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one act of cowardice from which there is no redemption."
"Why no redemption?All things change. Your presence comforts the living here except when you do this,
in which case you share your guilt with them, although they were not here when this tragedy occurred.
Takster Rimpoche is not here and so he has either reincarnated or found Nirvana. Why should you grieve
for that?"
Another monk's ghost, this one of a boy who could not have been more than ten years old when he
died, said, "But Lady, our wrong actions resulted in the death of a living being. We don't kill insects or
animals to eat because they too are living beings, possibly friends or family members in a new form. How
then can we forgive ourselves for slaying our master? You don't understand, Lady. He was an old man
and the soldiers tied him to a post and made us take up sticks and rocks and beat him with all our might.
He cried, Lady, and he bled a great deal. See how our robes are splattered with his blood? When I was
little and I cried because I missed my home, he took me onto his lap and rocked me and made me laugh,
and to repay his kindness I beat him and made him cry and bleed."
One of the other monks, this one middle-aged and heavyset, said, "Only Thondup was able to hold out
against the soldiers and refuse to participate, and they beat him to death even more horribly than we beat
the master."
"And where is Thondup?" Chime asked. "I do not see him here. He too has reincarnated or attained
Nirvana. And yet you remain."
"They made us tear down our own monastery, Lady. And trample and burn sacred writings our
monastery has protected for hundreds of years. They made us piss on the flames."
"All of these things the soldiers made you do were not of your own free will. Of your own free will, after
all of these things have been done to you, you remain here and reveal food to the living and comfort them
by your presence. But since they wear the uniforms of the enemy, you trouble their souls once a day with
this haunting. Look carefully at these soldiers. Are they the same soldiers who forced you to do these
acts?"
"No, Lady. But they are soldiers, all the same," the middle-aged monk said with a bitterness that Chime
thought was unbecoming to his station. "For years our bodies wandered the countryside starving while
our spirits remained here, reliving this deed, so that when we died our spirits stayed here instead of being
reborn. Then suddenly no rebirths were available, and so here we remain."
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"Do you not think it more productive, then, to come with me to Shambala where you may attain a good
rebirth and perhaps have a chance to make amends to your master and Thondup in your next lives, and
let these soldiers also come to Shambala so that they might work out their karma?"
"Lady, lead us."
"Lead us too, Lady," Fu Ping cried.
"For the living it is a long journey and extremely dangerous," Chime said. "Though others are coming
who can help you if only you can make it to a certain valley I will describe."
"We'll never last that long!" one of the other guards said. Chime had not thought they could see her, but
now it seemed that even here the boundaries between life and afterlife were much thinner and more
permeable. "You can see for yourself that we're sick and injured."
Chime said, "I don't wish to sound callous, but if you die, the journey might be easier for you. The
important thing is to keep sight of the brothers here and of me and not lose the way. Even being reborn
as an insect in Shambala would be a nicer life than the one you are living." And because these were living
soldiers, she had to explain about Shambala, how their wounds would be healed there and they would
not age, and how, if they died on the journey, there were many lifeforms reproducing all the time so that
they would be able to be reborn. The place these men were from had not been Buddhist for a long time,
but still they didn't seem to have too much trouble accepting what she told them. Of course, they were
already asking her, an astral being, to intervene with ghosts, so perhaps it didn't take much of a leap to
accept Shambala.
"I don't know," said the one with the burned face. "It sounds as if it's extremely far away."
"I don't want to be an insect," the soldier with the badly healed leg said.
"What's the matter?" Fu Ping asked with mockery harsh enough to cut through his fear. "Are you afraid
someone will accuse you of social climbing? We've been in the army. Being an insect will be a
promotion."
"Fu Ping, you're officer material, you know that, don't you?" another one asked, but in the end they
agreed.
"Now then, I must go seek other beingswho may need to go. If I give you landmarks, do you think you
can start the journey while I am gone?"
"Lady, I know how to start the journey to Shambala according to the old books," a monk said.
"Much has changed, although I believe the mountains are still there, even if some are smaller than they
used to be due to avalanche and bombs, and the lakes are still roughly in the same areas, though they
may have altered somewhat. I will try to meet you at Mount Kailas. Do you know the way?"
The monks nodded that they did know the way to the most holy mountain in Tibet. Chime said, "Go
there, and if you do not find me, after a time continue north and east, toward the Kun Lun Mountains.
When you have gone as far as you can in that direction, be alert for the hidden valley. You will know it
because you will see my body sitting on top of a ridge, guarded by a lion. And there are blue-green
flowers leading into the hidden valley from a broad deep plain crisscrossed with streams and without
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other plants or flowers."
"You have invited us, you are the Shambala being, therefore we will find it," the middle-aged monk's
ghost said.
"Do we have to take them?" the boy monk's ghost asked, pointing at the soldiers.
Fu Ping fell onto his knees with his hands clasped and looked appropriately piteous.
The boy monk's ghost sighed. "Yes, I guess we do. You must have much need for insects in Shambala."
CHAPTER XXVII
"How did you know where to find us, Buzz?" Meru asked.
"I didn't. I was following that black girl, Chime. Believe me, Cao Li, if I'd known you all were here sittin'
high and dry and fat and sassy, I'd have been over long before this. Youbeen holdin' out on me, buddy."
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