by Morgan Rice
The giant lay at Vesuvius’s feet, bound by a thousand ropes, held down by a hundred trolls, and as Vesuvius stood over it, so close to its fangs, he studied it in awe. The beast craned its neck, snarling, trying to reach out and kill him—but it could not budge.
Vesuvius grinned, delighted. He took pride in having power over helpless things, and more than anything, he loved watching trapped things suffer.
Seeing this giant here, back in his cave, in his own territory, gave him a thrill. Being able to stand so close to it made him feel all powerful, made him feel as if there were nothing in the world he could not conquer. Finally, after all these years, his dream had been realized. Finally, he would be able to achieve his lifelong goal, to create the tunnel that would lead his people under The Flames and into the West.
Vesuvius sneered down at the creature.
“You see, you are not as strong as I,” he said, standing over it. “No one is as strong as I.”
The beast roared, an awful sound, and struggled in vain. As it did, all the trolls holding it swayed left and right, the ropes shifting, but not giving. Vesuvius knew their time was short. If they were going to do this, the time was now.
Vesuvius turned and surveyed the cave: thousands of workers stopped their labor to watch the giant. At the far end sat the unfinished tunnel, and Vesuvius knew this would be the tricky part. He would have to put the giant to work. Somehow, he would have to goad it to enter the tunnel and smash through the rock. But how?
Vesuvius stood there, racking his brain, until an idea came to him.
He turned to the giant and drew his sword, aglow against the flames of the cave.
“I will cut your ropes,” Vesuvius said to the beast, “because I do not fear you. You will be free, and you shall follow my command. You will smash through the rock of that tunnel, and you shall not stop until you have burrowed beneath The Flames of Escalon.”
The giant let out a roar of defiance.
Vesuvius turned and surveyed his army of trolls, awaiting his command.
“When my sword lowers,” he called out, his voice booming, “you shall cut all of its ropes at once. You shall then prod it with your weapons until it reaches the tunnel.”
His trolls looked back nervously, all clearly terrified at the idea of freeing it. Vesuvius feared it, too, though he would never show it. And yet he knew there was no other way—this moment would have to come.
Vesuvius wasted no time. He stepped forward decisively, raised his sword, and slashed the first of the thick ropes binding the giant’s neck.
Immediately, hundreds of his soldiers stepped forward, raised their swords high and slashed the ropes, and the sound of ropes snapping filled the air.
Vesuvius quickly retreated, backing off, but not too conspicuously, not wanting his men to see his fear. He slithered back behind his ranks of men, into the shadows of the rock, out of reach of the beast after it gained its feet. He would wait to see what happened first.
A horrific roar filled the canyon as the giant rose to its feet, enraged, and without wasting a second, swiped down with its claws in each direction. It scooped up four trolls in each hand, raised them high overhead and threw them. The trolls went flying end over end through the air, across the cave, until they smashed into the far wall and collapsed, sliding limply down, dead.
The giant bunched its hands into fists, raised them high and suddenly smashed the ground, using them like hammers, aiming for the trolls who scurried about. Trolls fled for their lives, but not in time. He crushed them like ants, the cave shaking with each smash.
As trolls tried to run between its legs, the giant raised its feet and stomped, flattening others.
Enraged, it killed trolls in every direction. No one seemed able to escape its wrath.
Vesuvius watched with a mounting dread. He signaled to his commander, and immediately, a horn sounded.
On cue, hundreds of his soldiers marched forward from the shadows, long pikes and whips in hand, all preparing to poke and prod the beast. They encircled it, rushing forward from all directions, doing their best to prod it towards the tunnel.
But Vesuvius was horrified to watch his plan collapse before his eyes. The beast leaned back and kicked a dozen soldiers away at once; it then swung its forearm around and swatted fifty more soldiers, smashing them into a wall along with their pikes. It stomped others, holding whips, killing so many so quickly that none could get near it. They were useless against this creature, even with their numbers and with all their weapons. Vesuvius’ army was dissolving before his eyes.
Vesuvius thought quickly. He could not kill the beast—he needed it alive, needed to harness its strength. Yet he needed it to obey him. But how? How could he goad it into the tunnel?
Suddenly, he had an idea: if he could not prod it in, then perhaps he could entice it.
He turned and grabbed the troll beside him.
“You,” he commanded. “Run for the tunnel. Make sure the giant sees you.”
The solder stared back, wide-eyed with fear.
“But, my Lord and King, what if it follows me?”
Vesuvius grinned.
“That is exactly the point.”
The soldier stood there, panic-stricken, too scared to obey—and Vesuvius stabbed him in the heart. He then stepped up to the next soldier and held the dagger to his throat.
“You can die here now,” he said, “by the edge of my blade—or you can run for that tunnel and have a chance to live. You choose.”
Vesuvius pushed the blade tighter against his throat, and the troll, realizing he meant it, turned and darted off.
Vesuvius watched as he ran across the cave, zigzagging his way amidst all the chaos, between all the dying soldiers, through the beast’s legs, and ran for the entrance to the tunnel.
The giant spotted him, and he swatted down and missed him. In a rage, and attracted to the one soldier running away from him, the giant, as Vesuvius had hoped, immediately followed. It ran through the cave, each step shaking the earth, the walls.
The troll ran for his life and finally entered the massive tunnel. Though wide and tall, the tunnel was shallow, ending after a mere fifty yards despite years of work, and as the troll ran inside, he soon reached the dead end, a wall of rock.
The giant, enraged, charged in after it, never even slowing. As it reached the troll it swiped for him with its massive fists and claws. The troll ducked and the giant instead smashed into rock. The ground shook, a great rumble followed, and Vesuvius watched in awe as the wall crumbled, as an avalanche of rocks came pouring out in a massive cloud of dust.
Vesuvius’ heart quickened. That was it. It was exactly what he had always dreamt, exactly what he needed, what he had envisioned from the day he set out to find this beast. It swiped again, and smashed out another chunk of rock, taking out a good fifty feet in a single swipe—more than Vesuvius’s slaves had been able to do in an entire year of digging.
Vesuvius was overjoyed, realizing it could work.
But then the giant found the troll, grabbed it, lifted it into the air, and bit off its head.
“CLOSE THE TUNNEL!” Vesuvius commanded, rushing forward and directing his soldiers.
Hundreds of trolls, waiting on standby, rushed forward and began pushing the slab of Altusian rock that Vesuvius had positioned before the entrance to the tunnel, a rock so thick that no beast, not even this creature, could break it. The sound of stone scraping stone filled the air as Vesuvius watched the tunnel slowly seal up.
The giant, seeing the entrance being closed, turned and charged for it.
But the entrance sealed a moment before the giant reached it. The entire cave as it slammed into it—but luckily the stone held.
Vesuvius smiled; the giant was trapped. He was right where he wanted him.
“Send the next one in!” Vesuvius ordered.
A human slave was kicked forward, lashed by his captors, again and again, toward a tiny opening in the stone slab. The human, realizing what was about to happen, r
efused to go, kicking and struggling; but they beat him savagely, until finally they were able to run him through the opening, giving him one last shove through.
From inside there came the muffled shouts of the slave, clearly running for his life, trying to get away from the giant. Vesuvius stood there and listened with glee as he heard the sound of the enraged giant, trapped, swatting and smashing at rock, digging his tunnel for him.
One swipe at a time, his tunnel was being dug—each swipe, he knew, bringing him closer to The Flames, to Escalon. He would turn the humans into a nation of slaves.
Finally, victory would be his.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX