Far Horizons: Tales of Sci-Fi, Fantasy and Horror. Issue #20 November 2015 | Page 51

me.”
They sat on a pile of soft skins on the cave
floor and sat in silence for a while. Eventually Yo
broke the silence. “I am troubled, daughter.”
“What is it, Father?”
“The laws of the tribe are for a great purpose.
Without them we would have chaos. I fear that I have
misused my power for personal gain and will have to
pay a terrible price when Death takes me.”
Ju had an inkling of where this was heading.
There were many things that they had never spoken
about. They had skirted around them like hunters
avoiding a big cat. “If I have wronged you Father, I
…”
She was cut off in mid-sentence. “Hush child
and listen to me. There is more going on here than
I can fathom. First, two strange druids appear from
nowhere and begin to teach us about the sun and
confuse us with their magic. Then a tall dark stranger
appears and you become with child. He disappears
and months later a new, tall, red stranger appears and
the druid somehow convinces me he’s really the same
person. The druids have more say than I do. I should
have had you stoned, but I could not do that to my
own daughter. The druid convinced me to spare you,
yet I needed little convincing. He says that there is a
higher purpose at play here. With all of the strange
happenings I believe him. Tell me daughter. Who is
this Simon? What child do you carry in your belly?”
Ju winced as the baby kicked. She hoped that
her father didn’t misinterpret the action. She was torn
between her duties. The duty to her husband to keep
secret the special things they had spoken about; the
duty to her father to show him due respect; and the
duty to her chief to honour and obey him. She made
her decision and the baby kicked her twice as hard.
“I don’t completely understand him. He uses words
in his own language that I don’t understand when our
words cannot explain something. At night, he often
cries out in his sleep and I do not always understand
him. He often repeats one word, which seems to be a

name. I hear it because it is so like mine. He calls for
Juliana.” She paused, expecting a response from her
father but got none.
“I only know that he is special to me. I cannot
describe how he makes me feel. I have never felt so
alive. It’s like my whole body is on fire but in a good
way. He uses a word that I don’t understand but says
we are soulmates.” She groaned as a sharp pain shot
through her body and the baby kicked her again.
“Your time is close,” her father said. “It may
surprise you but your mother and I felt like that at one
time. I hope that she’s waiting for me on the other side
and we’ll feel like it again. You didn’t invent it. Is the
baby his?”
“What we have is different. I have talked to my
friends about it. Even those who are just joined. What
we have goes much further than they feel. The baby
isn’t his but he will be a true father. Does that not say
much about him?”
Her father only grunted. She knew that he was
punishing himself for letting two different men take
her.
She decided to tell him her biggest secrets.
“The one who came first,” she swallowed hard, “The
one who came first took me by force. He made me
bleed and he hurt me.” She had to bite her tongue
to stop herself screaming as another sharp pain
threatened to tear her apart. She imagined it must be
like being speared. “Simon was not like that. Even
though you had decreed that we were joined and he
was the same man. Even though the druid had told me
what must be. Even though I was heavy with child. I
encouraged him. He was gentle. He would never hurt
me.”
Yo stared at his only child, shook his head and
eventually spoke so quietly that Ju struggled to make
out the words. “You would have had a brother had
not Death taken him and your mother on the birthing
stone. He would be a proud man now with children
of his own. The tribe would have a new leader and I
would meet Death with contentment. Now everyone

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