I looked over at Father, and he nodded from the other side of the pit. We had scaled the cliff and were now mere feet from the Giant sleeping noisily on the rock floor. All around us, I could see bones and piles of viscera. It was disgusting to witness, and I felt myself becoming slightly sick. Some of the bones were large, almost Giant sized.
Had this creature killed other Giants? It seemed likely. While Giants were still rare, the legends said that when they encountered one another they would fight to the death. If this beast had killed others of its kind, it was truly dangerous. I felt a lump rise in my throat and did my best to quiet my fear. I needed to replace it with the anger I’d had moments ago, but up close, this monster was much more terrifying.
I readied my rope, making sure to loop it around my gloved hands for support and nodded back.
Father raised his wooden mallet in one hand, and a large carpenter spike in the other. The tool was two inches around and ten inches long, designed for framing thick logs together. He stepped forward and was directly in front of the Giant’s scrunched face. He stalked around to its exposed jugular and positioned the spike a few inches from the creature’s flesh, his hammer waiting in the air.
“Remember,” Father had said, “A Giant’s blood is toxic, so make sure you avoid it. If it gets in your eyes or mouth, you could die.”
I watched Father take a deep breath, and I tightened my grip on the rope. Then he struck.
He jammed the point of the huge nail into the Giant’s neck, and I watched as the beast’s yellow eyes snapped open. Then, with all of his strength, Father blasted the spike with the mallet. The crack of his connection echoed throughout the entire cavern, and a fountain of aphotic blood erupted from the Giant’s thorny skin.
The monster roared, and the sound was so loud that I had to cover my ears.
Father jumped back, the spike still lodged in the beast’s flesh, and narrowly dodged a swipe from its huge hand. It tried to strike out with the other one, but suddenly fell short. My rope was taught against his skin, forcing the arm against the ground. I traced the path of the rope as it wound through several stalagmites and acted as an intricate pulley. There would have been no way of performing this feat otherwise. Father took that opportunity to whip out another carpenter spike and slam it against the back of the Giant’s hand, quickly following it with a driving smack from the mallet.
The Giant cried out again as its hand was pinned to the cavern floor. It tried to rise, but I yanked the other rope hard, my legs on fire as I pressed my feet against another large rock. I used my whole body and lunged backward and the Giant’s body quivered and he fell down again with an anguished roar. I relaxed for a moment, just long enough to get a second wind. Father had another spike and was racing toward the monster’s face, his hammer in hand.
SNAP!
The Giant’s other hand shot out fast as lightning and grabbed Father’s arm, crushing it.
I froze. Father screamed out, but the Giant took that split second distraction to lift him into the air by his crushed arm and stand. I watched as the climbing hook that the rope was secured to strained against the rocks it was wedged between. Then it loosed. I wasn’t able to react quickly enough and the rope sawed painfully into my arm as the Giant ripped it away from me. The loop I had fashioned at the end to keep it in place was my undoing, because as the monster rose, I was jerked forward, striking my head hard on one of the stalagmites. The pain was dizzying. Blood filled my vision, and I hit a few more rocks as I was dragged along. I was being thrust along in the Giant’s wake, and kept colliding with objects, crashing mercilessly over and over as it moved. I heard the taught snap of the rope and I was flung to the ground. Rolling to my side was all I could manage as I searched for Father, and could feel myself starting to pass out.
Everything seemed to flicker in and out. In one moment, I was watching as Father was dangling by the Giant’s grasp, the beast slashing through the air at him. In the next fractured vision, Father had lifted himself up and grasped the Giant’s wrist, avoiding the swipe that surely would have ripped him apart. Then he wrapped his legs tightly around the huge arm, and with one arm still trapped, dug into the belt at his side and removed a large spike. With a ferocious roar, Father began stabbing the Giant’s massive hand repeatedly. Sickening green blood began to spew to the earth far below. The creature returned a bellow that almost drowned out Father’s own. Almost.
The Giant opened its hand, releasing my father’s crushed arm. Father released the powerful hold with his legs and fell to the ground. He struck it hard and rolled to the side as the Giant, now at it’s full height, slammed a thorny foot down where he’d just been.
Father lifted himself falteringly, using a large stalagmite to aid him, then quickly somersaulted over it to avoid another screaming slash from the Giant. The rock exploded in a shower of smoke and pebbles, and I felt my vision fade again.
Suddenly, Father was in front of me, lifting me by my shoulders and shaking me.
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“Hutch!”
I tried to focus on him, but my left eye was blurry and out of focus.
“Hutch,” Father called again, “stay with me, son. I’m so sorry, please.” Very disoriented, I could only just make out tears in his eyes.
“Father…?”
Father’s eyes widened and he clutched me to his chest. I was having trouble breathing, and began sucking in air rapidly, my mouth dry.
“My boy! You’re alive,” he said, and grabbed my head, “you’ve been hit pretty hard, son, and this beast isn’t down yet. We need to keep you out of the way, we’ve got--”
In a flash, the beast’s silhouette was looming behind Father. Suddenly, the Giant’s huge hand smacked him to the side, and Father went crashing into the rocks beyond.
“No!” I started to call out, but I was cut off as the green blood of the Giant’s injured hand filled my mouth and I coughed. The fluid was everywhere, caking me. I kept coughing, the blood had gone into my lungs!
I was going to die.
The beast ignored me and continued pursuing Father. It breezed past me with its lumbering gait towards the direction my father had been hurled.
I could feel my heart beating, almost unnaturally loudly. With each pulse, I could feel my own blood in my veins coursing in agony to the same rhythm. I tried to cry out, but my screams were garbled and I kept choking and retching.
I tried to focus on the Giant and Father. Where were they?
My heart beat again, and I was filled with pain, and wheeled around.
I could see the Giant now, maybe fifty feet away, its back to me. It had my father again, and was lifting him into the air. My heart drummed and my body felt like it was on fire, but then I saw something. There was a light.
A green illumination had appeared at the same time as my pain, and as it beat again, I could see it again. It was there and gone in an instant, but it had almost appeared to show me where its heart was. I’d clearly seen a massive, highlighted organ. What sort of magic was this?
My Father looked as though he’d been completely overwhelmed. He hung limply from the Giant’s grasp, his eyes closed. I couldn’t believe my incredibly strong father had met his match. It didn’t make sense to my brain.
No, Father!
I felt around for something, anything to help me.
My hand brushed against cold metal. With my good eye, I could make out the shape of the climbing hook. The shaft was about two foot long, and had four sharp, eight inch barbs branching out from the top for grasping. At the very end was the modified tip that Father had made. It was six inches long and tapered to a razor point almost like a spear. The pain racked my body again, and I knew I only had a moment. I lifted the haft of the hook and set my sights on the Giant. It had begun pulling Father’s arms wide, trying to tear him in half.
I shot to my feet and lifted the tool. Could I do it? I wasn’t strong like my Father. His might was renowned. I began to shake.
“Hutch!”
Father’s voice rang out deep and strong, and I snapped my head up to the Giant.
Father’s eyes were open, and he was struggling. His muscles were contracting with great strain as he was pulling back against the grasp of the Giant. The creature roared at him, and Father howled back.
“Hutch, do it!”
“I don’t think I can do it!” I called back, “I’m not as strong as you!”
“YES YOU ARE!”
--
Instantly, I was flooded with memories.
Growing up in the woods, playing with my siblings and running into four older children from the nearby village. They made fun of our ears and called us “curse blood”.
“Their mother’s not even human!” One had chortled.
Grenn had gotten so angry, even small, that he’d thrown rocks at them and the boys had converged, punching and kicking him. I lost my temper, I shouldn’t have, but I did. I hurled myself at the boys and struck them with my fists. I remember teeth flying, and broken bones and tossing one of the boys a few feet away.
Grenn had cried and I had comforted him.
“Freaks!” The boys had shouted as they fled.
Poor Grenn. His crying face was suddenly juxtaposed in my memory with that of his mangled and half-eaten corpse on the ground in front of our cabin where we’d found them. All of them. I could still smell the stench. This creature had done this. This creature had killed my family. Mother. Petra. Grenn.
---
With a cry of anguish, I felt my heart beat, and saw the flash at the Giant’s back, outlining his heart. I gathered every ounce of strength and hurled the climbing hook at the spot I’d seen. It left my grasp with more force than I’d ever mustered and I watched as it soared through the air and struck the Giant.
The beast screamed and reared back, releasing my Father and whirled around to face me. The makeshift weapon had stuck true, but hadn’t penetrated deep enough! The Giant launched itself at me, howling with pain and anger. I couldn’t move quickly enough, and as I tried to back away, I tripped and fell.
The huge monstrosity reached fast and was on me, its teeth inches away from my flesh.
“No!” I screamed.
CRACK!
My vision was full of the sickly green blood again, and the sharpened point of a spearhead. No. The climbing hook. More blood had gotten into my mouth and eyes and I couldn’t breathe. The monster had stopped moving, and I felt it slump to the side. Dead.
I felt firm hands on me, and they wiped away the blood from my face and eyes. I was coughing, and couldn’t get a breath.
“Hutch!” Father called, dropping the shattered remains of his mallet and ripping a piece of his shirt to clear more blood. Through ragged gasps, I could see that the entirety of the hook had been driven through the creature’s back, through its heart, and the end was sticking out if its chest.
But I was dying.
My blood was on fire and all I could see was blood. It seemed like everything was glowing with that same green illumination. I was getting hotter and hotter, and Father kept shouting but I couldn’t hear him. I was rapidly fading into the black. I saw another flash of green and this time it felt like something had jolted me. My body burned from the inside out and I wanted to cry out, but I didn’t have the air.
Time seemed to freeze there in that glow and suddenly, I could hear a tone. Like a fanfare. It reminded me of the horns I had heard sometimes when a noble visited the village.
Then I saw it, burning bright, even brighter than the green illumination. Golden letters hovered in the space above the Giant's form.
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THE FATES SPEAK. YOU HAVE GAINED AN ADVENTURE CLASS!
WELCOME TO THE FOLD, GIANT EATER.
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Then it all went dark.