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Authors: Isabel Allende
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valleys and cultivated terraces in the mountains of his own country, the Forbidden Kingdom. He would return there only when his education was complete.
Dil Bahadur learned to use the eye in his forehead with such precision that by now, at the age of eighteen, he could identify the medicinal properties of a plant, the ferocity of an animal, or the emotional state of a person, just from viewing the aura.
In only two years the prince would be twenty, and his master’s work would be done. Then Dil Bahadur would return for the first time to the affection of his family, and would go to study in Europe, because there was crucial knowledge to be learned in the modern world, information Tensing could not teach him but he would need if he was to govern his nation.
Tensing was devoting all his energies to preparing the prince to be a good king and to be able to decipher the messages of the Golden Dragon. Dil Bahadur’s course of studies was intense and complex, so that sometimes he lost patience, but Tensing, unyielding, prodded him to keep working until both were exhausted.
“I do not want to be king, master,” Dil Bahadur said one day.
“Possibly my student would rather renounce his throne and not have to study,” smiled Tensing.
“I want to live a life of meditation, master. How shall I achieve enlightenment amid the temptations of the world?”
“Not everyone can be a hermit like me. It is your karma to be a ruler. Your illumination mustcome as you travel a path much more difficult than that of meditation. You will have to achieve that while serving your people.”
“I do not want to leave you, master,” said the prince, his voice breaking.
The lama pretended not to see the tears in the youth’s eyes.
“Wishes and fears are illusions, Dil Bahadur, not realities. You must practice detachment.”
“Must I also detach myself from affection?”
“Affection is like the noonday sun; it does not need the presence of another to be manifest. Separation between beings is also an illusion, since all things in the universe are connected. Our spirits will be together always, Dil Bahadur,” Tensing explained, noting, with some surprise, that he himself was not immune to emotion, and that he shared the sadness his disciple felt.
He, too, was distressed when he thought of the impending day when he must return the prince to his family, to the world, and to the throne of the Kingdom of the Golden Dragon for which he was destined.
CHAPTER FIVE
Eagle and Jaguar
T HE PLANE CARRYING A LEXANDER Cold landed in New York at five forty-five in the evening. At that hour, the heat of the June day had not yet faded. The youth remembered with good humor his first trip alone to that city, when almost as soon as he left the airport, an inoffensive-looking girl stole everything he owned. What was her name? He’d nearly forgotten . . . Morgana! A name from medieval sorcery. It seemed to him that yearshad gone by since that incident, though it was only a few months. He felt like a different person: he’d grown up, he was more sure of himself, and he no longer had fits of anger and despair.
His family’s crisis was behind them. It seemed that his mother had beat her cancer, though there was always the fear that it would come back. His father was smiling again, and his sisters, Andrea and Nicole, were beginning to grow up, too. He almost never fought with them anymore, just enough to be a true brother. He had gained a lot of respect among his friends. Even the beautiful Cecilia Burns, who used to pay about as much attention to him as she would to a flea, now asked him to help her with her math assignments. Well, more than just help. He had to do all the problems and then let her copy his work, but the girl’s radiant smile was more than enough reward for him. All Cecilia Burns had to do was shake that shining mane of hair, and Alexander’s ears turned red. Ever since he had returned from the Amazon with half his head shaven, with a
Dil Bahadur learned to use the eye in his forehead with such precision that by now, at the age of eighteen, he could identify the medicinal properties of a plant, the ferocity of an animal, or the emotional state of a person, just from viewing the aura.
In only two years the prince would be twenty, and his master’s work would be done. Then Dil Bahadur would return for the first time to the affection of his family, and would go to study in Europe, because there was crucial knowledge to be learned in the modern world, information Tensing could not teach him but he would need if he was to govern his nation.
Tensing was devoting all his energies to preparing the prince to be a good king and to be able to decipher the messages of the Golden Dragon. Dil Bahadur’s course of studies was intense and complex, so that sometimes he lost patience, but Tensing, unyielding, prodded him to keep working until both were exhausted.
“I do not want to be king, master,” Dil Bahadur said one day.
“Possibly my student would rather renounce his throne and not have to study,” smiled Tensing.
“I want to live a life of meditation, master. How shall I achieve enlightenment amid the temptations of the world?”
“Not everyone can be a hermit like me. It is your karma to be a ruler. Your illumination mustcome as you travel a path much more difficult than that of meditation. You will have to achieve that while serving your people.”
“I do not want to leave you, master,” said the prince, his voice breaking.
The lama pretended not to see the tears in the youth’s eyes.
“Wishes and fears are illusions, Dil Bahadur, not realities. You must practice detachment.”
“Must I also detach myself from affection?”
“Affection is like the noonday sun; it does not need the presence of another to be manifest. Separation between beings is also an illusion, since all things in the universe are connected. Our spirits will be together always, Dil Bahadur,” Tensing explained, noting, with some surprise, that he himself was not immune to emotion, and that he shared the sadness his disciple felt.
He, too, was distressed when he thought of the impending day when he must return the prince to his family, to the world, and to the throne of the Kingdom of the Golden Dragon for which he was destined.
CHAPTER FIVE
Eagle and Jaguar
T HE PLANE CARRYING A LEXANDER Cold landed in New York at five forty-five in the evening. At that hour, the heat of the June day had not yet faded. The youth remembered with good humor his first trip alone to that city, when almost as soon as he left the airport, an inoffensive-looking girl stole everything he owned. What was her name? He’d nearly forgotten . . . Morgana! A name from medieval sorcery. It seemed to him that yearshad gone by since that incident, though it was only a few months. He felt like a different person: he’d grown up, he was more sure of himself, and he no longer had fits of anger and despair.
His family’s crisis was behind them. It seemed that his mother had beat her cancer, though there was always the fear that it would come back. His father was smiling again, and his sisters, Andrea and Nicole, were beginning to grow up, too. He almost never fought with them anymore, just enough to be a true brother. He had gained a lot of respect among his friends. Even the beautiful Cecilia Burns, who used to pay about as much attention to him as she would to a flea, now asked him to help her with her math assignments. Well, more than just help. He had to do all the problems and then let her copy his work, but the girl’s radiant smile was more than enough reward for him. All Cecilia Burns had to do was shake that shining mane of hair, and Alexander’s ears turned red. Ever since he had returned from the Amazon with half his head shaven, with a
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