"Is he- has someone seen him?" Shan asked anxiously.

"A Kazakh nurse who knows us. The doctors mostly give him medication to keep him asleep. He's in a secure ward, where they put injured prisoners sometimes. Not always a guard, but they keep the door locked."

But he was out of the camp, Shan thought. It meant there was a chance of rescue, a chance for him to at last speak with the lama. "Does he know about Khitai?"

Jakli sighed. "No one knows how, but he must. The Kazakh nurse speaks some Tibetan. He seems to trust her. He asked her in what direction the lama field was, because he had to pray toward the place now."

"Tell her not to speak anymore Tibetan. It could make others-" He stopped when he saw Jakli was not listening. He followed her gaze toward Kaju.

"There is something you have to do for Kaju," Shan said after a moment. "Only you can do it."

Jakli looked at him with uncertainty and sighed, as if preparing herself.

"It may be," Shan said slowly, studying Kaju as he wandered among the boys, discomfort still obvious on his face, "the most important thing any of us could do. But I won't do it. She was your friend, your teacher."

"No," Jakli said slowly, almost like a moan. There was no uncertainty in her eyes now when she looked up. Only sorrow. "I couldn't."

"He won't accept that she was killed. And everything else he has done is based on that delusion." Shan looked up the slope. "Maybe he will find that he has something to say to her."

"And if he runs to Yoktian and brings them back? With all the boys here? It would be just what Xu wants."

"I'm not sure what Xu wants anymore," Shan replied.

Jakli ignored him. "She would call it clear proof that the Kazakhs are conspiring. She will say we killed Lau and are covering up the evidence. She would take all the boys away, maybe all the zheli. Put them in a special school. Make them all Chinese."

"You can trust or you can distrust. Lau would choose to trust. It is up to you. I will not take him because to do so without your consent would be to dishonor you."

She looked at him with pain in her eyes, then walked slowly away, without reply, and Shan began to inch away from the group. Then, as he reached the shadow of the cabin, he moved quickly to the trail. In twenty minutes he was at the cavern. He lit one of the torches and stepped inside.

The waterkeeper's chamber appeared untouched. He walked around the room. By the tunnel he saw the words he had left for Gendun. The way that is told is not the constant way. With a spark of joy he saw that someone had written below it. It was Gendun's hand, unmistakably. But a constant can be found in the way of the telling, Gendun had written.

Shan turned and searched the room again. Under the sleeping pallet by the wall he found a large, soiled envelope, stuffed with papers. Government papers, routine paperwork for those paid to maintain streams. He scanned them quickly. They were separated in groups fastened with paper clips, dated at regular intervals. The waterkeeper apparently journeyed to town every other week, where he received his papers. All routine, except the very last paper. It was on special letterhead marked Poverty Eradication Scheme, Yoktian County, and sent by Ko Yonghong. The waterkeepers in the district were being privatized into the Brigade, it said. The Brigade would be presenting gifts in celebration of the event. And to facilitate the project, all keepers would be required to keep strict records of the movements of herders and others through their assigned watersheds. Because the Brigade felt special compassion for them, all orphans were to be especially noted and asked to report to Director Ko so they could be enrolled in a special benefit program. Continue to build socialism in pursuit of your duties, it said in closing.

Lau had been at the cabin the day she died, Jakli had discovered. The zheli had been given their solitary assignments and Lau had gone to see the waterkeeper. He had shown her the memorandum from Ko, and she had known it was the final sign, the beginning of the end. She had ridden to Karachuk that night, ridden at a desperate pace, to tell Marco that the Yakde and his protectors had to escape with Jakli and Nikki.

As Shan was leaving the cavern, two figures appeared at the entrance. Jakli, holding a torch, with Kaju. She looked at Shan with a sad smile. "Okay. I told him a true teacher would want to know the truth," she said.

Shan nodded silently and stepped aside to let her lead the Tibetan through the ice cave to Auntie Lau. Shan followed at a distance. He was at the entrance to the burial chamber when he heard Kaju groan and saw him drop to his knees. Shan stood at the back, by the frozen handprints on the wall, as Jakli showed him the bullet hole.

Kaju held his belly as if he were going to be sick. And then he sobbed.

Jakli knelt beside him, and they studied Lau without speaking.

"She left me files," Kaju said at last, very quietly. "Three days before she disappeared, she updated all the files about each of the children." The words came slowly, as if he were struggling to find them. "This one had pneumonia once, so keep a hat on her. That one likes to watch birds. This one is supposed to see a dentist in three months. It was as if she were going away." He looked down into his hands. "Not locations. She didn't tell me where to find them."

"Why would you say that?" Jakli asked, suspicion heavy in her voice.

"Major Bao asked. Twice, himself. And three days ago at the school, Comrade Hu asked. Said records had to be completed."

The words hung like a dark cloud over them.

At last Shan stepped to the Tibetan's side. "You should consider carefully who it is who lied to you," he said.

Kaju looked at him in confusion. "No one," he said in a brittle voice. "This is just a terrible tragedy." He shifted his gaze to Jakli, then back to Shan. "Except you. She was missing, they said. But you had her body hid."

"It was all planned. Arrangements were made to bring you to replace her."

"Plans for her to retire, yes," the Tibetan said. "She was going to Urumqi." He fell back off his knees, sitting, as if he had lost his balance.

"Ko told you that she would definitely be leaving for Urumqi?"

Kaju nodded. "Ko said he was going to erect a plaque to her at the school. She will always be a hero in the Brigade." Kaju kept staring at Lau's face. "I will not let them stop me," he said. It sounded like a vow to the dead woman.

"Who?" Shan asked as he sat beside the Tibetan.

"The ones who did this. The reactionaries."

Jakli groaned.

"It's wasn't reactionaries," Shan said calmly. "It was someone looking for a boy. A very specific boy." He told them, as they sat in the chill burial room, about the Yakde Lama. He was careful not to let Kaju know about the Raven's Nest or the waterkeeper, but he spoke about General Rongqi and how one of the zheli had been the incarnation of the Yakde, and about the Jade Basket.

Jakli sighed heavily, then raised her hand slowly and rested it on Auntie Lau's shoulder. The Tibetan sat in silence, his eyes restlessly studying the corpse in front of him. "If I were to believe you, it would mean they all are lying, that they were all working together. Ko. General Rongqi and Major Bao. They aren't. I know that. That's not the kind of government we have now. Bao and Public Security, sometimes they don't understand. One of our assignments is to help them understand new techniques for-" His voice faded, as if he had lost his train of thought. "But the Brigade is different. I got a letter from vice chairman Rongqi congratulating me on my appointment. The people sent me to university," Kaju added, as if it explained much.