‘Weren’t you the one who took us? When trouble came, you ran faster than a fox.’
‘I was just your translator. I tried to get you to study hard, but you didn’t want to, and even now you can’t speak Tibetan. That’s not like me at all, I studied Mandarin so diligently, I’m…’
‘Sick worried!’ a couple of soldiers said in unison, laughing together.
‘Right, I’m off. My brothers, when I come back, I’ll bring you some of our grassland’s wind-dried meat – it’s much better than the greasy stuff we get here.’ Gongzha lifted his bag onto his back and walked out; ten or more soldiers crowded around to see him to the gate.
*
The sunbeams sparkled, the sky was completely clear and waves rippled on Cuoe Lake. The warm breeze was making both people and animals lethargic. The yaks in the distance and the antelopes closer to hand were all extremely still, eating or resting, enjoying the gentle caress of the beautiful day.
Gongzha hurried home in a cloud of dust. After hearing what had happened, he suspected that Baila had something to do with it. His hand flew to his dagger and he raced even faster across the plain.
As he reached his family tent, Gongzan came out to greet him. ‘Brother, Ama’s acting up again.’
Gongzha strode into the tent to find a tousle-haired Dawa trying to get up off the couch and his little sister tugging at her clothes and crying. ‘What’s this, Ama?’ He walked over and pressed down on Dawa’s shoulder, holding her steady, then sat down beside her. ‘Ama, do you know who I am?’
Dawa looked at him, laughing crazily. ‘Ha ha, which tent did you go to that you’re only coming back now after such a long time?’
After she was calm again, Gongzha set off to collect some herbs for her. He took out the old gun and weighed it in his hand. He hadn’t used it in a long time and it felt unfamiliar to the touch. He slung the gun across his back, put on his leather chuba, hung the leather bag of gunpowder off his belt, and led his horse out from behind the tent.
On his way out of the encampment, just as he was about to mount his horse, he saw Baila coming towards him. When he thought of the scar on his mother’s forehead, his face fell.
Baila rolled her eyes when she saw Gongzha, snorted at the ground, and cursed. ‘Bairuo!’
‘Bairuo’ meant ‘your father is a corpse’ and was the most vicious insult on the grassland. His father’s untimely death had left a deep wound in Gongzha’s heart and even if he’d been of a calm disposition, he probably wouldn’t have let such a hurtful insult pass. But Gongzha was not known for his even temper. He pulled his foot out of the stirrup, turned and glared at Baila, his face trembling with rage.
‘Bairuo!’ Baila cursed again as she passed him.
Gongzha immediately raised his hand and slapped her, hitting her so hard that she spun round several times before she fell to the ground. ‘You stay away from me from, you hear? Otherwise I won’t be responsible for my actions,’ he said coldly. Mounting his horse, he cracked his whip and disappeared across the grassland in search of his mother’s herbs.
A crowd gathered when they heard Baila’s cries. They asked her what had happened.
‘The son of that wild jenny Dawa hit me! How dare he!’ Baila smacked the ground, stirring up a cloud of dust. ‘Danzeng, is that the sort of woman you spend your time with – a woman who raises her sons to hit your own woman? You’re really something. The punishment for your tent visits has come, and it’s come to your own woman!’
‘Ama, how could Gongzan have hit you?’ Cuomu pushed through the crowd and helped her mother up. ‘Isn’t he in his tent looking after his mother?’
‘What Gongzan? It’s that yak Gongzha. I’m telling you now: if you carry on seeing him after today, don’t blame me if I don’t recognise you as my daughter.’ Baila wiped away her tears, leaving streaks of dirt across her face.
Cuomu’s eyes lit up. ‘Gongzha’s back?’
‘I’ve told you, I forbid you from seeing him again.’ Baila clasped her back with her hands. ‘Ow! My back… That dead yak, bairuo…’
‘Ama, don’t curse!’ Cuomu supported her mother back to the tent; when they were almost there, they ran into her two uncles, who were on their way back from herding.
‘What’s wrong with your mother?’ her elder uncle, Niduo, asked.
Cuomu was about to speak when her mother butted in. ‘It’s that woman of your brother’s – yet again. She told her son to hit me. I can’t even straighten my back, and as for my face, well, see for yourselves.’ Baila turned the swollen, reddened right side of her face towards them, her tears falling thick and fast. ‘Oh, my three men have all become grass-eaters. Their woman gets beaten up by a wild yak and all they can do is look!’
Her words had the desired effect. A grassland man could take being called stupid, he could even take being called useless, but to say he was no better than the grass-eating livestock was an insult that struck deep. A man without the bloodlust fundamental to survival on the grassland was no man at all. If a man lost that, he lost the respect of his woman, and if even his own woman didn’t look up to him, he had no standing on the grassland.
‘Let’s go.’ Niduo jerked his chin at his younger brother, Duoji, who was standing next to him. Ignoring Cuomu’s shouted protests, they headed off, taking with them a stave from beside the tent.
The two enraged brothers plunged into Gongzha’s family tent. Gongzan and his siblings were tending to Dawa. Sensing something was wrong, they automatically reached for the knives at their waists. Niduo and Duoji didn’t even look at Gongzan; they just took their staves and lashed out in every direction. The pressure cooker and bowls clattered noisily to the ground, and clothes were thrown across the floor. Gongzan and his two brothers defended themselves with whatever household items came to hand. Their little sister Lamu was badly frightened, she only knew to protect her mother Dawa and hid sobbing in the corner.
By the time Danzeng and Cuomu had hurried over, Niduo had been stabbed in the back. He lay on the ground trying to hold his wound, blood staining his fur-lined chuba. Gongzan had been hit on the head with the stave and blood was trickling down his forehead.
‘Don’t fight, don’t fight…’ Cuomu quickly tried to help her uncle up, but his body was so weak he couldn’t stand. When she saw how pale his face was, she was badly frightened. ‘Aba, Uncle is done for!’ she yelled.
Her shout made everyone else freeze. They all stared at Niduo.
‘Why don’t you come and help me?’ Cuomu called to her Uncle Duoji.
Danzeng and Duoji carried their brother Niduo out of the tent and took him home on their backs. As soon as they’d laid him on the couch, Zhuo Mai raced in, pulling his son with him and carrying his medical bag. He felt for Niduo’s pulse, pulled up his eyelids and then sighed, shaking his head.
‘He’s dead.’
Cuomu sat on the floor, her face deathly pale, wanting to cry but unable to shed any tears. Danzeng could barely stand; he staggered and put out a hand to steady himself on the chest. His youngest brother looked on in a daze. Baila’s eyes rolled and she fainted.
Zhuo Mai caught her and signalled for a glass of water.
When Baila woke and saw Niduo’s bloodied corpse at the side of the tent, she let out a great cry.
‘Brother Danzeng, things have already gone too far,’ Zhuo Mai said, giving Danzeng a sympathetic look. ‘Being upset is not helping – you need to resolve this quickly.’
Duoji’s eyes flashed fire. He fixed Danzeng with a stare and spoke in a low, steely voice. ‘Second Brother cannot die like this. Oldest Brother, it’s for you to say: what should we do?’
What could Danzeng say? Could he say they would not seek revenge? No, he didn’t dare say that. No matter what he felt in his heart, he had to deal with this. His brother was dead, his corpse laid out right there in front of him. He was the head of the household, the backbone of the family. It was his responsibility to ensure that the people of his tent were not wronged. Danzen
g was a man of standing. His brother had been killed and this was a blood feud that could endure for generations – how could he not take revenge? How could it stop here? And yet, what sort of revenge should he take? Should he kill one of her sons? A life for a life. Blood for blood. Thinking of her now, so delusional that she didn’t even know him, how could he bring another bloody disaster on her tent?
‘Brother, I know you like that woman, but now her son has killed our brother. No matter how much you like her, is a woman really more important than a brother?’ Duoji looked at him, his face tense.
Looking down at Niduo’s mute, motionless, bloody body, Danzeng’s heart was like an eagle about to pounce. Blood rushed to his head. ‘Alright, let’s avenge Second Brother.’ Danzeng looked at his youngest brother, grimaced, and forced the words out from between gritted teeth. He lifted his feet and prepared to go out.
‘No, Aba, Uncle, don’t kill again! Uncle Niduo has already gone. No matter how much more blood is spilt, it won’t bring him back.’ Cuomu held onto her father’s leg, her tears falling like rain.
‘Will your Uncle Niduo die for nothing? A debt of blood must be repaid in blood.’ Baila’s eyes were bloodshot and she was hungry for revenge. ‘That woman… Your father was so good to her, and for what? He helped her bring up her son, and now see what’s happened – bitten by the leopard you raised,’ she said viciously. ‘Let go of your father, Cuomu. Don’t make the people of the grassland look down on him.’
When Danzeng heard his woman say that, he knew he had to go. He turned to leave.
‘Wait, wait. Will you just let me say one thing?’ Zhuo Mai glanced round at everyone in the tent. His voice was not loud, but it was full of authority. ‘When I’ve finished, you can go and kill people or burn down tents, whatever you want.’
Danzeng looked at his brother and his woman and sat down without saying a word.
‘Times have changed, and things are different here on the plateau now. Outsiders used to dismiss this land as a place of evil ghosts. They said that once you came up here, you could never leave. So no one wanted to come. And you yourselves never left, never mixed with the outside world. You settled everything among yourselves. If a man killed another man, the following day someone would come and kill him, and on it would go. If you wanted to put an end to the generations of blood feuds, you discussed how much would be paid in compensation, but the price for the lives lost was never equal.
‘Now it’s different. The Liberation has come. You’re not anyone’s serfs anymore, and you no longer have to run around for other people. Everyone is equal before the law: if you kill someone, you die, and if you owe a debt, you pay. There’s no difference in the value of a life now.
‘We can’t keep holding on to the old ways, paying blood debts with blood. I suggest that you go quickly to the town to report this matter and let the government handle it. Brother Danzeng, you’re the team leader and you’re well known on the grassland. If you set an example by changing the way justice is done on the grassland, future generations will thank you.’
‘Dr Zhuo is right.’ Wangjiu, the old clan elder, stooped in under the tent flap, supported by Shida and another young man. ‘That is the history of our grassland. If you kill a member of my family, I will kill one of yours. Year after year there is blood and sacrifice, and it goes on for generation after generation.’
Danzeng got up to let Wangjiu sit.
‘People say that we people of northern Tibet are abuhuo, that we’re hot-headed and unreasonable, that we’re dirty and unruly. We murder one another, turn our knives on each other. Why can’t we control ourselves? Why can’t we let the government help us deal with problems when they arise? Blood-letting doesn’t solve anything.’
‘Elder Wangjiu, I…’ Danzeng looked up at the old man, then clasped his head in his hands and knelt on the ground in front of him. His eyes slowly filled with tears.
‘Danzeng, your grandfather died in a revenge killing and your father died in a revenge killing. Now your brother is gone. Will Cuomu have to die before all this stops?’ Wangjiu spoke with feeling and patted Danzeng’s shoulder.
His words made Danzeng and Duoji hold their heads and howl. Danzeng agreed to go to the town and report the case the next day.
*
While all that was going on, Gongzha was halfway up Mount Chanaluo, carefully searching the rocky crevices for herbs. Loose stones occasionally rolled past him. The upper slopes, above five thousand metres, had snow year round and the summit got a fresh covering every day. The smallest disturbance could trigger an avalanche and bring down half the mountain, so Gongzha moved slowly and kept his breathing as light as possible for fear the vibrations might bring the snow crashing down on top of him.
Mount Chanaluo’s eastern face overlooked the lake. There were ravines on both the north and south sides, and to the west lay the endless sweep of Cuoe Grassland. The mountain was a haven for yaks, wolves and bears, and according to the legend of the Wolf Spirit it was forbidden by the Buddha to go there. The herders didn’t dare, and only the older, braver hunters ventured up there with their guns, in groups of two or three, but they always hurried away.
Gongzha’s father had often hunted up there, taking Gongzha with him. Zhaduo had also gone there to gather herbs and he’d told Gongzha the mountain’s story. He said that beyond the first layer of the mountain range was a snow valley and that this was the bears’ haven. When you were almost at the ledge just below the summit, there was a large black boulder, and on the boulder lay the magical chain sent from heaven that King Gesar had used to tether the Wolf Spirit. The main gate to Shambhala was right next to the chain.
Shambhala was the heaven that occupied many a herder’s heart. Was it really on this earth? Gongzha shook his head. He’d heard these kinds of stories since he was young. The children of the grassland could easily tell several days’ worth of stories about Shambhala. But no one could say what Shambhala looked like; they just put whatever they imagined was most beautiful into their stories. As he looked at the cloud-veiled mountain peak, he thought of the story that Cuomu had told him. How Chanaluo had once had a heart that beat, but that now, no one knew why, the heart was gone and all that remained was a cavity. Was that ledge Chanaluo’s heart cavity?
He stared hard at the mountain peak. He wanted to explore up there, investigate that mysterious ledge, the heaven-sent magical chain and the legend of the Wolf Spirit. But not tonight. Gongzha tilted his head and looked at the sky: the moon had already reached the mountaintop and Ama would be waiting for him. He checked the herbs in his pack and, stepping onto the packed snow, carefully slid down the mountain.
Just after he rounded a large rock, he suddenly saw Kaguo standing on a nearby boulder. Her thick fur stirred lightly in the breeze, and in the moonlight her small eyes shone bright and clear. She watched him quietly.
Gongzha froze, then instinctively reached for his gun. But slowly he lowered his hand. Under the light of the moon, man and bear looked at each other across the snow mountain. The mountain was utterly silent save for the in- and out-breaths of the man and the bear.
Then Kaguo jumped down from the boulder and bounded back up the mountain. In a little while she’d completely disappeared.
Gongzha stood staring after her for some time. He thought about how Zhaduo had instructed him to find her, how she would supposedly lead him to the Buddha and let the Buddha’s light shine on the grassland once more. This was what Zhaduo had requested and it had become Gongzha’s burden. Kaguo was a bear, what could she do? What did the Buddha have to do with a bear? Gongzha didn’t understand. He thought of the black Buddha he’d buried when he was a child and the book that looked like a religious text but wasn’t. Maybe he should find them and move them to another place. With these thoughts in mind, he continued his slide down the mountain, found his horse, mounted, and with a crack of the whip raced back to the grassland.
He got back to the tent before dawn to find his home in a shambles. The pressure
cooker, washbowls and blankets were strewn all over the place and their one small wooden chest had been smashed to pieces. His three brothers were clearing up and his mother was asleep. When his sister saw him, she buried herself in his arms and sobbed.
‘What happened?’
Gongzan explained.
Gongzha’s face darkened. He put the medicinal herbs he’d collected beside the window and began to help his brothers clean up.
When morning came, Gongzha made his youngest brother, the brother who’d stabbed Niduo, go to the town and turn himself in.
Because the guilty party had proactively reported themselves, the situation was now a lot less inflammatory. The government had stepped in and, whatever the outcome, that would at least guarantee there’d be no ongoing blood feud. As for settling Niduo’s funeral arrangements, the clan elder called Gongzha and Danzeng to Zhuo Mai’s tent to discuss them.
Wangjiu coughed, drank a little water, raised his head, and said, ‘What’s done is done. You are your respective tents’ head of household. I called you here today to discuss the funeral of the dead man.’
‘It is we who were in the wrong,’ Gongzha said. ‘How much money do you want? We are willing to pay.’ He saw that the hair on the side of Danzeng’s head had begun to go white and his heart sank. The Danzeng he remembered was a strong, authoritative man. How could he have lost that overnight? His back was stooped, his leather robe hung loose around his waist, and his hair was dirty and unkempt.
Ever since Gongzha had come to understand such things, he’d been witness to Danzeng’s comings and goings in their tent. In the lean years, it had always been Danzeng who went hungry so that they could eat; he’d looked after Gongzha and his siblings like a father. Then when Gongzha had grown and could look after his own tent, Danzeng had put him forward for the army. In Gongzha’s heart, Danzeng was like his own father. He’d always hoped that one day he would return to the grassland, marry Cuomu and take good care of Danzeng in his old age. But now this had happened.
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