Eventually she stopped and turned. She could still see Emory, though he had been shrunk by the distance between them. A reed of smoke rose up from the fire he was building, and Ama felt the pleasure of anticipation of how cozy that would be, to return to a fire, and maybe, even, something warm to drink.
Perhaps that was the trick to living a life, Ama considered, stooping down to admire the purplish tinge at the base of the grasses, the way the color shifted partway up each blade to green and then to caps of gold. Perhaps the key to being content, even without a past, is to keep your eyes firmly on the present moment, and looking no further than what was most probably around just the very next bend—tonight, a fire—and not anticipating beyond that, or allowing oneself to cast backward, into the great black void of before.
Ama heard a rustling sound, and she looked up, kneeling still, disappeared in the grasses. She was not alone.
It was a tremendous kitten, already as large as a small dog, tawny-coated, the promise of black spots not yet fully in, with tall fluffy ears each capped with a pointed tuft of dark hair. It stood just three feet away, short tail at alert, and appraised Ama with its black-lined saffron eyes.
“Oh,” Ama said. “Hello.”
The kitten did not seem to fear her in the least. When Ama stretched out her hand, the kitten stepped forward to smell it. Its soft whiskers tickled her palm; its dry dark nose snuffled around, and then its tongue emerged, rough and pink, to kiss her or to taste her, Ama didn’t know, but she was delighted.
“You are a darling,” she said to the kitten, who allowed her to pet its head. A rumbling sound erupted from the kitten’s chest—a purr.
Another rustle. Another cat emerged—this one, the mother. She was enormous. From where Ama crouched, her hand still on the kitten’s head, she found herself looking up as if in prayer at the mother cat’s chest. Thick white fur radiated out, all white from neck to belly, and down the insides of her legs, as well. Her massive paws—as big as Ama’s feet—flattened the grass beneath them.
The cat’s expression was all danger—narrowed eyes, turned-back tufted ears, bared teeth. A sound rumbled in her chest too, but not a purr. A growl.
“Oh,” said Ama again.
She stayed perfectly still, facing the cat but not staring right into her eyes, keeping her gaze respectfully lowered. Slowly, slowly, she withdrew her hand from the lynx’s kitten.
She placed her hands on the ground in supplication. And though she did not speak, she told the lynx, with every hair on her head, every inch of her flesh, I respect you. I honor you. I leave you in peace.
Perhaps the mother lynx understood, for her ears, which had been pinned back, rotated forward as if she were listening, and her black lips softened around her teeth.
The kitten purred more loudly and stepped forward, butting Ama’s arm with its head, as if trying to get her to pet it again. Ama ignored its advances, silently willing it to return to its mother’s side.
It wasn’t long before the kitten abandoned its pursuit of Ama’s affection. It turned its short tail to her and went to its mother, weaving between her legs.
The mother cat, with her babe returned to her, looked now at Ama with something akin to curiosity. She tilted her head to the side and widened her eyes, and her gaze seemed to ask, What are you doing here?
It was a fair question, Ama thought. She would have liked to have known the answer herself.
Ama’s gaze, which she’d held low in deference, glanced up to meet the lynx’s eyes. They were milky jade with infinitely black ovular pupils—not round, like Emory’s, not horizontal, like Reynard’s, not slitted, like the snake’s. The top and bottom of each pupil was tipped into a point. And, with a startled shiver of something like memory, Ama felt certain she had seen eyes like these before.
It was right there—in the back of her brain, in the shine of the mother cat’s eyes—a recollection, a calling back, a cognizance. If the cat would hold perfectly still. If she could move an inch closer. If they could gaze a moment longer, then, Ama felt certain, she could remember.
Her fingers twitched with their desire to grab on to whatever it was her mind was reaching for, spinning for, even as it frightened her. Around them, around the mother and the kitten and Ama, the wind stirred the grasses in a whirl. The clouds overhead glowed red as the setting sun sang out the last and loudest of its day, the sky growing velvet as it darkened.
Ah, there was beauty all around—in the purple stalks of the dancing grass, in the wide and wild sky, in this creature’s eyes, as she stood still, trying, Ama was sure, to tell her something.
And then something flew at them, not a bird, no, not a bird, and the lynx’s eyes shifted, too late, away from Ama’s, and Emory’s pickax struck the scruff of white at her throat.
Ama screamed as the lynx fell, wet with blood, into the now still grass, and the kitten cried piteously for its mother.
Ama’s Sorrow
“What have you done?” Ama said, her voice barely a scratch, so tight was her throat. The mewling kitten was pacing back and forth in front of its dead mother’s face. Blank now, the eyes held no secrets.
“I’ve saved your life again,” said Emory, reaching down for his weapon and jerking it free, dropping it with a thud into the grass. Blood poured from the wound, thickened, stopped. “It’s becoming quite a habit of mine, it seems.”
He turned to the kitten, grabbed it by its scruff, and hefted it into the air. “A shame about the kit, but nothing for it but to make it quick,” he said, and as he moved his hands, Ama saw with a flash what he planned to do—a quick jerk, a broken neck, the babe dead beside its mother.
“No!” she screamed, tripping wildly to her feet, grabbing for the animal in his arms. “No, you can’t!”
Emory stopped and smiled down at Ama as if she were an overtired child. “Dear girl,” he said, “I must. There’s no chance for a kit on its own. It would be cruel to let it wander and starve.”
“Please,” said Ama, knowing, somehow, that this was the right way to get what she needed. She made herself seem small and turned her hands palms-up, in supplication rather than demand. “Please, give it to me. Let me keep it as a pet.”
Emory looked as if he might relent, though he said, “Animals like this don’t make for pets, Ama. Better to let Mother give you one of her cats, if you like, when we reach the castle. She’s like you, in that way. Crazy for cats.”
“No,” said Ama, but it came out too strong, she could tell, by the way Emory’s face closed to her. She tried again. “Please,” she began, for he had liked that word. “Please. Perhaps the cat can keep me warm. When you are not able to.”
This brought a smile to Emory’s lips. And then he extended his arms, passing the kitten, who yowled and clawed and would have cried if its eyes knew how, into Ama’s grasp.
“You shall have to learn for yourself, I suppose,” he said grudgingly, “that wild beasts are not meant to be tamed.”
Ama curled the cat into her arms, and she wanted to turn her back to Emory, she wanted to march away, but instead she looked up at him through tear-bright lashes and said, “Thank you.”
It was a long and terrible night. The kitten, forlorn, screamed and yowled. It seemed that she would never stop—Ama had learned that the kitten was a female—and Ama’s chest and hands were striped bloody from its claws. But she would not let go, she would not release the kitten to the black night and the dangers that would consume it, were she not to hold on. Every yowl, every scratch, Ama took without complaint, for she knew it was her fault that this kitten had no mother. She had held the mother cat’s gaze too long; Ama had allowed the hunter to catch the lynx unaware.