The librarian’s clothes were invariably soiled from his days spent in his garage, but Tserung always fastidiously washed his hands before arriving at his second job. He sat at a table between two bright lanterns in the first of a half dozen stone-walled chambers. Every room was lined with shelves, and every shelf was filled with peche, the loose-leafed books of Tibetan tradition that had, at mortal risk, been secretly hidden in the former subterranean chapels while the army and the Red Guard had been demolishing the huge monastery that had sat above.

Tserung had a small bottled gas burner with a pot of tea on it that he now shared with Shan and Yara. “Nearly two rooms done,” the mechanic reported with a proud grin, showing two missing teeth. He had been the firstborn son of a traditional Tibetan family and as such had been destined to become a monk at the monastery. But Beijing had crushed the hopes of such traditions. The mechanic had told Shan that down here, serving as the guardian and librarian for the clandestine, illegal collection, was the closest he would ever come to feeling like a real monk. He had enthusiastically embraced Shan’s suggestion that he catalog every one of the thousands of peche on the shelves. Tibetan books were all hand-printed, their carved wooden printing plates carefully guarded and treasured by generations of monks. Religious Affairs had not only destroyed millions of such books but also scores of thousands of printing plates, making bonfires of the often centuries-old carvings, which meant that there were probably books on Tserung’s shelves that were the only one of their kind surviving, never to be printed again. Scattered among them, moreover, were hand-scribed chronicles and journals kept by the administrators of the big monastery, which had been the economic, cultural, and religious center in the region for centuries.

“There’s a large valley to the northeast, just outside the township,” Shan said. “I think some call it Gekho’s Roost.”

“You mean where the Chinese are reshaping the earth,” Tserung said in a tight voice. “The Five Claws.”

“Yes, the hydro project. But there was something else there, from a long time ago.”

“Gekho’s Roost, yes. But the old ones also called it the Valley of the Gods, because it’s where the land gods first came out of the earth.”

“Yangkar was the main monastery of the region. Families living in the valley would have sent their sons to Yangkar. Have you come across mention of it?”