Page 8 of A Thousand Painted Hours

I shook my head. I didn’t know how to say it in words—something had blazed through my imagination for a moment, the light and her limbs and hair, and I felt it in my hands.

“I like it,” Gurdaya said.

“Thank you.”

That night, Tanveer led the three of us up to the roof after dark. The sky stretched like darkest blue velvet overhead, scattered with glittering stars. “My father is a student of astronomy,” he said. “I asked his permission to show you his telescope, as it is a dark night, and we shall be able to see a great deal.”

“Aren’t all nights dark?”

Gurdaya snorted.

Tanveer touched my shoulder, ever so lightly, as if to shift my attention his way. “A dark sky is a moonless night.” He gestured toward the darkness above us. “Do you know what you see here?”

I shook my head. “Only stars.”

He drew a finger along a spray of white. “That isAkash Ganga, or what you know as the Milky Way. It is made of millions and millions of stars.”

“A river of stars,” I said.

His smile flashed. “Yes. And there is Jupiter, the largest planet in the galaxy.”

“I do know the solar system.”

“Good.” He pointed again. “Mars is that little star, and Saturn. Venus is the brightest one, there, sparkling.”

“Can you see them through the glass?”

“Yes.” He showed me how to position my eye. “It is easier if you don’t press your eye right into it, but hold your head a little away.”

I struggled to see anything, and frustration rose in my chest. Frowning, I lifted my head, and looked again with my bare eyes, then back through. Nothing. I shook my head. “I cannot see anything.”

“Let me adjust it,” he said, and bent in, tapping the scope a little, a little, a little. His kurta was pale in the darkness. “There,” he said, and backed away. “Carefully.”

Moving with extreme caution, I held my eye just a little away from the viewfinder, and to my delight, there was a round ball of shining light. “I see it!”

“That,” he said with some satisfaction, “is Venus.”

I stood up, beaming. “How magical!”

He grabbed my arm suddenly, his grip tight, and pressed a finger to his lips. With his free hand, he pointed out toward the garden below, a stretch of manicured grass surrounded with encroaching oak and chestnut trees.

And there, walking stealthily around the edge of the perimeter, was the tiger. In my excitement, I covered my mouth to avoid making a sound.

We stood motionless, but below, the tiger paused as if she sensed us. One paw hung in the air, her tail high, only visible because of the white stripes. I was transfixed by her size, the sense of power emanating from her muscles and stance. She paused only for a few seconds, then walked into the trees.

He was gripping my arm so tightly I felt indentations. He let go. “Sorry, but—” His face reflected my wonder, his eyes shining. “Can you believe it?”

I let the wonder and magic well up through me, spill over. I could think of nothing to express the gilded delight, but already I was thinking of how to draw her, the way she melded with the shadows, her stripes echoing the bright and dark shape of the night and the trees.

“We must tell someone!” Gurdaya said.

“No!” Tanveer said, catching his sister before she fled. “This is her world—we are the intruders.”

“I don’t want to die because a tiger has eaten me!” She shook off his grip, and made for the door.

“Gudiya,” I said. “What if you were the tiger, hungry and needing to feed your children?”

It was a last-ditch plea, but it seemed to sway her. She glanced over the wall, to the darkness. “All right. But if she attacks another person, we must tell them we saw her.”