They pitched camp just before sunset on the twelfth day. The tall lama approached Romelle while Brad and Chavadzy were occupied with assembling the yurts.
"Madame, if you ride now through that gully," he indicated a narrow ravine a few hundred meters away, "you will find yourself on the edge of an escarpment which offers a very nice view. May you enjoy it, Madame."
Although tired after the day's journey, she took him at his word and rode off on Fate. Rebel lifted himself wearily from a spot near the fire, and loped along.
In a matter of minutes, she had reached the end of the gully. She drew up at the rocky edge of a cliff, the steep escarpment he had told her was there.
A thin fleece of blue-gray clouds powdered a pinkish sky. The waning sun cast golden rays over white mist rising from a deep valley below. There were no trees, only remnants of recent snow icing the gray crags that rose above her to left and right. The greenery started halfway down with short grasses and full shrubberies, some of them abud. The trees began lower, short as saplings, then growing taller as they descended.
A ribbon of road began to her left. She could see it winding down until it uncoiled on the valley floor and shot out in a straight line to the opposite side. In the middle of the valley a settlement appeared, where lights were flickering. It was darkening there, sooner than where she was on the crag.
Her eyes drifted to the other side of the escarpment. A cliff projected halfway to the top. On the promontory stood a structure still gleaming in the westering sun, vermilion-pillared and gilt-roofed, clinging to the edge. It flowed around a massive terrace that shone like black glass. From it rose a statue, the figure of a woman, gigantic in size, as ebon and glossy as the terrace itself. The magnificence of the statue took Romelle's breath away, making her feel lightheaded.
She leaned forward in her saddle to breathe deeply and recover herself. Her gaze fell to a narrow crevice, protected from the wind, a little way down from where Fate stood. A spot of scarlet glowed against the gray stone. Her heart raced when she recognized a vivid blossom. She thought of the wallpaper in Eugénie's breakfast room. Such a flower grew only in the Valley of Mexico...and at Dragon's Heart!
Filled with excitement, Romelle rushed back to the camp after overcoming her first impulse to ride down to the valley at once and burst in upon Bart.
The tall lama insisted that would be foolhardy.
"The trail is steep, Madame, and treacherous, even in daylight."
Chavadzy agreed. "I have seen a man killed falling from that trail. He rode too close to the edge, his horse lost its footing on loose rocks, and pitched him over. No, Madame, we wait till morning."
"They're right, Romy," Brad chimed in. "I won't let you do it, if I have to stand guard over you all night"
Faced with such opposition, she retired to her yurt and fell across the sables.
I'm like a child on Christmas Eve. I can't wait to open my gifts in the morning. I want to see them now. Philo, I know I'm not being sensible. Can I trust myself not to sneak away while they're sleeping, and find my own way down? It's your Little Bart down there in the valley. I've come to Dragon's Heart!
I saw my first blossom. Oh, how I thought of the Empress! How I ached to have her here, and you, Philo, you! I wanted to crawl down the cliff and touch it. My father has made Magic Wine. Have I inherited his talent to make magic, too? If I touched it, and made a wish, would you come to me? Would the Empress also appear? Could we all go down the trail together? Philo, can you hear me?
The night seemed an eternity of waiting. Rebel sat up with her, sensing her compulsion, sensing she might leave him if he closed his eyes.
The walls of the yurt are light! Why? Has morning finally come?
She peered outside around the door flap. Bright moonbeams had melted the darkness away. Stillness lay across the camp. The horses stood quietly together. Fate lifted her head to stare over the bay's shoulder when Romelle's face came into view. Like Rebel, the horse felt the emotion of her mistress, as she had sensed Romelle's excitement when they caught sight of the valley together. The mare nodded as if saying, "I am ready, too."
It only took moments for Romelle to lead Fate quietly away from the camp, to mount, to walk it to the gully, with Rebel close at heel. The threesome were a comfort to each other among the heavy shadows of the ravine, and experienced equal relief when they were clear, and saw the valley below.
The mantle of mist at sunset had settled in foggy gray patches among the crags.
Romelle turned to the pathway leading downward, and gently lifted Fate's reins.
"No, Madame, I will not let you pass," said the tall lama, stepping from the shadows. "I thought you might try. I understand what it is to be apart from ones you love. Believe me, I know. But tomorrow comes. If need be, I'll wait for it with you here."
She looked down at him in the moonlight. A darker shading not apparent in daylight marked the hairline he would have had were he not to shave his scalp as lamas were required to do.
"You have a widow's peak," she said. "It's quite prominent."
He touched his forehead and shrugged.
Their eyes met.
In that moment, she shared with him an affective perception as Rebel and Fate had each shared one with her. He knew she would dismount and face him - before she did it. She knew he would walk toward her with a certain look in his eye - before he did so. They approached each other, and nearly touched, but both suddenly turned away.
"What can you tell me of this valley?" she asked in a voice struggling against emotion, crossing her arms on her breast and lifting her foot to a stone.
She gazed toward the far side.
"It is the crater of an ancient volcano, which accounts for its depth and its nearly perfect circular shape," he told her in a tone studiedly impersonal. "That's why it is called Dragon's Heart. The volcano must have erupted violently, spewing fire like a dragon in an explosion of volcanic bombs and magma from the vent. The only thing left was this great chamber at its heart, to be peppered over eons with loess carried on the winds from North China, then seeded by birds and watered by rain and melting snow."
"What about the little red flower?" she asked.
"You have seen one already?" he marveled.
"Yes, down there," she said, leaning dangerously over the edge to point to the rocky niche where it grew.
He lunged toward her and snatched her into his arms. "No!" he cried hoarsely, his lips touching her cheek. "You must not fall!"
Warmth flowed from his body, even through her fur cape. Disinclined to move away from him at first, she finally mastered her emotions, and stepped backward.
He spoke as if their surprise embrace had not occurred. "Well, it's quite warm for March. Everything is coming early this year. That's why the breakup of the ice on the Selenga River caught us by surprise. The winter was deep and long. Yes, I suppose even the flower of Dragon's Heart ought to bloom early at this altitude. The climate changes quickly as you descend. I am told that the temperatures on the floor of the valley are similar to those where the ancestral seeds of our little flower originated."
Romelle felt another quickening of her heart. The Empress Eugénie's wallpaper came to mind.
"Where is that?" she asked hopefully, almost afraid to hear the answer.
"From Mexico," he replied, "a very long time ago."
Romelle wished the Empress could have heard him say that. "How...how did they get to the other side of the world, from Mexico to here?"
 "A story has it that a Mexican Jesuit set out more than three hundred years ago in search of Prester John's legendary kingdom. In his pouch he carried seeds of a red flower unique to the vast lava flows of the Valley of Mexico, the place of his birth. He sailed aboard the Spaniards' Manila Galleon, which for centuries carried treasures from the Orient and the southern seas to Acapulco and returned with a fortune in silver and gold coins for circulation as currency throughout the cities of the Asiatic world.
"Continuing by sea from Manila to China, he heard tales and rumors which led him eventually to the Gobi and across the Mongolian plateau to these remote mountains and, finally, to the valley called Dragon's Heart. Saying a prayer of thanksgiving for the success of his journey, he took the seeds from his pouch and sprinkled them over the precipice beneath the terrace of the temple you saw on the cliff. Many of them lodged in the porous stone, which was the same as the dried magma in the Valley of Mexico. Having thus found a second home, the flower flourished. It finally covered the entire escarpment, and every year runs riot across the walls of the crater as the season warms."
Romelle's thoughts ran again to the Empress Eugénie. My godmother will be thrilled to hear how this blossom traveled to Mongolia. One of the mysteries of Dragon's Heart is solved at last!
"It is time to sleep," she said aloud. "How did you come here? I don't see your horse anywhere."
He smiled, and shrugged again. The gesture was almost endearing. "I walked."
"Let's ride back together," she suggested.
He mounted first, then pulled her up behind him. She clasped her arms around his waist, and lay her head against his shoulder. She felt a ripple of muscles through his cape as he guided the mare in a gentle walk with the reins. So at ease with him, so safe, Romelle fell asleep while still on horseback, nor did she waken when he carried her into the yurt.
Nor did she feel his tender kiss upon her cheek, or hear him whisper before he left: "Good night, my golden poppy. Sleep well. Tomorrow is Heaven's day."
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