Shan found himself sitting, staring at the sky, beseeching the stars. If only he could just take Lokesh and go. He had no more hope to give the Tibetans, he had no way of seeing through the mysteries that shrouded the gompa and Yapchi Valley. All he could see was the danger.

Time passed, perhaps an hour. Something moved in the darkness, ahead of him. A man, sitting on a rock a hundred feet away, was holding something that glinted in the moonlight, looking not at Shan but out onto the plain.

"The lamas have no patience for me," a deep voice suddenly said behind him. "They say I shouldn't expect to achieve so much in one lifetime." It was an extraordinary voice, hoarse and powerful, like a growl but not exactly. How had Lhandro described it? Like someone roaring in a whisper, because the knobs had broken his voicebox.

As Shan turned toward the man with the ravaged face he saw a second guard sitting on a rock, fifty feet away.

"I told them when I was young I had teachers from the tantric schools who taught that with the right practice you could achieve Buddhahood in one lifetime."

Strangely, Shan realized, he had never heard another name for the Tiger. He shifted uneasily, wondering how many more men with guns lurked in the shadows. And how often the Tiger spoke with Chinese in the night.

"I tell them compared with that, what I seek seems so little." The man sat beside Shan and watched the sky a moment. "When you're always on the run, always moving after sunset, the night sky becomes your home," he said, and for a moment sounded very tired. "You have a man who wrote a letter. Colonel Lin is no friend of Tibet. He has been written, more than once."

Written. The Tiger meant written in the Lotus Book, the purbas' compendium of atrocities against Tibetans.

"I would like to spend time with that Colonel," the purba leader said in a businesslike tone. "Take him somewhere. Valuable things could be learned."

Shan felt his belly clench. "Lin is injured," he said weakly. "Why?" he asked, looking into the man's ravaged face. "Why would you bother to speak to me about this? The purbas know where Lin is."

The man said nothing. Something moved in the distance, and one of the purbas with the guns leapt up. After a moment Shan heard the clatter of small hooves, those of a wild goat or gazelle, and the man returned to his post. Shan studied the Tiger. He seemed like another rock in the night, a lonely statue whose face was slowly being etched away by the wind. Shan realized that the Tiger might have answers to many of the questions that had been plaguing him.

"Why are there no knobs here?" he asked suddenly. "Why didn't the knobs take the abbot of Sangchi?"

The Tiger sighed. "The ones who have him are knobs and not knobs. Things are adrift in this district. Even those knob doctors aren't sure who to report to. We intercepted a request they sent to Lhasa, asking for instructions. They want to go up onto the Plain of Flowers to find the medicine lama. But Tuan and that abbot Khodrak want them here."

"But if monks become the political enforcers," Shan said. "What can the people do to…" his voice trailed off.

"Right," the Tiger said grimly.

"Somo said there are other knobs working for Tuan somewhere else. Five others."

"We can't find them. No one knows where they are. We have tightened security everywhere. No new faces are permitted at any of our meetings now. We have word out all over the district. But those five are not to be found. Everyone is wary, very nervous. It is getting more and more dangerous."

They sat in silence. Crickets sounded somewhere.

"I went to that hermitage where you started but you had already gone," the Tiger said suddenly. "The dropka who were there told us about an old lama taking away the body of Drakte. We followed, and stayed at the durtro until the vultures were done, trying to understand what had happened to him. We talked into the night, and when we awoke your lama was gone, into the mountains."

Had he been wrong about the Tiger? Was he there about Drakte, about finding revenge for Drakte? "I know Drakte was at Amdo town that night," Shan said. "Getting one of the Lotus Books. But why there, why couldn't someone have met him away from the dangers of a town?"

"That damned Serenity Campaign. The howlers are keeping scores for economic success. We laughed about it at first. But this gompa, this Khodrak, decided he had to have the best score in Tibet. And he did." The Tiger gazed at a particularly bright star.

"But it has to be lies," Shan said.

"Exactly. Drakte found out. He had other duties, but he was from this region originally, and he would not allow Khodrak to get away with the lies. It became a personal quest of his, even though I opposed it. When he finished his work for us in the south he roamed through this district to collect the true data. When he found out that a boyhood friend was Tuan's assistant he said it was destined, that he was meant to give it to that Chao. And Chao readily agreed, even said he would trade Drakte something just as good."

"But they were attacked."

"It must have been a trap. To a man like Tuan, Chao would have been a traitor. Chao died, and Drakte was fatally wounded. The Lotus Book Drakte carried was lost."

"How did Chao die, exactly?"

"A stab in the back, wide, like a butcher's knife. They were at a garage. It could have been an ax. Chao died immediately. If Drakte had come to us we probably could have saved him. But he went to you instead."

"You sound convinced they did not attack each other."

"That bastard Tuan must have discovered them. He would have been furious with Chao. Chao could have ruined him. Easiest solution for Tuan would have been to kill them both. He was in Amdo that night, in meetings about the Serenity Campaign. He could kill Chao, say reactionaries did it, and call him a martyr."

They listened to the crickets again. The Tiger pointed out a falling star. "Why speak with me?" Shan asked again.

"I told you. Because of that colonel. There's a woman back there who speaks like a nun," the Tiger said, "from that village that was burned. She says we can't have Lin unless you agree."

They were silent again, for a long time. "All they wanted was to complete their deity," Shan said in a sad, lonely voice.

"All I ever wanted was to grow barley with my father," the feared leader of the purbas replied, in a tone that seemed to match Shan's.

"That deity has to be mended in the light, not in shadow," Shan said after another silence, and he looked skyward, puzzled at the words that had drifted off his tongue. He heard the purba general sigh, and he waited for an answer, but none came. He turned and saw that the Tiger was gone.

When he returned to the campfire the dropka had retired to their tents and Winslow was huddled with Nyma, Lhandro, and Somo. Somo asked Shan to repeat in detail everything he had seen inside the gompa, and they reviewed their plan once more. Everything was ready, but no one had anticipated that Lokesh could not walk.

"That," Winslow said slowly, sprouting a grin, "must be the reason I am here."

The little bell came from far away to reach him, its first peal sounding like an alarm in his consciousness. Shan sat upright in his blanket. It was before dawn. He had slept fitfully, kept awake by Winslow as Lhandro and Nyma taught him a strange dance step in the shadow of the truck. The bell sounded again. Something inside him had been listening, the lao gai Shan who had learned all the many types of bells, sirens, and whistles used by the knobs and their prison guards, had learned to know which bell summoned guards with rifles, and which brought guards to search their barracks or carry a prisoner to the infirmary. Slowly he realized this bell was to summon monks to their predawn prayers.