Xavier's Arc

Chapter 4 of 21

The leg had healed. For six days Xavier fed the tiger from his hand, and the red beast let him. It rubbed its striped head against his chest. It followed him along the tree line. But it never let him behind it. Each time Xavier stepped toward the great shoulders, the tiger swung its haunches away and watched him with its black eyes. He could not ride an animal he could not mount. He knelt in the mud and thought. His boots, tall alligator hide, pressed deep into the soft ground. That was the problem. He was quick from the front, where the tiger could see his hands. From the side he was slow and clumsy, and slowness scared it. He needed one clean motion the beast would not read as an attack. Berry found him there at dusk. The bear came slow through the reeds, his gray sweater snagged with burrs. Weeks ago Berry had shown Xavier the roots that pulled him from the bog. Now the old bear crouched beside him and said nothing for a while. "It won't turn its back to me," Xavier said. "No wild thing will," Berry said. "Not while you loom over it. You want its trust from above? Then get above it gently. Give it your weight a little at a time." Xavier understood. He walked the tiger out to a low mossy hump. He climbed the hump and stood level with the tiger's spine. Then he leaned. Not a leap. He laid his chest across the broad back, arms loose, feet still on the moss. He let it feel him and no more. The tiger went stiff. A growl rolled up through its ribs, into Xavier's chest. Its muscles bunched. One wrong shift and it would throw him and never come near again. He kept his hands open on its fur. He breathed slow. He did not grip. The growl held. Then it thinned. The tiger turned its head and smelled his face. Xavier stayed still, his cheek against warm fur, his heart loud. Slowly he slid one leg over. He sat. His full weight settled on the tiger's back. The beast stood under him and did not run. Xavier let out his breath. He touched the striped shoulder, and the tiger stepped forward, carrying him three paces along the moss. He was riding. The bond had held the weight. Berry did not smile. He lifted his snout to the darkening trees and went still. "You've done it," he said. "Now smell the wind, boy." Xavier smelled it. Under the swamp rot came something rank and heavy, close. Branches cracked far off, then closer. Whatever had trailed the tiger's blood all these days had waited for this. The tiger under him swung to face the trees and snarled. Xavier drew his bone knife. He sat high now, mounted and seen, with no ground between him and the thing coming.