stern woman in the grey dress gasped and spoke into the ear of a man beside her.

"Lies!" Khodrak shouted. "You have no proof!" He looked back uncertainly at his guards, penned in by the soldiers, and then at Tuan, who still stood as if paralyzed. It seemed as though Director Tuan had suddenly given up. But Shan knew he had given up long ago. Tuan had never shared Khodrak's energy, or goals. Shan's visit to Tuan's office had cracked open a door in Shan's memory, down the dark, distant corridor that represented his Beijing incarnation. For Inspector Shan, who had specialized in corruption investigations, the evidence had been obvious. Tuan's ambitions had been more modest than Khodrak's. He had only wanted to retire before he died of his disease, to go to his modest cottage, financed by the phantom soldiers he had put on his payroll.

"You were in Amdo to stop the true records of the township from reaching the Bureau," Shan continued, "to stop Deputy Director Chao from receiving such records and passing them on to Lhasa. But then you recognized the Tibetan who was there, delivering those records. You had seen him in Lhasa with the abbot of Sangchi, the night the abbot disappeared. You realized it probably meant that the abbot was not in the south. But you never told anyone in Lhasa. You let the search continue in the south because you had your own plan to capture the abbot. Find the abbot and let him proclaim the success of your campaign. Not the Serenity Campaign. Your campaign. Not Lhasa's campaign. Not Beijing's campaign. A new campaign to take over enforcement at gompas from Public Security, with a new security force formed within Religious Affairs. A force like the one you founded with Director Tuan, without authority form Lhasa." Ultimately the top officials would care little about the murders. But Khodrak had committed a crime far worse than murder. He had conspired against an official party campaign. He had been disloyal.

"Lies!" Khodrak hissed again. "You will see," he said to the platform, "I have saved for you the greatest prize of all." He turned, searching the crowd, calling for Padme. "The proof of all their treason!" The young monk pushed back into the crowd and reappeared with the black leather satchel, which Khodrak hastily opened, producing a large bundle wrapped in cloth, which he triumphantly handed to the woman at the front of the platform.

As the woman in grey took the bundle two more of the dignitaries joined her, watching over her shoulder as she unwrapped it. When the cloth fell away Khodrak gasped and seemed about to strike at Padme with his staff. But Padme, too, stared at the contents with disbelieving eyes. It was Drakte's battered account book, which Shan had last seen at the cave the night before. The woman leafed through the pages then glared at Khodrak.

The woman seemed to shake with anger. Then she removed her straw hat. "Soldiers from Public Security," she barked out. "Reveal yourselves in the next sixty seconds and you will avoid punishment. This is an order from your general!"

The howlers needed no prompting, no discussion. Some cursed, some groaned, but all quickly shed their white shirts and trotted away, toward the camp. Two men in the official grey tunics of Public Security marched to Khodrak and Padme. Khodrak stared at the woman, leaning on his staff, gripping it with both hands, the color drained from his face. Another knob approached Shan, hand extended. Shan gave him the photograph of the cottage, still in his hand, the folded facsimile with the phantom names that Shan knew would tie back to Tuan, and finally the slip of paper Chao had given to Drakte the night before he had died. The knob studied Shan uncertainly, then looked back at the woman on the platform, who extended her hand for the papers to be brought to her.

Suddenly Padme pointed to the slope where Larkin and the Tibetans had been working. "The pagans!" he shouted with a strange mix of anger and hope in his voice, and darted through the soldiers, still pointing at the slope.

Somo had reached the place where Larkin had been digging, Shan saw, for a boulder there was now covered in bright crimson paint. The deity had revealed itself again.

Lin shook his head wearily and spoke to an officer at his side, who sprinted toward the army encampment. Most of the officials in the stand continued to watch earnestly, as if everything they were witnessing had been all part of the planned entertainment.

With a creak of metal the battle tank emerged from the shadows by the oil camp, its officer standing half out of the hatch on the top of the turret. It halted a hundred yards from the camp, its barrel quickly shifting to the range, and fired three shots in rapid succession.

The side of the mountain at the south end of the valley instantly exploded, as it had when the tank had attacked the first deity rock, raising a haze of dust and debris over the slope. But the third shell struck with a much larger explosion than the first two. Larkin's crew had been busy not only digging, but planting the explosives there. The tank officer stared in confusion and raised a pair of binoculars toward the ball of fire and cloud of debris that followed, then shrugged at Lin. Several of those on the platform clapped, apparently pleased with the way the army had punctuated the ceremony with fireworks.

Lin stared, first at the slope, where the dust was rapidly clearing, then at Shan.

Suddenly Lin's mouth fell open and he, with most of the crowd, gasped as they saw the massive creature that had appeared at the edge of the dig. Jampa stood there, smelling the exposed earth. The yak slowly stepped to the chest where Ma stored his artifacts and sniffed at it, touching it with his nose. While everyone watched the animal in silence, it stepped slowly forward, directly between Shan and Khodrak, past Lin, then stopped and stared at the distant slope. It cocked its massive head, then raised its nose high in the air and gave a long, extraordinarily loud bellow. Everyone seemed to be staring at the animal, some in amusement, others with somber, awed expressions, as though they sensed the yak was trying to communicate with them, or with something in the mountains. As if in reply a muted thunder came from the distant slope. Not really like thunder, Shan realized, but like a rumbling from inside the earth.

"Earthquake!" one of the venture workers cried out.

Still no one moved. All eyes followed those of the mighty yak now, to the slope, where the rumbling seemed to increase in intensity, the sound of pressure building. An odd muted rushing sound like a small eruption could be heard, followed by a blur of movement on the slope.

The brittle silence continued, broken at last by Jenkins, who leapt from his seat on the platform as he stared with sudden alarm at the slope.

"Jeeee– sus!" the American manager cried in a desperate voice, then vaulted from the platform and began running toward the nearest truck, barking out orders for the bulldozers to follow. He paused at the truck door to look at the scene. "Mother fucking army!" he shouted, firing each syllable like a shot from a cannon then, looking at his perplexed workers, pointed to the slope. "Go! Go! Go!" he yelled, and leapt into the truck.

Binoculars appeared in Lin's hands. He stared in confusion, but for only a moment, and when he lowered them there was something like awe in his eyes. He looked at Shan, his eyes momentarily filled with sadness, then he hardened again and spoke rapidly to the officer beside him, who lifted a small radio unit and began barking orders. Soldiers began running toward the derrick. Lin leaned toward the officer again, and after a moment of hesitation, disappointment clouding his face, the officer spoke into the transmitter. The soldiers escorting Larkin and the Tibetans, only a hundred yards away now, jogged away from the column. Their former prisoners seemed not to notice, for they were running to Larkin's side, cheering and pointing toward the slope, some of them waving khatas in their hands.

Lin looked at the glasses in his hand, then stepped to Shan's side and slowly extended them.

But Shan did not use the lenses to examine the site of the explosion. Instead he desperately searched the slope for any sign of Somo. If she had lingered at the rock she could not have survived. There was no sign of her.

"I don't understand," Professor Ma said over his shoulder.

"The deity has spoken," Lhandro offered. He stood a few feet away, supporting his father, who gazed at the slope with a huge grin, tears streaming down his face. Beside them Jokar knelt at the wounded dobdob's side, speaking in low tones, his hand resting on the crown of the Dzopa's head. Strangely, the dobdob pointed to the yak.

"Water," Shan said, his own voice filled with wonder. "There was an underground river, and now it has been released." The words seemed so simple, the reality so impossible. Melissa Larkin had never been trying to locate her hidden river for the mere sake of geology. She and the purbas had been trying to find it in the hope they could use it against the venture, to alter the course of the oil project.

Trucks roared up the valley, some packed with workers, others pausing to pick up workers by the platform, still others speeding by with piles of shovels, picks, and buckets in their bays. The people on the platform began drifting away, confused, asking when the ceremony would continue. Except for the knobs who had shed their white shirts; they stood in a tight group, listening with shocked expressions at the woman on the platform, who pointed fingers and seemed to be hissing at Khodrak. When she finished Khodrak was enclosed in a small knot of his former guards who, appearing eager to prove their remorse for straying, wrenched away his staff and pulled him toward one of the white Bureau trucks.

"The contour of the valley," Shan said with a sigh, watching as first Jampa, then Gyalo, stepped to Jokar, "means the water will go to the derrick, the lowest point." The dobdob clutched at Jokar's arm a moment, then released it with a sound like a sob, and with the monk's help the lama slowly climbed onto the yak's broad back. Lin stepped slowly to the edge of the dig and conspicuously turned his back to Lepka and the others who sat by it. Shan looked at Gyalo again and recalled the monk's strange words on the slope that morning, that Shan had solved the puzzle. All Shan had done was to tell Lhandro that he had heard a strange rushing noise in the ground near the first deity rock. Gyalo led Jampa and Jokar away, up the ridge, unnoticed amidst the chaos at the bottom of the valley.

Shan looked back at the dig. Tenzin had disappeared into the trees.

"But surely just a little water can make no difference," Ma said.

Shan stared up at the snowcovered peak in the distance. "No, just a delay. But perhaps over time it may not be a little. That depends on the mountain," he said, and realized his words sounded like he was speaking of a deity.

Jenkins certainly did not dismiss the threat. He could see the American in the binoculars, standing on the back of a truck near the village ruins now, shouting out orders as the bulldozers crawled toward the end of the valley. The venture manager was going to build a dam, to divert the water from his derrick. But a small river was already pouring down the slope near his truck, spreading across the barley fields in a dozen small rivulets.

When Shan turned back Nyma was tending to Professor Ma's torn hand as his assistant poured water over it. Lepka kept staring at the water covering the fields of barley. "Sometimes it's hard to know what deities want," he heard the old man say.

Suddenly a hand covered with streaks of red was raised in his face and he looked into Somo's gleaming eyes. "I saw Winslow," she said. "He said our Drakte can move on now. He said you did it."

Winslow. "Where is he?" Shan asked.

"On the slope, jogging back up." Somo pointed to the saddle of land. Gyalo and Jokar were halfway up it now, and as he watched the unmistakable form of the American joined them. Winslow was leaving, fleeing at last.

"I wanted to thank him," Shan said. "For putting that ledger in Padme's satchel." He had last seen the account book in Larkin's cave, but he remembered how the American had come with his backpack, and how Winslow had darted into the crowd when Padme had left his satchel on the ground. He watched Winslow moving up the slope, then saw more figures scattering over the saddle of land. The Tibetans who had been with Larkin.

"Where will they go?" he asked Somo.

"To that meeting place," she said. "Where the people wait for Jokar."

Shan stared with new despair at the retreating figures. She meant the chair of Siddhi, the rebellious monk, where, after what had happened in the valley, the Tibetans would be more inclined than ever to resist the government. "Jokar would never abide violence," he said with a sinking heart and turned. But Somo had vanished.

He took a step toward the saddle of land and another, filled with dread again. Nothing had really changed. The authorities would not only capture Jokar, they would take many Tibetans with him. He took a deep breath, and began jogging. Then the drumming began.

Lhandro was at Shan's side as he began running toward the slope opposite the saddle, toward the sound, toward what Shan hoped was the deity stone. But the rongpa slowed as they reached a small ledge that overlooked the valley floor, a hundred feet up the slope. The water had reached the derrick, forming a small muddy pond around it. The workers had stopped and were staring at the water. One man jumped off and ran toward the source of the water, splashing in the rivulets that coursed through the fields, then stopped, sank to the earth, arms upraised, kneeling in the mud, his hands clenched in fists.

Lhandro hesitated, looking with anguish at his precious valley, which was in chaos. Shan put a hand on his shoulder. "The water will stop," he assured the rongpa, "it is letting Jokar and the others have one more chance, that's all," he said, as though a deity had planned it all along. Confused by his own words, he turned and continued running as Lhandro headed toward the ruins of his village. The sound of the double beat, the heart drumming, seemed close now, almost directly above the center of the valley, not far from where Shan had begun chasing the runaway khata on his first day there. But he ran at an angle, parallel to the valley floor, as if he were another of the workers dashing toward the floodwaters. After a few hundred yards he edged close to the wooded tier on the slope, then darted into the shadows of the trees and began quartering back and up the slope.

He climbed above the source of the sound and worked his way down. It was muted now, because the drummer had again chosen a position in front of large flat rocks facing the valley, so muted Shan began hearing voices. They were high pitched, and seemed to be laughing. Suddenly he slipped on loose scree, and tumbled headlong, stumbling, righting himself as he hurtled between low shrubs. He found himself on his knees before two playful children, a boy and a girl of nearly the same age, the girl with crude bandages on her hands. They seemed familiar somehow, and at first he thought he had seen them at Yapchi Village. But then they both gasped at him, clearly recognizing Shan, and looked toward a figure ten feet away, squatting in the rocks, staring down at the valley. The boy darted to the man, who turned and stared at Shan with wide, surprised eyes, then his gaze shifted to a flat rock near where the children had been playing. On the rock sat the eye of Yapchi.