The Wildings (18 page)

“It’s true, Mara,” said Tantara. “I could never play with Tawny at all, or even come as close to her as I can even now to Rudra, because her hunter’s instincts are fully developed. And just as he needs to be around his own kind right now, at least when he’s growing up and learning to be an adult, so do I. Our scents are changing, Mara. Our blood is changing.”

Mara’s face had become very small. “Does this mean I can’t visit, ever again?”

“But of course you can visit, Mara,” said another, richer voice. Ozzy had padded silently over to the group. The great tiger had been listening to the exchange for a while and he felt sorry for the kitten.

“You’d be welcome any time, and you’re not at risk, because you’re not really here,” he continued. “None of us can harm you, not even Tawny.”

Mara sent Ozzy a warm hug through her whiskers, grateful beyond words to the big cat.

“Tawny thinks I’m a freak,” said the kitten.

“You know, Mara,” said Ozzy, “you’re not a freak. I’ve seen some freaks in my time—a tiger cub with two heads, a pair of deer joined at the hip—and you’re not part of that company. But you are a very unusual kitten. And you may not realize this now, but as time passes, you may not want to come back so often, though I hope you will always visit us. Think of it, though. If Tantara’s making friends with the gibbons and Rudra has a tiger friend, shouldn’t you be making a few kitten friends yourself? What about that Southpaw chap you’ve mentioned—doesn’t he drop in?”

Southpaw did drop in, intermittently, and Mara enjoyed playing with him. But Southpaw was always urging her to come outside and that was something Mara didn’t want to do—not yet at any rate. She preferred being safely at the zoo, visiting her friends but not having to actually step out of the comfort of her Bigfeet house. As she took a deep breath to say just this, something in Ozzy’s wise, concerned eyes took the words from her whiskers.

The langur and the cub watched the kitten as she shimmered uneasily in and out of view. Then Mara got a grip on herself and her outlines solidified.

“Thank you for explaining, Ozzy,” she said. “I’ll come back often to visit all of you.”

She gave Rudra a wordless head-rub, and twined her tail briefly with Tantara’s long, grey one. “See you,” said the kitten awkwardly.

“See you, Mara,” said Rudra. “Take care of yourself, and come back, don’t forget us when you’ve made new friends.”

The kitten left before they could see how sadly her whiskers were drooping. Rani guessed just how lonely and sad Mara felt, and the tigress’s heart went out to the kitten. “I hope she grows really close to someone of her own kind soon, Ozzy,” she said to her mate later that night.

“She will, Rani,” said Ozzy reassuringly. “If that kitten can make friends with tigers, she can make friends with the whole world. Just give her time.”

BACK HOME, SITTING MISERABLY
on the steps, Mara made a pathetic heap in the twilight. Beraal watched the small, sad figure, linking via whisker for a while and listening to the kitten’s sorrows. When Mara had finished, Beraal was beside her.

“If you please,” said Mara, “no lessons today?”

“No, Mara,” Beraal said. “No lessons today.” She touched her whiskers to the kitten, and she washed Mara’s ears until the kitten felt comforted.

As night fell, Beraal said to Mara, “They’re right, you know, the tigers and your friend the langur. You need to come out of the house, Mara. Southpaw and I would be glad to take you around, introduce you to the other cats—we could spend some time getting used to the park, if you like.”

Mara withdrew her whiskers. “I like it inside,” she said. “The outside is scary unless I’m sending and travelling by link. I don’t want to come out of the house, Beraal.” And nothing the black-and-white cat could say would change the kitten’s mind.

Beraal gave up finally, and after making sure that Mara was all right, she went off to do some mousing down at the dargah.
She would have asked Miao for advice, but the Siamese had stationed herself at the Shuttered House these past few days. Before she had taken up her watch, she had said to Beraal, her fur radiating menace: “That place has been on my mind and my whiskers ever since Southpaw brought back news of Datura and the ferals. The air in that house is changing, and if their Bigfoot is sick, we may have to prepare for dark days.”

Beraal had not entirely understood—to her, as to the rest of the Nizamuddin cats, the Shuttered House was a sinister, brooding place in the heart of their colony, but one to be avoided and padded around. Miao had watched the queen’s puzzlement, and said only, “I’ll need to spend a few days near the Shuttered House, to scent the ferals better. And if they are indeed going to come out, then we may need allies. Help Katar look after the clan, Beraal, I’ll be back soon.”

AFTER BERAAL LEFT
, the kitten stayed out on the stairs longer than usual, watching the mynah birds squabble and the squirrels play games of tag. The cheels circled overhead in companionable pairs. The grey musk shrews took turns digging up their mounds of earth, far down below at the bottom of the neem tree. It seemed to Mara that every creature in Nizamuddin had friends and companions, except for her.

Southpaw’s visits were unpredictable, and she thought miserably about how sometimes when her Bigfeet were out and she was alone, she would wander around the empty house, her tail down and dragging on the floor. If she couldn’t visit the
tigers as often as she used to, there would be a lot of empty hours for Mara to fill.

The Bigfeet found her crying softly to herself on the stairs, and when they picked her up, she was grateful for the cuddle. They fed her a rich meat stew and cooed to her, and let her sleep on their bed, and gradually, the kitten began to feel better. But the sore, empty space in her heart didn’t go away, and Mara was often aware of it over the next few days, even when she and Beraal were busy with their lessons, even as she played cheerful games with the Bigfeet.

When the clouds began to gather a few days later and the skies rumbled with thunder, Mara sat by the window and watched the first monsoon of her young life come down, the grey of the outside mirroring the way the little kitten felt inside. The high winds brought in tantalizing whispers of the rain-spattered trees and bushes, the rooftop universe of the wildings. But Mara didn’t think she would ever be at home in that vast, wide world where the skies yawned endlessly and the whiskers of the other cats bristled when they talked of the Sender.

“Y
es, Katar,” said Southpaw. “No, Katar.” This felt lamentably familiar to him, and his bottom was still hurting from where it had been soundly smacked by the tom.

The tomcat glared at the kitten. “First you go bouncing into the Shuttered House, then you sneak into a Bigfoot house, and now the Cobra’s Tree! What in the name of my whiskers and paws were you—” Miao emerged silently in their midst. It was as though she had materialized from out of the roots of the ancient flame tree, where Katar had taken Southpaw. She sat with her paws neatly folded, as if she’d been there all along. Her steady gaze rested on Southpaw for what felt, to the striped kitten, like an eternity. Then she moved forward. Southpaw felt the creamy fur on her face, soft and silky, brush his own fur with extreme gentleness; the Siamese’s whiskers rose, quivered, and wrapped around his smaller, more bristly
whiskers. He didn’t dare move. They stayed like that for a few moments, his frightened brown eyes locking with her faraway but sharp blue ones, and then she sighed and moved back, stretching prettily.

“I agree with Katar that wandering into Bigfoot houses is a very bad idea but you may go to the Sender’s house, so long as you stay out of the way of her Bigfeet,” said Miao. “It might not be a bad thing for either of you to be friends—it may even be necessary. And as for your inability to keep your whiskers out of trouble, I’ll see you at twilight on the wall of the cow shelter. Don’t be late.”

She turned to go, her beautiful, black-tipped tail tilted for better balance.

“Miao,” said Southpaw, his own stubby tail waving uncertainly, “what are we going to do?”

The Siamese’s blue eyes met his again.

“If you’re old enough to climb the Cobra’s Tree, and to get into the Sender’s house without permission, you’re old enough to hunt.”

Katar’s ears flicked in protest.

“But he’s not even six months old yet!” he said. “His whiskers are still black, he doesn’t have even one white whisker in the lot!” A kitten had to have at least three white whiskers before being allowed to hunt.

The Siamese’s tail flicked once, sharply.

“At the rate he’s going,” she said, “he won’t have even one white whisker before he gets himself killed. If he’s canny enough to survive Datura’s poisonous lot, he has what it takes to be a real predator. At twilight, Southpaw, remember.”

THE NOISE OF THE BIGFEET
’
S CARS
had dwindled, and lights twinkled in their houses, making them look to Southpaw’s eye even more like rat warrens. He had spent the afternoon at the Sender’s house, creeping in when her Bigfeet weren’t looking. But he’d reached the wall before the sky began to darken, even though he’d had to weave through the legs of Bigfeet on their way to a wedding. Southpaw took a detour to avoid the gaudy ceremonial tent, and though his nose twitched greedily at the smell of meat cooking, he resisted the temptation to carry out a one-kitten raid.

The pearly light of the evening slowly shaded into indigo; the kitten waited, motionless on the wall of the cow shelter. Night fell, and there was a touch of cold in the air. Southpaw listened to the chatter of the birds, their high-pitched evening quarrels, but he stayed where he was, foregoing the pleasures of chasing squirrels and beetles along the wall.

The moon had sailed high up into the deep indigo sky, and the chattering birds had long since gone to sleep by the time Miao arrived. The Siamese wasn’t there one moment, and then the kitten felt the fur on his back rise. He turned his head, and there she was, perched on the wall as though she had never been anywhere else.

He made no reference to the time he’d spent waiting, nor did the Siamese, but as she indicated with her whiskers that he should follow her, the kitten received the impression that he had passed some sort of unspoken test.

The night was humid, the air scented with queen of the night and jasmine blossoms. There was a half-moon, partly obscured by clouds. As they slipped down the wall into the
undergrowth, Southpaw felt his fur quiver with excitement. “Miao, where are we—?”

The older cat turned and cuffed him, her claws out just enough to leave a thin red line on his neck. “The first rule,” she said. “No mewing. No whisker linking unless I say so, because your prey is small enough to pick up the vibrations if they’re close enough to us. And smart enough to make a run for it.” She cuffed him again, this time slamming his head to the right and holding it down so that he could see a frightened grey musk shrew scutter away into the safety of the lantana bushes.

Southpaw’s flanks were heaving from the pain, but more than that, the kitten was in shock. Miao had washed him every day from as far back as he could remember, her tongue gentle as she teased out the tangles in his fur.

She had brought him his first piece of mouse, which tasted heavenly, and fed it to him herself. She had let him play with her tail and pounce on it, only lifting him gently away when he nipped too hard. The older cat had never rolled him on the ground, as Hulo did when he exasperated the tom, or smacked his belly, as Katar often did, or so much as nipped his neck in warning—but she had just cuffed him much harder than either of the other cats would have.

For a while he followed her in miserable silence, his head still ringing from the blows. The earth was cool under his paws, and when they crossed the stone path, he followed Miao’s example, retracting his claws.

Gradually, his mind cleared and he began to watch Miao more closely. She appeared to glide swiftly over the ground, and he realized that she set her paws down as lightly as she
could, often switching pace in mid-stride in order to avoid stepping on leaves, twigs, slippery mud, paper bags or anything that might make a sound. Twice, she froze in mid-glide, once to allow a stray dog to trot past—luckily, he didn’t even see them—and once for no reason that Southpaw could tell. She listened, the second time, with her head to one side, her whiskers stretched tight, and whatever she heard appeared to satisfy her, for they continued along the hedge, following its curved path all the way to the empty lot that stood behind the Bigfeet’s houses.

Southpaw’s tail, which had been dragging sadly on the ground, began to rise ever so slightly. The empty lot was on the edge of the wide stretch of scrubland that lay between Nizamuddin and the next set of buildings. It was a kind of no-cat’s-land, as wild as the grounds of the Shuttered House but much less threatening. The real badlands lay just beyond, where lantana and acacia had grown into a bristling tangle, and where the whippy branches of untamed queen of the night wound their way around the frame of a Bigfeet building.