Inside, Lhandro and his father were arguing. His father, having heard about Tenzin and Lokesh, wanted to return immediately to Yapchi. Lhandro kept telling his father that there was nothing to be done at Yapchi for the two prisoners. As Lepka saw Shan he broke off his dialogue and stepped to the doorway of one of the empty meditation cells, staring into the darkness. "It's the stickmen," the old man muttered toward the shadows. His voice was strangely feeble. "The stickmen never let up."

Nyma glanced at Shan with a sad expression as Lepka stepped inside the cell. "Sometimes he is like this. His mind wanders."

"What does he mean?" Shan asked.

"It's from his childhood," Nyma said. "A toy I think."

"Monsters from his dreams," Lhandro's mother said over Shan's shoulder in a voice tight with worry. "For years he has had nightmares every few weeks, crying out about stickmen," she added. "But this month, almost every night the bad dreams come."

Shan looked about the chamber. Winslow and Larkin were talking excitedly. The two purbas who had come with Larkin were speaking in low urgent tones with Somo about Lin. Shan studied the purbas. Perhaps he had spoken too hastily in telling Lin he was not a prisoner.

How many crimes, how many motives, he thought as he watched Lin, then the purbas. Everything was compartmentalized, as Somo had pointed out. Like Beijing's operations. The knobs had been looking for the medicine lama. The mountain troops had been looking for Tenzin. Tuan and his shadow Public Security squad were looking for the killer of Deputy Director Chao. Khodrak sought a man with a fish. Special Projects Director Zhu had falsely reported Larkin's death so he could stalk and kill her. Why? Because she had been taken under the wing of the purbas, she said. But Shan no longer believed it. Everyone had their own plans, their own mission, and none seemed to know what the others were doing, or why. Shan did not even understand what Jokar was doing. Had the medicine lama really come so far from India only to wander about the mountains above the Plain of Flowers?

"How long has Jokar been back?" Shan asked Nyma.

"Back? We told you. He's been gone since the day you left."

"But I saw him. On the rocks above."

Nyma rushed outside, Shan close behind. Jokar was gone. Had Shan only imagined seeing the lama?

They stepped around the talus, studying the rocks closely. The old man could easily have fallen. In fact it seemed almost impossible to climb to where Shan had seen him.

But when they returned there was an air of excitement. The purbas had quieted. Lhandro and his father wore looks of confused awe. Lhandro's mother was on a pallet, and the medicine lama was bent over her.

"Suddenly he was just there," Lhandro said. "Standing beside my father in the meditation cell, as if he had just spirited there. No one saw him come in. He said my mother should lie down and asked if she was over her stiff knees. Her knees had been stiff, until we brought the Lamtso salt back."

Jokar moved to Lhandro's father, who sat nearby. Close to the butter lamps. In the brighter light Shan saw a discoloration on Jokar's neck, a large dark bruise that he had not noticed before. As if the lama had been beaten.

Jokar touched Lepka's pulse and the two men began speaking, in low tones at first, then in a more relaxed, louder fashion- of Rapjung and how the herb gatherers once came every autumn to Yapchi, how sometimes a lama and student would come for a month to stay and mix medicine.

"I remember a beautiful house there," Jokar said, "like an old wooden temple." His voice was like shifting sand. He kept holding Lepka's wrist as he spoke.

Lepka smiled back. "That house brought serenity to many people."

When the lama was finished with Lepka, he looked at him, and then his wife. "Sometimes," Jokar said quietly, "don't always use that staff of yours. Lean on your wife. She is a strong staff, too."

Nyma sat in the corner, watching Jokar with an expression of guilt and awe. She still wore her rongpa clothes. Shan had not seen her doing her rosary since the day the village burned.

The purbas lingered in the shadows of the opposite corner, watching uncertainly. "Are they scared of him?" Shan asked Somo, when she retreated toward the door.

"No. But I'm scared. They seem sure he is the one now, they're saying more purbas should come and guard him."

"The one?"

"The monk who has come to fill the chair of Siddhi."

Shan stared at Somo in disbelief and fear. The frail old medicine lama would never propose aggression against the Chinese. But he might know of the chair of Siddhi and want to go there to speak with the people about the Compassionate Buddha. To the purbas it might make little difference, what Jokar said, as long as he took the seat. A prophesy fulfilled would have much power among the people of the mountains, and the legend could be made to serve the purbas' goals. The legend said the lama who sat in the chair was the leader of revolution. Suddenly one of the young Tibetans from Larkin's team rushed forward and knelt beside Jokar.

"Rinpoche," the youth blurted out, "will you come, will you do this thing for all of us?"

Jokar slowly turned, cocking his head at the man.

"Will you take the chair of Siddhi?" When Jokar replied with only a stare the purba repeated the question in a shaking, excited voice.

The lama offered a small smile and nodded. The purba's eyes flared, and he looked back triumphantly at Somo. He leapt up, fastened a small pack to his back, and ran out the door.

When Jokar stood again he walked purposefully to Winslow, who sat only a few feet from Shan, and sat down. The American grinned, then shot an awkward glance at Shan, as if asking what to do. The lama's hand rose and settled over the crown of Winslow's head, not touching it. The hand slowly drifted along his head, neck, and body, an inch off the American's skin. When he finished the lama sighed, and lifted Winslow's wrist. "The mountains have a hard time with you," Jokar said softly.

Winslow cocked his head at the lama, as if trying to understand. "I'm doing better," he said, grinning awkwardly, as if he had decided the lama was referring to his altitude sickness.

"You have come far for this," the old man said. His deep, moist eyes surveyed Winslow again, settling on the crown of his head. "There is that one black thing. You must get rid of that black thing." He paused again and gazed into the American's eyes. He seemed about to speak again, but sighed. It was his turn to cock his head, as if to better understand something he saw in the American. "You've come far," he said again, and slowly rose.

Winslow stared at the floor. He seemed shaken, somehow. He swallowed hard, and looked up at Melissa Larkin, who returned his solemn stare. He grinned awkwardly. "Feels like far," Winslow quipped, then rose and stepped outside.

Five minutes later Shan found the American sitting by the gnarled juniper tree. "You found her," he said uncertainly. "Now you can go back."

"There's a path I'm on," the American said softly, with an odd curiosity in his voice, the curiosity of one who was confused by one's own actions, or emotions. They stared at the tree together. A small brown bird lighted on a nearby branch and watched them. "I'm meant to be on it. It's just that sometimes it's hard to see it."

There was another mystery Shan had not had time to consider, the mystery of who Winslow was, or who he was becoming. "You came to find Miss Larkin's body," Shan reminded him. "You found her alive. You saved her life. Go. Everything that's left-" he struggled for words. "From here, everything becomes very dangerous."