by Graeme Hurry
They must have followed her. Was that what Haya had noticed, when she stopped outside her house on the way here?
Enedju was trying to pull away from Djereb. Then his eyes widened and he and Djereb went as still as stone figures. Hori wasn’t moving either, and just as Meka realized that magic must be holding them in place, Sekiu stepped through the doorway into the room.
“Is this what passes for Young Folk gratitude?” he asked. He sounded scornful rather than angry, and delighted by the opportunity to be scornful. “Look. He stole the axe I gave you.”
Meka hadn’t noticed that the axe in Djereb’s hand was hers, the one with the bronze head.
“I borrowed it,” Djereb said, still straining against the invisible bonds that held him. Sekiu had held Meka still the same way when he was a child, making her unable to control any muscles except those in her face and the ones in her chest that allowed her to breathe.
Djereb’s face changed when Haya entered the room. “Witch,” he said. “What have you done with my daughter?”
Instead of answering the shepherd, Haya said, “I suspect this man has not told you the complete truth, Meka. Did you know that he agreed to give me his daughter in exchange for healing the son?”
Meka wanted to accuse Haya of lying, but one look at Djereb stopped her.
She rose from her crouch against the wall. “Is that true, Djereb? You told me and my mother that you’d only agreed to give her sheep.”
Djereb’s eyes darted between her and Haya, who had crossed the room to the edge of the pool. “What kind of monster asks a man to choose between his children?”
“Was everything you told my mother a lie?” Meka asked.
“Have you looked around you?” Djereb demanded. “My people are being turned into animals. Can’t you see how wrong this is?” He grimaced as he tried once again to move his body. “Your mother is a woman of honor. I thought you would understand.”
Sekiu was shaking his head. “You thought my own sister would take your side against me? See what fools they are, Meka.” Turning to Meka, he frowned, then glanced at the doorway between them. “What are you doing here?”
A small figure had crept into the room, clinging to the edge of the doorway. Like the boy with the tail, she was Young Folk from the waist up; unlike the boy, she had the legs and tail of a black-haired goat.
The goat girl didn’t answer Sekiu. She looked unsteady on her feet, and no wonder, having to balance all her weight on goat hooves and legs never meant for walking upright. But there was nothing goat-like about the brown eyes staring desperately at the three Young Folk men bound by magic across the room.
“Mernet.” Djereb’s voice was raw. “What—?” He seemed too overwhelmed, too despairing, to say more.
“It’s an imperfect design, isn’t it?” Sekiu’s tone gave no indication that he knew or cared he was talking to the goat girl’s father. “She survived, which is its own accomplishment, but I think I have to abandon the idea of joining Young Folk to unmodified goat legs. The pelvic and leg structure are wrong. What I need to do is transform the legs instead of replacing them, but right now I can only work transformations on myself.” He held up one hand, and as Meka watched, it shrank and hardened into a goat’s hoof, then back into his own flesh and bone.
Meka glanced at Haya, who had moved even farther away from the rest of them and was shaking her head as if saddened. “How does this help you heal anyone?” Meka demanded.
Suddenly, Djereb was free and rushing at Sekiu with upraised axe. But before Meka could wonder how he had broken the magic bonds holding him, he was flying backwards through the air. He struck a thick wooden post in the wall with a sickening thud, then slumped to the ground.
Enedju cried out. His eyes bulged and his jaw contorted as he renewed his effort to escape. But whatever had allowed Djereb to defeat Sekiu’s magic was giving Enedju no help at all.
Sekiu clucked his tongue. “As if that was going to work.” He moved to where Djereb had fallen, stooping to retrieve the axe fallen from the shepherd’s limp hand. “Not quite dead, but unlikely to be a threat for the next little while, if ever.” He extended the axe towards Meka. “I believe this is yours again, sister.”
With a glance at Mernet, shrinking now against the wall as if she expected Sekiu’s wrath to fall next upon her, Meka approached her brother and took the axe from his outstretched hand. The haft was still warm from when Djereb had held it. She didn’t dare look at Haya. Haya, the only person in the room who could have broken the magic bonds holding Djereb in place. Who had neglected to replace the entrance stone when she and Meka entered, leaving the house open to the three Young Folk.
Sekiu knelt to examine Djereb. Meka took a step closer, then another.
Her brother shook his head. “I don’t think he’ll live much longer. Hm. The question is, will transformation work better on a body too weak to resist?” He extended a hand over Djereb’s legs, his forehead furrowed in concentration.
After, Meka always wondered. Had he known what she was about to do, and chosen not to stop her? Or had Haya done some magic to further distract him?
With both hands, Meka swung the axe down hard into the base of her brother’s skull.
* * *
Their third day on the River, Mernet finally ate, a handful of roasted wheat and a strip of dried aurochs meat. She still would not speak, but she clung tightly to Meka whenever Meka took a rest from paddling. Meka tried not to feel aggravated when the sharp edges of the girl’s hooves snagged threads of her skirt or scratched through to her legs underneath.
“They’ll follow us,” Enedju predicted, again. “When they see the girl, they’ll kill us to protect their secret.” The girl, not my cousin.
“If Haya wanted to kill us, she wouldn’t have let us go,” Meka said, again.
Meka had carried Djereb’s daughter from Sekiu’s house, her goat legs shrouded by a linen garment, through the paths of the City to a place upstream. Hori and Enedju met her there with the boat. While waiting, she feared that they would not stop for her, that she would have to stay in the City. But Meka’s mother still had Djereb’s son, and although Hori and Enedju did not want to take Mernet—she couldn’t keep up with the herds on those legs, Hori said—a healthy male child was apparently precious enough to go back for.
Or maybe they simply acknowledged Meka as one of their own now, and wouldn’t have left her behind any more than they would have left Djereb, had he survived.
“The Old Folk witch won’t send anyone after us,” Hori said. “She has the death she wanted and a corpse to stitch the blame onto. The other archmages, though, if they cared for your brother more than she did—”
“They didn’t,” Meka said, remembering the archmage Kialu at the House of Healing, how even the mention of Sekiu’s name had brought forth a contemptuous sneer. “They’ll be as happy to be rid of him as Haya is. Even though—”
No. She couldn’t defend Sekiu in front of Hori and Enedju. Haya hadn’t let them see the room with the victims stretched out on stone slabs, but they had seen a dozen other Young Folk children like Mernet and the half-baboon boy. Meka was unable to think about what Sekiu had done, though, without anger for Haya and the other archmages. For the way they had used him, profiting from his knowledge while despising him for how he found it. Even Haya, who had been as a wife to him, showed no grief at his death.
And yet, were Meka and her companions any better? Djereb had also profited from Sekiu’s knowledge, when Haya healed his son’s broken neck. Haya’s parting words haunted Meka. “You will come to us again,” she promised. “Someday, perhaps hundreds of years from now, someone you love will lie dying. You will remember what we can do, and forget the price.”
“Don’t let me forget,” Meka whispered in Mernet’s ear.
Perhaps the girl understood, perhaps not, but after a moment she answered Meka with a solemn shake of her head.
Contributor Notes
Peter DiChellis concocts sini
ster tales for anthologies, ezines, and magazines. He is a member of the Short Mystery Fiction Society and an Active (published author) member of the Mystery Writers of America, Private Eye Writers of America, and International Thriller Writers. For more, visit his site Murder and Fries at http://murderandfries.wordpress.com/
Graeme Hurry edited Kimota magazine in the 90s and a horror anthology called Northern Chills in 1994. Now he has branched out by editing this kindle only magazine, Kzine. He has a story in Terror Tales of The Scottish Highlands anthology and an honourable mention in Year’s Best Horror 2001 for a story he collaborated on with Willie Meikle called The Blue Hag.
Gary J. Hurtubise is a writer and physics teacher from Kingston, Ontario. His science fiction has also been featured in the Far Orbit Last Outpost anthology edited by Bascomb James. His blog and samples of his work can be found at www.garyhurtubise.com.
Kristin Janz is a Clarion West graduate and Writers of the Future finalist whose fiction has appeared in Escape Pod, Daily Science Fiction, and On Spec. Although Canadian, she has lived in the United States, near Boston, for over eighteen years. Along with her husband Donald S. Crankshaw, she is also co-editor/publisher of Mysterion: Rediscovering the Mysteries of the Christian Faith, a speculative fiction anthology of stories that engage meaningfully with Christianity, although not exclusively from a Christian perspective (www.mysterionanthology.com). Kristin’s own author site and occasional blog are at www.kristinjanz.com.
Craig McEwan works as a biomedical scientist in Southampton, England. He also plays punk-rock mandolin for the band Beautiful Life. His fiction has previously appeared in Quantum Muse.
Brian M. Milton is a Glasgow based writer who only ever goes back to Ayrshire if forced. He will leave the reader to decide how much of his story is autobiographical but he does give Standing Stones due caution. Brian has been published in anthologies such as Caledonia Dreamin’, Oomph: A little super goes a long way and Thirty Years of Rain as well as in Issue 15 of Kzine.
Jackie Neel has previously had stories published in Perihelion, The Colored Lens and SQ Mag.
Kenneth O’Brien lives and works in the south of Scotland. He writes short stories in Fantasy, Horror and, on the odd occasion, a bit of Science Fiction. He has previously had stories published in Dark Eclipse, Dark Moon Digest, 9 Tales Told In The Dark, 9 Tales Told From Elsewhere and an anthology called Malevolence: Tales From Beyond The Veil.
Dave Windett is professional comics artist and illustrator. He has worked for numerous publishers in Britain, Europe and America - among them Cappelen Damm, DC Thomson, Fleetway, Future, Marvel UK, Panini and PSS (a division of Penguin USA. Korky the Cat, Count Duckula, Lazarus Lemming, Inspector Gadget, Ace Ventura, Tails the Fox, The Loony and Tiny Toons are just a handful of the very many original and licensed characters he has drawn. With Writer John Gatehouse he self publishes some work under the Little Lemming Books imprint the latest of which is The Kaci Bell Mysteries. He recently completed work on Monster Hunters Unlimited a four book series for PSS. Samples of His work can be seen at - www.davewindett.com
