Black and grey realism tattoo of a stone guardian lion statue standing on the outer thigh.

Stone guardian lion on a thigh

Realism · Thigh · Black and grey · Photo

A stone guardian lion, shown standing front on with its head raised and mane carved in detailed scrolls, fills most of the frame. The piece is rendered in fine, realistic shading with smooth grey gradients that give the stone a weathered, sculpted look. The lion sits on a dark plinth against pale skin, with the composition centred on the thigh.

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A story inspired by this tattoo · fiction

The snow had shut the pass for nine days when the stone lion at the gate of the Lantern Ford inn began, the innkeeper's wife swore, to lean forward. Nobody believed her. Her husband Wen Liang said the frost had split the plinth and the lion was only settling, as old things do. He said it while carrying in firewood, his breath going out ahead of him in clouds.

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Wen's brother came up from the valley with a merchant from Chengdu, and the merchant walked round the lion twice, tapping its mane with a silver knuckle. He offered forty taels. Wen's wife, Mei, said nothing, but she set a bowl of hot millet porridge on the step beside the statue, the way her grandmother had, and went to bed without looking back.

In the morning the merchant's mule was gone from the stable. The snow in the yard was printed with a single line of pawprints, broad as dinner plates, that circled the inn three times before stopping at the gate. The bowl was empty. The lion's mouth, which had always held a carved ball, now held a fresh pine needle.

The merchant did not ask for his money back, and nobody mentioned the price again. That afternoon Wen went out with a broom and swept the snow from the lion's shoulders. His hand, when he rested it on the stone, was warm as a loaf, and he stood there a long time before he went in to eat.

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