Stargate SG-1 Ficlet: By Her Choice
Title: By Her Choice
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Daniel, Sha-re, Kasuf.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: The movie, Children of the Gods.
Summary: Kasuf wants to give daughter Sha-re to Daniel as his wife. Daniel thinks Sha-re should make her own choice.
Word Count: 840
Written For: Challenge 157 - Courtship at beattheblackdog.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Stargate: SG-1, or the characters. They belong to their creators.
Kasuf had given Sha-re to Daniel, as was his right by the traditions of his people. He was the tribe’s leader, the Goodfather, the one they all respected, the one whose word was law. Sha-re was his daughter, and in his opinion Daniel, as one of those who had freed his people from the rule of the false god Ra, would make her a fine husband. Sha-re herself would be a fitting reward for one to whom all the tribes of Abydos owed so much.
Daniel saw things differently. Sha-re was beautiful with her smooth, lightly tanned skin, her deep brown eyes, and her cascade of thick, dark hair. And she wasn’t just beautiful; she was intelligent, and brave, and full of joy. Just being in her presence made Daniel giddily happy. She was the kind of woman who wouldn’t have looked twice at him back on earth; any man would be proud to have the love of such an incredible woman, and that was the problem.
Kasuf wanted him to accept Sha-Re as a gift, and as a dutiful daughter, Sha-re would not refuse, accepting that her father knew what was best for her. But Daniel was from earth, from America to be more precise, a country where personal freedom was a way of life. Forcing someone to marry him felt wrong. He wasn’t about to simply take Sha-re as his wife, not like that, not as an object, the ownership of which might be transferred from one man to another as easily as if she were livestock. Sha-re was a person, not an animal. Her father shouldn’t be the one to say who she must marry; she should get to choose her husband.
There was no way Daniel could deny that he desired Sha-re; he couldn’t imagine any man not falling immediately under her spell. Loving her would be so easy, but he wanted her to love him in return, not just be with him because her father willed it. As much as he respected Kasuf, this was one matter in which Daniel was not prepared to compromise.
So he courted her. It was an odd kind of courtship; he spent time with Sha-Re, in public, and often in the presence of her brother Skaara. Daniel learned from both of them, sending Sha-re into paroxysms of laughter over his inability to milk a goat, or grind grain into flour, or help erect the tribe’s tents. He knew so much about tribal life in theory, through the books he’d read and the archaeological digs he’d been on, but he had almost no practical experience. Yet his willingness to learn, and his refusal to give up no matter how many attempts it took for him to master something Abydonians learned in childhood, impressed as well as amused Sha-re.
He told her of the world he came from, and taught her about things she would most likely never see, now that Daniel had burned his bridges. It had been his decision to remain on Abydos and cover the Stargate, so that no one could go through from either side, and it was no sacrifice; he felt more at home among the members of Kasuf’s tribe than he ever had back on earth, among people who derided his theories and dismissed him as a kook. He hadn’t fitted in there, but here on Abydos he could be useful. He taught as much as he learned, dipping into his knowledge of history to steal ideas from other time periods for such things as the irrigation of crops and the digging of wells. He came up with improvements for the weaving looms the women used, and he taught the Abydonians English.
Sha-re listened to his stories of earth with delight and wonder, and recounted to him the legends of her own people. It made Daniel wish he had some way of recording her words other than in writing; he had precious little paper in the notebooks he’d brought with him, and only a couple of pens. Once the ink ran out, that would be it. Not that it was likely anyone from earth would ever read what he’d written, but he still wanted there to be a record of all that had happened since he and the others had first come through the Stargate; a complete record, not the heavily edited version Jack O’Neill and the rest of his team would put in their official reports, just on the off chance that when he uncovered the gate a year to the day from the team’s departure someone might get in touch.
In the meantime, he had a life to live, and a woman to court, and after a few short months, a marriage to prepare for since Sha-re proved as stubborn and determined as her father. She could have had any man, but still she chose Daniel, for his own sake and not simply because her father decreed that she should be his.
For Daniel, that was the beginning of a whole new adventure.
The End
Fandom: Stargate SG-1
Author: badly_knitted
Characters: Daniel, Sha-re, Kasuf.
Rating: PG
Spoilers: The movie, Children of the Gods.
Summary: Kasuf wants to give daughter Sha-re to Daniel as his wife. Daniel thinks Sha-re should make her own choice.
Word Count: 840
Written For: Challenge 157 - Courtship at beattheblackdog.
Disclaimer: I don’t own Stargate: SG-1, or the characters. They belong to their creators.
Kasuf had given Sha-re to Daniel, as was his right by the traditions of his people. He was the tribe’s leader, the Goodfather, the one they all respected, the one whose word was law. Sha-re was his daughter, and in his opinion Daniel, as one of those who had freed his people from the rule of the false god Ra, would make her a fine husband. Sha-re herself would be a fitting reward for one to whom all the tribes of Abydos owed so much.
Daniel saw things differently. Sha-re was beautiful with her smooth, lightly tanned skin, her deep brown eyes, and her cascade of thick, dark hair. And she wasn’t just beautiful; she was intelligent, and brave, and full of joy. Just being in her presence made Daniel giddily happy. She was the kind of woman who wouldn’t have looked twice at him back on earth; any man would be proud to have the love of such an incredible woman, and that was the problem.
Kasuf wanted him to accept Sha-Re as a gift, and as a dutiful daughter, Sha-re would not refuse, accepting that her father knew what was best for her. But Daniel was from earth, from America to be more precise, a country where personal freedom was a way of life. Forcing someone to marry him felt wrong. He wasn’t about to simply take Sha-re as his wife, not like that, not as an object, the ownership of which might be transferred from one man to another as easily as if she were livestock. Sha-re was a person, not an animal. Her father shouldn’t be the one to say who she must marry; she should get to choose her husband.
There was no way Daniel could deny that he desired Sha-re; he couldn’t imagine any man not falling immediately under her spell. Loving her would be so easy, but he wanted her to love him in return, not just be with him because her father willed it. As much as he respected Kasuf, this was one matter in which Daniel was not prepared to compromise.
So he courted her. It was an odd kind of courtship; he spent time with Sha-Re, in public, and often in the presence of her brother Skaara. Daniel learned from both of them, sending Sha-re into paroxysms of laughter over his inability to milk a goat, or grind grain into flour, or help erect the tribe’s tents. He knew so much about tribal life in theory, through the books he’d read and the archaeological digs he’d been on, but he had almost no practical experience. Yet his willingness to learn, and his refusal to give up no matter how many attempts it took for him to master something Abydonians learned in childhood, impressed as well as amused Sha-re.
He told her of the world he came from, and taught her about things she would most likely never see, now that Daniel had burned his bridges. It had been his decision to remain on Abydos and cover the Stargate, so that no one could go through from either side, and it was no sacrifice; he felt more at home among the members of Kasuf’s tribe than he ever had back on earth, among people who derided his theories and dismissed him as a kook. He hadn’t fitted in there, but here on Abydos he could be useful. He taught as much as he learned, dipping into his knowledge of history to steal ideas from other time periods for such things as the irrigation of crops and the digging of wells. He came up with improvements for the weaving looms the women used, and he taught the Abydonians English.
Sha-re listened to his stories of earth with delight and wonder, and recounted to him the legends of her own people. It made Daniel wish he had some way of recording her words other than in writing; he had precious little paper in the notebooks he’d brought with him, and only a couple of pens. Once the ink ran out, that would be it. Not that it was likely anyone from earth would ever read what he’d written, but he still wanted there to be a record of all that had happened since he and the others had first come through the Stargate; a complete record, not the heavily edited version Jack O’Neill and the rest of his team would put in their official reports, just on the off chance that when he uncovered the gate a year to the day from the team’s departure someone might get in touch.
In the meantime, he had a life to live, and a woman to court, and after a few short months, a marriage to prepare for since Sha-re proved as stubborn and determined as her father. She could have had any man, but still she chose Daniel, for his own sake and not simply because her father decreed that she should be his.
For Daniel, that was the beginning of a whole new adventure.
The End