Ama, the herdsmans daughter, carried the image of the sleeping girl in her memory: she could not stop thinking about her. She didnt question for a moment the truth of what Mrs. Coulter had told her. Sorcerers existed, beyond a doubt, and it was only too likely that they would cast sleeping spells, and that a mother would care for her daughter in that fierd tender way. Ama ceived an admiration amounting almost to worship for the beautiful woman in the cave and her ented daughter.
She went as often as she could to the little valley, to run errands for the woman or simply to chatter and listen, for the woman had wonderful tales to tell. Again and again she hoped flimpse of the sleeper, but it had only happened once, and; she accepted that it would probably never be allowed again.
And during the time she spent milking the sheep, or carding and spinning their wool, rinding barley to make bread, she thought incessantly about the spell that must have been cast, and about why it had happened. Mrs. Coulter had old her, so Ama was free to imagine.
One day she took some flat bread sweetened with honey; walked the three-hour journey along the trail to Cho-Lung Se, where there was a monastery. By wheedling and patiend by bribing the porter with some of the honey bread, mao gain an audieh the great healer Pagdzin tulku, who had cured an outbreak of the white fever only the year before, and who was immensely wise.
Ama ehe great mans cell, bowing very low and her remaining honey bread with all the humility she could muster. The monks bat daemon swooped and darted around her, frightening her own daemon, Kulang, who crept into her hair to hide, but Ama tried to remain still and silent until Pagdzin tulku spoke.
"Yes, child? Be quick, be quick," he said, his long gray beard wagging with every word.
In the dimhe beard and his brilliant eyes were most of what she could see of him. His daemoled on the beam above him, hanging still at last, so she said, "Please, Pagdzin tulku, I want to gain wisdom. I would like to know how to make spells and entments. you teach me?"
"No," he said.
She was expeg that. "Well, could you tell me just one remedy?" she asked humbly.
"Maybe. But I wont tell you what it is. I give you the medie, not tell you the secret."
"All right, thank you, that is a great blessing," she said, bowing several times.
"What is the disease, and who has it?" the old man said.
"Its a sleeping siess," Ama explained. "Its e upon the son of my fathers cousin."
She was beira clever, she knew, ging the sex of the sufferer, just in case the healer had heard of the woman in the cave.
"And how old is this boy?"
"Three years older than me, Pagdzin tulku," she guessed, "so he is twelve years old. He sleeps and sleeps and t wake up."
"Why havent his parents e to me? Why did they send you?"
"Because they live far oher side of my village and they are very poor, Pagdzin tulku. I only heard of my kinsmans illness yesterday and I came at oo seek your advice."
"I should see the patient and examine him thhly, and inquire into the positions of the plas at the hour when he fell asleep. These things t be done in a hurry."
"Is there no medie you give me to take back?"
The bat daemon fell off her beam and fluttered blackly aside before she hit the floor, darting silently across the room again and again, too quickly for Ama to follow; but the bright