As the second night with a new moon began, Borim poked his head out from one of the shallower trenches and ran through his mind everything they had planned for when Anzo finally came. Halander was in the bunker, keeping watch. At the first sign of the giant’s approach, he would abandon the bunker and light the oil-caked ground with a torch. After that, their presence known, the giant would surely charge forward, expecting a challenge.

Borim would abandon his trench and get Anzo’s attention while the viatari surrounded the giant from all sides and did what they could to kill him. As long as he kept himself from getting hit by the giant, Borim would be able to maintain Anzo’s attention and keep him from attacking the others. It would be a long battle, but eventually they would emerge victorious—at least, he hoped so. The strategy was one often used by the dwarves against the grattles in the mountains, and it had always been fairly successful.

All they needed to do was determine from which direction the giant would approach. It was dark, especially without the moon. Visibility was limited, but that meant it would be the same for their opponent. Salevari had mentioned during the past month that Anzo typically came from the west, following the river, so Halander’s focus would be in that general direction. Still, nothing was guaranteed.

It was quiet. Hardly any wind blew within the canyon, and the city behind them was asleep. Borim felt his heart beating faster than usual as he once again went over the plan. He wanted to keep it fresh in his mind so that when the time came, he’d be able to do his part without any hesitation or mistakes. He looked to his right and left at the trenches flanking his, where Vandaar, Telaara, and Tessa were lying in wait. He could see their silver heads poking out of the earth, but only just.

A roar broke the silence like a rock-slide crushing a tranquil forest beneath the mountains. Borim tried to pinpoint where it had come from but couldn’t. It bounced off the canyon walls, each echo as vigorous as the first. It seemed to be coming from everywhere.

Borim looked toward the bunker, wondering if Halander would hop out and light the oil. He didn’t think the viatari would. For all they knew, the roar could have come from some wild animal, but he had a sinking feeling that wasn’t the case. He felt his blood start to boil and his muscles tighten. Something was coming.

Another roar, and this time Borim saw where it came from. Near the edge of the northern canyon wall stood a large, dark figure. It leapt into the air, completely out of Halander’s line of sight, and the dwarf watched helplessly as Anzo landed hard on top of the bunker, crushing the small mound and turning it to rubble. A third roar burst forth from the giant as he rushed toward the city.

“Out of the trenches!” Borim yelled. He could hardly register what had just happened. That jump would have been fatal even for a viatari, yet the giant seemed entirely unaffected by the height. He hoped Halander was still alive. The metal plating in the bunker should have protected him, even from such a devastating blow. Still, he couldn’t help but imagine the viatari’s crushed body beneath all that rubble.

“Intercept that giant!”

Borim let loose a war cry, catching Anzo’s attention. The giant turned to face him, only a few steps away from entering the city. He couldn’t make out his features because of the darkness—the oil fields they had spent so much time preparing remained unlit—but he saw the giant was at least as tall as a large oak. 

It was clear Anzo was immensely strong, or he wouldn’t have survived the jump from the canyon wall. He wondered if blocking attacks with his new shield would be wise. His regular dwarven shield would have been able to absorb anything that hit it, but as much as he had grown to like Dalyr’s blacksmiths, he didn’t trust their craftsmanship like he would one of his own kin.

Anzo swung his arm in a wide sweeping motion but Borim rolled aside, barely avoiding the attack. Vandaar and Telaara leapt from their trenches and onto the giant itself, doing what they could with swift, targeted punches and kicks while Tessa focused on attacking his legs. It didn’t do much, if anything. The giant chuckled as Vandaar delivered a powerful kick to its head.

“Blades!” the viatari ordered.

Borim heard the sound of steel flying. Now was the time to see if they could kill this giant. He charged shield-first and slammed into Anzo’s knee, making it buckle. Tessa moved to the other knee and sliced through the tendons. Anzo roared in fury as both Telaara and Vandaar jumped higher onto his back and started stabbing and slashing with their weapons.

The dwarf rolled in between the giant’s legs and jumped away before he could be struck. He waited for Anzo to turn around so he could bring his hammer to the giant’s face, but Anzo had already lost interest in the dwarf. Borim tried to recapture his attention with another war cry, but it was too late. The giant’s focus was on the two viatari on his back.

Telaara and Vandaar continued attacking with reckless abandon, unaware of the danger they were in. Borim, familiar with the berseker’s rage that his people often fell into during battle, knew what was coming.

“Get off,” he cried. “Telaara, get away from him! Vandaar, pull back!”

Before he even finished his sentence, however, the giant bucked and twisted suddenly, shaking his attackers off. With a lightning speed that belied his size, Anzo grabbed the two viatari who had been flung into the air and threw them into the darkness. Borim didn’t see where they landed, but he was at least sure they hadn’t been killed. Anzo had thrown them hard and far, but he’d seen viatari suffer worse injuries.

He expected the giant’s focus to turn to him and Tessa next, but Anzo had lost all interest on anything but the city. His eyes were fixed on Dalyr, whose inhabitants had woken to the sounds of battle.

“We should pull back into the city and join their warriors,” Tessa said. “We’ll have strength in

numbers.”

The giant roared once again. Borim shook his head. He knew they had very little time left to do anything on their own before the giant went straight into the city, and they would not get a chance like this for another month. They did not have another month. Not wanting to waste any more time thinking, Borim jumped onto the giant’s back as he stood back up. He grabbed onto something that felt like hair and held on tightly as Anzo lurched and moved forward. He heard Tessa yelling for

him to let go, to come back, but her voice died away as the giant moved forward into the city.

He tried hitting Anzo with his hammer as he held on, but it didn’t seem to have any effect. He might as well have been swinging at a block of diamond. With a heavy heart, knowing he had failed, Borim could do nothing but hang on and watch. Many of the guards in Dalyr stood ready in formation to fight—it was clear they had never expected Borim to succeed—but Anzo simply barreled through them, crushing any who stood in his path. The viatari’s attacks left the giant with multiple

wounds, but they were shallow and he didn’t seem to feel them.

Buildings crumbled as the giant passed through, and from their ruins he picked out several unconscious viatari and placed them in a large basket he had tied around his waist. Sometimes the giant wouldn’t even knock down a building to capture the viatari but would simply pluck them from the streets as they ran around in a panic. Borim could hear those who had been captured sobbing and screaming for help.

Their terror concerned Borim. The viatari were gifted with extreme strength and speed and the ability to create illusions. And yet, this single giant was tearing through an entire city of them and collecting them as if he were picking apples in an orchard. He wondered if perhaps holding onto Anzo was a bad idea. If all of Dalyr really couldn’t defeat this monster, what chance did he have doing it alone?

He shook his head. No. Everyone in Aleganthia was depending on him to obtain aid from Dalyr, and to do that, he had to defeat Anzo—even if it cost him his life. He had no choice. He had to keep holding on. It was his duty.

Anzo continued his attack on Dalyr for another hour, which felt like a lifetime to the dwarf hanging on to his back. Borim’s arms were numb and cramping, but he only tightened his grip as the giant jumped a great distance back onto the canyon wall and began climbing. His body jerked back and forth with each movement, thrashing the dwarf the entire time.

Once he had cleared the cliff wall, Anzo was off. The giant sprinted through the forest, past the Granian River, and on through the desert. The cold wind of the night roared past Borim’s ears, battering his aching body.

It was pitch-black in the desert. Borim couldn’t make out any of the dark masses he saw. They could have been sand dunes or mountains or a forest, for all he knew.

He hung on like that for the rest of the night, nodding off every now and then but managing to maintain his grip. Dawn approached, and as the sun lifted itself over the horizon, Borim got his first glimpse of where Anzo was taking them.

As far as he could tell, he was still in a desert-like area, but the land was not as dried up or harsh. Small bushes and trees were scattered across the earth, and mountains loomed overhead in the distance, dark and menacing. He shuddered as their shadows touched him—so different from his own Silent Mountains. By their height, he figured they were approaching the Ul’ner mountain ranges—they had to be.

They weren’t headed toward the mountains proper, though. Rather, Anzo ran toward a strange rock formation that looked like it was growing out of the mountains. Borim thought it resembled a giant hand dragging its fingers through the earth.

The giant slowed down as he approached the strange rock formation. He walked past the fingers of the rock-hand into a cavernous space lit by a single large fire in the middle. Cages lined the wall opposite from where they entered, and some even hung from the ceiling, next to long stalactites. Other things hung from the ceiling as well. Flesh swinging on iron hooks, Borim realized. He didn’t want to think of where the flesh had come from.

Anzo walked to the cages against the wall and knelt down, opening his basket full of viatari.

“Yes, yes,” the giant chuckled. “Good haul. Yes. Good pickings.” He began putting them into the cages by groups of three. Borim counted about twelve captured viatari. He was surprised to see that Drathanar was among them, his hair wilder than ever but his eyes no longer menacing. There was a real fear in them as he was shoved into a cage with two other viatari.

Finally, unable to hold on any longer, Borim let his cramped hands relax and he slid off the giant’s back, crashing hard onto the ground with a groan, his plate armor taking most of the impact. He sat there, dazed, gripping his shield and hammer, unable to stand. He wanted to stand, knew he had to, but his legs wouldn’t obey. Nor would his arms, which tingled painfully as blood flowed through them once again.

Anzo turned around as Borim hit the floor, and the dwarf finally got a full view of the giant he had failed to kill.

He was almost completely naked, wearing only a loincloth—though that by itself was large enough to cover Borim’s body entirely. Muscles rippled under his tightly drawn flesh. The giant seemed to be made almost entirely of muscle. Strange markings in orange paint covered his blue skin along his calves, chest, and face. A long mane of fur went down the length of his back from his head. Tusks jutted out of Anzo’s jaw, making it so his mouth was always open in an ugly smile. His tusks were long and yellow, and his eyes leered down at Borim, slightly intelligent but certainly not like those of a dwarf’s or viatari’s.

“Try escape?” Anzo asked, his voice like gravel pouring out onto metal. “Not today, little cousin. Today you stay.”

Borim couldn’t do anything as the giant wrapped his large, meaty hand around him and tossed him into an empty cage. The last thing the dwarf heard before his vision went black was a lock clicking into place.