The Path

by Rebecca Neason

  The rider returned quickly. His expression was almost a sneer as he told his leader what he had found.

  “It’s a small village,” he said. “No more than a hundred people at most. Crops grow in the fields. No sentries—a few dogs. I’m not even sure they have weapons.”

  Nasiradeen nodded and gestured the man back to the line. If this had not been their first encounter, Nasiradeen might have been tempted to take his warriors around the village in search of larger prey. But he would not deny his men the first of their warriors’ pleasures.

  He drew his sword and raised it. Behind him, the others did the same.

  It was not a battle, it was a massacre, and it lasted even less time than Nasiradeen expected. He held his captains and his cavalry back and let the foot soldiers swarm into the village. Men, women, children, even household pets had been cut down at their morning meal, offering little or no resistance for their own survival.

  I’ve seen sheep put up more of fight on their way to slaughter, Nasiradeen thought as he rode his horse through the carnage. Dead bodies, human and animal, littered the ground. The smell of blood was heavy in the air. Overturned cooking fires had caught two of the houses on fire, and Nasiradeen gave no order to control the blaze.

  Let them burn, he thought. Let the whole village burn. Let the smell of burning flesh be an offering to Shiva and let the smoke carry the message of our presence to the other villages. Maybe next time we’ll find a worthy battle.

  Around him, he heard the screams of women his men had captured for their pleasure. This, too, he made no effort to stop. Most of the women would die from their wounds or from the shock of grief and rape. But the ones who lived would give birth to sons who would be warriors. They would grow up under a different regime—his regime—and they would be strong enough not to let this happen to their mothers and sisters, wives and daughters.

  Nasiradeen drew his horse to the outskirts of the village, inclined to wait this once until his men had wearied of their victory. Then they would press onward toward the city of Lhasa, leaving a conquered country in their wake.

  The days took on a surreal quality for Duncan MacLeod. It was as if he had entered into a time without time, a place where pageantry and superstition, ancient symbols and future intent melded in elaborate union.

  In his long life Duncan had been witness to countless rituals. He had attended weddings and ordinations, coronations and knightings, births, deaths, and rites of passage. Yet this ceremony was different from anything he had seen.

  For nine days, amid the tantric prayers led by the Dalai Lama, the initiates were made part of a spiritual lineage going back centuries. The intricate dances of the first day, to claim and purify the site of the ceremony, had been only the beginning of the rite.

  After the first day the emphasis shifted to the preparation of the initiates, who were, in the essence of their beliefs, asking for spiritual rebirth as children of the varja master, the Dalai Lama. Amid ever more elaborate prayers and blessings, the initiates made their bodhisattva bows, pledging themselves to eternal altruism. Offerings of flowers, incense, butter lamps, and food were exchanged between initiate and master, symbolizing their union in Enlightenment.

  Divinations were also made on behalf of each new practitioner of Kalachakra, so that they might individually know how best to purify themselves along the Path. Even their sleeping each night was an ordered part of the ceremony. Blades of Kushi grass, the grass upon which the Buddha was sitting when he attained Enlightenment, were handed out, to be put under the initiate’s pillow and mattress—one to clear the mind of obscuring thoughts and the other to aid in the generation of beneficial dreams.

  While the initiates were being thus prepared, the monks in the thekpu, the Mandala house, continued their work on the Great Kalachakra Mandala. Theirs was another ritual, as elaborate as the one taking place outside. All 722 emanations of Kalachakra had to be visualized and their individual mantras recited, the different sections of the Mandala purified with scented saffron water and each of the monks inside the thekpu likewise consecrated before the actual sand construction could begin.

  All of this lasted for nine days. On the morning of the tenth day, the sand Mandala was completed, and the final steps of the ceremony began. Duncan and Xiao-nan were seated on the ground in their accustomed places amid the crowd. She had carefully explained each day’s action to him, wanting him to share this experience as fully as possible.

  And Duncan knew he had reaped the benefit here. He felt no closer to understanding the Buddhamind, as the Dalai Lama called it, or to attaining Enlightenment. Those were both still concepts in words only. What he had found was peace. The restless strivings that had filled him for so long had finally, somewhere in the last nine days, been set to ease. All of the ghosts were quiet.

  For Duncan MacLeod, that was Enlightenment enough.

  Xiao-nan leaned close to him and whispered. “Do you see, my Duncan,” she said, “the blindfolds they are given now. These show the spiritual blindness they must overcome.”

  Duncan watched as strips of red cloth were handed out to the monks and nuns in the first rows. These were tied in symbolic actions around their foreheads. Then pitchers of scented water began to make the circuit through them.

  “The sips of water they now take,” Xiao-nan continued her explanation, “three sips to cleanse the gates of their bodies, speech, and minds. Now they will make their pledges to turn from all wrong ways of conduct and repeat their vows of bodhisattva, then they will be taken to view the Great Mandala. We must pray for their benefit, my Duncan, as they will pray for ours and for that of all beings.”

  All around Duncan, the people were chanting again. The soft syllables of this mantra had a soothing, almost hypnotic effect. Duncan joined his voice to the others. He had done so often over the last days so that now the sounds rolled easily off his tongue.

  OMAH HUNG HO HANG KHYA MA LA WA RA YA HUNG PHAT.

  The sounds, though chanted softly, seemed to hold the air in sudden stillness, a barrier against the evil of the world. The mantra would continue for hours, until the initiates had all viewed the Mandala and retaken their seats before the Dalai Lama.

  As Duncan chanted, he let his mind drift over the days past and the days yet to come. Tomorrow, the initiation rite would be concluded and the Mandala house opened to the people so that all could see the great sand map of Enlightenment. The day after that, the twelfth day, the colored sand would be swept up and placed in a special receptacle, then carried to the river and poured into the moving water so that its blessing power could move across the land. On that final night, the city would have a festival of celebration.

  Then, finally, the visitors would leave Lhasa, and life would return to normal. Duncan was eager for that to happen. Although he had spent each day and most of the evenings with Xiao-nan, there had been no time to be alone together. For Duncan, missing those times of shared solitude was like a subtle ache in his bones.

  As eager as he was to be alone with Xiao-nan, to hold her again as they sat in the sun by the river or amid the sweet scents of the garden, the thought also brought a little whisper of dread. Soon, before their wedding plans were allowed to go much further, he had to tell her the full truth of who he was. He did not doubt the love, but a small part of him still feared that the difference between them would be too much for her to accept.

  His thoughts were interrupted by the feel of Xiao-nan’s hand sliding gently into his own. He turned to see her watching him with eyes so full of love that all else in the world ceased to matter.

  Duncan had seen many wondrous things in his two hundred years. He was living proof that the inexplicable existed. But it was from Xiao-nan he was learning the true magic of life. It was the magic of needs met without speaking, of human hearts united.

  It was the eternal magic of love.

  Chapter Twenty-six

  Father Edward knew Nasiradeen must reach Lhasa soon, and the charade he was playing would finall
y be over. What he did not know was whether the army would arrive before this Tibetan ceremony that occupied the city was over or after, when all was quiet again. Either way, Father Edward would be prepared.

  A part of him hoped Nasiradeen would arrive before all of the many visitors had departed. He had no doubt the army would cut them down to a man; Nasiradeen was not known for his clemency to the vanquished. But the ceremony was almost concluded now. Tomorrow was the twelfth and final day; after that, the people would go home. How many of them would Nasiradeen meet on the roads? he wondered. They would have to be killed before they could bring back a warning.

  So much fighting going on without him; Edward wanted his share in the victories.

  For the last few days, Father Jacques had gone to watch the activities in the city square. He had tried to persuade Father Edward to accompany him, saying that the more they understood about the people of Tibet, the better they could minister to them, but Edward had refused. Oh, he used the phrases Father Jacques expected to hear about heathen practices and beliefs—but the truth was far different. He needed time alone to find something he might use as a sword.

  It had been a frustrating and fruitless search. The house, including Father Jacques’s belongings, yielded nothing but a few kitchen knives, appropriate for cutting vegetables but useless for anything else. Edward tucked one into his boot and went to search through Father Jacques’s tools. Here, too, he was frustrated. Two hand trowels, a shovel, a small hand rake, and a pair of shears; nothing he could turn into a weapon to fit his hand and his training.

  This morning he waited until Father Jacques was out of sight, then headed in the opposite direction. His goal was the marketplace. Surely, he thought, some of the stalls would be open for business—and if they weren’t, well that would not stop him, not if he saw what he wanted.

  And if he could not find it there, then what? he wondered as he walked down the silent streets. Start going through the homes in the city? It would be an easy task; there were no bolts or bars to the doors in Lhasa. Or, perhaps outside the gates, someone among the visitors would have something he could barter and then sharpen into the weapon he wanted. But he had only today and tomorrow to find out.

  He entered the market to find most of the stalls closed. Here and there, a vendor selling incense or fresh hot food still had his shutters open to any who might pass by, but otherwise all was still. That suited Edward. Ignoring the vendors who looked up hopefully at the sound of his steps, he headed toward the far end of the market where the various metal crafters had their shops.

  He passed the stalls of jewelers and artisans without a glance. He was not after something ornamental. The blacksmith’s shop was another matter. Edward had heard Father Jacques speak of this man as an artist in his own right, creating farm tools and blades as well as decorative work. Here, Edward would begin his search.

  What he wanted was not likely to be found in the front shop, so he did not waste his time searching amid the candlesticks and cooking pots, the kitchen knives and household tools. Making certain no one was watching his movements, he went around to the back of the building where the smith had his forge.

  Like the other buildings in Lhasa, this, too, was unlocked, and Edward had no trouble slipping inside. He left the door ever so slightly ajar to admit some additional light, then set to work, trying not to make enough noise to alert the few shopkeepers down the road.

  Minutes of mounting frustration passed as he found only hand plows and ropes of chain, ornate grillwork and large iron kettles, brazier grates and small cooking stoves. There were some long metal stakes that, with enough time and the right tools, Edward thought he could turn into pikes—but time was something he did not have, not that kind of time, and there was no place to do that kind of work.

  Then, in the back of the shop he found the knives. There were blades and cleavers of several sizes, many not yet fastened to handles and all of them still not sharpened. That did not matter; there was a sharpening stone back at the mission house that Father Jacques used on his shears. But a handle was necessary; that Edward could not fit himself.

  He began to rummage through the blades, carefully, still trying not to leave too much evidence of his passage. If the theft was not discovered for a few days, it would be too late.

  Finally he found what he wanted and lifted it close to examine in the dim light. The blade was about twenty-eight inches long and thick. It was the type of blade used to cut through brush and small trees. But the handle felt good in his palm. He swung it a few times, testing the feel. It was not the curved blade he was used to, and it did not have the balance of a true sword, but it would do. Oh, it felt good to be armed again.

  For the first time Edward was glad of the cassock he wore. He hid the blade beneath the long black robe and carefully exited the shop. He would not take the chance of walking back through the marketplace, but instead began to cut between buildings, taking the quickest way possible back to the mission house.

  Soon, the blade would be honed, and he would be ready for the army to arrive. He would be Shiva’s warrior once again.

  It was the final day of the ceremony, the day the sand Mandala would be destroyed. Yesterday Duncan and Xiao-nan had stood in line far into the evening for their chance to view the Great Wheel of Time and symbol of the Path to Enlightenment, and the sight of it was more amazing than Duncan anticipated. The colors were bright, vivid, the design so intricate he knew he could study it for hours and still not take in every detail.

  In his travels he had seen masterpieces from all over the world, works of art crafted in paint or stone, bronze or wood, ivory, gold, and jewels. He had seen pictures in caves and designs cut into rocks that dated back to the time when humankind had no other language, messages so old their meaning had been lost. He had also seen artwork so new the paint was still wet and the chisel marks had not yet been polished away.

  But the sand Mandala was somehow both; like the whole ceremony, it was a bridge between the past and future. Its symbols were stepped in antiquity but it was a living, breathing past that drew the mind not backward to what had been, but forward into what might someday come to pass—for the individual viewer and, Duncan found himself hoping, for the peace of the world.

  As he continued his slow progress around the Mandala that measured seven feet to a side, he could not help but wonder if it was a vain hope.

  As she had with everything he had witnessed over the last twelve days, Xiao-nan acted as guide to what he was viewing. He learned that the bands of colored sand surrounding the great inner structure, which was the Mandala itself, all had their meanings:

  The outermost circle was done in stripes of different colors. This was the circle of fire that protected all within the Mandala and represented bliss consciousness and pristine awareness. The green circle within that was the symbol of space. It contained a chain of varjas which were the indestructible mind. Next came the gray sand of wind and the pink-red of fire, the white of water, and the yellow of earth. Within the band of yellow, a greet pattern swirled, representing stability.

  The circles were the six elements, and inside them was an ornate square surrounded by four crescents. These were the gardens which contained offerings to the deities and the gates into the heart of the Mandala. The square itself was the palace of Enlightenment, each floor a step closer to that perfected state.

  The outer square was the Mandala of the Enlightened Body. Inside that were the Mandala of Enlightened Speech, of the Enlightened Mind and the Enlightened Wisdom. Finally, the innermost square was the Mandala of Enlightened Great Bliss.

  Within the different levels of gardens and squares, were figures of animals and dancing deities, humans in different poses, flowers, trees and the heavenly wheels. So much to see; Duncan could only open his mind and let it imprint itself on his memory, to be called up later and pondered.

  But now it was all being swept away. The colored sand was being pulled together into a pile, into a vase to be poured into t
he river. Duncan felt a vague sense of loss to know that the beauty of these last days would not be repeated for another forty years. The Dalai Lama had been right when he had said they would pass swiftly. But then, Duncan admitted to himself, the young man was usually right in the things he said.

  Usually.

  Duncan and Xiao-nan walked with the rest of the people, following the Dalai Lama to the river to watch the sand cascade into the water and be carried on to bless the land. The ritual completed, the mood turned to one of celebration.

  Returning to the city as dusk fell, large bonfires had been lit in the square where the initiation had taken place. While the Dalai Lama and monks returned to the Potala, the people of the city gathered in the square for a night of social gaiety and the usually quiet city of Lhasa seemed to erupt in laughter.

  People brought food from their homes and from the camp outside the city walls. Musical instruments—drums and cymbals, flutes, bells, and horns—appeared and added their noise to the night. Children set off firecrackers, ran and danced around the fire while the adults talked and sang and told stories from the past.

  Duncan left Xiao-nan chatting with a group of friends while he went to stretch his legs. The last twelve days had been a wonderful experience, but now that it was over he found himself weary of sitting.

  He walked through the crowd, listening to the sounds of Lhasa at play. Now and then, someone would beckon to him, inviting him to join their conversation. But he would only smile and wave and move on. Then he spotted Brother Michael, the eldest of the Capuchin monks, standing along the edges of the crowd, and went to join him.

  “Good evening, Brother Michael,” he said when he drew close. The monk turned and looked at him, squinting in the growing darkness. Then a bright smile spread across his face.

  “Ah, good evening, Mr. MacLeod. It is indeed a fine night for a party. I saw you sitting among the people at the ceremony these past days. Tell me, what did you think of it?”