“The photographer had worked with Jiao there, and one of his assignments was to photograph all those who Jiao branded as troublemakers. Yes, he recognized me. He was confused, because he must have known I had been driven away to prison. Your deputy saved me that day.” Lhakpa sighed. “You do know why they were there, don’t you, Shan?”

“To begin planning for Yangkar to be the project’s administrative headquarters,” Shan said.

Lhakpa gave a forlorn nod of his head. “It will be the end of Yangkar as we know it. They poison everything they touch.”

In the valley below, Huan’s men had mounted a large searchlight on a truck bed and its beam was sweeping the workers compound. Little by little the valley was taking on the air of a prison.

“We can’t stop the dam, Professor,” Shan said.

“Just Lhakpa. That life is over. And we must stop the dam. The young ones are talking about a night of violence, about burning the equipment and the buildings.”

“They will be killed,” Shan said. “And their families will be punished.” New directives had made it a crime to simply have a family member who had engaged in acts of dissent or sabotage.

Lhakpa gave a melancholy nod of agreement. “No one will win,” he conceded.

“Sometimes in Tibet,” Shan whispered, “winning is just enduring.”

They watched the wispy line of smoke from the incense reach up toward the stars. Lives hung by such threads.

“But it is the wrong site,” Lhakpa said after a long silence. “The geology isn’t right, too many fractures in the valley rock structure. There were seismic tests that confirmed that but all those maps have disappeared, all traces of the tests are gone.”

“Which is why Sun Lunshi was bringing more maps back on the train,” Shan said.

Lhakpa nodded. “Even the economics are wrong. The investment needed for the transmission lines and the loss of power along the lines will make recovery of costs impossible. But this area has nagged the government for decades. Too Tibetan. Too religious. Too suggestive that we are not who we think we are.”

“Sorry?”

“Tibetans didn’t sprout from seeds planted here. Long ago they came from somewhere to the west and north, from the horse tribes of central Asia, not from China. The cavern and those standing stones were proof of that but…” Lhakpa shrugged and stared into the glowing ember of his cigarette. “I tried science. I tried reasoning. I tried compassion. What’s left?”

“Prayer?” Shan wondered out loud.