The air tasted purer, if thin, as I lurched out of the veil and onto a narrow dirt path edged in scrub brush. Sunlight poured down from the crystal blue sky over the towering, square edged castle carved into the side of the mountain. For a moment I felt the disorientation of confusion as I looked past the struggle before me and around at the barren peak, the surrounding mountain range of gray stone. But no, this wasn't the Empress's palace in Nepal, but ...