the path of the tiger | sila komchai

38 He had no idea when it had stopped drizzling. He felt terribly cold, as if he was running a fever. Dull pain shot through his legs from his shins, his knee joints hardly bent and he had to drag his feet every step of the way.

Going for broke this time had ripped his body and clothes to tatters and left him with the mere dregs of life.

Oh no, it couldn’t be! In the narrow water trough further down, he found more footprints. Was he being hunted or was he just walking into them?

No time to examine how old the footprints were and whether they pointed up or down. He just turned round as if his brain had switched to automatic, and broke into a limping lope, dragging his pathetic legs across the ridge to the wide depression on the other side, to get as far away as he could from these terrible signs of danger.

His teeth were clenched to breaking point, his saliva had long dried and his throat was parched. He kept moving until he came to a steep ravine and let himself tumble down to the small brook below, hectically scooped up water in his hands and drank so greedily it splashed all over his face and into his nose.

On the other side of the brook were more tiger footprints…

I’ll be damned! Was it actually blocking his ways of escape? What kind of unearthly creature was it that could outguess his every move? Or had his sins from some former life caught up with him? His brain was so confused it couldn’t hold on to anything. Fear overcame SILA KOMCHAI | THE PATH OF THE TIGER