Maya's Aura: Goa to Nepal

by Smith, Skye

  The pictures showed how to use the aura, but nothing else. The only writing on each page seemed to be a simple title for each picture. There was no explanation of what was happening, or what was being attempted, or what effect was expected. There was not even a key to explain the tiny graphic symbols painted around the edge of the pictures.

  Would Vidu know about this book of pictures? Would he be able to explain them? She had a strong desire to brave the slippery trail and run down the mountainside to show it to him. No, that must wait until morning. Morning. The detectives.

  An hour ago she was sure that what she must do was to flee the detectives and follow Marique to Nepal. Now that plan was on hold until she could interpret this book. Even the book could wait until she had patched up the hole in the statue base. This she did by replacing the brick tile and sealing it in place with a mixture of rice paste and the dust from the original mortar.

  For the rest of the afternoon and for most of the night, she studied the twenty pages of the book searching for a hint to the meanings of the symbols on the pages, pages that she already understood. There were six pages that were entirely familiar to her because she herself already used those techniques.

  That night when she fell asleep in her coffin, she clutched the precious, ancient book to her chest.

  * * * * *

  From her vantage on the trail, Maya could see that the Sikh detective was sitting in the river pool washing himself. The river pool was just the bend in the river where the hot water from the lower cave joined in. Men had built up a wall of loose river stones to divert most of the river around it, so at the join the water was warm, though it cooled down quickly as you went downstream from the join.

  The pilgrims were allowed to bathe at this place, though the rough pool did not appeal to her. At the hottest point of the join there were two many remains of chickens that had been dunked in the boiling water before plucking, and of goat meat that had been sterilized in the same way.

  The detective was trying to run a comb through his long dark hair, and was cursing his tangles. She put her packsack down carefully on a flat stone beside the pool. "Here, let me," she said softly.

  Her voice startled him and he was so eager to cover his private parts with both hands that he left the comb stuck in a tangle. She sat behind him on a dry stone and took up the comb and began to tease out the tangle. "Your hair is wasted on a man," she said admiringly. "It is so thick and shiny black."

  He half turned to see her face, but not so far as to pull his hair out of her hands. "So is yours, although your blonde roots are beginning to show."

  "Yes, I know. I will have to touch them up when I get back to the hotel. Traveling is so much easier when I have dark hair."

  "I thought all women wanted blonde hair?"

  "Blonde hair is like waving a flag to every hustler and beggar and horny male in India. No, thank you. Especially not when women travel alone."

  He looked around her and beyond her. "Where is your friend?"

  "She left. She's gone to look for that man that rescued us in Goa."

  The man became so agitated in his movements that he lost his balance and slipped deeper into the pool and into the cooler water. She let go of his comb so that she wouldn't rip his hair out.

  "Ahh, Inghatoo malla Shiva that gets cold quickly," he cursed.

  "Well you needed to cool off anyway," she giggled. "Either that or get bigger hands. Come back here and sit still so I can finish your hair. There is no way you can catch up to her."

  It only took one hand to cover his privacy while he made his way out of the frigid water and back into the warm. He settled again on the stony bottom with his back to her and she reached forward to work on his tangles. "Tell me more," he ordered. He felt a bit foolish giving an order to a woman who was looking for lice in his hair while he sat in the nude in a mountain pool in the morning sunshine.

  "It is much as you suspected," she began. "He did question the Indian driver of the slave bus, and he did find out where the bus had just driven from. He is on his way there now to see if there are any more children to rescue."

  "That is a job for the police, blah, blah, blah," he continued for five minutes. She ignored his bluster and instead concentrated on bringing up her aura. This was a wonderful opportunity to try the new skills that Vidu had taught her, including making sound vibrations in this man's brain.

  She pinned his long black hair up onto the top of his head and held it in place with the comb, and then hovered her right hand over the back of his neck between his ears. She could see him slumping down as he relaxed to her non touch.

  "What was that?" he asked and stiffened. "Did you hear something?"

  "No, what did it sound like?" she said innocently. It was working.

  He relaxed again, and then heard it again. It was a voice. A strange voice. Not a human voice, and yet saying human words. In English. When he concentrated on listening the voice stopped. Only by ignoring it could he hear it. It was stronger now. "Trust this woman. Believe in her." In English.

  All his life he had waited for the great spirits to speak to him. He had expected it in Punjabi, not English. He looked around. There was no one near save the girl. This was not a girl's voice, not even a human's voice. It was as if someone were bowing a cello and making words from the sound. Trust this woman. Believe in her.

  He tried not to think of it, not to think of anything, hoping that the voice would come back and tell him more. He couldn't stop himself from concentrating. His ears were listening too intently to hear the voice any more. Damn. Well at least the message was clear.

  "Are the police along the Nepali border any less corrupt than those in Goa?" she asked.

  "Huh, what?" He opened his eyes, wishing the girl would stop talking so he could listen for the spirits. "No. I mean there are always some corrupt police. There must be, otherwise the slavers couldn't get the children across the border without papers, or collect them together in one place ready for transport."

  She pressed her lips close to his ear and whispered, "If I can find out the location of the slaver's compound, can you promise me that your men will swoop in without warning and free the children and arrest the slavers and the corrupt police and politicians?"

  "If you know where the children are being held, then it is your duty to tell me. Withholding the information makes you an accessory to the crime, blah, blah, blah" He blustered for a while.

  "And if I tell you then I will be an accessory to the slavers escaping because they will be warned by the local police."

  "What if we never involved the local police? Then would you tell me?"

  "Impossible. You will need men and equipment and planning. The police will find out. They will know before you swoop in," she objected.

  "I am a federal officer. I don't have to use the local police. I don't even have to use the state police. I can use other federal officers and the army. The locals won't know until it is done."

  "Why should I trust you? Even if you are honest, what about your partner, your boss, the army boss, all the rest that will know in order to plan it."

  "I have no answer to that. There is corruption at every level of life in this country. You are wise to be skeptical." He decided to try a different argument. "These slavers will be armed and dangerous. How else can you keep your friends out of harm's way?"

  "Have you ever seen that Rambo movie where he helps the Afghan peasant rebels who were being bombed and machine gunned by high tech weapons and helicopters?"

  "Yes, I have, but I am surprised that you, an American, would mention it. Hasn't your CIA destroyed all copies of that old movie? Aren't you embarrassed that your country has changed sides and is now running the high tech weapons that are bombing the peasants?"

  "Huh," she said. "No. We are the good guys. America is not bombing peasants. Anyway, this guy that rescued us is like bloody Rambo. He knows things, does things. I, we, believe that if there are more Nepali children being held, that he can rescue the
m, and he will rescue them."

  "Perhaps he can," he admitted. "The risk is that the corrupt and the criminals will get away, and by next month there will be other children enslaved."

  She hovered her hand down his back to its base. She had long ago found out how agreeable nice men could be when they were swollen hard. She knew from the low moan that her aura was now having that effect on him.

  "Okay. How about this," she said softly into his ear. "I will stay here with the old holy man for two more days. You and your partner go back to Dharamsala and organize some men. By the time I return to Dharamsala there will be an email from Marique, telling me where they are. I will get them to find the place, scout the place, and if it is in use, then I will tell you where to make your raid."

  He was about to argue but the sound of a bowed cello told him again to trust her. Instead he sat feeling delicious in the morning sun and tried not to think of his wife, and tried not to feel guilty about enjoying himself so much while being paid.

  * * * * *

  "I am sorry," Vidu apologized. "Without the key, I can make little more of this book that you have. Certainly it is about a holy man with a strong aura. He must be a saint because he is always dressed in white."

  "The Chinese would call him, like, a white monk. I was told that once by some Burmese monks. In their fables he walks the earth to make sure that evil men do not become too powerful." She handed the old man the letter. "This was with it. I couldn't read it. I think it written in Tibetan."

  "Ahh," Vidu murmured as he read. "Ahh," he read it again. "A Tibetan man fleeing the armies of Mao carried this book here in 1956. He split the book into two halves. One half has the pictures, the other half has the explanations. They are almost useless without each other."

  "But there was only this half hidden in the statue."

  "That is because he hid the other half in a statue in the first monastery that he reached on leaving Tibet, in a place called Kaagbeni, in a region called Mustang," Vidu explained.

  "And where is Kaagbeni?"

  "I don't know. If it is on the Tibetan border then it must be in a pass through the mountains and difficult to reach. He mentions a river, the Kaligandaki. I think that is a gorge in Nepal."

  "May I keep this book until I have figured it out?"

  "Of course. I am too old to make use of it. If only I were twenty years younger."

  "Why, what would you do?"

  "Well, find the other book for one thing. Perhaps become a white monk. I am too weak now."

  "You still have a strong aura. Who says a white monk must be strong? His power is unexpected, hidden. Look at me. I mean really, like, look at me. I look like the ultimate desirable victim for a sex predator, yet I have the power. I have used the power. I have erased dangerous men from this life. Rubbed them out."

  So went their discussions for two days. They sat endlessly together pooling their knowledge and their experience, trying to decipher the book. It was frustrating. Even if they thought they knew what a picture meant, they could not try it out. Both of their auras were too powerful for experimentation. Being wrong could have fatal consequences.

  Two days later they both hiked, or rather, walked into Dharamsala, for Vidu was too old to make good time on the trails. He had decided to return to Sri Lanka. Not, he swore, to revenge his brother, but to ensure that psychopaths were not in charge of the country.

  She was on her way to Kaagbeni, wherever the hell that was.

  * * * * *

  * * * * *

  MAYA'S AURA - Goa to Nepal by Skye Smith

  Chapter 17 - The Nepal Border

  There is a sufficiency in the world for man's need but not for man's greed. - Mahatma Gandhi

  The email that Maya received in Dharamsala from Marique had indeed contained the location of an old residential school that the slavers were pretending to use as an orphanage. Will and his two army buddies had left Marique in a hotel on the Nepal side of the border while they sneaked into India to find the place.

  Meanwhile, the detectives had driven Maya in their car towards the Indian border town where the slaver school was. She spent the entire drive in the back seat, but that was okay because it wasn't a squad car so she could open the doors herself if need be. What wasn't okay was their driving. She finally learned to cover her eyes when she was afraid, rather than strain her tonsils.

  When they were close to the border they turned off the highway and into a military reserve. They were expected. There was a meal waiting for them in the officer's canteen.

  "You are not coming," the detective repeated sternly over her protests. "An army commando unit is doing exercises in this area, and they have been assigned to us to storm the school. The last thing we need is for an American girl to be injured during an army exercise."

  "If it weren't for my friends you wouldn't even know that the school was still in use. They risked their lives first finding the place and then checking it out. I owe it to them to make sure that the children are rescued and like, the bad guys are arrested."

  "Oh ,please understand," his stern voice had become softer. "If we botch this and children get hurt, well, that I can explain to my superiors, but not if the press find out. If we are criticized by the press then my career will be over. I will be hung with the entire blame. I don't want you watching. I don't want you taking the story back to America and telling the press."

  "I would never do that. You are trying to save the children. I would never bad mouth you. Besides, Marique says there are like, guard dogs inside the garden walls. You need me to quiet the dogs."

  "You can do that?"

  "I can, I have a power over dogs," she said quickly with a confidence that she did not feel.

  "Alright. But you stay in the car unless we come and get you."

  "That's all I want. I want to be the independent witness, like to the good deed you are doing."

  His partner lifted his eyes to the ceiling and gave a look of exasperation. If it had been up to him, this trouble-making American girl would be safely locked up until this was all over.

  * * * * *

  At midnight the helicopters arrived with the commando unit. The helicopters could be heard for miles so they would not be part of the raid, just a part of the cleanup afterwards. Within a half an hour the troops were loaded into trucks seconded from a nearby army training camp and were on the road. Two car loads of federal detectives were in front, with the car carrying Maya in the lead.

  The detectives assumed that they were in command, but the commando captain completely ignored them and at the last muster point he blocked their cars in with his truck and sent a squad of his men forward on foot to scout the walls.

  That squad rushed back with news that Maya already knew. There were guard dogs on the school grounds inside the walls. "What did you expect?" she asked the captain. "What easier way to stop children from escaping?"

  "Our plan required my men to reach the building before being detected. These dogs change everything. We will have to second some poison to create poison bait."

  "Or you could put me over the wall and let me keep the dogs calm," Maya said.

  The Sikh detective nodded to the captain. He believed she could do what she said. His inner voice had told him so. His partner groaned in disbelief at the girl's nonsense.

  Maya snorted at him. "I'll prove it. That farm house over there has dogs. I will walk right up to the house and the dogs will give no warning." Before they could stop her she started to jog towards the single light that marked the farmhouse. After a few steps she turned and asked them for the local word for 'sit'.

  They told her the word and then watched her walk towards the house, but did not follow her. It was a valid test which they expected her to fail. Farm dogs all knew their duty was to announce strangers.

  Halfway to the farmhouse she started to have misgivings. Farm dogs in the highlands of India were medium--sized and vicious. Luckily, like most third world dogs, they were rock trained. If the person they
were hassling picked up a rock, they assumed that the next step was to throw it at them, and all dogs in India knew how much rocks hurt. They would back away and raise a loud barking warning of the danger.

  That was exactly the result she did not want. She wanted them to stay brave until they were on her, and then use her aura and the animal magnetism she had learned through magic mushrooms, to make them gentle and curious to be near to her.

  She was about two hundred feet from the farm house when she heard a throaty snarl from the bushes behind her, and another to the side of her. There were at least three dogs and they were sneaking up on her and blocking her retreat. The sound of the snarl put pictures of filthy sharp teeth and diseased mouths into her head. No, she couldn't think of that. She must be calm. She must raise her aura and push it out at the dogs. She must still her mind and recapture the feeling of the mushrooms.

  A minute later the snarling stopped and was replaced by the sound of sniffing. To dogs, the real world was the world of scent. They were searching the evening breeze with their noses to find out who she really was.

  Of course. Her aura scent. Lily of the valley. She sat on the ground. She forgot about the dogs, forgot about the farmhouse, stilled her subconscious, put her consciousness to sleep and bathed herself in the scent of lily of the valley.

  She lost all sense of time and space and the air around her, until she felt what could only be a cold wet nose against her foot, and then another. She opened her eyes and hovered her hand above the head of the closest dog and pushed her aura into the beast. It began to moan softly. She shushed it.

  Now she stopped her aura by touching the dog, and scratched it behind the ears. Indian dogs were not the lap dogs of the West. These dogs had never been pampered by a hand behind the ears. They were in love.

  She stood and walked to the farmhouse, with the dogs matching her steps beside her. Under the weak light that marked the house she stopped, turned, and waved towards the detectives. Then she pushed her aura at the dogs again and told them to sit, and when they were still, she walked back to the men waiting for her on the road.