If We Were Giants

by Dave Matthews

  One morning, Kirra opened her eyes to birdsong and a breeze rustling the leaves. She was mentally and emotionally exhausted, but the flood of memories had slowed to a trickle. The rest of them were still lurking, she was quite certain, ready to overflow and engulf her at any time. But at least for this moment, her mind was mostly clear. Functional, anyway.

  Kirra took the opportunity to think about what she should do next.

  She could brush off Loba’s questions, pretend everything was fine, agree with the family that this was just a random group of hunters and they would wander back to their own land soon, never to be heard from again. But she knew she would never do this. For one thing, this family had been much too good to her, and for another thing, lying and pretending were not going to keep the Takers from coming back.

  Another option was confessing everything, of course. That was also not something she’d be able to do. After losing one family…could she really look another family in their eyes and watch their faces as tolerance toward her turned to doubt and anger and revulsion and hate? She did not think she could survive that.

  When the true answer came to her, it was so simple she was honestly shocked that it had taken so long.

  She must leave. Now. And never come back.

  The fall of Zedu had been her fault. Entirely. But it was everyone else in her native community who had suffered. And what had happened to her? She was living comfortably with nice people, safely hidden in the trees with plenty to eat.

  She didn’t deserve this—some part of her had always known this—and the gods would not allow it. That was why the Takers had shown up. It was her inescapable punishment, coming to find her at last.

  If she left, the Tree Folk would be spared.

  She should have made the ultimate sacrifice at the Takers’ camp that night, presented herself to Red Streak and his troops and accepted the outcome as a consequence of sneaking Outside without her father. If she’d only had the courage to do that back then, Zedu would still be a happy and thriving community today.

  But instead she had run, taken the easy way out, and ended up leading the Takers right to Zedu’s doorstep.

  So now it was time for her to accept the fate she had rightfully earned. Exile herself from her second home, and keep the Tree Folk safe.

  Kirra listened carefully for any sounds coming from the hut above. All was silent. The family must be out and about their business in the forest. Perfect.

  She pulled herself out of her hammock and made her way to the platform above. It would take a quick minute to pack her few possessions and then she could leave this place forever.

  THE POUCH ON KIRRA’S BACK was relatively light. It hadn’t felt right to take any food from the family for her journey, even though she had caught or prepared much of it herself, so she only had her clothing and a cutting stone. It would be enough. It was more than she deserved.

  She hesitated, toes on the edge of the circular platform that surrounded the hut. As usual, she paused for a moment out of nervousness and respect for the two-hundred-foot drop to the ground. Kirra lingered even longer this time, heartbroken at the thought of never seeing these people again, never getting to—

  She pushed those thoughts away. They would paralyze her. She was going to have to get better at avoiding Memory Traps. She’d have a double set of them now—one for each home she had lost.

  As she stood there, she detected a faint scent drifting into the forest. She raised her nose and sniffed: It was the fresh smell of moisture gathering in the air. Kirra shaded her eyes with her hand and looked to the east, where billowy clouds had started to form and appeared to be headed this direction. The wet season was finally on its way. Maybe not today, but soon.

  She sighed. Having to contend with heavy rains didn’t make her decision to leave any easier. It would be more difficult to find food and nearly impossible to build a dry shelter. But, she admitted to herself, there was never going to be a good time. She just had to do it.

  Kirra took a deep breath and extended one leg out over the open air. As soon as her foot hit the branch, she heard a voice say, “Where do you think you’re going?”

  She flinched and glanced up. Luwan was perched on a branch above the hut. As she looked at him, his friends started to emerge from behind the surrounding screen of leaves. There was Teeha, the builder, with her rough hands and serious face. Kharee, a muscular boy a few years older than her, along with his younger brother, Mozan. And finally, Makina, a small but agile girl who could zip through the trees almost faster than a Hook Hunter.

  Invisible to Kirra just a moment before, they suddenly appeared, as if parts of the tree had come to life.

  They all stepped easily onto the platform. She just stared at them, heart racing.

  “It’s so good to see you out of the hammock!” Luwan said. “You feeling better?”

  She nodded.

  “So.” He gestured to the pouch on her back. “Where are you headed?”

  Kirra cleared her throat. “Oh…you know. I have to try to get to the salt caverns. I need to repay Mome for his loan.”

  “Is that right?” Luwan took a few steps toward her. “Then what’s in the pouch? Shouldn’t it be empty?”

  “Oh…I borrowed some other things from him as well. I need to return them.”

  Kharee scoffed and shook his head.

  Mozan whispered, “She’s not a very good liar.”

  Makina clapped a hand over her mouth to stifle a giggle at that.

  Luwan stepped closer and reached for the pouch. Kirra didn’t move to stop him. She felt as if she had no fight left in her. He gently grabbed the strings and lifted the little knapsack off her shoulders, then opened it up and looked through the contents.

  “These are all your clothes,” Luwan said. He looked back up at her with soft, sad eyes. “Please tell me that you aren’t trying to leave.”

  “You don’t understand—I have to.” She snatched the pouch back from him. In her desperation to get away, her words tumbled out in a rush. “I know you won’t be able to understand, even though you’ll try, because you’re a good person, but please don’t get in my way, because if I don’t leave right now, then something very bad could—”

  “Shh.” Luwan took her by the shoulders. “Just listen to me for a minute, all right?”

  She shook off his hands, looked at the ground. “Luwan, please, I can’t—”

  “Hey, it’s me. You can trust me.” Luwan looked at her steadily until she raised her head and met his gaze. “We have something to show you.”

  Kirra scanned his friends’ faces. All of them were offering her sympathetic smiles—except Teeha, who never smiled at anyone.

  “Now listen,” Luwan said softly. “If I say the word hunters”—he whispered it—“you’re not going to lose it again, are you?”

  Kirra took a deep breath and then shook her head.

  “Good.” Luwan smiled, too. “Because I think we might have solved that particular problem.”

  The river’s current was lazy, but Kirra could still hear it. She had been traveling for a while through the trees with Luwan and his friends, and now her breathing started to become shallow and she could feel her hands getting clammy as she realized they were approaching the place where the group of Takers had been spotted.

  “Why are you bringing me back here?”

  Luwan turned and grinned at her. “You’ll see. Just another minute.” He hopped to a lower branch, and another, and then scrambled all the way down the trunk until he was standing on the ground. He looked up and waved for Kirra to join him, and the rest of his friends followed.

  Luwan led the little band around a copse of trees and then the river was before them. Kirra’s heart started thundering at the sight, but she clenched her fists and took deep breaths. She needed to keep it together, stop being so fragile and pitiful. And, though she didn’t believe for a moment that Luwan and his friends had solved anything, she owed it to him to at least see what they wanted to s
how her.

  “We’ve been spying on them. The hunters,” Luwan said. He pointed downriver. “Do you see what they’ve built to get back and forth? It’s very clever.”

  Kirra squinted. On the riverbank there was a wooden post with a rope looped around it. The rope stretched across the water and was tied to a corresponding post on the opposite side. Resting by the post on the far shore was a raft that was tethered to the rope. So, she thought, after the Takers finish their raids, they must use this contraption to ferry their game back and forth.

  Kirra’s mind raced. The good news was that they were taking their plunder away from the Tree Folk, back to the other side of the river. The bad news was that Kirra knew they wouldn’t stop there. When more of them realized how good the hunting was over here, more of them would show up. And even if they didn’t decimate the entire animal population of the forest, they were bound to discover the homes in the trees eventually. And then another community of good people would be destroyed.

  “Hey. You still with us?” Luwan shook her gently by the shoulder, jostling her out of her thoughts.

  She nodded.

  “Okay,” he said. “They went hunting three times last week. But we haven’t seen them in several days.”

  Makina stepped forward. “The rains will be coming any day now, but we think they’re going to try at least one more time, since they’ve left that raft there.”

  Mozan added, “After the river rises, their pulley system will be worthless. No way it will work.”

  “We’re going to be ready for them,” Luwan said. “And we’re going to make sure they never come back.”

  “No.” Kirra shook her head. “Don’t do anything to them. Please. Stay away from them.” Her eyes pleaded with Luwan and she grabbed his arms with both hands. “You don’t understand. The best thing you can do is hide. Remain safe up in the trees.” Kirra felt a frantic desire to leave. The longer she stayed here, the more danger these people were in. She had to get on with her punishment and exile herself to keep the Takers away.

  “Shh.” Luwan broke her grip lightly and turned her desperate clutching at him into an embrace. He held her for a few moments until her shaking subsided. “Come on, Kirra. At least let us show you what we’ve built.”

  “You’ve built something?” She pulled back and gave him a look. “What do you mean?”

  “Luwan—he told us.” Kharee stepped forward. “These hunters, they scared you. We wanted to scare them back.”

  Luwan grinned. “My friend Kharee doesn’t always have the best way with words, but that pretty much sums it up.”

  Kirra shook her head. “But you can’t scare these—”

  “Yes we can!” Little Makina marched right up to her, the girl’s head barely reaching Kirra’s waist. She talked as fast as she moved through the trees. “We were all talking about it, and when we spied on the hunters, we saw how big they were, and I said, ‘They look like giants,’ but I didn’t think anybody would listen, because everyone looks like a giant to me, practically, but then Mozan agreed with me, which is funny, because he never agrees with me about anything, and Kharee also agreed with me, which is even funnier, because he’s pretty gigantic himself, and that’s when I said I wish we could be giants, too, because then they would be as scared of us as you were scared of them, and then Teeha joined in the conversation, which is weird, because she doesn’t say much, you know, but she said, ‘What if we actually could be giants?’ and then she and Luwan went away and talked and came up with their plan and then came back and told us and we all liked it, and then we worked really hard the whole time you were in your hammock, and Teeha is a really good builder and we are really good helpers—me, especially—and now we want to show it to you, because Luwan thinks it might help you smile and be yourself again, so will you let us show you now? Please?”

  Kirra peered around at all the faces gazing eagerly at her. Had they really made this whatever-it-was for her? No—it had been for Luwan, really. But he had wanted to do it for her, and the rest of them seemed to want to make both of them happy.

  She reached down and tousled Makina’s hair. “Well, I don’t see how I can say no to all that.”

  Makina clapped and hugged Kirra fiercely, then grabbed her by the hand and tugged her deeper into the forest. “Come on, it’s right up here.” She led Kirra and the others to the ferry post the Takers had set up on this side of the river, then started to follow a path that led into the forest.

  As the band of friends walked along, Kirra turned to Luwan, raising her eyebrows at him in a question.

  Luwan gestured to indicate the path they were walking on. “This is the access point for the hunters. They come this way every time—saves them from having to clear a new trail for each hunt.” He pointed up ahead. “They split up eventually, in ones or twos, to cover more ground and get more game, but at this spot they are always still together. And so they will all see this at the same time.” Luwan spread his arms wide with a flourish.

  Kirra looked up. And, oh, by the gods, what had they done?

  Towering over their heads, a good twenty feet above the forest floor, a great face emerged from a screen of leaves and stared down at them. The face alone was as tall as Makina, and it was scowling at them with thick, furrowed brows and a long, sharp nose.

  Kirra stepped back, her hand over her chest. Luwan laughed and clapped her on the shoulder. “Doesn’t it look real? I told you, Teeha is amazing. She can build anything.”

  Teeha crossed her arms over her chest and nodded her agreement with this assessment.

  As Kirra looked closer, she could see the illusion for what it was: a huge structure made of wood and mud and rocks and brush. But still. It had looked real enough when she first glanced up at it. A forest giant, just like something out of a story.

  “It’s pretty incredible,” Kirra breathed.

  Makina tugged on her arm. “I made the nose all by myself,” she whispered. “Well, mostly.”

  “You did a nice job. That thing is hideous.”

  Makina beamed.

  Kirra stepped back a few paces to take in the entire scene. The face was impressive, but she realized that wasn’t even half of it. In between the leaves she could see two thick arms descending, so long that the knuckles almost dragged on the ground, and also two sturdy legs that had been crafted out of fallen logs. Draped around these limbs were old quilts, pieces of clothing, and strips of fabric that had all been sewn together, so it appeared as if the huge creature were wearing a tattered multicolored cloak.

  Kirra had to admit that the whole thing really did look like a giant lurking among the leafy trees.

  “Teeha showed us how to build the skeleton out of wood,” Luwan said, “and then use the trees to prop it up, anchor the whole thing in place.”

  “The trees are the real giants,” Mozan said. “They’re just helping us with our fake giant.”

  “And then, as you can see, we filled it in with anything we could find in the forests,” Luwan said. “We didn’t have time to make a body, but we think it’s still going to be enough. It doesn’t have to be perfect—if all goes well, they won’t be getting close enough to examine it—but just good enough to work one time.”

  Kirra wrinkled her brow in confusion. “Good enough to work how?”

  “To scare them away!” Makina said.

  Kirra studied the entire structure. She cleared her throat. “It’s good, really good—Teeha, the craftsmanship is incredible, and I have no idea how you all pulled this off…but do you really think they’re going to be afraid of it?”

  “Oh, it gets even better.” Luwan grinned. “Teeha also knows all about mechanics—straps and hinges and ropes and pulleys and levers. She even snuck down and studied the ferry rig that the hunters put together to get ideas about how to make it move. Isn’t that just perfect? We all tried to—”

  “Wait—it moves?” Kirra said.

  “Yes!” Makina shouted. “Teeha, tell her how you got the idea!”
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br />   The stoic builder shrugged and looked at the ground, clearly uncomfortable with all the attention. “It was nothing. I just…I remembered these puppets that my dad made for me when I was a little girl. The head and arms and legs were all connected to strings, and you could hold a little board where the strings were attached, and when you moved the board this way and that, you could make the doll move around. Dance or walk or whatever.”

  Kirra nodded. “I had one of those when I was little, too.”

  “Uh, everybody?” Kharee said. “We need to show Kirra how it moves. Now.”

  “We will,” Luwan said. “Just first let us—”

  “No,” Kharee said. “Now.” He pointed across the water.

  The group of Takers was making its way across the river stones on the opposite shore, heading for their raft.

  “GET TO YOUR STATIONS!” Luwan cried.

  The rest of the gang scurried about, scrambling up trees and placing themselves at various positions around the huge puppet. Luwan grabbed Kirra’s hand and pulled her into the forest.

  They climbed a tree above and behind the giant’s head so Kirra could peek through the leaves and have a good view of what was happening below. When he found the perfect vantage point, Luwan took Kirra by the shoulders and slowly lowered her to a seat on a wide branch. He bent over and peered into her eyes. “Look, I know this is scary for you. I don’t pretend to understand or know why—because you have never told me anything about, you know, before you came here—but I trust you. I believe you have a good reason to be afraid of these hunters, okay?”

  Kirra nodded, grateful he wasn’t pressing her for more information.

  “So please trust me. We’ve been practicing all week, while you’ve been…resting. So even though I know these men spook you, will you be able to stay while they approach? Watch what happens?”