Ellen Datlow - Tails of Wonder and Imagination

Wrapping himself snug in these assurances, Justin tramped past the brick retaining wall at the corner of State and Sixteenth without so much as a glance toward the spidery line of poplars where a tiger might be hiding. He rounded the corner and marched on. Heck, he had walked this way dozens of times. Hundreds, maybe.

But tonight the usually comfortable features seemed alien and warped out of reality under the snow, and finding himself in this strange white landscape, Justin suddenly felt the tiger-fear return. It bobbed up and down within him until he could almost feel the tiger’s nearness, so close that the hot jungle breath seemed to huff against his cheek.

He was half-way down the block when he saw a shadow slip effortlessly from behind the house two doors up. It seemed to glide dream-like across the snow, then disappear behind a car parked in the driveway. It was just a shadow, but before it had vanished, Justin thought he caught a hint of striping.

There are no tigers in the city.

Justin watched and waited—waited for whatever it was to show itself. He even considered turning hack, rerouting around Rush Street, but that would put it behind him.

Come on, he scolded himself. You only find tigers in India. Or the zoo. Or behind parked cars. Nonsense. Tigers don’t stalk kids from behind parked cars in the middle of an American city. Only little kids let themselves be scared by shadows in the night. Not one of the Shot Brothers. Not a kid who had dared the ice on Shepherd’s Pond. Not a kid who was only two years away from attending Rathburn Junior High, where you get to keep your stuff in your own locker and change classrooms every hour and eat your lunch out on the bleachers. Kids at Rathburn didn’t go whimpering and whining because they saw a shadow in the snow—probably thrown by a branch moving in the wind.

But there is no wind tonight.

Justin swallowed hard, then started forward. He walked slowly, never shifting his gaze from the tail light of that parked car. If only he could see around it without getting any nearer. If something were crouching back there, it would be on him before he could cover the first five feet. And then…

… teeth and claws, tearing and slashing.

You scared?

You bet.

When he had drawn even with the driveway across the street, Justin stopped. Two more steps, maybe three, and he would see if his father and the kids at Rathburn Junior were right, or if tigers do indeed lie in wait on winter streets. Of course, there was still time to turn back.

Perhaps it was the idea of turning back that propelled him forward. If he were to retrace his steps, he would never know; but if he looked and saw no tiger behind that car, then the tiger-fear would be banished, and he wouldn’t see them anywhere. Not in bushes. Not behind trees. Not between houses. Just three steps, and he could lay tigers to rest forever.

Justin took those three steps the way he had walked out onto the ice on Shepherd’s pond. Old zit-faced Corkland had dared him, and he had faced it.

One—two—three.

He turned and looked.

Nothing. Nothing behind that car but an old coaster wagon lying on its side. No tigers. No lions, bears, werewolves, or boogie-men. Just an old wagon. His father had been right all along.

He covered the last block and a half with steps as light and carefree as those of a June day, when the air smelled of new-mown grass and the sun baked your skin brown. But, of course, it wasn’t June, and as he sprinted up his porch steps Justin realized that he had reached home without a moment to spare. He could scarcely see his breath at all. Much longer out in the icy cold and he thought his lungs might have frozen solid.

As he stepped into the familiar warmth of his own house, he heard voices coming from the living room. It sounded as though his folks were having a party, although the voices seemed rather subdued—much the way they sounded on bridge nights when the evenings began quietly, but noisied up as the hours grew old.

Justin tip-toed down the hall, thinking it wise not to interrupt. And as he passed the living room, he caught a snatch of conversation. It was a man speaking, “…bound to happen eventually. They should have put up a fence years ago. I’ve a good mind to…”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Gordon,” a woman said. (It sounded like Aunt Phyllis.) “This isn’t the time.”

That was all he heard before hurrying to his room.

When he flipped on the light, he was greeted by all the treasures which reflected his short life in intimate detail. The Darth Vadar poster, the Packers pennant, the Spitfire on his dresser, the bedspread decorated in railroad logos.

And one new addition, sitting in the corner on great feline haunches.

For the briefest instant, Justin felt the urge to run—to flee into the living room and hurl himself into his mother’s arms, as he had done so many times in the past. But as he stared transfixed into the tiger’s huge, emerald eyes, he felt the fear slipping from him like some like dark mantle, to be replaced by the soft and gentle cloak of understanding.

“It’s time to go, isn’t it?” he said in a voice that was low, but unwavering.

The tiger’s eyes remained impassive, as deep and silent as green forest pools. Warm pools that never froze over, the way Shepherd’s Pond did.

In his mind, Justin heard again the pistol crack of ice giving way beneath him, and he felt the chill water closing over his head. It really hadn’t hurt that much, not the way he would have thought. Not much pain, just a moment of remorse when he realized he wouldn’t be seeing his folks anymore—or Steve…

… had it all been a dream, this last wonderful evening together with Steve? Would Steve even remember?

Justin looked at the tiger, searching its peaceful face for the answer; but those fathomless eyes kept their secrets.

“Did you follow me tonight?” Justin asked.

Whiskers twitched as the tiger’s muzzle wrinkled into a slight grin.

“Yes,” Justin said softly. “I thought it was you. You’ve been following me all my life, haven’t you?” He turned to close his bedroom door, and when he turned back, the tiger was crouching to spring.

Susanna Clarke lives in the medieval city of Cambridge, England, and is the author of the multi-awardiwinning, bestselling novel about English magic, Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell . She also has written a series of short stories about magic, set in seventeenth- and early nineteenth-century England, most of them collected in The Ladies of Grace Adieu and Other Stories.

“The Dweller in High Places” is about a young girl who makes an unlikely friend in the attic of her boarding school. The story was originally produced for the BBC. This is its first print appearance.

To begin with then, my name is Lucy Manners and I am twelve years old. Last summer my older sister, Tiz, married Mr. Rainworth. It was a sad change for me because Tiz and I used always to be together. My brother, Gowland, is with Lord Wellington in Spain, fighting the French. So when January came Papa said he was tired of my long face and he sent me to school to Mrs. Hackett’s in Great-Titchfield-Street.

On the first day two girls approached me. I was pleased, thinking to make new friends, but I soon discovered that that was not their intention. Instead they called me skin-and-bones, said that my muslin was frayed and my shoes were old-fashioned. There was no end to my faults according to Emmeline Twist and Amelia Froggett, and not content with calling me names, they tried to make me afraid with silly stories about ghosts.