Eliot Pattison - Bone Mountain

"They told us some young officer is training his men," Shan said, as though it might give comfort. But there seemed to be no other words to say. Two more shells were fired, and when the smoke cleared on the slope the deity stone was gone. Not just the stone- an entire patch of the slope was gone, the trees and lichen rocks replaced by a patch of smoldering, shattered earth. The tank spun about and began its slow course back toward the oil camp.

No one spoke of the incident, although some of the older villagers seemed unable to move, and only stared mournfully at the smoking patch of earth. With a stab of pain Shan realized they might have concluded another deity had tried to join them, and been killed by the Chinese. Slowly the village went back to its work. Shan watched, perplexed, as Lhandro's mother and Nyma began hanging scraps of cloth from the sills of windows across to the pen walls or to the ground, anchored with stones. Some were khatas, others small prayer flags. Several villagers were sweeping the entrances to their houses, some even washing the walls. One man held a can of black paint and was painting in huge script, inscribing the mani mantra along the front of his house. Between two houses Shan found a dozen of the villagers in a circle, offering mantras. It was a familiar scene to Shan, sad and uplifting at the same time, the way battles were fought between the Chinese and the Tibetans. Prayer flags and mantras against battle tanks.

As if to complete the festive air, Lhandro ordered a large fire to be ignited in the center of the path, near the entrance to the village. His mother and wife brought a large pot and an urn of butter and set about to make tea for the entire village. They would use the new salt, Lhandro proclaimed, and his mother brought out an old dongma that had been used to churn tea when Lepka was a boy.

As they drank the tea the headman's father told a story, passed down through many generations, of how their house had been built- a long story replete with details of how the strongest trees had been chosen, with prayers spoken to each tree before it was cut; and how the clan members had gone high in the mountains, above the trees to where glaciers lived, to bring rocks back for the foundation, because they had lived so close to the sky deities and knew the language of the wind and could tell it to blow gently over the valley.

A remote sort of happiness settled over the village, a contentment edged with anticipation. Shan saw more than one of the villagers wipe away tears, and several more joined in the cleaning of the houses. The group that lingered by the fire began a new song, softly at first, then growing vigorous, even loud. Lokesh looked at Shan with puzzled eyes. It was, Shan realized, one of Lokesh's traveling songs, a pilgrim's song, a song of lonely wanderers.

When the army trucks appeared again, winding their way slowly up the valley, no one in the village seemed surprised. Lhandro sighed, and helped his father back into the house. "They will search in earnest this time," the headman said to Shan and Lokesh, handing Shan his drawstring bag. "You must go up the slope. You have done all you could do here. Take the trail Anya brought you on, from Chemi's village. Someone will find you."

Above them, already on the trail, Winslow waved and turned away at a jog. But they didn't follow. Shan and Lokesh stopped in the shadow of the first large tree above the village and watched as the trucks arrived. The first vehicle turned around, so its rear cargo bay was facing the village path. A soldier pulled back the canvas cover, revealing a dozen soldiers in combat gear. Shan took a step forward, a chill creeping down his spine. Colonel Lin climbed out from the cab of the truck and up into the bay, the soldiers still sitting, as though waiting for a command, and raised a bullhorn to his mouth.

"Citizens of Lujun Valley," he began, and with a sinking heart Shan saw that Lin was reading from a prepared script. "You have been honored to participate in the great economic opening of these lands by the people's government." Lin paused and even from his position two hundred feet away Shan saw a frown on his face. "A new sun is rising, and all the peoples of China embrace you today." Shan remembered his bag, and pulled out his battered field glasses.

The people of the village had stopped their work, stopped their singing and their mantras to gather in the central path, several moving to stand at Lhandro's back as the headman positioned himself between the trucks and the village. A figure emerged from the first house, leaning on a staff, a burlap sack over his shoulder. It was Lepka, walking straighter and with more strength than Shan had seen before in the man. He stepped to his son's side as the soldiers from the second truck produced a folding table and chair and set them up near the entrance to the village, forty feet from Lhandro. A man in one of the green nylon jackets appeared, carrying a clipboard, and settled into the chair. Two men in white shirts appeared and unfolded a small banner fixed to two poles. Serene Prosperity it said in red letters.

"There are new communities, with water pipes and electricity, waiting for you. You may cast off the last chains of feudalism." Lin lowered the paper with an impatient scowl. "You people are being relocated," he barked. "The village is being requisitioned by the 54th Mountain Combat Brigade on behalf of the oil venture. Some of you may obtain jobs in the venture and live in company housing. The others will be moved to one of the new cities." Lin meant the soulless complexes of cinderblock housing with tin roofs that Beijing built around factory complexes. There would be no barley fields, no livestock, no caravans to Lamtso, no elegant wooden houses infused with prayer.

"You did not ask us," Lhandro called back. Strangely, his father bent and lifted a thick flaming branch from the fire and held it at his side, like a weapon.

"Of course we did," Lin shot back. "The venture asked the District Council. They approved on your behalf. They are your political representatives."

The wind had died. Lhandro's words came as clearly as those Lin spoke though his bullhorn. "The District Council is all Chinese. They have never been to Yapchi Valley," the headman shouted. "We demand to speak to the Council."

Lin smiled icily. "Be careful what you ask for, comrade."

"No one asked the land," a thin but strong voice called out. "No one asked the land if it wanted to give up its blood, so Chinese could run their cars in Beijing." It was Lepka. Other villagers reached into the fire and lifted burning sticks, like torches. They had no weapons. Surely, Shan thought, they didn't believe they could rid themselves of the army simply by burning two trucks. Even if they tried the soldiers would cut them down. He lowered the glasses and took an anxious step forward.

Lin glared at Lepka, turned and snapped out a command. The soldiers on the benches beside him leapt out and instantly formed a tight rank in front of their colonel.

"You will assemble in a line by that wall," he commanded the villagers. "Have identity cards ready. You will approach the table one at a time."

The villagers did not move.

"You will form a line!" Lin shouted, throwing down the bullhorn. He unsnapped the cover on his holster and his hand settled over the butt of his automatic pistol.

Lepka slowly moved, not toward the table but back toward his house. He began to sing again, in a loud, reedy voice that carried up the slopes. The lonely pilgrim's song. Shan was confused. What was in the bag at his shoulder? It had the shape of a thin box with sharp edges. Other villagers joined in the song and began wandering back among the houses. A woman ran forward and wiped a window clean. Another woman appeared at a doorway, paused to hang a long brown cloth on a peg by the door, and darted around the house.