fantasy – Short Stories | Fish-eye Perspective

Author’s note: This is third installment of a short story from my latest book: The Bracelet and the other short stories. You can find the other parts here: Broken: Part 1 and Broken: Part 2.

On the morning of the fourth day, I gathered wildflowers that grew within the temple yard. A tiger was manning the boundary. It gave me hope that my ‘friends’ wouldn’t be able to come tomorrow, and I wouldn’t have to go back. I could stay here forever, seeing her every day. I held the flowers lovingly in my arms until she came, afraid to put them down lest they’d get dirty.

When she came, I all but jumped up. She placed the basket in the same place and looked at me. I meekly held out the flowers. She accepted them quietly with a smile that almost made me swoon. She turned to leave. I couldn’t hold back anymore. I might have to leave soon. How could I go without knowing her name? Or rather, how could I go at all?

“Please don’t go,” I begged her.

“Do you need anything else from me?” her voice was teasing.

“I…I don’t even know your name,” I blushed to the roots of my hair like a schoolboy.

“I thought you’ll never ask. People call me Kyarr,” she replied.

“Oh! I thought Kyarr was the deity here.”

She kept smiling.

“I…My ‘friends’ are due to return tomorrow. I was wondering…thinking that…I…Would you…” I couldn’t bring myself to say the words. What if she says no? What if she considers it an insult? I know nothing about her. She could be married. She looks young but people marry early in this part of the world.

Heck, even I’m married! What was I even thinking?

She waited for a few seconds. Then, probably realised I wasn’t going to finish. So, she simply said, “I know your friends come tomorrow morning. I guess, it is the last time we meet.” She was still smiling.

“Would you like to come with me?” I blurted out, then lost all the courage and looked at my feet.

“I can’t. I’m needed here. But thank you for asking.”

It hurt to see that there was no pain in her eyes. She was smiling as always while my own heart was ripping up in pieces. “Will you at least stay the night? I just want to look at you until I leave,” I knew I was transgressing some social boundary, but I couldn’t remember what…

“I can but you might not like how I look. That’s why I haven’t been staying here for the past three nights.”

I could hear the warning in her voice, but I was past caring now. If it was the last time I was looking at her, I didn’t care if a few hair came out of her bun as she slept. Now that I think of it, I can’t remember how she wore her hair—Was it a bun? Pig tails? Or did she leave them loose over her shoulders? She’d still be the only one I love.

“I insist.”

She shook her head, giving up, and sat on the stone throne on the pedestal. Then she gave me that smile that melted my knees…

…and turned to stone—a magnificent stone Tigress.

*****

My helpers returned the next day and told me the goat was still very much alive. I told them about Kyarr, but they didn’t believe me. They said Kyarr, the stone Tigress, has always been there on the pedestal. She was the temple deity.

They said the curse was turning me mad like all those before me.

*****

I would like to believe them and forget all about her, but how can I?

Even though I have returned home, my dreams are full of tiger calls, and my every waking moment is spent thinking about her. Somehow, her being a tigress makes no difference to me. She’s still the one I love.

Often, I see her walk away from me. I call her. I beg her to stop, but she just gives me a smile that would make me follow her anywhere. And then, she keeps walking until I can walk no more. Once I fall, I crawl behind her until I faint. And when I wake up, I find her gone.

My bleeding feet and knees don’t hurt. My heart bleeds knowing I’ll never see her again. I tried booking a flight to return to my Kyarr, but my wife—I can’t recall her name now—she won’t let me go. I think she’s jealous. Could you please make her understand, Doctor? You do believe me, don’t you?

The doctor looks up at me with eyes filled with pity. He stops the recorder and makes some notes in his pad. He signals a male nurse to escort me to my padded cell—my cage from where I can’t escape and walk until my feet hurt and crawl until my knees bleed…

End

Author’s note: You can find the free PDF version of my latest book: The Bracelet and the other short stories here: Link.

Photo by Mike Marrah on Unsplash

Author’s note: This is second installment of a short story from my latest book: The Bracelet and the other short stories. You can find the other part here: Broken: Part 1.

I settled on the platform on the tree, hid behind the leaves with the gun in position and waited. It wasn’t long when the goat started bleating. A tiger walked in. I guess, it wasn’t hungry because it wasn’t stealthy. It just sniffed the goat, the goat bleated, and the tiger looked straight at the place I sat.

Somehow, it knew I was there.

I had a clear shot, but the intensity of its stare made my hands shake. I fired but missed.

That’s when all hell broke loose.

All of a sudden, sixteen tigers rushed out of the bushes around me, roaring and tearing at my tree. The tree was rather sturdy and impossible for an animal to climb but, in my bones, I knew it can’t last against so many tigers. I fired several rounds of bullets but, weirdly enough, they hit none of the sixteen.

Soon, I was out of ammunition.

After a few minutes—it felt like an eternity—of scratching away the tree bark, the tigers began to return to the shadows of the forest. But one of them remained stationed beneath the tree. I had a suspicion that he’s waiting for me to get drowsy and fall down. After a couple of hours, as the rush of adrenalin subsided, I started getting sleepy. Meanwhile, crazy as it sounds, another tiger had come in and relieved the first one from its ‘duty’, which means they were working as a team.

It was weird and scary in extreme. Three days from now, one of them would still be here, meaning that my help would never arrive.

I wondered whether the ‘help’ had reached home safely. I wondered when he will return. I had travelled across the world to be here, but now I couldn’t wait to return to my family. I clung to a branch fiercely and prayed to see my wife and daughter one more time.

*****

Dusk arrived and the last rays of light fell on a piece of metal shining on the top of the trees—the pinnacle of the ancient temple of Kyarr. The wise words returned to me: “If the situation gets out of hand…” Well, the situation was certainly out of hand. I couldn’t stay the night here. Maybe, the temple could offer a better shelter. I could hide in the inner sanctum and close the doors. Other people had survived there, hadn’t they?

There was no point waiting to die here. I would rather do something.

I couldn’t carry my baggage. It would slow me down. My guns were all useless without the bullets. So, I used them to create a diversion. I dropped my bag down first, threw my heavier gun as far as it would go in my opposite direction, and then my lighter gun ahead of it. In the end, I threw my skinning knife as far as it would go in the trees. The tiger took the bait and ran towards it.

I jumped down and dashed towards the temple. I didn’t hear any tigers behind me, but I didn’t stop to check too.

I reached the temple in one mad dash. It had no boundary so entering was rather easy. I ran inside the prayer hall and turned to close the doors. There were none.

“Don’t worry. They won’t hurt you here. You aren’t carrying weapons,” a pleasant female voice made me turn around. She was sitting on the stone throne on the pedestal.

“But I had shot several rounds at them a few hours back.”

“But you can’t anymore.” It wasn’t a question. She smiled dazzling me. “Please make yourself comfortable until your friends return for you. If you are hungry, you can have these fruits,” she pointed towards a basket at her feet. With those words, she left the room.

*****

I hid there for four nights until help arrived.

The first night, I could neither eat, nor sleep. Occasionally, I heard the tigers roar just outside the periphery of the temple. Not sure what kept them out though—the temple had no doors to close.

It wasn’t the fear that kept me up though. It was the woman—I kept thinking about her smile, her face, her grace, her voice…

*****

The next day stretched before me with nothing to do. My smartphone had stopped working the moment I had entered the deeper forest, as expected. Now the battery was dead as well. I tried missing my wife and daughter, but I couldn’t. All I thought about was ‘her’. I craved for her with the intensity of a man dying of thirst in the desert. But no matter how I tried, I could not recall the colour of her clothes. I had been so taken in by her face.

At dusk, she returned with a fruit basket. I think, she was wearing something orange. I can’t be too sure. All I could remember was her face and dazzling smile. She asked me if I was well. I wanted to say that I was dying to see her again. But all I could manage was a nod. She left the basket in the same place and left with the dazzling smile.

I wanted to stop her and ask her name. I wanted to ask her how she knew my language and about my friends; where she lived and why she returned only at dusk and only to deliver the basket; why she never said a prayer in the temple; and where was the deity anyway.

But the words stayed lodged firmly in my throat. All I could manage was to look like a thunderstruck tree.

The next two nights were spent pretty much the same way. I tried sleeping but kept dreaming of her. But as soon as I would lift my hand to touch her face, tiger roars would wake me up. I could hardly remember my wife’s name. Heck, I couldn’t remember my own name if I didn’t have my ID in my pocket. Both days, mornings were spent waiting for the dusk to arrive so that I could see her again; and evenings thinking of what I could have and should have said to her.

The roars didn’t bother me anymore. I might not even have noticed if the tigers had eaten me.

Author’s note: To be continued…

Photo by Mike Marrah on Unsplash