The Game of Shepherd and Dawse (17 page)

Juju was none too pleased about having to perform this task. He saw no honor in it. Winter had set in and he was quite comfy where he was (thank you very much). Teewok and Makeshaw knew how to appeal to his better half though, and with a grumble or two he made his way across to the place where the elders had gathered. As Juju drew closer, Soladus held out his arm as if to say, ‘Please steady me as I walk, dear boy’.

Soladus and Juju turned and made their way to the spot where Soladus had chosen as his last in this lifetime. In the background, the elders and the younger’s had started chanting a farewell mantra in admiration of their ageing seer.

Soladus and Juju had to walk a long way and this was hard on the dying man, but Soladus had wanted it like this. He had always wanted one last trial of endurance before he went. Juju on the other hand could have done without it and knowing full well that the old man couldn’t hear, he quipped,

“You better find your spot soon old man or I might as well kill you right here and be done with it”.

To Juju’s amazement Soladus replied without even looking at him, “And what would be the point in killing a dying man, Juju”?

You see, the thing was Soladus never had lost the use of his hearing. He only pretended he had so that people wouldn’t talk too much when he was trying to guide them through their worries. He had heard it all before, so many times before.

Juju didn’t like the old man. There was just something about him that he didn’t get, and it would be fair to say that even as frail as this old man was and as muscular as Juju was, Juju feared him. They finally arrived at the resting place and Soladus knelt down.

“Come sit before me, my child”, Soladus said, and Juju did as he was asked.

Soladus didn’t speak to Juju with any disrespect or anger. Instead he spoke to him very gently and with so much love, the kind of love that Juju had craved for so, so long. This brought tears to one of Juju’s eyes and he just sat and listened.

“I’ve been watching you, Juju. I know what you've been doing and this place isn’t safe for you anymore. In one week’s time, there will be a lot of angry fathers wanting your blood, so it is time for you to leave. You know where you need to go. You have seen it in your dreams and there you will be lord and master. It is your destiny”.

Juju knew exactly where Soladus meant, if only by psychic intuition, and he had seen the place Soladus spoke of in his dreams. To be honest, Juju had had enough of Shepherd Wood anyway.

“Now if you really want to kill me, child, help me take off my top, dear old friend”.

This was the part that Juju actually found really difficult. When it was laid on a plate like that, he didn’t want to do it. But he managed it. Then, he left Soladus kneeling in the woods while he made his way back to the village.

Any slight purity that Soladus’s presence had imparted soon vanished when Juju thought about being evicted from Shepherd Wood. His frustration soon turned to anger and his anger soon turned to hate. Juju decided to commit once final act of atrocity before leaving, and this would be to slash Sasha’s throat.

There was a part of him that really didn’t want to do this but a greater part of him that did, and that fact enraged him. He reached the hut where he and Sasha slept and found Sasha asleep. He stood over his grandfather with a tear running down his cheek and reached for the knife he always wore on his hip. It was a very good knife. He had made it himself and had used it to kill many an animal (and to wound a few people in the village too on occasion).

To his astonishment, the knife wasn’t there. He must have dropped it when he was helping the old man to his resting spot. He was annoyed at losing his knife but also grateful for the fact that he couldn’t slash Sasha’s throat because he still had lingering feelings of affection. Juju left the village and didn’t so much as look back at it. Shepherd Wood would never see Juju again.

Soladus folded his top neatly and placed the knife on top of it. He had pulled it from Juju’s sheath as they were walking. Soladus didn’t actually need Juju’s help in holding his arm; he had just done this as a ruse to get hold of the lethal weapon. When the elders came for Soladus’s body they would see the knife, plus an absent Juju, and put two and two together, realizing what had happened.

Soladus very last words to the world would be, “Such a shame to spoil such a beautiful thing, but it has been such an honour to be a part of it”.

Life in Shepherd Wood suddenly took on a whole new meaning once the inhabitants realised Juju had gone for good. Something lifted and people were joyous. To those who were old enough, it reminded them of the times that had been, before all the troubles in recent years had started. It really was a truly wonderful time and even the weather had changed to bright, sunny and warm - which was odd as they were in the middle of the onset of winter. There was a quite euphoric feeling about the place now. There was even talk about dismantling the barrier around the settlement. However, within a week everything had turned again.

Winter came in for real and there was no more talk of taking down the barrier. What caused this sudden change of heart and change of minds was the sudden swell in so many of the young girl’s bellies.

Gemini the farmer was becoming quite a dab hand at growing things, but now he felt for the other members of the tribe. He was pleased that he and his family had been spared Juju’s attentions as his daughter was too young to get pregnant. But just one week later, daughter Libra started showing a bump too, at the grand old age of only nine summers strong.

Before leaving, Juju had gone on a monumental shagging spree, and there didn’t seem to be any Shepherd girl left untouched. He had charmed some and forced others, but the end result was mass pregnancy and many angry fathers baying for Juju’s blood.

Some of the pregnancies were just as difficult as the one that Aman had had to endure. There would have been many more deaths had someone not come up with the notion that if you made a horizontal incision in the stomach of the pregnant woman and took the baby out that way and then sewed it up like you would a piece of clothing that you might just save the lives of both mother and child. By and large this worked and after a few hiccups, the women of the village learned how to become good at it. The knife that was always used because of its sharpness was the one that Juju had used to kill so many animals, so it was quite fitting that it was now being used to save lives rather than destroying them.

The initial reaction to the oncoming onslaught of offspring from Juju on their way to the tribe was one of dread. When they actually arrived though, it wasn’t as bad as everyone had thought. The children were known as the ‘quarter children’ - being three quarters good and only one quarter bad. The Dawse energy had been diluted and each child would show this in different traits and in varying degrees. Some were messy but intelligent, some were clean but not very clever, some were attractive but nasty, and some were ugly but really kind hearted. Every child had its issues and every child had its talents. They all ate differently as well, with some preferring their meat well done while others ate their meat raw. A few liked their meat half and half, and some at no meat at all.

Compared to the original children of Shepherd Wood, they would still be quite a handful. This was probably the time in history when mothers and fathers first started to nag their children.

For some of the tribal members, it was just too much having so much Dawsey energy in one place, so they began to drift away from Shepherd Wood in hopes of dispersing the Dawsey energy even further. Each member would take their offspring and move to a separate tribe. This didn’t have the desired effect they hoped it would though, as this only seemed to speed up the interbreeding process.

Within a very short 500 years or so, almost every Shepherd tribe on the planet had changed beyond its original recognition. Each new generation diluted the dark energy a bit further, yet every so often through probability and chance, nature would throw up an almost pure Dawse or an almost pure Shepherd, and one would wreak havoc while the other would bring calm.

For the most part though, the influences the children grew up with helped to determine which side of the fence they would swing to. If they were brought up around negativity, their nature would veer toward the Dawse side of things and if they were brought up around positivity, they would veer toward the Shepherd way of thinking. The only time when their environment had no impact at all was when all the right genes came together and made them an almost pure Shepherd or an almost pure Dawse. In these cases, no external influences could change them. They were what they were.

Every so often a pure Dawse would be born and wreak havoc in their community: they would commit murder (sometimes on a massive scale), they would rape and bully and they would spend their lives trying to take what was not rightfully theirs. These people would either be punished or banished from their community, but if they were strong enough they would encourage others of that nature to do the same dark deeds. Over time, they would build themselves a small army of people who would control and dominate the area that they were in.

Still, they didn’t have it all their own way. For the part of the world they were in was predominantly inhabited by people of a Shepherd nature, so whenever one of these vile creatures rose to prominence there would always be someone of a strong Shepherd nature to try and block them. Shepherds too would raise an army of people and hunt down the wrongdoers until justice and peace prevailed.

There was a land far away from where it all started, that by and large managed to keep to a very Shepherd way of living and thinking. These people lived in harmony with the land and respected all of the animals that lived upon it. These people would become known as the Native American Indians and they would keep their way of life intact for many thousands of years. Until, that is, some people of a rather Dawsey nature came and invaded their lands and nigh on wiped out their whole civilization.

Joe closed the book very gently and looked over at Charlie and asked, “Do you know what this means, my old friend”?

Charlie was smart enough to know that this wasn’t the end of the book. No books ended like that. “I would hazard to say that there is one final part to this amazing story, Joe. I’d stake money on it”, he said confidently.

“I gotta give it to you, kiddo. I’d have to get up awfully early in the morning to catch you out, hey”?

They both smiled at each other with mutual appreciation. They had both enjoyed the journey of Shepherd Wood. Joe enjoyed narrating it and Charlie enjoyed listening to it. Charlie was in no rush now to hear the end. He wanted to savour the experience for a while longer. So they both put the book aside for a special day when ‘The Game of Shepherd and Dawse’ would be complete.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

SALLY SOUR MAKES MISCHIEF

“
Keep your friends close and your enemies even closer.” ~ Joe Sadsoul

Sally Sour was on the prowl again.

“Cooee! Home Help”! She called through the letter box.

“Just a second”, Joe called back.

Joe’s legs were so bad that day that for the first time ever he was actually glad to see her. Sally was quite shocked to see Joe using a Zimmer frame but at the same time it gave her a kind of glow. She preferred her old people to be fragile so she could lord it over them. She fussed and faffed about doing the things Joe had asked her to do, while making a bit of a hash of it at the same time. Then she sat down for a cup of tea with him. This wasn’t because she wanted to have a good old chinwag with Joe or to give him some company but because she smelled an opportunity in the offing.

Her style of conversation was much more cordial this day than her usual patronising tone and she kept probing Joe about his general health and welfare. Any stranger would have thought she was the most caring person in the world, but Joe was no stranger and he was no fool either. It was the sudden change in sour Sally's caring attitude that made him feel uneasy because life had taught Joe that when people start to act out of character like this, it meant they were after something. And in this moment, Sally continued on her fishing expedition to find out all she could.

“I suspect you get very tired – what, with having to keep up this big house and all. Not to mention all of the baby sitting you do for young Charlie. That Angela should know better than to burden someone of your age with her troubles”. Sally's tone implied the only thing she cared about was Joe’s welfare.

Joe ignored the comment, asking her to close the door quietly on her way out, before he put on the television for himself.