Chapter 15

“Are you the cause of the trouble at the post office?” Tsepak asked when we met him the next morning.

“Yes, we cut off their electricity,” I told him.

“We know. The people from the power company have already been there. They don’t know why the electricity can’t get into the building. They tried using a generator and couldn’t get power into the building with it,” he told us in a rush of words.

“How is the rumor about the Dragons returning going?” Jorani asked.

“It’s all over the city already, at least among the Tibetans. One of my spies even reported that a few people had passed the post office and had commented that the Dragons had caused their trouble,” he told us.

“Their troubles are only starting,” I assured him before changing the subject.

“Have you decided on any locations for us to start delivering the food to?” I asked.

“Yes, we have three locations for the food deliveries plus a place to send the expensive foreign things to, so they can be delivered to those who can sell them the easiest,” he told us.

We went to visit each of the locations so we could create a marker spell there to locate them before sending them the food. The first three were stores in the various markets where the poor and elderly usually shopped. The fourth location was an office. They already had a number of imported items there that I was sure the Chinese government didn’t know had entered the country.

“Only a few items every other day for here,” Tsepak told us pointing to the other items.

“For the rest of the locations, a sack of rice and a box of vegetables every other day to each one will keep them stocked,” he told us.

“Is that sufficient?” Jorani asked.

“Barley sells for 1.5 to 2 Yuan a kilo. Rice sells for 4 to 4.5 Yuan a kilo. The poor can barely afford Barley. Vegetables are a bit less expensive,” he told us.

“They buy food in rather small quantities then?” Jorani asked.

“Yes, daily as they can afford it,” he told us.

At this rate, the food we had wouldn’t last very long. We would need to obtain more in a couple of weeks. We, therefore, needed to have the police and the soldiers busy guarding other locations, so we could remove what we needed from the government warehouse without a problem. I didn’t mention this to Tsepak but would bring it up to Jorani later.

“We can start the deliveries tomorrow. What is a good time for that?” I asked.

“They normally receive their regular deliveries early in the morning. If you deliver your things at about nine in the morning, they won’t get the shipments confused,” he told us.

“Which television station transmits most of its programs in Tibetan, and which transmits mostly in Chinese?” Jorani asked him. Tsepak told us which transmitted the most in each language, and we knew which one to take off the air.

We left him then after arranging where to meet the next day. The rest of the morning and part of the afternoon was spent arranging the food for delivery over the next week. We checked the spells on the fruit and vegetables to ensure that they would remain fresh. I estimated that we had about 14 days’ worth of food here before we would need to make another visit to the government warehouse. The limiting factor was the fresh fruit and vegetables. We had rice for many weeks, unless the demand increased. In that time, we would need to arrange things so that the police and soldiers would be too busy guarding other locations to worry about the warehouse.

The remainder of the afternoon and most of the evening was spent resting, as we had a busy night ahead of us. We were up before 11:30, and Jorani made dinner for us while I reviewed the spells that we would be using tonight. Following dinner, I went over the spells with her to be sure she knew how to use them. Finally, we returned to the corridors. It was after two in the morning. The latest change of guards had already left, but the returning guards weren’t back yet. The regular nightly patrols were also all out and weren’t due to change until eight in the morning. Tsepak had been a regular encyclopedia on police routines in Lhasa.

When ready, we transferred to Beijing Street in front of the Potala Palace before changing into our Dragon form at the forty-foot-tall level. It was a dark night. The moon had set earlier, and there were heavy clouds covering the area. With our Dragon eyesight, we had no trouble seeing in the dark.

Because of the huge area to be covered, it would require both of us to cast the spells needed. The buildings of the Potala Palace, our target for tonight, measure some 400 meters (1300 ft) east to west, and 350 meters (1150 ft) north to south. The walls average 3 meters (9.8 ft) thick and are 5 meters (16 ft) at the base. It soars 117 meters (384 ft) to the top of Marpo Ri (Red Mountain) rising more than 300 meters (980 ft) above the valley floor.

We, however, weren’t going to ward the entire complex of buildings. We were only interested in warding the ‘White Palace’ and its associated buildings and also cutting off all of their power. Warding even just this part of the complex was a herculean task for just two Magic users, as it needed to be done with a deft hand. I had pictures of the Palace on my laptop, and we had also seen it in person. We would be warding it in sections starting at street level and working our way up the hill. Even in the dark, the White Palace stood out, and we started casting our wards on the buildings of the White Palace and the stores in front of it. We also cast the spell to remove the use of electricity from the buildings at the same time.

We worked from the air for most of the buildings, taking each level in turn. We also worked the left and right ends of the Palace separately from the center because of the way it was laid out. We stopped when we ran out of white walls or steps. On landing on the back side of the mountain, we were tired but had completed our mission. Returning to our Human forms, we transferred back to the corridors.

“Should we return to the Nest?” Jorani asked once in the corridors.

“There isn’t any place to sleep here,” I reminded her.

“Yes, I definitely need a nap and something to eat,” she agreed. We took one of the canned hams with us, and I gave it a quick heating after opening the can. We slept very well for the remainder of that night and were up by eight in the morning.

Meanwhile in Lhasa, the repercussions of their actions were already being felt. The returning guards found that they could not access the guard room and the entire complex was dark. The Sergeant of the Guard tried his radio but received no answer. By four o’clock, when the next guard change was due, there were no replacement guards, and those who had previously come off guard had to return to duty. The Sergeant of the Guard had alerted those at the offices of the Municipal government and the Chengguan District government to the problem, but only the night staff were on hand at each place. The duty officers needed to call those in charge and alert them to the problem.

Those inside the buildings of the White Palace had instantly become aware of the problem when the lights went out and all of their equipment stopped working. They weren’t aware yet that all of it was dead, destroyed by the huge amount of Magic necessary to ward the entire White Palace complex. After stumbling around in total darkness for a time, they realized they couldn’t get out of the buildings and their flashlights didn’t work. They did have a few candles and some chemical glow sticks, but it was mainly dark, dark, dark. Daylight wouldn’t be of much help to them as much of the complex had no windows, or only small ones. It was only the top floors of the Palace that had large windows and only on the exterior walls. The interior rooms had no windows.

The mayor / chairman of the Chengguan District government eventually called out the fire department and transferred officers from the various police stations to set up a blockade around the Potala Palace. Guard duty at various facilities in the city was canceled, and those personnel transferred to help man the blockade. There were no tours of the Palace that day or the next, as no one was allowed near the Palace or its surrounding area.

That morning at about 9:30, one of the trapped Chinese officials managed to make his way to the upper floors of the Palace. He was surprised to find the Monks there as peaceful and unconcerned as could be.

“Don’t you know that we have been attacked?” he demanded of Dukhor when he finally located him.

“Attacked! Was anyone injured?” the Monk asked in a concerned voice.

“No, no one was injured, at least not seriously. It wasn’t that kind of attack. No one has been able to enter or leave the buildings however. The electricity has also been off,” he told him.

“Yes, we noticed the lack of electricity, but it has gone out before. We weren’t worried. We have our butter lamps and our prayer wheels. We have prayed and meditated since rising early this morning,” Dukhor told the upset official pointing to two of the larger rooms full of Monks chanting and spinning their prayer wheels while others meditated in the second room. Both rooms were dimly lit by butter lamps.

“Aren’t you worried about not having any food? We can’t cook without electricity,” the official asked.

“We often fast, so the lack of food today isn’t a problem,” Dukhor assured him. The official returned to the floors below shaking his head, unable to understand the Monks.

We were up at eight that morning, and Jorani heated up the remaining rice from the large pot she had made for our supper last night after I heated the stove. We could have certainly used a microwave, but there was no electricity here in the Nest.

Just before nine o’clock, we returned to the corridors, and one at a time, I opened the portals to the three locations where we were delivering food, and we pushed the ready bundles of food through to them. The fourth location received a box of the foreign food items to sell.

Later that morning, we met with a very shocked Tsepak.

“You’re the ones responsible for the debacle at the Potala Palace, aren’t you?” he demanded on seeing us.

“Yes, we set that in motion last night,” I told him.

“The city government has gone crazy. They have pulled the police and guards off of everywhere else to try to contain the truth about what has happened. I have it on good authority that they have even requested additional soldiers to help man the blockade around the Potala Palace. It’s a madhouse over there with everyone accusing everyone else of creating the problem.

“Many Tibetans have gone past the blockade to see what is going on. The Chinese will admit nothing, but our people only smile. Everyone has heard the rumor about the Dragons returning by now. The word in the various tea houses is that the Dragons have caused these things,” he told us referring to the post office and now the Palace. We only smiled. The wards and the spell on the power would last until the next morning. When the power returned, the Chinese would learn that all of their computers and other electronic equipment had been burned out, but they wouldn’t have any idea of how. It would put their surveillance of the local inhabitants out of business for some time to come. We slept very well that night after a relaxing day.

Much of the next day was spent going over the tribute on the entry level of the Nest. We hadn’t checked it closely since arriving, as we had been otherwise engaged. We were quite surprised by some of the things that we found in the various rooms. The room with the gold nuggets also had gold that had been melted and cast into small bars or rectangles.

“How did they do this?” Jorani asked, and the Queens apparently answered her, as she got a faraway look on her face for a short time.

“Oh!” she said following that and picked up one of the small gold rectangles that was about an inch wide (2.5 cm) by two inches long (5.0 cm), and a quarter inch thick (6.5 mm).

“They made these in molds of baked clay,” she told me following that. I had also picked up a couple of them and bounced one in my right hand for a short time to gauge its weight.

“These are about five Troy ounces each (155 grams),” I told her. “At the current rate of exchange, these bars are worth around $9,000.00 each,” I told her to a gasp.

“That much for those little pieces of gold?” she asked in surprise.