"I meant what time of the day, or night," I said staring at him.
"Usually a few hours after sunset," he said looking a little embarrassed.
"How many days ago was each of the attacks?"
"Ummm," he said thinking about it a minute.
Laria leaned into me, "Four nights ago, nine nights ago, and fifteen," she said.
Gunis nodded, "What she said."
"So about every five or six days there's an attack here?"
Everyone nodded.
"So, tonight or tomorrow night. Okay. Let's go back to one of those taverns and have a drink," I said taking one last look around.
Five
Hidden Vale, Village Wall
8 Months
I was sitting on one of the 'guard posts' along the wall, which was really just a wider part of the wall with a place to sit, set at the west end of the village, which is where most of the attacks came from. The sun had set about three hours ago, and I had Laria with me, tucked under my chin and wrapped up with me in my cloak. I was only wearing leather armor, and was only equipped with the two long swords I normally fought with these days. If these things really were giants, I'd be better off in heavier armor, and with a larger, heavier sword and shield. Or maybe just a two-handed sword.
My reason for having Laria here was because I was curious about her and about the town. Plus it was boring out here all by myself. The rest of the townsfolk were more than willing to wait indoors.
"So the seven men I caught, they're the village elders?" I asked Laria.
"Not the elders so much, as the ones who run things," she said leaning back into me.
"And Gunis runs them?"
She nodded slightly, "He owns the tavern we were at today, he also owns the general store, and a large herd of the muzhen. One of the first places the giants attacked was his ranch to the west of here; the people killed were his farmhands."
I nodded, "What does your father do?"
"He owns the woolen shop, and produces and sells most of the wool dyes."
"Karl?"
"He owns the largest of the taverns."
"And who were the other four?"
"Ed, he owns the tannery, Tal, he owns the fletcher's shop and the third tavern, Kasin, he owns the largest butcher shop and is also the main supplier of lamp oil, and Serrin, he owns the biggest ranch and farm outside of the village."
"The blacksmith wasn't one of them?"
"No, Ulris won't set foot out of his shop when he has work to do and hates traveling. He also said, more than once, that it was a fool's errand."
"Well, it may have been, but at least it worked."
"Yes, it worked rather well," Laria purred and tickled my muzzle with the tip of her tail.
"So what was that comment your father made to Gunis about his daughters being bandit fodder?"
"Gunis had two daughters, he traded them each off to one of the bandit groups a few years ago when they raided the town," Laria sighed and leaned back into me again. "It wasn't pretty, neither of them wanted to go of course. Father thought we should have bought them off with food and money."
"Gunis likes his money, huh?" I mused.
"And he has little use for women, other than in his bed, and even then only if they give him sons."
"How many sons does he have now?"
"Three, the oldest is eight or nine now. Hamand I think his name is.
"He must have been pretty unhappy with his wife, if she gave him two daughters first," I pondered.
"He was, they say he traded her off to bandits ten years ago, and got a new one!" Laria growled.
"Wow, I don't think he and I are going to be friends," I sighed.
"Especially not if you follow through on your threat to make this part of your wife's kingdom," Laria giggled.
"Oh, it's happening, don't worry about that. Why do they call this place the 'Hidden Vale' anyway? If you get bandits raiding, it can't be all that hidden.
I felt her shrug, "The story is that when it was first settled, no one ever came here, the part they don't mention out loud is that the original settlers were all bandits and that this was a bandit camp as well. Over time, some set up a village and they stopped being bandits."
I chuckled at that. "And now the bandits come and prey on them, and not the other way around."
"Well, according to father, the last of the original bandits died off a couple of generations ago." She paused a moment, then asked softly, "Is your wife really the queen?"
I nodded, "Yup, she is."
"Is she going to be okay with me?"
"I don't honestly know," I sighed. "But don't worry about it; I'm the one she'll be mad at."
"But if I can't live with you, where will I live?"
I shrugged, "I can let you stay at my room in the temple, and if I have to, I guess I'll buy you a house or something."
"You'll buy me a house?" She said surprised.
"If I have to. I take care of my women, and well, you're mine now," I said and gave her a hug.
"So what's it like, being a champion?"
"It depends on the god you work for. I got lucky, mine is the best."
"So, you really do work for a god?" She said surprised.
"Yup," I noticed a couple of dark shapes starting to resolve in the distance. They looked fairly large, if I was judging distances properly.
"I think I see our friends," I said to her and I opened up my cloak. "You need to run and alert everyone, then go back to your room and wait for me there."
"Be careful, William," she said and turned to kiss me.
"Always," I said and kissed her back.
She jumped down from the wall then and ran off as I got out my longbow and readied my arrows. I had put an oil soaked cloth on the end of each of them, and I had a small lantern hanging off the inside of the wall, so I could light them easily. My only real shortcoming was that I only had a dozen arrows; I had only brought the bow along for hunting, I hadn't been expecting to actually use it for something like this.
I waited for the shapes to resolve into something I could distinguish, they weren't moving terribly fast, but their strides were rather big, so they approached at the same rate as a man at a fast walk.
I counted as they drew near, there were only four of them, but they were definitely big. Probably fifteen feet tall, maybe bigger. I put two arrows into the body of the furthest one back, to see what happened.
It stopped for a moment, fumbled around a bit and then started to slap at itself as it made loud grunting noises. The other's ignored it however, and the flames soon went out. So I started to shoot arrows at its head.
It screamed pretty loudly when the first one hit, I got it a second time, but it tuned around and started running away, so the third one missed. The lead one was almost on me at that point, so I sank two arrows into its face, and then had to drop my bow as everything shifted into overdrive and it swung its massive club at me.
I jumped over the swing, as it came around, and drawing my swords I jumped down from the wall and charged it.
The other two fanned out to either side, the lead one was now bellowing from my shots, I'd put an arrow in each eye, and while I hadn't killed it, I had definitely blinded it. It was stamping it's feet and flailing around with it's club, so I dodged around behind it, keeping an eye on the other two, who seemed more interested in stepping over the wall than helping their leader.
I took a look at its legs, now that I was close enough to see. It was wearing leggings of some sort, and either a boot, or it had leather wrapped around its foot. Winding up I chopped at where its Achilles tendon should be and was rewarded with a loud scream and it toppled over backwards as it lost the use of its foot, dropping the club.
I ran back towards the wall, and quickly vaulted over it, chasing the other two.
At this point the village archers had all started shooting flaming arrows at the giants, both of which were now trying to put the fires catching on their clothes out by slapping at the bu
rning spots with their hands. Both had dropped their huge clubs and were no longer trying to attack anyone. I was looking for an opening to hamstring another one, when it struck me.
They were human giants! I would have expected any giants that lived here, to look like us, like felines, the dominate race in this sphere. But these all looked like humans. Their heads were a lot smaller than I would have expected, but they had skin, heavy skin. They were wearing animal hides as armor, but poorly cured skins, with the fur still on them, so to the people here, who had never seen a furless human, they just assumed that they had sickly fur with bald patches.
As for their bodies, they had legs bigger than tree trunks, and massive arms as well, but their shoulders were narrower than their hips, and you could feel the ground shake as they stomped around. As the arrow fire increased, they finally turned and ran, one of them tripping over the wall and falling to the ground with a loud crash.
It bellowed loudly, but the impact with the ground had put the fire on its chest out, the other one however ran away rather quickly, burning more and more as the skins it was wearing caught fire.
The one that tripped got to its feet and stomped off after it, and the one I hand hamstringed was still bellowing and was trying to crawl after them.
Running up behind it I jumped up onto it's back, and digging my foot claws in I brought both swords down on the base of it's neck, driving them through the thick flesh, the underlying bone, and up into the brain, with all of my might.
It shivered once, and then it collapsed to the ground, dead.
"You killed it!" One of the villagers said while the others cheered.
"I killed one of them," I said. "I'm going to track the others and see where they're going."
I wiped my blades off, put my cloak back on, and gathered up my bow and remaining arrows.
"Anyone coming with me?" I asked.
One of the ones from the original group of seven, Tal, nodded. "I'll go with you. I know these lands pretty well, been hunting them for years."
I noticed the rest of the males were looking unsure, they probably didn't want to go, but they also didn't want anyone to think they were cowards.
"I'm not planning on fighting them tonight," I told them, "so the rest of you can go back to your homes, and keep an eye on things."
They heaved a collective sigh of relief and started to break up and head back to their homes.
"Can't say as I blame them," Tal said softly.
I shrugged, "You're coming."
"Yeah, but I plan on letting you do all the killing," he grinned.
"I'll keep that in mind."
It took us a half hour to catch up with them, moving at a fast jog. The one that had been on fire was down on the ground when we did, and the other one quickly gave up on it and left it there. So I killed it just like I had the other one.
After that, we followed the remaining one, but made sure we didn't get too close. It followed a path up into the mountains, and eventually turned into a small canyon. We'd been following it for over two hours now; I was guessing it was probably three or four in the morning.
"That's a box canyon," Tal told me, "it doesn't go anywhere."
"You sure?" I said pausing to look around at the ground. It was pretty dark out, as the moon had set, but there was enough starlight, that even with my feline night vision I could see a lot of large footprints.
"Positive. I've been in here before. There's a cave about a span and a half off the ground, but that's it.
"Ever been in the cave?"
He shook his head, and then looked at me. "You think that's where it's headed?"
I shrugged, "Let's go see."
We followed it in, and sure enough, it climbed up into the cave, which was about twelve feet off the ground, and disappeared inside.
"Wait here," I told Tal, and jumping up, I grabbed the ledge and pulled myself up enough to take a look inside. It was a lot darker in the cave, with no light at all, plus it stunk something fierce. But I could feel a gateway!
Pulling myself up onto the ledge I stood in a crouch and slowly made my way inside. I listened for a minute, and after not hearing anything, I pulled out small torch and used a cantrip to light it.
The cave was empty, but the dirt and sand on the floor revealed large footprints, so moving cautiously I made my way further in. The cave itself was pretty large, and it ran fairly straight, with a slight downhill slope. The roof was pretty uneven, but it never got lower than fifteen or so feet.
It took me probably five minutes because I was moving so slowly, but I came to the portal which was against the back of the cave, where it ended. It looked a little different to me, so I approached it carefully and put my hand on it.
I pulled my hand back quickly as I got shocked unexpectedly, swearing as I did. It wasn't a big shock, but I'd never been shocked by a portal before.
Extending my hand carefully a second time, I touched it, and experienced the shock again, it wasn't too painful, but it was definitely uncomfortable. I couldn't make much sense out of what I was feeling, but it didn't feel good, and it didn't feel safe. So I withdrew my hand and checking my surroundings I quickly made my way back out of the cave.
"I was starting to worry!" Tal said when I dropped down from the ledge above him. "What did you find?"
"Trouble," I told him. "I need to talk to some people back at Hiland about this."
"That bad?" He said.
"Maybe, I don't know."
We left at a faster jog than we had used to come here, I wanted to be back not long after sunrise, so I could look over the bodies before the villagers had a go at them.
When we got to the first one, the sun was starting to rise, I looked it over, and using one of my swords, I cut the straps on some of the armor and peeled it back.
"What in the god's name is that thing?" Tal said.
"Recognize this hide?" I said and motioned to poor leather armor I'd cut off.
He shook his head, "No, not at all."
I was standing there looking at it and wondering if I could roll it over when suddenly the sun hit it, and it changed.
"Look out!" Tal said and jumped back, shocked.
I just shook my head and stared at it. Then I poked it with my sword.
It had turned to stone.
§ §
I was asleep in Laria's bed, curled up with her, when my dreams suddenly cleared and I was in Fel's bar.
"Hi, Fel," I smiled, "I have a lot of questions tonight."
Fel smiled back and handed me a beer, we were sitting at our usual table in his bar. "I thought you might. Like your new girlfriend, she's cute. But I must admit that I am surprised at how easily you were lead astray. Again."
I grinned, "Yeah well, I didn't want them to feel all insulted if I turned them down when they made a gift of her to me."
"Is that what you're going to tell Rachel?" he laughed.
"I'll burn that bridge when I come to it," I sighed, "I'm still getting used to the idea that I'm the best thing that could have happened to her."
"Well this village is a bit backwards, by even Saladin's standards. They're pretty xenophobic as well, a hold over from their bandit days."
"So that bandit story is true then?"
Fel nodded, "Yes."
"I think one of the first things I'm going to do, after I get back, is going to be to lead an army up here to claim this place. Rachel would probably appreciate an outpost this far west up in the mountains."
"Hoping she'll get over Laria if you take it for her then?" Fel chuckled.
"Actually I was thinking of building a temple here, and asking you to talk to her for me, sort of as a thank you," I said with a smirk.
"Too bad that's a part of your normal duties, and not something you would do as a favor, isn't it?" Fel said smirking right back at me.
I shook my head, "Why do I even try? Like I'm ever going to get the better of a god."
Fel laughed, "Oh, I don't know, it's kind of funny that
you think you can get favors out of me, when I already can read your every thought."
I shrugged, "Man's gotta' dream."
"Apparently."
"Now, about these giants? What the hell are they? Why haven't they changed to fit in, and why did they turn to stone? Also, what the hell is up with that portal?" I asked, getting down to business.
"There are many aspects to the infinite," Fel said looking at me with a serious expression, none of his usual humor was apparently now. "Some of it is what you might call 'negative' energy, or perhaps an underside, laying below the spheres you normally associate with, like a shadow or an echo of the layers above.
"While quite rare, portals from spheres in those portions of the infinite, let's call it the 'underworlds,' do at times open up into our normal worlds."
"Is that why I felt the shock when I touched it?"
Fel nodded, "If you weren't a champion, you would have been injured by that shock, possibly knocked unconscious. Only a champion can even transit through a portal to the underworlds and survive the transit, and I would not recommend it. If you die there, the path back is long one and full of perils and nasty experiences."
I nodded, "Stay out of the portal, got it. What's the story with those giants though? Why didn't they change to fit in? And why did they turn to stone? Why the hell are they even here?"
"They didn't change, because of the nature of the underworlds being too different than the normal worlds. If you were to go through, you would find that you didn't change either. As for turning to stone, well actually they're not giants, in your original world they are known as trolls, and they come from a world of darkness and nightmares. Nothing from their world can survive the light in this one, which is why they only come raiding at night."
"I thought trolls were small and lived under bridges?"
"Different type of troll, these were called 'hill trolls' or 'mountain trolls' in your world. As for why they come," Fel sighed, "They like to eat meat."
"Like, suzhen, cattle, deer, and such?" I asked.
"And people. They especially like people."
"Well hell," I said. "If I had a couple of pounds of C4, I could collapse that whole tunnel and seal them in."
Portals of Infinity: Reprisal Page 5