Love In No Man's Land

by Duo Ji Zhuo Ga

  15

  Northern Tibet’s No Man’s Land was also known as Kekexili in Qinghai Province. It was barren, lonely country, and the land was so poor, it barely merited the term. It could not support crops or trees, and the only plants that grew were short, wild grasses and low shrubs, sparse and frail. Most of the land had not even a centimetre’s growth of grass on it. In No Man’s Land, mountains of six or seven thousand metres seemed like small hills. No matter the time of year, the peaks were permanently snowbound, flashing their silver light as they had for a thousand years, adding a sparkle of white to the otherwise green summers and brown winters. The bright blue sky and white snow complemented each other perfectly.

  It was a paradise for wild animals. When people elsewhere on the plateau went crazy and started killing animals just for fun, the wild yaks, asses and sheep that had nowhere to hide fled there, to No Man’s Land, where there were hardly any humans. Vegetation was also scarce: there was less food and the environment was harsher, but at least the animals’ lives were not in danger, so they could find happiness.

  Happiness was not something that just animals needed; people needed it too. On the vast plain, a brown horse walked slowly, as if it was taking a stroll. Its rider wore an old sheepskin chuba tied around his waist. A thick beard covered almost half of his face, his eyebrows were the colour of coal, his skin was rough, and his long hair was filthy and wild. He carried an old hunting gun on his back. He appeared to be asleep, but he was not asleep.

  It was Gongzha. Twice on Mount Chanaluo he had tried to kill Kaguo, and twice he had failed. Even so, Kaguo was spooked and had fled to No Man’s Land. Gongzha had followed. Cuomu had been dead for many years, but Gongzha’s memories of her had only intensified with time. The more he thought about her, the clearer his memories became: in his heart, she was forever young and beautiful. Now he didn’t even need to think about her; she was always by his side or in front of his eyes.

  The day slowly fell towards night. As the evening sun began painting the sky red, the grassland and the snow mountains turned gold. In one small patch of that golden grassland stood a few tumbledown mud walls. An old woman carrying a wooden bucket on her back hobbled out from between them. She started when she saw Gongzha. ‘Guest, are you lost?’

  Gongzha sprang off his horse and led it over by the reins. He bowed and put his palms together in greeting. ‘Dear Ama, I am a hunter. I’ve been chasing a bear here.’

  ‘Oh, we haven’t seen an outsider for many years. Respected guest, please come with me and rest your feet. I’ll stew you some mutton ribs. An eagle only has the strength to fly when it is full,’ the old woman said, and she led him to a black tent nearby.

  Gongzha followed the old woman, tethered his horse to a post, entered the tent and sat down by the stove. She served him butter tea, then threw several yak pats into the stove and used the sheep-gut bellows to blow the fire until the flames leapt high. Her kindly, wrinkled face glowed in the firelight and Gongzha’s thoughts turned to his own mother and to his brothers’ children. His wanderer’s heart was suddenly filled with bitterness. Women and children were a man’s future, the hope in his tent. But his own future and his own hopes had disappeared at the sound of Kaguo’s wild howls on that gloomy afternoon long ago.

  With these thoughts preying on him, Gongzha’s heart began to hurt again. He picked up his butter tea and gulped it down, hoping to suppress the pain.

  The old woman stood up and refilled his cup. ‘Where are you from, child?’

  ‘Cuoe Grassland, Ama.’

  ‘Cuoe Grassland?’ The old woman lifted her head and stared through the window in the roof of the tent at the white clouds drifting overhead. ‘Now that is a lovely place!’

  ‘Has Ama been there?’

  ‘No, but I’ve heard of it. A place like heaven!’ The old woman withdrew her gaze. She used a fork to lift the meat out of the water and into a bowl, placed it in front of Gongzha, and passed him a small knife. ‘Eat, my respected guest. I have nothing fancy to offer you; I can only give you this mutton to fill your stomach and give you the energy to journey across the grassland and over the mountains in search of your bear.’

  Gongzha hadn’t eaten stewed mutton in a long time. Like any hunter out in the wilderness, he ate what he could hit. He didn’t stand on ceremony – to do so would have been disrespectful to his hostess. He took the meat in one hand and his knife in the other, and in a flash devoured a large part of everything in his bowl. The old woman grinned appreciatively, poured him some more tea, and passed him the salt and some hot pepper. When they heard someone approaching from outside the tent, the old woman lifted the door flap, smiled and went out.

  When he finally got the point where he couldn’t fit anything else in his stomach, Gongzha stuck the knife into the rest of the meat, stood up and went out of the tent. The old woman had been joined by a young woman and they were driving sheep towards the sheep pen. He went over to them, borrowed the old woman’s slingshot and launched a few stones. They whirred through the air and landed squarely on the old ram that was trying to stray from the flock, forcing him back into line.

  The young woman smiled at him. Working together, the two of them herded the sheep into the pen and shut the gate.

  ‘I’m Yongxi. Who are you?’ The young woman tilted her head to one side, flashing two large dimples as she smiled.

  ‘Gongzha.’ He strode over to take the bag of yak pats out of the old woman’s hand, swung it onto his back and returned to the tent.

  The old woman smiled, her eyes narrowing, and said to her granddaughter Yongxi, ‘That child can really work!’

  Yongxi giggled, swung her thin plaits behind her, and trotted over to catch up with Gongzha.

  ‘Where are you from?’

  ‘Shenzha County.’

  ‘Our area here is called Ejiu, that snow mountain is called Tajiapu and we are all its children.’

  ‘Tajiapu?’ Gongzha squinted at the distant snow mountain.

  ‘You know it?’ As Yongxi looked at him, the evening sunlight slanted across her face and her delicate eyelashes were so defined, you could count them.

  ‘I’ve heard of it,’ Gongzha said and he looked away.

  Yongxi kept up with him and chattered on. ‘Tajiapu must be quite famous then, if even you’ve heard of it, but it has only a few children. There aren’t even a hundred of us herders here. Granny says there used to be many people on Tajiapu Grassland, but they left.’

  ‘They left? Why?’

  ‘It’s said that Tajiapu was invaded by demons, so it was always hailing. No grass grew, so the yaks and sheep starved to death, and the herders had no choice but to look for better pasture elsewhere. Granny said that some of them moved to Cuoe Lake.’

  Gongzha turned to look at her. ‘To Cuoe Lake? Are you Nacangdeba?’

  ‘Yes, we’re Nacangdeba. How did you know?’

  ‘I’m from Cuoe Lake.’

  ‘We’re family?’ Yongxi jumped in front of him and grinned at him in delight, her eyes wide. She called to her grandmother in the tent, ‘Mo, he’s from Cuoe Lake and he’s Nacangdeba!’

  The old woman glanced at Gongzha with a smile but said nothing.

  The Nacangdeba on the grassland all had one ancestor. No matter where they wandered, they were all one family.

  Gongzha stacked the yak pats by the stove. Then he went out again, found some stones and began to repair the yak enclosure. He got hot and took off his leather chuba, tying the sleeves around his waist; his weathered, coppery skin gave off a faint golden light in the evening sun. Yongxi stood by his side and helped by passing him stones. She didn’t know why, but every time she looked at the full-bearded man from Cuoe Grassland, a strange new feeling arose in her heart.

  That night, Gongzha slept in the little black tent in the wilderness. The stove gave off a rosy glow and made the tent quite toasty. In its innermost part, the old woman made a bed for Gongzha out of three cushions and a new rug. The auspicious blue images on the
rug had taken her a year to create; she’d planned to give the rug to her granddaughter when she was grown up and started a tent of her own. Tonight she brought it out to welcome their relative from a faraway place. Only treasured guests received such treatment and Gongzha was moved, though he said nothing. He was not one to express himself, keeping both his gratitude and his anger buried deep.

  When the stars had risen and the moon hung over the mountain peaks, the grassland became so still, it was as if it had entered a different dimension. The three of them sat on their rugs in the faint light cast by the stars and the old woman told Gongzha stories of the past.

  ‘We were also once from Cuoe Grassland. My grandmother was called Duojilamu and her first tent was by the side of Cuoe Lake. When my mother was small, demons suddenly invaded the grassland. They went everywhere, stealing yaks, sheep and girls, and burning any tents they found. Our ancestors couldn’t defeat them, so the men ordered the women to escape during the night, taking the elderly and the children with them. That was how my mother left her home; her mother brought her here to No Man’s Land in Shuanghu. Her brothers froze to death on the road, and her father did not return. I heard that none of the men of the clan escaped; some said they were eaten by the demons.’

  The old woman sat facing the fire, occasionally throwing yak pats onto the flames. The fire was perfectly hot enough, but she needed to do something to distract herself from her grief. Shaking the dust off the old stories had exposed the pain hidden beneath.

  ‘The year I was five, there was a great blizzard here. The snow was up to our knees and it didn’t melt for two months. The livestock all froze to death. Many people did too. The clan leaders had no choice but to tell the herders to go and find a new pasture. Most people left, but my parents only had me, so our life wasn’t that hard, and they were used to it here, so we stayed.’

  ‘Duojilamu? Cuoe Grassland?’ Gongzha sat on the rug, his sheepskin chuba wrapped around him, staring at the serene old woman in the firelight. Her face was a mass of wrinkles, her hair was white and wild, and her spirit was peaceful, as if she’d seen everything in life there was to see. She was like the shaft of a bow, like the craggy mountain ranges that loomed over the grassland, ravaged but steadfast. Only mothers of the grassland had that kind of face; only mothers of the grassland had that kind of mountain-like spine.

  As she spoke, Gongzha thought back to that strange cave, and he muttered to himself, ‘Duojilamu?’ The name was familiar – he’d seen it somewhere:

  The smoke is rising and the door to Shambhala has been opened. I must go. Duojilamu, my woman, you must raise our child. When he’s grown, he must avenge his father and drive the Jialong off our grassland.

  That mysterious stone chamber, those peaceful corpses, that man who’d written his last words in the dust on the ground… Gongzha told the old woman about everything he’d seen in the cave on Chanaluo. As he talked about the men’s final words, he heard Yongxi weeping quietly beside him.

  Without looking at either Yongxi or Gongzha, the old woman rose to add some water to the pot on the stove. ‘People come and people go. No matter how beautiful the grassland is, it will never belong to just one person.’ She returned to her seat and squeezed the bellows twice to fan the flames again. ‘It’s like this fire – it will die down today, but tomorrow it will brighten again. The grassland too: its flowers wither, but next year they will bloom again.’

  The night slowly grew silent, and all that remained of the fire were some faintly glowing embers.

  In the middle of the night, Gongzha suddenly woke up. He heard footsteps outside the tent. From his many years in the wilderness, he’d cultivated a keen pair of ears: he could tell just by listening whether it was a human or an animal drawing close.

  The person approached the tent slowly, then raised the door flap. A gust of cold wind rushed in. Squinting into the moonlight, even with his eyes half closed, Gongzha could tell it was a young man. He didn’t move; he barely even drew breath.

  The young man walked over to where Yongxi was sleeping, called her name softly and began to pull at her quilt.

  Gongzha still didn’t move. The grassland had its traditions. When a young man came visiting at night, pursuing the young woman in his heart, no one had the right to interfere.

  Yongxi seemed unwilling; she clutched at her quilt, struggled, and began to cry, calling out, ‘Mo! Mo…!’

  The old woman didn’t stir. Perhaps she was sleeping, or perhaps she was waiting for something.

  Gongzha didn’t stir either. He was simply respecting the customs of the grassland.

  In that tiny space, Yongxi’s struggles seemed all the more helpless, her muffled cries all the more piteous. But her tears didn’t seem to have any effect on the young man. He began to pull vigorously at her arms and tear at her quilt.

  Yongxi’s cries got louder and she began to swear at him.

  Now Gongzha got up. He crossed the tent in two steps, grabbed the young man’s arm, twisted it behind his back and pushed him out of the tent without a word.

  The last thing the young man had expected was an encounter with a man who didn’t understand the rules. He whipped out his knife and rushed at Gongzha, who was standing by the tent door. Gongzha didn’t move. He waited until the young man drew close, then grabbed his wrist, yanked him to the side and threw him to the ground, where he lay splayed like an old sheep.

  He scrambled up and glowered at Gongzha, who stood there as strong and silent as an iron tower. The young man knew he was no match for him, so he turned away, cursing, clambered onto his horse and sped off.

  Gongzha watched him disappear swearing into the distance. Then he went back inside the tent, walked over to his rug and crawled back into his chuba; within minutes he was breathing evenly.

  Yongxi sat clutching her quilt around her, staring in confusion at Gongzha’s sleeping form. Moonlight streamed through the little skylight and illuminated her face: her eyes were misty and her cheeks were still wet with tears. The old woman’s snores were as peaceful as before.

  Once this now tranquil night was over, could everything really remain unchanged?

  *

  When dawn broke the next day, Gongzha didn’t leave straightaway. He helped the old woman tether the sheep together in pairs while Yongxi brought over the milking bucket. As she did the milking, the old woman said with feigned carelessness, ‘Our household has no man and we need to move pastures soon. As it’s just me and Yongxi, one old woman and one young woman, we’ll have to ask a man to help us.’

  ‘How long until you move?’ Gongzha said lightly. He tied the horns of the last two sheep together, straightened up, and looked over the two rows of sheep.

  ‘Ten days. We’ll move to another side of Tajiapu.’

  ‘I’ll help you move and then leave,’ Gongzha said. He strode over to pour the full buckets of milk into the butter churn.

  Yongxi and her grandmother stared after him as he worked busily in the morning sunshine and burst into smiles.

  Gongzha said little, but his hands and feet never rested, and he kept himself occupied both inside the tent and out. He hated the thought of the compassionate old woman pushing a heavy cart over the snow mountain, and anyway, it didn’t matter to him how many days he stayed. His purpose in life was to catch Kaguo; whether he did so sooner or later, the outcome would be the same. He knew Kaguo had come to this part of the country, and if he didn’t chase her, she wouldn’t go far. He would let her survive for a few more days.

  Ejiu was a true wilderness and life there was fragile. The ground was covered in pebbles the size of fingernails. If heaven was gracious and sent more rain and less hail, wind and snow, then the people and the animals could live comfortably through the year. If heaven was not gracious, it took only one season of sandstorms for the grassland to become a place of starvation. The grass that managed to endure such hardships completed its cycle swiftly – it sprouted, made rapid growth, flowered, and dropped its seeds all within a relati
vely short period. If the herders moved their livestock to the pastures just when the grass was at its best, there was hope for the season ahead. It was the most labour-intensive task of their year.

  Before they moved the cart to the new pasture on the other side of the snow mountain, Gongzha first wanted to relocate most of the livestock there. He asked Yongxi to be his guide. On Cuoe Grassland, moving pasture was something all the families did together. The busy sounds of moving would fill the air and nothing and nobody would even contemplate attacking them, neither wolves nor other people. But in the infinite wilderness of Tajiapu, they were on their own: people had become an endangered species.

  Gongzha had tied his chuba around his waist, and his long, wild hair blew in the wind. He walked with his tanned face to the sun, and his rough skin could have been used as sandpaper. Yongxi was by his side. She’d dressed carefully in a red robe with gilded edges that set off her figure perfectly; her freshly washed wavy hair had not yet dried and it rippled behind her in the wind. As she walked, she knitted something with yak wool.

  The two occasionally exchanged a few sentences; usually it was Yongxi asking a question and Gongzha replying. A black dog travelled with them, racing back and forth and circling around them. As they crossed the snow mountain and meandered along the pathless slope, Gongzha and the dog worked together to push the yaks into one long line.

  The reflection of the sun’s rays off the snowy ground was extremely strong and Gongzha had to keep raising his hands to shield his eyes. Yongxi called to him, opened the yak-wool circlet she’d been knitting and placed it over his eyes. He smiled at her gratefully. It was a simple but effective device. When worn over the eyes, the knitted shade protected the wearer from the glare but still kept their line of vision clear. In the highlands, where sunglasses were not yet commonplace, the herders had developed their own way of preventing snow-blindness.