In the Jungle

  The boy had always measured his childhood in pawmarks. Every evening after school, he would run out into the wide, golden grasslands that stretched beyond his village. The wind would whistle across the tall grasses, and somewhere in the distance, the grey shadows of wolves would flicker, hunting, playing. He had grown up with them, as if they were kin, watching pups stumble over their paws, watching the older wolves keep sentry against the horizon. For him, the grasslands were alive because of their presence. But slowly, that horizon began to change. First came the rumble of machines, chewing at the earth. A new road carved itself through the belly of the grassland. Then came the flyover, tall and indifferent, cutting across the sky like a scar. Complexes rose like grey fortresses where grass once swayed. The wolves grew uneasy, their howls more distant, their hunts disrupted by headlights and the never-ending din of traffic. The boy, now older, still visited the grasslands...

  Long ago, when the world was still forming, the Great Spirit of the Forest gave birth to a pair of twins.  One emerged striped—he was the Tiger. The other was bare-skinned, with eyes like stars:  The Baiga. The spirit whispered: "You share the same blood. One guards the woods; the other cares for people and their balance with the Earth." From then, Baigas and Tigers walked as kin, bound by a promise. Even now, the Baigas regard the tiger as elder brother, protector, unseen spirit. Every pugmark, every roar is a message, and the stripes—the script of the forest, written so the land remembers its story. Once, a young boy named Jhamu walked with his grandfather through the forest at dusk. The air was heavy with the scent of mahua, and from far away came the low rumble of a tiger’s roar. The boy’s heart pounded with fear, but the old man placed a steady hand on his shoulder. “Do not be afraid,” the elder said. “That is not the call of danger; it is the voice of your fami...