Against the Giants

by Ru Emerson - (ebook by Flandrel; Undead)

  Gran could hear Mibya shrieking. Her own legs wouldn’t hold her. Mibya’s voice died suddenly. Probably the woman had as well. Gran squared her shoulders and crawled to where Lhors still knelt and caught hold of his ear. She tugged. Finally, he crawled after her into the dark. She kept a pinch-hold on his ear. He whimpered and flailed ineffectively at her. “Stop it!” she hissed. “There is no time! Stay out of the light and gather up as many of the women and children as you can without being seen!”

  “But…” He couldn’t manage anything else.

  Gran slewed around in front of him to pinch his other ear as well. “Listen to me!” she ordered in a furious whisper. “We will lose many of our dearest ones this night. It’s too late to stop that! All we can do now is rescue every single soul the gods permit us to save! Do you understand me?”

  Silence.

  The giant who hovered over the soup pot removed his makeshift lid and gazed down at the interior. Her stomach churned. Apparently satisfied, he dropped the lid back with a ringing clatter, then strode off to help his fellows. Several of them had fished brands from the fire and were thrusting them deep into the stable roof.

  She could no longer hear Yerik, Gran realized bleakly. She forced herself to concentrate on the heaving boy who stared at her with wet, terrified eyes. “Get people into the cellars—not the new cellars, they’ll collapse! Or get down to the lower dell or the stream. Find anyone hiding beneath the floors of houses. They’ll die if they stay there. Do you understand me, boy?”

  At first, she couldn’t be certain that he did. A glance over his shoulder as more lightning flashed gave her a new count of enemy. At least ten more leather-clad brutes were approaching from the north.

  Lhors caught a shuddering breath, nodded sharply, then scrabbled away from her on his hands and knees into the darkness.

  Gran went flat and still as more giants stormed uphill from across the fields. If I’m stepped on, she prayed silently, let it kill me at once.

  A woman’s scream topped even the thunder. The ground trembled all around her. For one brief moment, it was blessedly quiet. The stable went up with a crackling roar, and giants cheered. She clapped her hands over her ears and huddled next to dead Lharis as those trapped inside the building burned, while others fought free of the flames only to die on huge spears and swords.

  Something was bruising her ribs, she realized—the dead warriors sword lay some distance away, but one of his daggers had fallen from its scabbard. Slowly, cautiously, she wrapped a hand around it and drew it from under her. The weight of the thing, the feel of the carefully wound leather wrappings around the hilt, gave her a little inner strength. At least she could choose her own death, if nothing else. She drew a deep breath and opened her eyes.

  There were at least twenty giants out there, most surrounding the fiery stable while others torched houses or went looking for herd beasts or other fodder. They’d consider human bodies the same as game, fodder for the pot. She didn’t dare stay here.

  May the gods bless you for your care of us, she silently offered Lharis, then eased cautiously away from his body and back into the dark.

  The roaring fires of burning houses and barns cast an uncertain light. Shadows of running villagers and stalking giants flickered and danced in the flames’ cruel glow. Gran moved through the darkness, avoiding the light when she could and refusing to acknowledge the bloodied and broken corpses that littered her village.

  In the end, she was only able to rescue two young girls who had hidden under the back of the common house. Now smoke filled the building, flame shot through the thatched roof, and the back wall was uncomfortably warm. She could hear giants laughing down by the burning stable. Another was close but seemed to be occupied with plundering the henhouse. She couldn’t leave the two anyway, Gran realized bleakly. She’d delivered young Ilina herself, ten years earlier.

  It took work and time to persuade the girls to leave the scrape they’d dug themselves, even though the boards were beginning to glow red. When a pocket of pine-resin popped, sending sparks showering in all directions, little Ilina fixed her eyes on Gran’s eyes, clamped her fingers around weeping Nidyi’s wrist, and somehow got them both into the open just before the whole building collapsed. Gran gripped Ilina’s fingers and felt hers gripped in reply. She fought them all away from the fire, dragging the girls across open ground and into the prickly brush.

  Horrid laughter echoed all around them, punctuated by occasional screams or howls of pain.

  The girls would have stopped at the brush, but the old woman was adamant. She tugged fiercely at them, now hissing an order against one young ear or another while dragging the two terrified girls downhill along a shallow gully. Numb from terror, they stumbled into the narrow-mouthed cavern where just hours earlier she’d emerged with a basket of barley and a freshly mixed bag of herbs for the soup. She got the two inside ahead of her and waited while they eased their way back into darkness.

  The cries of her people tore at her. She clutched the dagger, but the urge was foolish—one old human woman against so many giants, the least of them twice her height. She’d die to no cause, and these two girls would surely die as well.

  She gasped as booming laughter drowned everything, including thunder. The sky above her was blood red, then painfully blue-white. Thunder roared to deafen the very gods, but it couldn’t quite drown a spiraling roar that shook her very bones. One of their enemies had just died up there. Rain suddenly poured down in sheets. She was soaked between one breath and another. All at once, the fires were diminished.

  Wind soughed over her. Gran’s nose twisted as she smelled burned hair and charred flesh. Thunder momentarily deafened her and drove her to her knees. When she could again hear, all she could hear was a deep, rumbling voice, bellowing orders that made no sense to her.

  * * *

  Just after dawn, Gran coaxed the girls from hiding and back up the hill. Lharis’ dagger rested against her back the way she had seen him wear it. “In case,” she whispered, but Ilina and Nidyi didn’t hear her. Both followed where she led, often stumbling. That was good. With luck, they’d never remember the previous night. With better luck, she’d have no need of that dagger. If she did, they were all three dead anyway.

  She moved cautiously into the square, the girls behind her. The enemy was long gone, leaving behind the burned husks of buildings. The dead lay everywhere. Oddly, the village goats grazed on spilled grain just beyond the ashes of the stable. Gran frowned. Why had the giants left goats and bodies behind? It wasn’t like any of the tales she’d heard.

  But she could see the answer right in the middle of the square. A dead giant sprawled across the open ground, his leather armor still smoldering and what skin she could see blackened as if by fire. She smiled grimly. A giant killer of a storm, yes. Lightning seeks whatever is tallest: tree, stone; sword set upright at a crossroads, or a giant in the midst of an otherwise barren square. The rest of his kind had fled rather than join him in death.

  Behind her, a twig snapped and she whirled, dropping Ilina’s wrist and fumbling awkwardly for the dagger. But it was only Lhors, weaponless, his face haggard and tears making muddy paths down a filthy face. The dark beard he’d begun to show this past year was burned in places, and one eyebrow was mostly gone.

  The girls remained where she left them. Lhors blinked at her expressionlessly, but as her fingers dug into his arm, he winced. Not in shock like the girls, then, just hurting. But there was no time for mourning—not for either of them.

  “Boy,” she hissed.

  “G-gran?” he stuttered. “They’re dead. E-everyone. All of them.” His hand fell limp against his leg. “I tried what you said. I tried!”

  “Shhh. It’s all right,” she said quietly.

  “No, it’s not!” He pulled free of her grasp. “N-no one would listen to me. They ran, and then I had Bregya and her youngest boy, and she l-looked at me and she… she…” He swallowed, turned away. “They’re all dead, except us,�
� he said finally.

  Gran patted his shoulder. There was nothing she could say that would mend this, and just now, she wanted to weep for her own son. But this boy… he kept things inside when he was upset. She didn’t dare let him do it with this. “I’m sorry, Lhors. It’s a dreadful thing. At least you and your father did what you could to avert it. Remember that.”

  The boy’s eyes brimmed, and his lips twisted in anger. “Why remember?” he managed, his voice thick with tears. “Will it change anything?”

  “Not now, but it will help you later.”

  He swore a soldier’s oath that shocked her silent. “I don’t care about later! My father—he had no chance! He fought for the king all his grown life! And then, only to be cast off like an aging horse because he was too old to fight! To send him out here to protect peasants!”

  “And we were grateful to him. He gave us his skills, and he gave us you. Second-guessing a life is foolish, Lhors,” Gran said flatly. “He died a hero. Remember that.” She wrapped both arms around him briefly. “We can’t stay here, Lhors. There’s no time. The giants may return. Are you hurt?”

  He shook his head.

  “You’re certain no one lives?”

  He nodded.

  “You’ve checked the cellars beneath the houses that aren’t burned?”

  “All of that. There’s no one.” He gazed helplessly at the twisted, blackened wreck of the stable.

  Gran closed her eyes briefly. “Lhors, we’ve work to do, you and I.”

  He nodded faintly. “I’ll fetch shovels—”

  “No, there are too many, and there are other immediate needs. One of us must go to High Haven at once to see if they were also attacked. If not, they must be warned of the danger, as must every village around us. I will have one of the High Haveners ride down to New Market with the warning and have him bring back men to dig graves or build pyres.”

  “But I can dig—”

  She laid a finger across his lips, silencing him. “No. You have another, harder task. You must catch Old Margit or one of the other horses and take the road to Cryllor. You must request an audience with Lord Mebree and inform him of what has happened. At the very least, you must warn the guard company there that giants have done this.”

  Lhors stared at her, his mouth slack. “Go to… Gran, why would they care? And I can’t ride worth a—”

  “They’ll care,” the old woman replied bluntly. “About revenues at the very least. Dead villagers don’t pay taxes. But the guard will have to stop giants who are bold enough to openly attack the way those did. Remember that this is not a plea for our lowly selves. Remember that. Keep this in mind instead: taxes. The king will send an army to keep the money flowing.”

  The boy swallowed, and his prominent throat-apple bounced. “Gran, you’re mad! You’d send me to convince a council? My father was only a captain of one of the hill companies, and that was over twenty years ago!”

  “Yes, but that’s more than any of the rest of us ever were. You are the son of a soldier, and that’s more than anyone else can claim. You are the only one we can send, Lhors. There is no one else. Now, remember to say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ often, especially to officers and nobles. That may open doors for you. Do not let them refuse to hear you, though.”

  “I can try,” Lhors said doubtfully, “but I won’t leave you here alone. We’ll all go. If I can catch Margit, the girls can ride her to High Haven. Then I’ll go on, I promise you.”

  To her dismay, Gran’s eyes filled with tears. She dashed them impatiently aside. “Good lad. Go find Margit. We’ll wait here.”

  Old Margit was nowhere around. Lhors searched for the mare for nearly an hour before giving up. If the giants had not taken her, then she had fled too far away for him to find, so he returned to the husk of a village to fetch Gran and the girls.

  Before the sun was much above the horizon, Lhors, Gran, and the two children were on their way to High Haven. The first hour or so, they did not trust the road, fearing another attack by hiding giants. Instead, they stumbled their way through trees, brush, and the occasional creek. Their progress was excruciatingly slow, and after a while, Lhors urged them onto the road so that they could find refuge all the quicker.

  They reached the tiny herding village at midday. Gran and the girls remained there while the villages remaining able-bodied men readied their defenses and prepared to go back to Upper Haven to bury the dead. Lhors went on, carrying a flask of water, a few ripe apples, a bit of bread, and a clay jug of herbed oil to pour over it. Mostly, he ate and drank as he walked. Now and again, he ran when the road was smooth enough, though nightfall slowed him to a walk again.

  He reached a small garrison outpost in the hills just short of daybreak the next day. Fortunately, his father had friends among the small company of scouts who patrolled the surrounding hill country. Lhors had no trouble passing on word of the destruction in the foothills. He had rather hoped to be sent back to High Haven, but the captain, a tall, bearded man named Edro, had other ideas.

  “You’re young and trained by your pa, but no true soldier, lad. And you have cause to petition for a company to come and clean out these giants, if they’re still about. I’ll take some of my men and head to Upper Haven myself to make sure the folk are safe and all. You better travel on up to Cryllor and let Mebree know what’s happened out here. So happens, your pa served Mebree before he retired. You stand a better chance of getting the lord’s ear when someone like me might not.” He also ordered a horse, an old gelding with a rough gait and a hard mouth, for the youth. “I’ll tell you truth, lad. No one here wants to ride old Bruiser. But once he’s far enough away from his stable, he’ll cover the ground for you, faster’n you could do yourself.”

  There wasn’t much Lhors could do but agree to the added journey and take the horse—a raw-looking old white brute with long, brownish teeth and a pink nose that had been badly chewed on at some point. Bruiser was no better than Edro had promised, but the bone-jarring trot ate up distance.

  Late on the third day out of High Haven, he rode up to Cryllor’s double gate and gratefully handed the gelding’s reins over to the guard.

  Cryllor was an outpost, a fort that still resembled one, though these days it was the size of a small city. It was quite the biggest place Lhors had ever seen. Despite the grief that swaddled his mind and emotions and weighed on him like a stone, he couldn’t help but pay heed to sights that ranged from the exotic to amazing.

  The city was ancient and many-walled. As it had grown from a log-walled garrison to a minor fortress and finally to a city, it had expanded well beyond the original fortifications. Still, the lords of Cryllor had prudently maintained that innermost wall and made certain that new outer walls were built as needed. Some of the newer barriers had been razed as the city grew. The stone from the previous outer bastions was then used in the new ones or broken down to be remade into buildings or to pave new streets.

  The oldest three sets of walls remained in place. The innermost still enclosed Lord Mebree’s manor and served as a final defense against any enemy strong enough to win through the main battlements and the city itself. The other two rings were each four man-lengths across—but hollow. They still served as barricade, barracks, stables, butteries, and weaponries for the lords armsmen.

  Since King Kimbertos had come to power, there had been no attacks anywhere around Cryllor. Lord Mebree’s city, once a strong fortress and a prosperous market, was nearly as infamous for its many slums and the well-entrenched thieves’ guild. Cutpurses and assassins were everywhere, as were the poor. The markets gave over vast sections where the needy could find stale bread, overripe fruit, soft tubers, and sacks of grain and flour beginning to mildew. Sour-smelling food stands alternated with tattered blankets piled next to used clothing, discarded boots, ill-tanned hides, or bits of fabric and leather too small to serve those who could pay for better. One or two stalls sold partially used charms and spells, while fortune-tellers with greasy pack
ets of cards or poorly blown gazing-balls tried to sell their skills.

  The wealthy and noble kept summer quarters high in the hills, well away from the heat and stench of the city. In winter, they lived in comfort behind locked gates, sending armed guards to accompany their servants on errands beyond the household walls.

  But to a boy who’d only once a year gone to New Market with his father, Cryllor was shining and glorious. I should have come here with Father, like he wanted, not like this, Lhors thought, but there had never been enough free time. The village had depended too heavily on Lharis for his hunting skills.

  Now Lhors gazed listlessly from paved streets and stone fountains to the carved doors on ancient dwellings and the gargoyles perched on the corners of flat roofs. The city was more impressive than he could have imagined from his father’s tales—yet it mattered no more than the incredible variety of people crowding those streets. He stared briefly at two reed-slender elves, then at a girl in bright-colored skirts and scarves swaying on a small, raised platform. At her feet two boys sat cross-legged, fiddling with their reed pipes while a third paced back and forth, adjusting the skin on his drum. None of this held Lhors’ attention for long. None of it was important.

  He gazed up at one of the inner lengths of wall—all that was left of what might have been an outer wall a long time before when the city had been much smaller. Now there was barely room for two guards to pace a few steps and keep watch over the people below.

  “My father might have stood there once,” Lhors said to himself. His throat closed. He drew breath through his nostrils then forced his attention elsewhere.