Once, in a time when tigers orated like kings and mice had voices so soft no creature but fellow mice could hear them, there was a forest that stretched low and content across the land, furred with soft plants and heavy, dozing trees. In the forest ran creatures of every ilk, who were friend and foe to each other. There were nervous deer who scampered away on gangly legs through the brush, and birds who sweetly sang and brought home food in their beaks for their complaining children.
There were also hawks, of course, who swept up slow squirrels with sharp eyes and sharper beaks. And there were wily foxes, who would snatch eggs from the bird who let their guard down, leaving nothing but despairing parents in their wake. But no creature could blame each other for simply answering the call of their own nature.
Among the creatures that called the forest home lived the humble rabbit. There was a whole warren of rabbits, their nests stretching under the earth in long, meandering tunnels and boroughs, a miniature kingdom of brown fur and twitching noses and gentle paws.
One day, in a particular warren, under layers of dirt and sod and grass, there was a rabbit who, curled up and quivering, gave birth to thirteen children, slick and pink and shining, like the sun on a river during dawn.
Of the bunch, the thirteenth child was the weakest, slow to squirm his way to his mother’s milk. There was nothing particularly special about this rabbit, who still had his eyes tightly closed, sleek still from birth. He was a rabbit like any other, if not slightly weaker than most of his kind.
One might ask why, then, this particular rabbit would be of interest to anyone. There were thousands of rabbits in the world. Rabbits were no special species. No one thought twice when one scampered across their path, strange little fellows only concerned with their own rabbity business. Of course, there were countless stories about talented rabbits, wily heroes who escaped traps or amused all with their antics, loyal servants who pounded medicine on the moon or pulled the chariots of goddesses.
But those rabbits had nothing to do with this particular ordinary rabbit. This was his story, a rabbit who was the youngest of his litter, the twelfth living sibling.
The twelfth living, and not the thirteenth, because the one before him was a stillborn.
As the young rabbit squirmed, his mother, with all her maternal instincts and animal habit, pushed past her youngest child, who could not even squeak with protest as she did, like he was no more important than a blade of grass in a meadow. The warmth and slick of that undreamt sibling still lingered against the rabbit’s pink skin when his mother, with liquid eyes and gleaming teeth, opened her mouth and swallowed the stillborn. In a gnash of teeth and blood, tender flesh slid to pieces under her blunt work.
Gone, in an instant. The young rabbit, who still had no language or even eyes with which to understand knew, from the cooling spot beside him, that death had eluded him by luck alone. There was no difference between him and his sibling, and there would be no protection against himself and death, which would nip at his heels forever, waiting to swallow him whole.
Now, there were a hundred reasons a rabbit might eat her own young. For survival. For sustenance during starving times. Sometimes, out of stress. Perhaps one could argue she did this out of love for her surviving children, and even love for the child who had not survived.
But those reasons were nothing more than conjecture, and all the young rabbit had was his own animal logic.
In a single moment, the rabbit understood that there would be no one to ensure his survival but himself. The one who gave birth to him was not his friend nor his ally, as a rabbit gave birth simply because she had to, and not out of particular affection for her young.
So the young rabbit wriggled his way to his mother’s breast, squirming with the rest of his soft siblings. He latched on with his small, gummy mouth, and he suckled, and he lived.
In a span of several weeks, the young rabbit grew quickly. Soon, he could open his eyes and hop about, smell the air and inquire into the life around him. If he was lucky, he would live a full, storied nine years. If he was not, then he might survive just one. Swiftly, swiftly, swiftly: that was how his life must pass.
The rabbit did not have a name. Rabbits had no concepts of names, because names were only given when one had hope for their offspring. And the idea of having any expectation for rabbits to be more than prey was laughable.
Besides, the rabbit could distinguish all his siblings by scent alone, and the idea of mistaking one for the other in the cool darkness of their warren was unthinkable. The most a rabbit might do is to call his kin by their order of their birth. But it bothered the rabbit to be called the twelfth brother, his status forever marred by things he could not help, of his weakness and youth.
“It would be nice to have a name,” he asked his mother once. “What would you have named me, if you could?”
“Why do you want such a thing?” she said, yawning, nuzzling his furry little face. “You are a rabbit. That is all you need to be, and all you need to know.”
“If you loved me, you would name me,” the rabbit accused, but his mother only twitched her nose.
“I love you, so I do not name you,” she said. “You do not need to be anything more than what you are.”
When the rabbit was old enough, he ventured to the surface with one of his older brothers, the ninth brother, who was more friendly with him than anyone else. They greeted each other in the warren, and nuzzled together on cold nights. The only thing peculiar about the ninth brother was that he was curious about the outside world. The rabbit never saw the point, of course. A larger world only meant more dangers.
“It’s big,” the ninth brother said, nose twitching. He had the biggest eyes out of their brothers, eyes like soft liquid stars. “So, so big! What do you think is out there?”
A foolish question, when the rabbit had not ventured out of their burrow once. “I’m not sure. Why don’t you go take a look if you’re curious?”
“Then you have to come with me.”
“Why should I do that?” the rabbit asked.
“Because it’ll be less frightening if we go together,” his brother reasoned. It didn’t make much sense to the rabbit, but his brother pleaded endlessly, and so they hopped along to the entrance of their warren. The ninth brother poked a nose out in the air, sniffing, before lifting his body into the brightness of the outside world. He could not wait another second to see this place he had heard so much about.
“Come see,” his brother said. “It’s so beautiful.”
And so the rabbit dragged himself into the world, into the traitorous brightness. The darkness protected, nestling him close like a secret. But this? This unnatural, blazing light, which revealed every inch of his body to the cold world outside, to predators? This was dangerous.
But then the rabbit gazed around at the cool grass, the dappled sunlight, the forest rushing green and wide and lush around him. He sniffed, smelling the loam and the fallen berries and the mingled scents of other creatures like him. He heard the whistles of birds, those chatterboxes, and the tread of soft-hooved deer, and the wind singing through the leaves.
This was the world outside his burrow. He might even call it beautiful.
The ninth brother hopped further into the grass. And as the rabbit took another paw forward to follow him, the birdsong trailed to a halt. The deer scampered away. Even the wind held its breath, and the rabbit tensed, thumping his hind paws in warning at the ninth brother, who froze, crouching low and trembling.
There was a new scent, a scent that purred and kneaded its paws across the forest. The rabbit heard it before he saw it: a low rumble, and the most elegant of paw pads that fell onto the forest floor like an emperor in his palace. A creature who had no need to hide itself from the world, who did not need to skulk.
There was the barest flash of black shadow and orange fur through the foliage. The yellowed ivory of a well-used fang. And an amber eye, slitted and narrowed. Time suspended, stretching long and low, and it was all the rabbit could see. He might as well have been swallowed within that amber.
But then the tiger disappeared within the foliage, and the birdsong tentatively returned, and the deer pawed softly, and the wind resumed its pace. Still, the smell of fear lingered, like a reminder to every creature, the only legacy of prey.
“What was that?” the rabbit asked.
“I think I know. I’ve heard about it,” the ninth brother said solemnly, with awe and wonder. “It’s the king of the forest. It’s a tiger.”
Deep down, in a secret place of the rabbit’s heart, something sang.
The rabbit would have to venture further into the woods from now on, regardless of his initial wishes. He had no choice, not if he wanted to survive. His mother would not care for him forever, and he was coming upon that age where he was expected to fend for himself. If he did not learn the ways of the world, he would die, as simple as that.
So the rabbit reluctantly ventured out of the shelter of his home, to nibble on grass and speak with his fellow animals. The birds were gossipy sorts, and had a difficult time focusing when they were not preening. The deer were easily spooked and shied away if he spoke for too long.
The rabbit did not see the tiger again. The woods resumed their easy serenity, but the peace and beauty felt brittle to him when he saw how easily it was disturbed.
“The tiger? She does not come here often,” one of the birds chirped. They never missed a chance to gossip, especially about beasts greater than them. “Thank goodness for that. She always looks as if she would gulp us in one huge swallow.”
“The tiger? Why are you asking about her? Is she here? Did you see her? Is she coming?” one of the deer stammered. They were frightened by any mention of a predator, especially one who had already torn a chunk out of their herd. Just last year, one of the elderly deer had been her victim.
“Why do you keep asking about the tiger?” the ninth brother asked.
“Because she is the king of this forest,” the rabbit answered.
But that was not quite the whole truth, nor the root of the rabbit’s fascination. The tiger. He had not seen her face, but the way she moved, the way she sent the forest trembling with the sweet scent of fear. The noble beast. She was a creature who bowed to no one, who ruled alone. In the forest, there was no beast greater than her. She must never have known the taste of defeat in her entire life, the rabbit thought. To walk as she did. To know as she did. To never fear as she did. What a life that would have been.
Unfortunately for the rabbit, he was not a tiger. He would never be a tiger. He was just a simple rabbit. And his life would always follow the natural pace of a rabbit’s.
On what should have been an ordinary morning, one of his sisters burst into the warren, ears aquiver, blood on her fur, and the rabbit’s heart went still at her cries. “Mother is gone.”
Like the foam of the tide, he and his siblings flowed out of their warren, guided by the sister, to where their mother’s body lay.
There was not much left of her. Her body laid in a pool of blood, and most of her flesh had been scrapped away by whatever predator had dug into her. Judging from the teeth marks, it must have been some skulking predator. A fox, perhaps. Or even a cat. Her entrails dripped into the ground, and her bones shone through like stars, clean and white. Eventually, carrion and bugs would eat the rest of her, and she would decompose and return to the earth.
His mother, who he rarely talked to, was taciturn and treated each of her children quite the same. They did not talk much, for she was one to let her children discover their own fates. The rabbit did not think much of her in return, for he could never forget his unborn sibling, and what happened right after his birth. Still, she had groomed him and fed him and raised him. She had even loved him, in whatever capacity she could.
“Mother…” the ninth brother said, ears drooping. “I will miss her.”
They all bent over their mother, one last time, looking at the rabbit who had given them life and had nurtured them to come this far. She was gone. This would be their fate one day.
“I don’t want to end up like her,” the rabbit confided in his ninth brother, the thought springing unbidden at what lay in front of them.
And to his surprise, his brother tilted his head. “Why not?”
“I do not want to die. I do not want to be ripped apart like that, by some ungraceful creature. Are you saying you do?”
“Not at all,” the ninth brother said, nose twitching. His eyes shone with a strange sort of joy, a joy that the brother had nurtured from all his time exploring the world and nestling with the soft body of his siblings. The ninth brother had never felt anything but love when he stepped into the great, lush, beautiful forest. To smell the fresh air, to sip from a flowing stream, to say hello to the birds and the deer and the squirrels. “It is simply how things are meant to be. I see nothing wrong with that. Don’t you think it’s exciting, brother? To think we will eventually become flowers, that our children will eat to survive? That we will always be a part of this world?”
The rabbit, however, felt none of his brother’s wonder, but a strange sense of betrayal. Here was his closest kin, who spewed such odd ideas at him. “I do not want to be a flower, brother. I want to be alive. Really alive.”
“But we are alive right now,” the ninth brother said. “Is that enough?”
“It will never be enough,” the rabbit said. His eyes gleamed chatoyant. “Not a life like this.”
The rabbit, after several revolutions of the moon, had grown enough that he could leave the warren. As was the fate of all rabbits, of all children, really, he must learn to make his own way in the world.
The rabbit could always return to the familiar loamy darkness of the warren where he was born, but it was no longer enough for him. At some point, he had outgrown the narrow spaces and soft, indulgent darkness. All the rabbit could think about was his siblings, who were content to lounge and hop and enjoy their little area of the forest.
All he could remember was his mother, torn open. Simply prey for other beasts to feast on.
None of his siblings understood. They looked down on him for his arrogance to refuse the lifestyle of prey animals like them.
“You are just a rabbit,” they would chide him. “The youngest, and the weakest. Why do you ask for so much?”
So the rabbit decided. He would find the king of the forest, and live a different life. The most beautiful animal of them all, the most mighty, the most wise, would guide his path. On a cool blue dawn, the rabbit ventured out of the nest.
As he readied to go, poking his head out of the warren, the ninth brother thumped his hind legs. “Wait! Are you leaving already?”
The rabbit turned, nose twitching. “I must.”
“Don’t you want to stay a little longer, brother? With our siblings and I?” The ninth pleaded, even though he knew it was in vain. He had never understood the faraway dreams that swirled like mist in his youngest brother’s life, because though the ninth brother loved the world, he feared what it would do to his brother.
“I can’t. I need to leave, brother. I want to find the king of our forest.”
The ninth brother’s nose twitched. “I understand. Then, please let me come with you.”
“Brother?”
“I don’t want you to travel alone. And I love this world, so wouldn’t it be right to see more of it?”
The rabbit nuzzled against the ninth brother. His brother was warm, and smelled sweetly of grass. They had once shared the same womb together, pressed together in the darkness, waiting to join the world.
The two rabbits left for many moons and suns, wandering across the forest. It took time for them to traverse the vast expanse, and everytime either of them heard the ready cry of a hawk or the howl of a wild wolf, they would crouch flat against the grass, trembling against their own will. But while the rabbit would hide in hollows, resentment sparking along his veins, unable to retaliate, the ninth brother marveled at the shine of the hawk’s wings, and the strength of the wolf’s voice.
Across streams and over hills. Across rushing seas of grass and the sturdy roots of trees. Across pebbles and sand. Rabbits were small and swift, but it would still take them quite a while to cover so much ground. This was especially so in a vast forest such as this, which stretched beyond comprehension. But that was how far the brothers went, and all the while, the brother asked nearby animals for the tiger.
“I don’t know,” the other animals would tweet or squeak or croak, in response to this strange little rabbit, who sought danger instead of running from it. “I don’t know where she is. And it is better that way.”
The rabbit only grew more frustrated with each failed attempt, but the ninth brother would only thank the other animals and inquire into their families, their lives, their particular habits.
The world was so, so vast. It seemed there would never be any end to their travels.
On a particularly cloudless day, when the sky was pure and blue and endless, the two brothers rested and the ninth brother asked, “Why are you sad, brother?”
“My quest is not going well. I’m beginning to think the tiger never existed,” the rabbit grumbled.
“I am sorry to hear that, brother. But I hope you have still been enjoying yourself,” the ninth brother said earnestly. “There are so many different things to see, and animals to talk to! I would never have known if I hadn’t left with you, so for that, I thank you.”
“You’re the one who’s found enjoyment for himself. I did nothing,” the rabbit grumbled, but his ears twitched in a pleased manner.
The brothers were so occupied by their discussion that neither of them noticed when the shadow of a hawk fell upon them until it was too late.
A piercing cry ran out, and they both startled. Run, or freeze? Neither choice was good enough.
“Hide, brother,” the ninth brother cried, and ran through the grass. The rabbit’s movements were slow, his paws heavy, as death fell close to him.
Again, and again, and again. The rabbit had been born in fear, and lived in fear, and even after all his journeys, he still quivered in fear at the gaze of a predator. Like his sibling, like his mother, he was helpless.
But perhaps this slowness saved him, for the hawk’s attention was not caught on the rabbit, but the scampering ninth brother. The rabbit could do nothing but watch as the hawk, as graceful as water flowing through a stream or the leaves dancing during a strong wind, descended and tore into his brother. The ninth brother was dead the instant the hawk struck into his heart, and it bent to rip out chunks of bloody meat.
For an eternity, the brother watched the hawk eat its meal as lovingly as a mother would.
His brother. His ninth brother. The family nearest and dearest to his heart.
Gone.
His brother.
When the hawk had its fill and flew away, the rabbit hopped over numbly, steps heavy in the dirt. What did his brother always say? That it was beautiful to be a part of the world? To be the growth for flowers and new life?
But where was the beauty in this? In an ugly death? In the life of prey?
The rabbit hovered over his brother’s corpse, the scent of blood trickling into his nose, greeted by nothing but raw pink meat and shredded fur where once had stood his brother. Only a predator was allowed to eat. Or was it that to eat was to be a predator? That was the way of the world, wasn’t it? That to the strong, the world was a feast, just waiting to be indulged. And to the weak, the world was nothing but futile struggle and bitter ends.
This was his brother.
The rabbit took a bite.
This was his brother.
The rabbit took a bite.
The meat choked his throat. Blood gorged his senses. He was a rabbit. He was a rabbit who knew his place in the world better than most, and still he chewed, and still he ate. His flat teeth were made for grass, not for meat, and they did not have the right shape to properly digest the ninth brother, so the flesh slid in awkward lump, stringy lumps down his throat.
Still, the rabbit ate, until there was nothing left for the lingering crows or the waiting scavengers, who watched him with disappointment. But this was his brother. This was his family, and no one else’s.
Rabbits did not bury their dead. Rabbits did not think much of their dead, as most animals do. To die was as natural as living, and though they might mourn, they ultimately had their own affairs to tend to. But this particular rabbit, unlike the others, would carry his brother with him forever.
Why did rabbits die? Why did rabbits live, just to be consumed? Was this truly happiness?
No one could answer the rabbit’s questions, and his family was far, far away now, too far to know of their sibling’s fate. The rabbit’s siblings had already fled for burrows and families of their own, living only to be eaten and indulge in simple lives.
The rabbit could do nothing but go forward. So he trekked farther than he ever had before.
Over swollen rivers, and pebbly banks. Through fields of rustling grass. Across trees so old and ancient they spent most of their days sleeping, without answering to anyone. Deeper and deeper into the forest he went, till he no longer recognized the calls of the birds or the steps of the animals around him. Strange creatures stirred in this woods, none that he recognized, each with their own frightful howls and caws and barks.
But it was here, where no beast of his kind had tread before, that the rabbit found the tiger.
He did not see her at first, not until he was almost within a few hops of her. She blended in with the dappled shadows, as if the very forest was cradling her. She laid on her side in rest, rippling with muscle, striped in orange and black and white: a noble beast, the king of their forest, who could sleep and eat and live as she pleased.
Something sang in the rabbit’s heart, the same feeling he had when he first saw her.
He should have prostrated himself before her, but the rabbit only hopped closer. One step, then another, and the tiger rolled over, her bright amber eye flashing indulgently.
“A rabbit?” Her voice rolled deeply, smoothly, over him, like the wash of the river’s waves, a low growl deep in her throat.
“And you are a tiger. The king of our forest,” the rabbit replied in return.
Her tail swayed lazily. “Did you bring yourself here as an offering? To be my midday snack, perhaps?”
“No. Nothing of that sort. I wanted to ask you something.”
“What is it that something like you would want to know from me?”
“How can I be like you?”
The tiger purred, warm and throaty. “Like me? Are you feeling quite right? You are a rabbit, and I am a tiger.”
“And that is precisely why I want to be like you.”
“Now, why would you do that? Isn’t there joy to be found in your own life? There is nothing wrong with being prey. I love my prey, as I love every creature in this forest, as the hawk loves the mouse, and death loves life.”
“If you love us, why must we be hunted? We are not yours. You cannot love us,” the rabbit protested.
“Why must that be so? You nourish me, and I love you. What other creature would claim this forest, as long as I roam? My presence is protection from worse threats. So then, is it not mine? Am I not your king?” the tiger asked.
Something hateful surged in the rabbit’s heart, and it tasted like his brother’s blood. “You are no king of mine. I do not want this sort of love. I want to survive, tiger. I want to be like you.”
“Then what if I eat you right here?” the tiger queried. Her voice was slow, indulgent. The rabbit was a curious creature to her; she had seen so many belligerent prey in all her plentiful years, but never one who had challenged her so directly. She might as well have been entertaining the fanciful musings of a kitten.
“Go ahead and try,” the rabbit snarled, thumping his leg in agitation.
“You are small and skinny… you wouldn’t make for a nourishing meal,” the tiger said. “Is this all you required from me?” And with that, she yawned, licking at her paw, eyes closing. She had seen many interesting things in her day, so nothing kept her attention for long.
The rabbit was just a rabbit, and he was the smallest and youngest and weakest of all his siblings. He was not even a very gifted or special rabbit, one who humans would write stories about. Like the rest of his family, it was simply his fate to be consumed. He knew this. He knew this all very, very well.
Everyone talked of love. His mother. His brother. The tiger. Was this love? Was this really love? Beautiful flowers might grow from his bones, but he would not be there to see it.
The rabbit looked at the tender and smooth expanse of the tiger’s throat. He opened his own soft mouth, with all its blunt teeth, and he leapt. Maybe now, he would finally understand what it meant when everyone spoke of love.
Grace Zhu is a MFA candidate at Emerson College. She likes to draw inspiration from fables, folktales, and fairytales, and enjoys writing about rabbits and women doing unscrupulous things.