Black Flame (7 page)

Having fought with more than one wolf on the grasslands, and with other dogs since, Kelsang was not inclined to think well of the wolfhound. And yet he had no desire to start a fight. He turned slightly and slipped past, growling a warning to the other dog not to get too close. His muscles were tight and ready to spring into action.

But before the wolfhound had time to react, a reflex made Kelsang twist right around and sink his teeth into its neck. They clashed in midair, their teeth grinding, their paws grabbing at each other's torsos. As soon as he landed back on the ground, Kelsang pulled away. This was the first time he had encountered such a worthy opponent since arriving in the city — he had nearly been knocked to the ground. After a brief pause, they clashed again. Since they were roughly the same build, Kelsang decided not to make a tactical withdrawal, but instead charged forward with all his might. The other dog was of the same mind and met Kelsang like a lump of rock.

They crashed into each other again and again, biting and scratching. Kelsang was about to bite into the wolfhound's right leg, but his opponent was quick and was already poised to bite his shoulder. Instead it twisted farther and went for his neck, forcing Kelsang to refrain from biting and shrug it off.

They pulled apart and stood eyeing each other. The wolfhound was also clearly surprised to have encountered such a valiant challenger.

A loud cracking sound. Everything, even the air, was shaking, and for a few moments Kelsang couldn't hear anything. The flagstones around him split, sending flying splinters up his nose. This wasn't the first time he had been deafened by such a sound. Back at the guesthouse, out on the grasslands, when he had been forced to fight those two dogs, a sound just like this one had rung out, killing one of them. He had been shocked by the vibration but hadn't fully understood its power.

Now he understood. He barked in anger. Where had the sound come from? Before he could determine the answer, there was another explosion right beside his head, and another slab of stone cracked open. Such an almighty force. The wolfhound clearly knew what was happening as it darted toward the shadows. Kelsang did the same, running out of the alley in the opposite direction.

Another gun shot.

When they realize that their time is up and the fear of death takes hold, most dogs will let out a howl that summons all their inner strength. It's their only way to express their love of life. For the rest of his days Kelsang would tremble whenever he recalled this terrible sound.

He stood in the shadows, the long hair on the back of his neck standing on end. The wolfhound had been hit squarely in the back but was still scrapping with its absent opponent under the streetlight. The gnashing of its teeth echoed around the alleyway like the sound of iron being filed. It looked like a giant squirming insect as it struggled to drag itself to the other side of the street using only its forelegs, its hind legs already paralyzed. Windows lit up along the alley as the howling woke its inhabitants.

Kelsang believed that howl must have risen from the depths of hell itself. He was too scared to move from his corner. Another shot came whistling past.

He couldn't control the shaking that came from deep within him. Fear was eating away at his strength. He had to escape. If he waited any longer, he would be drowned by this sound, and that thought was more chilling than the coldest winter on the plateau. It was enough to make his heart burst.

He started running, hiding in places where the light didn't reach. If there had been anyone in his path, he would have bumped them out of the way. He had already rounded two corners, yet the sound was everywhere, ringing in his ears, driving him insane. He could only keep running.

The howling wolfhound let out a cough that sounded like cloth tearing and then fell silent, as if it had suddenly fallen into deep water.

Kelsang careered into the courtyard and plopped down on his mat. It smelled like he did, and it comforted him. He stared at the half-open door, panting heavily. The haunting sound hadn't followed him, but still, once his breathing became calm, he decided to make sure. There was silence in the alley outside. It was empty. The light in the painter's window was still on.

Kelsang thought back to the events at the guesthouse and then thought about the last half hour. Guns were terrifying weapons, he concluded, with their smoke and devastatingly loud sounds. And they belonged to humans. A gun had taken away that dog's life, but he had been lucky — the other bullet hadn't got him.

The next day, in a shop that sold sweetened Tibetan tea, a loquacious man bragged to his friends that he had almost shot a small black lion the night before. The lion had been fighting a stray. No one believed him, of course. The last time, he claimed he'd shot an elephant through the ear, all because the elephant had found nighttime in the holy city too boring and had gone for a walk.

Kelsang stayed in the courtyard for the next few evenings, the events in the alley still lingering in his thoughts. But on the third night, feeling confined and depressed, he decided to venture out again. He was a shepherd dog, and while Lhasa had no sheep for him to tend, he still had to do something to relieve the urge to run.

He was more cautious than before, however. He stayed close to the alley walls, refusing to stray into the moonlight where he would be accompanied by his own shadow. He kept his nose up in the air as he ran, sniffing out new smells from the daytime activity in the city.

Perhaps it was just a coincidence, but Kelsang found himself back in the same alley as the other night. He edged down its walls, faltering, sniffing at the air and listening for hidden dangers. Finally, he reached the streetlight.

The dog's corpse had been cleaned away, yet Kelsang could detect a trace of blood among numerous other smells. He found the red-smeared bullet lodged in a corner, locking the smell of blood and smashed lead deep in his memory. He didn't know why he had come. He flared his agitated nostrils, breathing in the dog's blood as well as a myriad other smells, including human urine and the sweet fragrance of shampoo, which came from one of the sheep that had been cleaned and left to roam the city as a spiritual offering to Buddha.

Kelsang stayed in the shadows for a couple of minutes, careful to stay well hidden. Then he began to run again, deciding to leave everything to do with that dog far behind. He would continue to run these streets, but from now on he would be more secretive, more careful. These experiences were maturing. In fact, they were proof that he had already adjusted to life in the city.

As day broke, he was drawn to a familiar scent, or rather he was seduced by it. Unable to control himself, he ran toward its source, squinting his eyes. Two sheep were grazing on a small patch of grass up ahead. His nose had been seized by their smell, even though it was not entirely the one he was used to. They had been cleaned so vigorously that not a trace of dirt could be found in their wool, and they shone like fine white silk. They were covered in red and green silk ribbons and were absorbed in munching the grass.

When Kelsang approached, their reaction was all too familiar. Showing no sign of fear, but rather overwhelming acceptance, they huddled together looking at him meekly.

Only when he was right in front of the sheep did Kelsang realize that he didn't know what to do or where to herd them. There was no shepherd, no campsite and no flock. This was the city, with concrete and stone as far as the eye could see.

A strange chemical smell wafted from their wool. These were not the sheep of the grasslands that he knew so well. He felt strange seeing these sheep here in Lhasa, so far away from the camp — so strange that he had to run away. There were just two of them — this was not the flock that he had been longing for.

Kelsang was to see many more such sheep, but after that first encounter, he kept his distance. He lost the urge to rush toward them and round them up. They, too, were aimless, solitary creatures since leaving the grasslands.

Kelsang now knew his way around Lhasa — at night, at least. He began to leave his scent on easily distinguishable landmarks, such as a streetlight or a stone by the entrance to an alley. He would go back the next day and sniff each one carefully. Only rarely did he discover the scent of another dog. Usually dogs trying to assert themselves recoiled at his strong, wild smell. Sometimes, in a moment of mischief, a stray would make a half-hearted attempt to leave its scent on top of Kelsang's and then never dare to appear in that part of the city again. Almost all of Lhasa's strays avoided him. He only brought disaster.

Kelsang had his own forbidden areas of the city. At least, he never returned to the alley where the wolfhound was shot. Even though he had grown accustomed to hiding in the shadows when he ran, he knew that guns hid even in dark corners. He would never return to that place — danger lurked there.

Kelsang had settled into city life. But although he was a Tibetan mastiff, he was still, after all, a dog. He needed a place to stay and a master. The old painter was the perfect person to fill such a role. If the weather was particularly good, the old man would take a break from his painting and go out into the courtyard wearing a pair of sunglasses. He would then settle into his chair. Kelsang didn't feel close to him. The painter hadn't said much since Kelsang first appeared in the courtyard, nor had he even looked at him properly. But the old man did come every day at the same time with a bowl of milky butter tea mixed with
tsampa
barley flour. In the painter's eyes, there was no difference between feeding Kelsang and watering his flowers. Kelsang was a small seed that had been blown in by the wind and had quietly taken root.

Kelsang didn't expect intimacy. As long as he had a master, in some sense of the word, then he was happy. And when it came to life in the city, the old painter was as perfect a master as he could wish for.

Not many people in Lhasa knew that such a talented painter lived in the Tibetan-style two-story house. The old man had no friends, and apart from the person who came once a month to deliver his pigments, his only visitor was his granddaughter, Drolma. No one knew how old he was. The painter hardly came into contact with the outside world.

The small house was also home to two priceless thirteenth-century
tanka
paintings. The master's own paintings were art treasures, too, and some of them had even been commissioned for temples within the Potala Palace itself. Visitors who came from afar to the incense-filled temples marveled at their beautiful colors and ingenious compositions. Young art students came year after year to gaze at the
tankas
, astonished by their quality. “I'd stay here and live on stale bread and water for weeks just to keep looking at them,” they'd exclaim. Not even the altitude dissuaded them from lingering for hours before the old man's masterpieces. Only when night fell and the temples were closing would they pick up their backpacks and head to a youth hostel for the night. They had no idea that their creator was still living and working on even more paintings in a small red house down a quiet alley nearby.

The old painter himself probably didn't know the real value of his paintings. He simply sat before his easel and painted the old stories before they were lost forever. Which two colors would go best together? That was all he cared about.

But there was someone else who knew.

It was a still night with no moon.

Other dogs never wandered into the alley because it was where Kelsang lived. They knew that the giant dog only slunk around in the shadows of darkness and that it was safe during the day. But even so, they avoided it because of Kelsang's presence — the smell of the wilderness that he left there.

The neighbors had no idea that such a dog lived with the painter, and his habit of going out only at night meant that his presence remained a secret, buried in the depths of the alley.

Kelsang had nearly finished his circuit and was approaching the entrance to his alley. Usually a soft light would be shining from the second-floor window, and he could then set off for another round about the city. But as he drew closer, he smelled something strange permeating the sun-dried stones. It was a mixture of cigarette smoke, alcohol and sweet tea, and it made him feel uncomfortable.

Kelsang shook his head. He had been so content just moments ago, and now he was desperate to get rid of this unpleasant smell. But he couldn't have his way. He was a dog with an acute sense of smell living in one of the cleanest parts of the city. The smell wasn't going to go away just because he wanted it to.

Suddenly he heard strange noises in the dark, as if they were confirming the presence of the new smell. Even though to Kelsang, the alley belonged to his master, life in the city had taught him a few things. He didn't rush forward straight away but hid in the dark, waiting to discover the source of the noise.

“Are you sure nothing's going to go wrong?”

It was only a whisper from a dark corner of the alley, but Kelsang still heard it.

“Nothing's going to go wrong. The old man lives alone. I've been watching the place and there's no one else. The girl only comes once a week.”

“Really?”

“Really.”

“I'm still a bit scared.”

“There's nothing I can do about that. It's just the old man, and he's so old, he's fossilizing. All we have to do is flash our knives, and the old codger will hand over the paintings. Remember what the guy said? It doesn't matter how big they are. As long as we get them to him, he'll give us ten thousand
yuan
.”

“Ten thousand
yuan
, ten thousand
yuan
…” The cowardly voice was trying to take in what it would mean. The other one swore quietly as he stumbled over a stone. The tiny sound was like a clap of thunder. The two men nervously dropped to the ground and were still. They didn't see Kelsang slip past them into the courtyard as if he were one with the night.