Soul of the Fire

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The tear on the young nun’s cheek dripped onto the rosary in her hand. As she turned her brave, open face toward Shan Tao Yun, a shaft of sunlight burst through the port in the side of the prison wagon where they huddled, illuminating the tear like a diamond. Once, precious stones had been prized in their land for the adornment of altars and reliquaries. As Shan stared at the rosary, he realized that such tears were the new jewels of Tibet.

“Drapchi, Longtou, Chushur, Gutsa,” the old Tibetan at Shan’s side recited in a matter-of-fact tone.

Shan recognized the names of the prisons his friend Lokesh recited not because of his years as a government investigator in Beijing but due to his own years as a prisoner in Tibet. They were being transported from Lhadrung County, home of Tibet’s most infamous labor camps, toward the ring of prisons around Lhasa that were akin to medieval dungeons.

“We will have a hearing or trial or something, won’t we?” Yosen, the young nun, asked, then began patting the back of the second, older woman beside her. Pema, the grey-haired woman in the tattered felt dress of a farmer, had sat with her eyes closed for the last two hours, frantically working her prayer beads.

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