We cut down a side street, and into an alley that opened up to a courtyard that doubled as a parking area, Dorj kicking up dust and debris as he skidded to a halt, nearly colliding with a roadside trash can.
There were no rules as to where someone could park. I even saw someone partially parked on a basketball court, a few older boys still playing basketball even though it was getting late.
“We’re here,” Mary called to us as we got out of the truck. “This is where I live with my uncle.” She looked up at an apartment building, easily nine stories tall.
“I thought you lived in another city,” said Ingrid.
“I’m living in Khovd for the summer, to stay with my grandparents because they’re getting old.”
“So you don’t live with your parents?” I asked as Dorj peeled off, likely taking the truck out for a spin or possibly back to the countryside.
Who knew with that guy.
“No, my dad still lives in London. He’s a chef there, and hopefully, I’ll move back next summer. My mom lives here in UB, but she isn’t here right now. She’s in Singapore studying English. She never picked it up while we lived in London. She mostly stayed home with me, so she’s trying to improve her English before we move back.”
“How global,” I said as we came to a big metal door.
Mary stopped in front of the keypad and pounded in a number. As soon as she did the door popped open, allowing us to step inside.
We came into a small interior space with a stairwell and an elevator. The elevator door opened and a woman wearing a super tight dress and high heels stepped out, a clutch under her arm. Next to her was a well-dressed man in a suit and black tie.
They looked at us curiously and moved past.
“Where you think they are going?” I asked as we got to the elevator.
“Maybe to the disco,” Mary said. “They are quite popular here.”
“Discos?” Ingrid asked.
I was about to ask the same question. I hadn’t heard that word used for a nightclub, well, ever.
“You know, nightclubs,” Mary said as she pressed the button that went to the ninth floor.
“Your Internet’s working now, right?” I asked her.
“Yes, but my phone died,” she said, reaching into her small bag and showing me her dead phone screen. “But don’t worry, I have a computer. You can use it to contact your friends.”
“Nice,” I told her as we reached the top floor.
The doors cranked opened, and the first thing to meet my ears was the sound of a beating drum.
“Oh no,” Mary said, pausing.
“What is it?” I asked her.
“Well, I guess this isn’t such a big deal. I told you earlier my uncle is a shaman. He must be seeing some people tonight.”
“He’s a shaman?” Ingrid asked, looking from Stella to me.
“Yes, and hopefully he isn’t taking his red spirit,” Mary said as she made her way to a big metal door that reminded me of a bank vault. All the apartments had them. It would take a damn bazooka to get through these things.
“Did you say his ‘red spirit?’” I asked.
“Let’s just go to my room when we get inside, and I’ll explain everything. Maybe you can meet the shaman,” she said.
“Sounds like a plan.”
Mary opened the big metal door, and sure enough, we were greeted by the loud pounding of a drum, some random noises too, which sounded like garbled chants. Rather than go all the way into the hallway to the right, where the sound was emitting from, we hung a left straight into Mary’s room.
She plugged her phone in and pointed to her laptop, which sat on the desk.
“I’m sorry there’s not a lot of room,” she told Ingrid and Stella, “but you can sit on the floor.”
“That’s fine,” Stella said as she sat.
“I can also bring chairs. Well, I don’t want to disturb my uncle.”
“No, this is fine,” Ingrid told her.
“Here we go, here we go,” I said as I opened her laptop and saw the login screen. I turned the laptop to her, and Mary typed in her information. Once she was done, I went to GoogleFace and clicked on the email icon.
I typed cherryblossomgirls and keyed in the password, “Michelle.”
It loaded for a moment, my heart fluttering for just a second in anticipation.
Sure enough, I saw that Dorian had already saved a message in the drafts folder.
Gideon.
We are all safe. We don’t know where you are or what to do, but for now, we are staying at a hotel in Nagasaki. I will keep checking this email account. Please respond.
Love,
Dorian
“We got them!” I told the others.
“They’re okay?” Ingrid asked.
“Yes, they are,” I said as I started to type a message:
Dorian,
We are in Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia, which is…
(I looked up the distance on GoogleFace.)
about 1600 miles from Nagasaki. I will keep checking this draft folder through the night and into the morning.
“Where would be a good place for our friends to meet us?” I asked Mary. “Preferably a very large space, that is easy for them to find.”
The young Mongolian thought for a moment. “You mean in UB, right? Because Mongolia is an incredibly large country, twice the size of Germany.”
“Yes, here in the city.”
“Sukhbaatar Square,” she said. “It’s in front of our government building. It’s very large, and it should be easy to meet them there.”
“Thanks,” I told her as I continued to type my message:
We will meet you in a place called Sukhbaatar Square. You can use your empathetic teleportation to get there. We are currently in an apartment on the ninth floor, but there are a lot of buildings around, and you would be teleporting a long way. It’s best to pick a large place, so that’s why we’re going with the square. Let me know as soon as you get this message and we will arrange a time. I can’t wait to see you all.
(I did another quick internet search.)
You are one hour ahead of us, FYI. So if I tell you meet us at 9, I’m telling you 9 your time, which is 8 our time. We’ll work it out.
Love,
Gid-ee-un (my Korean name)
I made sure the message was saved, and once it was, I turned to the others.
“As soon as Dorian sees the message, we’ll be heading to Nagasaki.”
Stella nodded. “Sounds like a plan.”
“Are we checking out the shaman in the meantime?” Ingrid asked.
Mary hesitated for a moment. “It can be a bit strange,” she finally told us, “but it is something that is unique to Mongolian culture, that people find interesting. I don’t know if you’ll be able to ask the shaman any questions or anything, but maybe you should at least observe it.”
“I’m down,” I said. “Ingrid?”
“Definitely.”
Stella shrugged.
“Right.” Mary stepped out of the room and returned a few minutes later. “The shaman will see you now.”
Chapter Five: My Uncle the Shaman
I was ushered into a small room and told to sit in front of a man wearing a red mask, with fringe hanging off it that stretched past his waist. The shaman wore black robes with trinkets pinned to his lapel, a string of prayer beads wrapped around his wrists. He sat with his legs crossed, rolling his head on his shoulders, trembling.
A pair of eyes, a nose and an open mouth were stitched onto the front of his mask, glaring down at me.
The room smelled of smoke and alcohol, a haze hanging in the air. Next to the shaman was his translator, a girl just a few years older than Mary, who sat on her knees listening to the shaman grumble.
I would later learn that shamans needed translators because they spoke in the spirit’s native tongue, and considering the spirit could be from an era that stretched as far back as Genghis Khan, it was usually different
from the modern Mongolian language.
It was fascinating how this woman not much older than Mary seemed to understand the shaman’s garbled responses, which sounded like a drunk Daffy Duck to my ears.
The translator went for a long pipe and stuck it under the fringe of the shaman’s mask. She took a cigarette and lit the end of it, taking a few hits off the cig before stuffing it in the pipe. The shaman began puffing on the pipe, the end of the cigarette glowing red.
I caught a glimpse of Stella to my right.
I didn’t see her conjure anything up, but I was pretty sure she had put a vector shield in front of us, her eyes showcasing her fright, her body language showing that she was ready for anything.
Ingrid sat behind me on my right, Mary too, the Mongolian girl whispering to Ingrid.
“What’s going on here, Mary?” I asked.
“My uncle has taken his angry spirit,” she explained. “That’s why he’s wearing a red mask.”
The shaman continued to puff away at the cigarette until it was gone. The translator removed the pipe and gave him a bowl, which she quickly filled with liquid from a three-liter Fanta bottle.
“And what’s he drinking?” I asked.
“Watered down vodka,” Mary said.
“Um, okay.”
“The spirit likes it. All spirits seem to like things like cigarettes and alcohol.”
“So he’s drunk?”
“No. You will see once the spirit leaves him. He won’t be drunk.”
The shaman’s voice rose. He started speaking in a garbled language like he was cursing under his breath. The translator bent over and listened for a moment, and when she was done, she spoke in Mongolian to Mary.
“She says that the shaman is ready to meet you.”
“Okay, hi,” I told the shaman, scooting forward.
“No,” Mary said. “Bow before him and let him touch your head.”
I did exactly as I was instructed, bowing before the shaman, his hands guided to my head by the translator.
He made a grunting sound as he massaged the back of my skull. He said something, and I heard a metal bowl being filled with alcohol. The shaman swallowed it down and spit it on the back of my head.
I shot back up.
“Relax,” Mary said. “He’s blessing you.”
“With his spirit?”
“You’re the one that wanted to see the shaman,” she said.
“I thought that was Ingrid,” I told her.
“My idea, but you’re the guinea pig,” Ingrid said, Stella chuckling under her breath.
Mary nodded. “You need to donate something to him. Do you have something you can give him?”
“Not really,” I told her as I tried my best to wipe away some of the liquid that had gotten on my glasses.
Mary took my glasses from me, wiped them on her shirt, and handed them back. This gave me a moment to think, as the shaman still gyrated on his hips, grunting every now and then, making gargled noises with his throat.
“I’ve got something to donate.”
I took the knife that Veronique had made me from my boot. Holding it in both hands, I pressed it forward, telling the shaman that it was a gift. Mary explained this to the shaman’s translator, who then spoke directly to the spirit.
The translator guided the shaman’s hands forward, the man making a sound that reminded me of Yoda as he took the blade from me. He brought the blade to his face, even though he couldn’t actually see it. I grew tense once he traced his finger along the edge of the blade, figuring he would draw a bead of blood.
The shaman grunted and handed the knife to his translator, saying something to her.
Not a moment later, she was handing him a drumhead that was about three-inches thick. It had a cross on the underside of the drumhead that allowed him to hold it like a shield.
Once his drum was in place, he stuck his free hand out, the translator giving him a mallet with blue fabric tied to the end.
The shaman brought the drum in front of his face and started beating it, harder and harder until the sound was deafening. As he tapped out the rhythm he shook his head, the fringes of his mask beating against his chest and face.
He finally let up, and beckoned me forward again.
“Okay,” I said, following his lead. He placed his hands on my head, and began speaking to the translator.
“He wants to know where you’re from,” Mary said. “He knows that you are a foreigner, but this spirit has never left Mongolia, so it is a bit confused.”
“I’m from America,” I told him.
Mary translated to the translator, who then spoke to the shaman.
The shaman’s spirit tried to pronounce the word a few times but couldn’t, so he moved on.
“He wants to know how you came here. Are your horses well?”
“My horses?”
I looked back at Mary to see that she was nodding.
“We came here…” I hesitated for a moment. I got the sense that I was talking to an old spirit, especially with the horses question, but I didn’t know how much I should say. Then again, wasn’t like the shaman was going to come after us or tell anyone, especially if he really was channeling his spirit. “We were teleported here through a portal,” I finally told him.
Mary was stumped by this one for a moment. Eventually, she figured out a way to tell the shaman, which was then translated to him by his assistant.
“He says that you have a great power, one that he has never sensed in a person before.”
“Thank you.”
The shaman spoke some more.
“He wants to touch your head again.”
“Sure,” I said, bowing before him, the musk of incense berating my nostrils.
“He says that your power is hidden, that it is something that may surprise even you.”
“Hidden?” I considered this for a moment. “It’s not exactly hidden, but sure, and it always surprises me.”
“He also says that you recently parted with someone, and that it was a mistake.”
I swallowed hard; I knew exactly what the shaman was referring to.
Or at least I thought I did.
Letting Arianna go with Angel was against my normal mode of operation. I knew it at the time, and I was definitely feeling it as I knelt before the shaman, the man speaking in a garbled tone again.
He dug his fingers into my head, the pain making me wince.
“He says that you have made a very dangerous mistake, that it is going to come back to haunt you. That your enemies are growing stronger.”
“Great.”
“He says that your life is at risk.”
“Not so great,” I said, Stella chuckling behind me.
I was trying to be skeptical about all this, but it was kind of hard given the situation, the intense man seated before me whispering things to a translator who then spoke to Mary.
The shaman mumbled for what felt like forever. Finally, Mary spoke again: “He says that the next five days will decide your fate. You need to throw milk to the wind every morning for the next five days. He also wants you to carry this with you.”
I felt the translator’s hand drop onto my shoulder, indicating that I could sit up now. Once I did, I saw that the shaman was holding an old coin.
“A coin?” I asked Mary.
“It’s an old Mongolian coin. Mongolians don’t use coins now, but we used to. It’s fifteen tugrik,” she told me, and sure enough, when I turned the coin over I saw the number fifteen. I also saw the date 1970, as well as Cyrillic writing.
“The shaman says that this and the milk will protect you.”
“Okay,” I told her.
“I will show you how to do the milk in the morning.”
“Thanks. Can I ask him some questions?”
“Please,” Mary said.
“I…”
And in that moment I suddenly didn’t know what to ask the spirit. Even if I respected his culture, I didn’t quite believe in
what he was doing, what he was telling me. Then again, it was easy to be superstitious when a shaman just conjured up a doomsday prophecy.
“Do you have a question?” Mary asked after I didn’t say anything.
“What am I doing wrong?”
It was a stupid question, and I regretted it just as quickly as it came out of my mouth, but Mary translated it anyway.
The shaman replied; his translator got his pipe again, which she shoved under his mask. She lit a cigarette once it was in place, and took two puffs of it before placing it in the pipe so the spirit could do his thing.
I was called forward again, and once I bowed, the shaman took a deep drag off the pipe, blowing cigarette smoke onto my head. He did it again, and again, until I was coughing.
Finally, the shaman spoke, Mary listening to the translator once he finished.
“He says that it is important to know the difference between your instincts, what’s right, and what’s wrong. He thinks that you get confused with these things sometimes, but if you seriously take the time to consider what you’re trying to do, the answer will present itself.”
“Okay,” I said, the cigarette smoke all around me now. “Okay.”
Once he set his pipe down, the shaman took his drum again and started beating it. We were told to back away, and as soon as we did, he jumped up, startling all of us. He fell back to the ground, the spirit apparently gone.
His translator was at his side immediately, helping him take off the tight mask.
And I assumed he would look red-eyed and possibly drunk after all the alcohol and cigarettes he had smoked. But nope. From what I could tell, he was completely sober, a stern look on his face as he took us all in.
Finally, Mary’s uncle turned to his translator and asked her something in Mongolian, or at least I recognized that it wasn’t the same crazy language he’d spoken in his trance.
“What’s he asking?” Ingrid asked Mary.
“He wants to know what happened,” she explained. “He never can remember what the spirit has said. Did you enjoy it?”
I looked from Stella to Ingrid, both of whom had wary expressions on their faces. “Sure, and tell him thank you for the coin,” I said, showing the coin to the shaman.
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