He went to the bathroom and took a shower. The scar on his thigh would be gone by morning. Regeneration was a young giant’s gift. Few would survive to adulthood without it.
• • •
Amy Holcomb left the engine running and the headlights off as she stared at the hotel where most of her crew stayed. She couldn’t very well go door to door hammering her fist on the cheap plywood, yelling for Hueg to show himself. He’d been absent for three days, far too long for a simple hangover.
Smith and the others wouldn’t talk about it but didn’t seem worried. She had gone to the bar yesterday and knew all about the fight. “I’m this close to calling the police and telling them to kick your door down,” she said to the inside of her truck cab.
Most of the hotel looked vacant. Tenants were on their way home from the bar or already asleep.
She reached to twist the key in the ignition, start the car, and leave. Hueg was not her problem. Maybe she wanted him to be, but he wasn’t.
The light to his room came on. The door opened. She couldn’t see inside from where she had parked and doubted he could see her without stepping onto the sidewalk and looking around.
“Let’s go, Amy,” she muttered. Slipping out of the car, she squatted down and hurried toward her quarry. The young man had a girlfriend or a wife. Otherwise, he wouldn’t be so uninterested in her.
That’s what she told herself.
Heat emanated from his room as though he had just taken the hottest, longest shower in history. There was no steam. She couldn’t smell soap or shampoo.
Moving between cars parked outside each room, she crept close enough to see in his open door.
She stopped. The bartender had described the fight in detail. The man wanted to be a newspaper journalist. He was good with description and the story he told was compelling if a bit unbelievable.
Amy braced herself to see blood and discarded bandages all over the hotel room.
She peeked in and saw his face, illuminated by blue light from the television. But there was also a strange, contrasting light as though the cheap room had a blazing hearth in one corner. He smiled at some joke made in the epic fantasy he was watching at full volume. She’d never seen him smile. Her heart skipped a beat.
The oversized, childlike stranger wasn’t exactly handsome—fascinating was more accurate.
She edged sideways to see more of the room. Clean and orderly, it looked like he wasn’t planning to stay long. Flat-as-a-board bed covers still had hospital tight corners.
He had a wife or a girlfriend—had to—there was no way a man could keep a room this tidy on his own. It was like he slept on the floor and took baths out in the icy river to avoid making a mess.
Angry now, she boldly stepped into the threshold. “Just tell me you’re married so I can stop losing my mind. I mean don’t you find me attractive?”
The words died in her throat as he turned to look at her, fire swimming in the palm of his hand like a pet. He was naked to the waist, his skin a swirl of black and silver tattoos deeper than the skin they were drawn on. The strange scrollwork markings on his skin retreated from his neckline in time with his pulse from a small, rune-carved medallion.
• • •
Hueg looked up and saw Amy’s eyes go wide. He slammed his hands together to put out the fire he had started with napkins and a lighter, then toyed with for hours as he watched television.
She spun out of view.
He jumped up and ran to the door to watch her running into the night. She slipped on the ice, slid past her company pickup truck, and fought back to her feet.
He started after her and realized his mistake immediately. She had been startled by something she didn’t understand. Now she was terrified by his pursuit. He wished Tegerst were here. His father’s bodyguard and weapons master would know how to fix the situation.
Amy scrambled back to the truck and tried to yank the door open.
He closed the distance.
She turned and ran into the woods.
Wearing only blue jeans and the medallion his mother had given him, Hueg sprinted after Amy, but her size allowed her to duck under branches and down side trails that restricted his movement. He was faster than she, but the terrain protected her.
She screamed when he caught her by the river. Snow fell harder, but he could feel battle heat inside of him.
“Wait! I don’t want to hurt you,” he said.
“Why are you chasing me?” she shouted.
“Why are you running?”
She backed closer to the water, hands forward defensively. “You were on fire but not really on fire... I don’t know why I ran. I’m just scared, okay!”
He took a step back. “I’m sorry. I’ll leave in the morning. Please don’t talk to anyone about me after I’m gone.”
“What?” she asked, stepping forward.
“People are looking for me. It’d be better if you didn’t get involved,” he said.
“You’re not leaving,” she said. “You signed a contract for six weeks.”
Hueg stepped closer and took her by her shoulders. She tensed but didn’t pull away. Looking up at him wide-eyed, she seemed small. Hueg was little more than half his mature size, yet loomed over her and weighed twice as much. He lifted his medallion with one hand and pressed it to her lips.
“That’s kind of weird...oh my,” she said. Her chest rose and fell as her breathing changed. She gazed at the images the medallion revealed to her.
He led her along the river that now resembled his home world. Meant as a gift, the medallion helped to hide him in this world while still being able to see his home.
Holding hands, they looked across an ice-covered lake. Men walked across the frozen landscape with fire in their hands. From time to time they thrust a hand downward and melted a hole. Others followed and fished from the carefully carved ice wells.
The dragon called Utimir soared over the mountains looming on the horizon.
“Those aren’t men,” she said. “They’re giants.”
Hueg said nothing for several long moments. “I shouldn’t have shown you this.”
She faced him. “Why did you?”
“I am alone in a strange land. No one is my friend. I didn’t want you to think I didn’t like you,” he said.
“But you’re not a giant like those... um... giants,” she said.
“How old do you think I am?”
“I don’t know?”
His heart ached as he looked at images of his home as it had been before he left. “Either four or fourteen in human years. It doesn’t translate well.”
“Oh my God. I was—you look like a grown man. Let’s just get that straight. Don’t judge me,” she said.
“Human women seem stranger the more I talk to them,” he said.
She laughed but it didn’t sound right. “You better take a few more days off, then come back to work.”
“Are you sure that’s a good idea?” he asked.
She touched his thigh. “Mort told me you got stabbed through the leg. You did, didn’t you?”
He didn’t answer.
“But now you run like a two-hundred-and-fifty-pound gazelle,” she said.
“It wasn’t as bad as it looked,” he said.
“The rumors about the bank robbery are true, aren’t they? Anyone you know?” she asked.
“No giant would dishonor himself with theft,” he said.
“Really?”
“Not theft of human money. There is nothing in this world my people need,” he said.
“How can you know that?”
“Because if there was something we wanted, we would have already taken it.”
Color drained from her face.
“I need to find the prison truck.”
“What prison truck? And why would you need a prison truck?” she asked.
“I believe someone has captured one of my people and is making him or her do things.”
She raised an eyebr
ow. “How would someone make a giant do something they didn’t want to do?”
“There are ways.”
• • •
Hueg drank gallons of whiskey in pursuit of his goal. Each bar crowd had different stories. Some were about the abandoned military base no one could ever find. Others were about bank robberies. One mentioned a haunted forest where it sounded like the moon was screaming at the trees.
He listened. He explored. He avoided getting in fights.
One night, a year after he revealed his secrets to Amy, he followed a quiet man from a bar to his military surplus Jeep and watched him drive out of town. This far north there were few cabins he didn’t know about. The man was headed into pure wilderness during the blizzard season. Gentle snowfall could become a whiteout without warning.
Hueg kept his distance in the pickup truck Smith and Amy had taught him to drive. He watched the stranger head up false roads and come back. A year of searching had taught Hueg a lot about the area. He knew which roads ended in rock falls or just ended for lack of taxpayer interest.
He followed for several miles, then parked. He ran after his quarry. Jogging wasn’t his favorite thing despite the value his father and Tegerst put on the skill. A fast army almost always won wars, they said.
He was careful to look behind him often. It wouldn’t do for Amy or Smith to see what was about to happen. Tegerst had taught him to watch in all directions to avoid ambush. A fire prince must always be ready.
The trees of this world were small, almost delicate, but there were a lot of them here. Enemies could hide. There could be an army encircling him.
He considered stopping because it was important to evaluate options. Every time he heard of a bank robbery or wild stories of a giant criminal, his heart burned not only with the need for justice but with loneliness and homesickness. If he didn’t find the captured fire giant, he would go crazy.
What was the purpose of living in this world if he could never go home and wasn’t willing to help another of his kind escape a cruel master?
The attack came with surprising force. He had seen the firearms of this world and watched countless action movies. The mercenaries attacked with military precision.
First came a pair of Humvees, one from ahead and one from behind. Others followed, but there were men standing in the modified turrets of these two vehicles.
He thought about taking cover in the trees, took a step in that direction, but realized his mistake. His enemy had chosen the terrain. Far more dangerous traps awaited in the darkness to each side of the road.
He ran at the vehicle blocking the way.
The mercenary soldier behind the turret aimed, using all his strength and weight to turn the weapon. The barrel made “whumpf” sound. A net shot forward, missing Hueg as he dove sideways and rolled to his feet.
He went around his attacker, throwing the entire line of vehicles into confusion. Without weapons, his only hope of getting past them was to evade the attacks altogether.
Dozens of men fired weapons that sounded muted and weak, not like silenced guns from the movies, but like there was something wrong with them.
Several rounds struck him on his arms, legs, and torso without drawing blood.
He jumped onto the last vehicle coming down the road, stuffed the gunner down into his turret without killing him, and jumped off the back of the moving Humvee. Tumbling and rolling several times, he limped onward shaking off the injury as best he could.
A pair of large helicopters swooped over the trees.
One hovered over the road, spinning rotor blades blocking his forward progress. The other prevented his retreat.
Slowly, and with less coordination than the initial ambush, the Humvees surrounded him on the narrow road. Squads of soldiers burst from the trees to reinforce their ranks.
The commander of the ambush gave a hand signal. Both Humvee gunners fired nets.
Hueg relaxed and allowed them to hit from two directions which reduced the amount of wrap around force of each. Carefully, calmly, and rather slowly, he shrugged out of the nets.
“Level 2 less lethal!” the leader yelled.
Guns fired and rubber slugs that felt like bullets but were not pelted him.
Hueg sprinted toward the leader, grabbed him by the neck, and threw him down. His enemies surrendered to chaos and swarmed him. He grabbed their guns when they came too near. Unfamiliar with these particular weapons, he cast them aside. Kicking, punching, and pushing, he scattered them.
In time, they would overwhelm him but he would never surrender.
“Use Krast! Use Krast!” the lead soldier screamed.
Hueg froze. “Krast?” What was his father’s stablehand doing in this world?
The fire giant that emerged from the oversized prison truck stood fourteen feet tall. Black, silver, and copper coloring twisted across skin and through his hair.
The oversized—even for a giant—stablehand froze when he saw Hueg. “Help me, Huegransguax.” Each word caused him to twitch with pain. He lumbered forward wearing a collar with the spikes facing into his neck. Electricity popped from the device when he resisted his orders.
Hueg looked at the mercenary leader. “He’s not a fire giant you motherless human. He doesn’t regenerate, he only suffers.”
“They know what he is and what he is not,” a familiar voice said from the shadows of the forest.
Hueg ducked Krast’s fist, then sidestepped to avoid being grabbed.
“I have to, my prince. I’m sorry,” Krast said as he lunged again.
Hueg jumped back and looked for the owner of the voice. A sick feeling filled his gut and he wanted to run away.
Tegerst moved into the light. “You have come far in this world, Huegransguax. Now your odyssey is at an end.”
“I don’t believe you could hurt me. You took an oath,” Hueg said.
Tegerst, skin nothing but swirls of dark silver, glared at him with eyes of smoldering flames. He towered over Hueg, shoulders broad and muscular, scars marking his hands, forearms, and torso from hundreds of sword and axe fights.
Krast grabbed Hueg by one arm and lifted him up.
Hueg counter grabbed the arm, lifted his feet high, and wrapped them around the stablehand’s neck like he had seen human ground fighters do. He squeezed until Krast threw him down.
“Look at Krast,” Tegerst said. “What do you think I would do to you. Krast is one of my illegitimate children. You are heir to the king who enslaved me and my people for a hundred years.”
Krast screamed as the device on his neck charred his skin. Whoever controlled him was somewhere out of sight, yelling commands and swearing in the human language.
Hueg retreated. He couldn’t win without hurting the innocent stablehand.
Humans with guns and vehicles blocked his retreat. More of the soldiers for hire appeared at the edge of the forest.
Hueg looked at Tegerst.
“You cannot defeat me. If you try, Krast will pay for your rebellion. Kneel and swear fealty to me and my human allies.”
Rage burned through Hueg’s heart. His father’s bodyguard was calling him a rebel as though he were the traitor. Krast had been tortured and forced to dishonor himself with evil deeds.
Tegerst murdered Hueg’s family.
“Now I see your father’s legendary temper!” Tegerst shouted.
Hueg could not create fire from nothing, but he could use it once it existed. Screaming in the human language, he promised to rip Tegerst’s head off.
Human guns fired as he sprinted past Krast.
Hueg pulled the tiny sparks from the weapons closer and closer as he charged.
It wasn’t enough but he had no choice.
All the fire in the battle came to him, obeyed him, refused Tegerst’s attempt to do the same thing.
Hueg fueled the fire, sang to it in his mind, promised it secrets, and tempted it to grow large by feeding on oxygen in the cold air.
Not enough to slay his father�
�s traitorous bodyguard, the battle lord who had been his father’s friend and taught Hueg to fight. He only pulled enough fire from the battle to cover his fist.
Tegerst opened his eyes wide as realization took him. He stepped backward to retreat but was too slow. “No, Huegransguax, let me explain.”
Hueg jumped into the air and slammed his burning fist into Tegerst’s head.
Tegerst staggered backward. “I kept the youngest of your siblings alive!”
Hueg scrambled onto his enemy as they both fell and struck him again. “They can never survive this world without my help! What have you done?”
One, two, three times Hueg punched the traitor. He smashed aside the old warrior’s defenses, then opened his fist. With his fingers and his thumb extended, he thrust the fire into Tegerst’s chest.
The former bodyguard to Hueg’s family cursed, then looked Hueg in the eyes. “You will never find them.”
Hueg stood and backed away from what he had done.
The mercenaries circled him with their weapons.
Blood leaking from his wounds. Not all of the bullets had missed.
“Do you know where my family is?” he asked them.
No one answered.
“Then you better run.”
A short time later, he stood alone on the road. Krast lay dead, head blown off when the control device self-destructed.
He walked back to the body of Tegerst and kicked dirt into his lifeless face. “This world isn’t as big as you think it is. I will find my father’s other children and take them home. The afterlife is unkind to traitors. You probably didn’t believe you would ever die.”
A Word from Scott Moon
ALTARS OF NIGHT
BY MICHELLE GARZA + MELISSA LASON
THE ALTARS OF NIGHT
BY MICHELLE GARZA AND MELISSA LASON
BLOOD FLOWED, a sea of it, from each broken door, making crimson rivers emptying into the gutters. Cara watched it drain into the sewer but held her tongue; it was not the time to protest. She was dressed in darkness, a flitting shadow in the night. Father Olon knew what this attack symbolized, what it would mean to her and yet he showed not an ounce of mercy, not even to a girl he called his own. She could smell his men not far away.They kept their shoes shined and polished by the hands of the street children, many of whom probably died in his raid of the ghetto. Cara drew her hood up, her eyes hard and unblinking as the blood was chased out the doors of the small houses by the cries of orphans. They too would become night children. The watchmen came around, just as she knew they would.Behind them, a group of lowlifes dragging carts to collect the dead. The city was nothing but a warzone. The dead-eyed police were no better than the gangsters, and they paled in comparison to the Father of the Altars of Night. Their feuds over territory often erupted to claim only the innocents, instead of any who really deserved to wear a wooden suit.
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