Free Beast by Donna Jo Napoli Page B

life, but she cannot ruin this one. I will fight her with all my might. I will learn to enjoy the company of lions. I will take my position as king of beasts.
    This thought brings another: My ears, eyes, nose all pay attention. There is no lion in the area but me. The hunters must have killed them all.
    They will kill me, too, if they see me.
    If I run to the southeast, the Indian caravan will pass by me in a few hours.
    I rise, prepared to leave, when I notice a flicker of light from my bedroom window. I cross the open area, passing by the pavilion where the body of my lioness lay last week, and stand under the window. Two bodies breathe within, the regular breath of sleepers. I rise on my hind legs and rest my front paws on the window ledge. Lit candles line the perimeter of the room. Beside each candle are three bowls: a large one with cut roses floating in water, a medium one with smoking incense stalks standing in sand, and a small one with balls of hardened honey rolled in crushed almonds. Mother and Father lie in my bed in each other’s arms. Her hairfalls loose across her face; his face presses against her shoulder.
    This room has become a shrine to call me back to them from whatever world I now inhabit. If I could see their beloved faces, I know they would speak of misery and of hope. Father and Mother deserve to know that I live still, though I cannot live as their son anymore.
    I can never kiss them again. I can never allow myself to touch them. I cannot be Orasmyn. The loss blinds me for a moment.
    When sight returns, I look back over my shoulder. There is no way to be sure that the people in the holding pen are not looking in this direction. The risk makes my upper lip curl under. I push off from my hind legs, balance for a moment with all fours on the ledge, and drop into the room.
    Father groans in his sleep.
    The Shahnameh lies on my reading platform, on the floor. With my bottom teeth, I flip open the cover. Then I use the very tip of my tongue to turn the pages. Page after page. Searching.
    Father groans again and shifts, twisting his neck so that now, if his eyes open, he will see me. He will see lion.
    I turn the pages faster. Finally I find the illustration I sought, the illustration I was admiring a weekago: Bahram Chubina slaying the lion-ape. I leave the book open to that page.
    That’s when I see the new book beside the Shahnameh. It is Gulistan — Rode Garden. The author is Saadi. This must be the book of verse that Mother said she wanted me to read. How perfect for her to have chosen a book with the title of my beloved flower. Once upon a time, opening this book would most certainly have brought me laughter, for nothing is better than Sufi humor. Once upon a time.
    Never again.
    Father stirs. He is half awake.
    I take the book in my mouth and spring out the window in one huge leap.

CHAPTER NINE
India
    B y day I trot along out of sight behind trees and bushes and the numerous boulders that lie close to the path the caravan follows. When we come to towns, the Indian travelers pass through, stocking up on foods, while I give wide berth, staying in the shadows.
    I learn quickly that domesticated cats are easy prey. The lesson scared me at first, because my nursemaid Ava used to say that anyone who killed a cat would die. Dogs tied up outside houses at night are likewise easy, and that was a worse lesson — a repulsive lesson. Ava said dogs have seven souls, so they must be killed seven times to really die. If she was right, multiple souls haunt me now.
    These beliefs of ancient Persia mix uneasily with the Muslim religion of my heart, yet both of them grow dearer to me with each leonine act that distances me forever.
    Or maybe not forever. The book I took from the palace, Gulidtan, lies hidden under a slab rock within the Shah’s hunting park. The verses await a self that can open it and drink thirstily.
    Would that such a self should survive and conquer.
    But for now the self that