In the moonlight he saw the hint of a smile on the professor’s face. “The old herders in the cavern you found, they were praying for months before the explosion in the cave, from the first time those Institute surveyors were spotted in the valley. Now they pray nonstop, all night and all day, in shifts, pray for the valley, pray for Gekho, pray for the American woman. We don’t know how long it will be before Public Security discovers them. They won’t flee. Public Security will arrest them. That Lieutenant Huan will call them saboteurs and traitors.”

“Is that what the others from Larung Gar were charged with?”

Lhakpa sighed. “I hear the 404th is a terrible place.”

“There was a meeting at the prison last week. Jiao was there, with Lieutenant Huan and a man named Major Xun, deputy to the governor of the county. Afterward all the Larung Gar prisoners were put in solitary confinement. It means they intend to do individual interrogations of them now, probably brutal interrogations.”

The news seemed to strike a painful blow. Lhakpa lowered his head into his hands for a moment. “Our world is such a broken place, Shan. Sometimes I feel like my soul is so withered it will just blow away in the next strong wind. Maybe we should all become snow monks and lose ourselves in the mountains.”

“I’ve tried that. All I got was cold.”