Against the Giants

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 anda prosperous market, was nearly as infamous for its many slums and the well- entrenched thieves’ guild. Cutpurses and assassins were everywhere, as werethe 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 packets 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 withhis 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 incrediblevariety 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 wasleft 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 tohimself. His throat closed. He drew breath through his nostrils then forced his attention elsewhere.

Some distance away, a man clad in mail and plate armor that shone like silver moved through the crowd. He was followed closely by a boy and a horse. The horse was a huge creature, blue-black with a well-brushed mane and tail that hung nearly to the paving. The steeds head rested on the knights plate-clad shoulder as if he were an enormous pet.

That’s a paladin! Lhors thought in amazement. To think! Hisfather had told him wonderful tales about paladins, and this past winter he’dopenly spoken of his hopes that Lhors might become equerry to such a man. I might have liked that, Lhors mused, if only because Father would have been proud, but the village could never have spared me. Even Lhors’ huntingskills-nowhere near as good as his father’s-were needed.

Lhors glanced after the paladin and the boy with renewed interest. Odd companions. The mail-clad man was an impressive figure, the boy a gawky creature of perhaps ten years with spiky brown hair and ragged clothing. Curious, Lhors thought. There must be some tale there, though he hadn’t the witto work one out.

Some distance on, a gray-bearded man juggled three lit torches. Lhors slowed but moved on almost at once. He had seen a boy moving among the awed crowd, using a slender-bladed knife to relieve people of their coin bags. Cutpurse. So that is where the word comes from, Lhors realized. He made certain of his own coins and kept going.

He paused now and again to repeat the gate guard’sinstructions to himself. Straight past the Shrine of Heironeous, which he would know by the huge stone hand clutching a lightning bolt. He tried not to think about the combination of huge hands and lightning. Who or what was a Heironeous? It must be a god to have a shrine, but who prayed to a god who called upon lightning?

Upper Haven had prayed to all the gods in general-one neverknew which might be offended by being left out. Lhors knew little of such things himself. His father now and again invoked the name of Trithereon, though when things went wrong, Lharis bespoke one he named as Dread Hextor. “One who was awarrior and is now poor is doubly in the care of Hextor,” was all his fatherwould say.

“Straight past the shrine,” he repeated to himself, “thenturn south beyond the armorer’s and south again at the wall. Follow the wallaround to the gate.”

All at once, he could see the shrine-a small stone buildingwith a massive lightning bolt and fist of shining black stone. Lhors felt suddenly very peasantlike and out of place. He hurried on, passing through a sprawl of stone buildings, small huts, and a few open-sided tents. This must be the armory, he decided, though other goods were sold as well-furs, wroughtmetal jewelry, and a variety of armor. The noise was incredible here. A massive brute of a smith on his left was beating red-hot metal, and just beyond him, two younger men were battering horseshoes and dipping the finished products into a vat of water.

He caught the familiar reek of a tanners-rotting hidessoaking in salt brine-and stopped short. Bregya. His throat tightened.He’d helped her this past year with the scraping after she’d become too ill andweak to do the heavy work. Upper Havens master tanner had become something of a substitute mother to Lhors, instructing him in proper manners, helping him to understand girls, and knowing when he needed to talk about things that he couldn’t tell his father. Lhors swallowed hard and moved on quickly.

Do not think about Bregya! To come this far, only to weep in the city streets or worse, before the guards! His father’s shade would behorrified, and he himself would die of shame.

Lhors had rehearsed the tale often on the journey here. A boy of his class would be given little time for an audience with a lord, however important his message. The more he ran the words through his mind, the less the words themselves would hurt. You must tell what happened as quickly and clearly as you can, and if the lord permits, you must ask his help.

He ran through the words once again as he turned the corner. “They must be stopped. They destroyed our village and now are more confident. Ifthey burn every village in the hills, then they will believe nothing can stop them. Then they will turn on the plain, perhaps even the king’s city. Better toend their terror with Upper Haven.” He stumbled over a badly angled cobble andglanced around furtively. No one was watching him, fortunately. “Upper Haven wassmall, but honest,” he continued to himself. “We paid the king’s tax every year,and we provided goods for the baron’s hunting lodge. Perhaps the coin is smallcompared to that of a town like New Market, but join our tax to that of the other villages…” And there I pause, Lhors told himself. Let Lord Mebree seethe answer himself, as my father would say.

He bore south at the wall, fingers trailing over its greened stones. The way was narrower here and the wall very tall and sturdy looking. On his right was a long row of joined buildings that might be houses, but they had few windows or doors, and there was no sign of people anywhere.

As the wall curved away to the left, he came upon a small baker’s shop where the smell of fragrant bread filled the air. His stomachrumbled, and he fingered the twist of fabric that held a silver and three copper pieces in his right pocket. He’d left the hill garrison with three silver piecesthe captain had pressed upon him-more money than he’d had for himself in all hislife. It appalled him how quickly it had gone, frugal as he’d been and as littleas he’d eaten. And there was still the return journey. But it would be foolishto come so far and faint from hunger at the king’s feet. He eyed the display,finally choosing a plain roll for a single copper.

The baker’s wife eyed him appraisingly as she took the coin,then split the roll and spread a generous dollop of runny cheese on it for him. “You’re too thin, lad,” she told him severely and waved him away when he triedto pay for the extra. “Most young ’uns as lean as you are would try to stealtheir bread. I appreciate honesty in a boy.”

He thanked her as graciously as he knew how, suddenly grateful for Bregya’s lessons. Odd, though, he thought as he walked away withhis mouth full of soft bread and spicy cheese. It would never have occurred to him to steal food.

The tough little loaf would have been almost enough by itself. With the addition of the cheese, his stomach was properly full, and he felt alert for the first time in days.

He drank from a fountain where water poured from the mouths of oddly shaped stone fish. There were more guards here and the long row of houses gave way to a series of pens and stables. Two horsemen, helmets eased back off their faces, rode past him at a slow amble, heading in the direction he was going. Some paces on, they dismounted, handed their reins to a barefoot boy who led the horses into a fenced enclosure close by and began unsaddling them. The men vanished, and moments later, Lhors could see the broad opening that breached the innermost wall and beyond that, the high wall.