Neon Lotus (27 page)

“You’re
right,” she said. “But where is the amrita?”

A glinting
white diamond blinked in the three-dimensional map, several levels above their
own. It flashed repeatedly, signaling them with something like desperation.

“We’ll go to
the left,” Jetsun said, studying the image. “That will take us up these stairs
to an elevator. The halls just above seem to be deserted, but there’s a lot of
activity on the level of the amrita. And there’s someone in the room with it as
well.”

The white
light fluttered as fast as a sparrow’s heart.

“Well have
to chance it,” she said.

The map
blinked out but the lotus stayed open in her hands. Jetsun led the way up a flight
of stairs and along a second corridor. As they approached the elevator, a man
in a green uniform came striding toward them. His eyes widened in wonder when
he spied the lotus.

“We claimed
it after all, eh?” he said. “That’s three out of five now, isn’t it?”

Marianne
kept her face low, bent over the lotus. “Three?” she said.

“The nectar,
the vajra, and now the lotus! Victory is only a matter of time.”

The elevator
door opened. Jetsun stepped in and Marianne followed. The man stared after
them. As the doors closed, she appreciated the fact that he plainly had only
two eyes. He must have been one of the residents of Golmud, a mere employee. It
relieved her to think that they would not be conspicuous for lack of a third
eye.

“Get ready,”
said Jetsun.

The elevator
slowed and came to a stop. Marianne felt the lotus tugging her forward as the
doors opened; she gripped it firmly. Several people strode past the car; two
guards were waiting to enter. Everyone who saw the lotus gave it his full
attention, slowing to stare and turning to look as Marianne and Jetsun
approached the room where the amrita was being held.

“So much for
staying inconspicuous,” she whispered.

The door
they wanted was flanked by two three-eyed guards; like everyone else, they
stared at the lotus in amazement.

“It was just
found,” Jetsun said. “We brought it as quickly as we could. Please open the
door—”

The guards
raced for the privilege, both of them training their sonic keys on the lock
simultaneously.

As Marianne
walked through the door, a tingle spread through her fingers and arms.

Then the
lotus grew silent.

The room was
wide, circular, crowded with equipment. Despite this, it contained only one
person. He stood before a column at the center of the chamber. The door shut
behind them and they took a few steps forward, but he did not turn.

Suddenly the
lotus spoke. It sounded like a deep bass growl this time, like a brazen god
chanting
“
AUMMMMMMM
.”

The man in
the middle of the room turned slowly toward them, his three eyes narrow with intrigue.
They were deep blue eyes; his hair was fiery red.

It was the
man who had interrogated Marianne.

Her reaction
was spontaneous, uncontrollable. A burning hatred flooded forth from her heart
and merged with the song of the lotus. It streamed toward him, focused by the
tapering petals.

He slammed
backward into the column with a soft shriek, then sank to the floor.

Jetsun
gripped her arm. “Don’t kill him, Marianne!”

She did not
want to stop the hatred from flowing through her fingers into the petals of the
lotus. Tara, her guide, a part of her soul, had been crushed by this fiend!

Jetsun
grasped her hands and tried to pry her fingers apart.

“Give it to
me, Marianne,” he whispered.

She let go
abruptly. Jetsun whirled away with the lotus.

Slowly he advanced
on the fallen man, keeping the
flower aimed at the ceiling. Crouching down, he
studied the strange dark face and broad nose, the triple eyes.

“Who are
you?” Jetsun asked. “Where do you people come from? What do you want?”

“They think
they are gods,” she said, standing over him. “They bring death and they want
the world.”

The man
blinked slowly with all three eyes, turning an injured expression toward her.

“You . . .”
he whispered. “You dare to strike a god?”

“It was not
I,” she said. “It was one of the gods’ own tools. This is the lotus that you
sought.”

She knelt
next to Jetsun.

“How did you
know where to look for it?” she asked. “Who are your spies?”

“Spies!” He
laughed weakly. “What use would the gods have for spies?”

“You have
the amrita,” she said. “And you have the vajra as well. Where might that be?”

The man
shook his head. He sighed, closed his eyes, and groaned in pain. Deep in his
mouth, she saw his black tongue working.

“Look,” Jetsun
said. He held out the lotus for her to
see.

Just over
the opaline pad where the map had floated, a new three-dimensional image
appeared. It looked like the translucent ghost of the man before them. Tiny
traceries of colored light sizzled and snapped in his body, sending out rays of
color, webwork patterns. After a moment all that remained of him was a shifting
tangle of radiant lines. The brightest sparks were those in the brain. Marianne
saw them brighten further, taking on shapes of their own, solidifying in the
air above the lotus.

“Where is
the vajra?” she asked.

The man let
out a wordless shout, as if the information were being wrenched from him.

Above the
lotus, a golden vajra shimmered into being. At either tip of the wand, where
nine prongs radiated outward and met again to form two ovoid cages, pools of
rainbow color glowed brilliantly, trapped within the prongs.

“Where is
it?” she said.

The vajra
dwindled as if viewed in a camera that had drawn back to reveal its
surroundings.

The
three-eyed man gave a weak cry of frustration.

She saw a
building, a shrine of monumental proportions: a tall base of tapering tiers
capped by a vast gray dome. It was a chorten, traditionally the repository of
sacred relics. But it lay within an enclosure of high fences crowned with
barbed wire.

“Where?” she
asked again.

The chorten
dissolved. She stared down at a multicolored map of a realm she didn’t
recognize.

Jetsun
nodded. “I know where that is. It’s in Kham near the Lancangjiang, the upper
Mekong River. Eastern Tibet.”

“Can you
find the way?”

He nodded.
“With the help of the lotus. But how can we get there?” His eyes brightened.
“Ah, now there’s a good question for this fellow. Where is the jet you stole
from us in the Kunlun?”

Marianne
looked at the three-eyed man. His eyes were slits now, unfocused. She put her hand
on his throat, then drew it away slowly.

“Jetsun,
he’s dead.”

“Dead?”

She
remembered Reting Norbu’s story of the three-eyed man who had assassinated
Tashi Drogon. A poison capsule between the teeth. Perhaps they all took such
precautions.

“He must have
killed himself to keep from talking.”

Jetsun shook
his head. “Well, it looks as if the lotus caught him, just as it did Tsering.
He’s in here now.” He couldn’t keep the humor from his voice: “I think we’ve
found ourselves a guide.”

A guide, she
thought, but not a friend. Small consolation for the one I lost.

Jetsun stood
up with the lotus. “Now, about that jet. . . .”

A soft voice
spoke from the flower: “Not yet, Jetsun Dorje,” said Tsering. “We must liberate
the amrita.”

“Where is
it?”

Marianne
rose and put her hand on the central column.

“Here, I
think.”

A dark pane
of glass was set into the face of the column. When they’d entered the room, she
had thought
there
was light beyond it. She found a button below the pane, touched it, and the
light came on again.

Inside the
column, behind the glass, was a hollow chamber, and in this chamber was a tall,
stoppered test tube. There was perhaps an inch of white liquid in the test
tube, the subject of various kinds of scrutiny. Tiny lenses glittered like
jewels in the ceiling and sides of the chamber; arranged in racks around the
test tube were dozens of glass droppers, probes, and vials. A pair of rubber
gloves lay in prayerful repose at the bottom of the window, and there were
holes in the side of the column whereby one could insert one’s hands into the
gloves in order to manipulate the objects inside the compartment.

Looking at
the tiny bit of fluid in the test tube, she felt a sourceless but overwhelming
sadness. It was as if she were looking at another victim of cruel and
persistent torture.
How
many potent secrets had been extracted from the innocent white
nectar?

She felt
certain that the substance was aware of her; it was conscious. The nectar that
was drunk throughout the Tsaidam basin had its origins in this very
compartment, although those tainted distillates were quite different from this
primal fluid.

And the
amrita knew. It knew what had been done with the knowledge it had surrendered.
The realization drove her to tears.

It cried out
to them, pleading for release.

Jetsun must
have felt the nectar’s desperation. He sobbed deep in his throat and handed her
the lotus. Then, standing back, he raised his fist and twisted his torso as if
coiling an inner spring.

“No!” cried
Tsering, from Marianne’s hands.

But the boy
in the lotus was too late.

Jetsun’s
blow was powerful. The glass smashed inward. Jagged shards danced against the
far wall and came glittering down among the instruments. As if in slow motion,
she saw the continued sweep of his hand, with drops of blood now streaming
against the dark skin. She saw him strike the test tube and knew that he had
intended it from the first.

The amrita
had cried out, after all, to be freed.

The tube
exploded. The nectar must have been under pressure, for it spattered the walls
of the chamber and
mixed
with the blood on Jetsun’s hand. A warm, sweet scent poured out of the ruptured
chamber.

Dazed,
apparently astonished by his own action, Jetsun staggered backward and raised
his hand to his face.

He touched
his tongue to his hand.

She could
almost see light spreading through him.

“Taste it,”
he said to her. “Quickly!”

She reached
into the chamber and found a concave shard of glass still cupping a few drops
of the precious amrita. She wet the tip of her finger in the nectar and touched
it to her tongue.

For a moment
she was blinded. Light streamed from every object in the room, including the
corpse. The walls grew transparent and then vanished completely.

She saw the
entire building around her, as if she were again staring at the lotus map. The
building dissolved. She saw hills, fields, mountains, all of them fading into
emptiness. She saw the world itself, the spinning globe of Earth, girdled by
satellites so numerous that they formed a glittering ring that would one day rival
those of Saturn; these, too, disintegrating. The sun and planets whirling like
cogs in a cosmic clock, now gone. The galactic lens paling to nothing, an
evaporating dewdrop. All distinctions of time and space were void. She drifted
in the realm where appearance and emptiness—sense and substance—fused; where
the manifest met the unmanifest. It was all and nothing; it was now and never.

She
straddled reality. In a sense, she did not exist. Yet this nonexistence defined
her being.