Chapter 11 - Urgo'Etrudzke

The giant clung to the outside of the tower, glaring at them through the hole with coal-black eyes as cold and uncaring as stone. It was even more terrible to behold up this close than it was out by the gates. It looked down at the bloody remains of what was left of Sarge, then let out a heaving laugh as loud as a thunderclap. Morten flung his helmet off and had to cover his ears before it ruptured his eardrums. Even with his ears covered, he could still feel it vibrating through his ribs.

Heimrich stood up in front of him, pointing at something while his mouth was moving. Morten’s ears were still ringing from the giant’s laughter. Was Heimrich yelling at him? Dammit. Where was his crossbow? How could he lose his crossbow at a time like this? His mind felt like a bowl of cold porridge. Where was Sarge at? He would know what to do. Heimrich stepped in front of him again, grabbed him by the shoulders, snapping him back to the present. Heimrich looked him right in the eyes and yelled, “Crank!”

“Finn, you help him too!” Corporal Heimrich yelled. He pointed at the ballista with his drawn sword. Morten hadn’t even seen him draw it.

“Duncan! Grab one of those bolts and get it over here!”

“Aren’t we supposed to load it first before we crank it?” Finn asked. “Isn’t this... unsafe?”

“Safe?! That ship has sailed, Finn!” Heimrich yelled. “Now crank!”

Crank? What could they possibly hope to do against this monster? Morten felt another wave of nausea pass over him when he looked at the splattered remains of Sarge still dripping from the brick, but he didn’t argue, just gritted his teeth and started cranking for all he was worth. Finn joined him, cranking on the windlass arm on the opposite side, while Big Duncan ran for the far wall, where the bolts were stacked.

The ballista roared to life with an angry, mechanical growl as the gears ratcheted together, pulling back the thick steel cables connected to the bow arms. A single drop of sweat rolled down Morten’s forehead and got stuck in his eyebrow. He didn’t dare stop cranking to wipe it, though, no matter how badly it itched. He kept cranking until his arms burned, but they were probably only halfway there.

“No, no, not the one with the rope!” Heimrich yelled. “Never mind, just hurry! Hurry!”

The bolts were bigger than a halberd and made from solid steel. There was a wicked barbed tip at one end and a long line of rope trailing from the other end. Duncan ran back toward them, cradling the giant bolt. Even he strained from the weight of it. The others used to joke about Big Duncan being half-giant, suddenly it didn’t seem so funny anymore.

Where was the giant? Why hadn’t it smashed them all to a bloody pulp yet? Morten stared out the window, waiting for a giant hand to come through the hole and crush him flat at any second. But the giant just watched them, a look of mild amusement on its face. Morten heard the stones above him groan and saw the top of the tower slowly lean in the direction of the giant.

“Hurry Duncan!” Morten yelled.

Big Duncan scrambled forward, only a few more steps to go.

“Look out!” Finn shrieked.

The giant’s hand came in through the hole and swatted Big Duncan as if it were lazily swatting at an annoying fly. Duncan flew across the tower and hit the stone with a sickening splat. The giant roared in pain; the bolt Duncan had been carrying stuck out from the bottom of its palm. It shook its hand, and the bolt fell to the ground with a thud, a dozen feet away from them. The barbed tip glistened with blood as dark and thick as tar.

“Duncan!” Morten yelled, but he just lay against the wall, whimpering as he held the wreckage that remained of his shattered arm. He tried to push himself up once, then slipped in a growing pool of his blood. He slumped down and grew very quiet and very still.

“Finn, grab that bolt! Morten, keep cranking!” Heimrich shouted, sword gripped tightly in his hand.

“Cranking? We should be running!” Finn yelled back.

“Grab it now, dammit!” Heimrich pointed his sword tip at Finn’s throat, a crazed look in his eyes. Finn swallowed, then turned and ran for the bolt. Morten swallowed too and kept cranking. Heimrich gave him one more stern look, then set his sword against a wooden box and began pulling some of the levers and dials covered in dwarven runes.

Morten gritted his teeth, fighting the windlass on every rotation without a partner to help. He heard Finn struggling too, the metal bolt scraping on the stone as he dragged it behind him. Morten fell backward as the arm locked into place with a satisfying metallic clank; the bowstrings were now ready to fire.

“Morten, hurry and help Finn!” Heimrich twisted furiously at a small dial that shifted the ballista upward, toward the gaping hole where the giant still howled in pain.

Morten ran over to help Finn, picking up the trailing end of the bolt and carrying it the last few steps. They grunted as they lifted it together to the stern-faced dwarf’s awaiting mouth. Morten carefully slid the heavy bolt down the grooved track of the ballista. There was a mechanical click as the bolt slid into place. Now, it was finally ready to fire. Morten breathed a sigh of relief.

Then he heard a low growl that made the hair on his neck stand on end. A shadow passed over him. He looked up to see the giant’s hand poised right above him and the ballista, ready to smash them all like a spoiled child, bored with its new toys.

Morten heard a yell behind him, and then Heimrich jumped on top of the ballista, brandishing his sword overhead. “Don’t you fucking lay a finger on Urgo’Etrudzke, you filthy cur!”

Time seemed to slow down to a crawl as he leapt from the ballista and thrust his sword into the giant’s hand. The giant howled as the sword stuck into its palm like a tiny metal nail, with Heimrich dangling on for dear life.

The giant growled, shaking its hand until the sword pulled free and fell. Heimrich fell with it, landing hard on his back against the ballista. The giant pressed its middle finger and thumb together, then flicked its massive finger forward. Heimrich’s arm holding the sword got ripped clean off at the shoulder and his dwarven spectacles flew off his face, disappearing in the darkness. He fell back on the ballista in a bloody heap, between its frame and the still taut metal cable.

The giant grasped the sides of the tower and put its horrible face in the gaping hole, letting out a roar that shook the entire tower. Morten covered his ears and stepped backward until he pressed up against a stack of boxes. He felt like he was going to vomit.

“Kelak ni’bodan Urgo’etrudzke!” Heimrich yelled. Something in Dwarven Morten had never heard before. Then Heimrich grabbed the metal lever next to him with his remaining arm, pulling it back with a grinding clank, and then several things happened at once.

The ballista’s metal cable snapped forward with a hiss like an angry serpent, slicing through Heimrich. The top half of his body fell and lay on the stone floor, motionless. The bolt launched forward, lancing the giant straight through one of its onyx black eyes, disappearing until only the piece of rope stuck out from its eye socket.

The giant had a confused look on its face as it hung onto the tower with one hand and batted at the air in front of it with the other. Its one remaining eye bulged wide and darted frantically from side to side as it tried to make sense of what had just happened.

Then it toppled backwards, making a gurgling, choking sound that turned into a bloodcurdling roar of pain as it fell down the cliff below. The giant’s scream ended abruptly, and then there was a suffocatingly loud silence. Morten shuddered, he knew he would never be free from that horrible noise again for the rest of his life, along with the image of Giles’s bloated face.

Had they done it? Did they really kill a giant? Morten swallowed and looked over at Finn, who was just as speechless as he was. Morten took a step towards the ballista, to see if Heimrich was still alive, even though he already knew the answer.

A creaking groan next to him made every muscle in Morten’s body tense. The ballista suddenly lurched forward, metal squealing as it scraped against the stone. Morten sprang out of the way just in time as the ballista crashed past him and flew out of the hole in the tower wall.

Morten breathed a sigh of relief, but it was cut short as something jerked his feet out from under him, his jaw smashed against the stone floor. Time froze for a second before he was yanked across the floor. Morten managed to roll over and saw a rope coiled around his ankle. He kicked furiously at it with his other boot like it was a deadly viper, but it was no use. He flailed his arms around, trying to grab anything in reach to slow him down, but the ledge was fast approaching. Finn stared back at him helplessly with wide eyes. The top half of Heimrich lay on the stone floor staring back at him too, with arms outstretched as if trying to save him.

He finally kicked the rope free from his ankle, but he was sliding too fast to stop now.

“Morten!” He saw Finn running towards him out of the corner of his eye before he felt the ground fall out from under him. His legs dangled over the edge as he clutched onto the stone for dear life.

*******

It was bad now. Real bad. Just a bloody slaughter down there on the ground. Private Pyke was glad he was up here on the wall by what was left of the front gate instead of down there on the ground.

There wasn’t a frontline anymore. Not one that he could see from up here. Just a chaotic press of bodies, screaming and howling at one another in rage and pain. Packed so tight there was scarcely any space to swing a weapon in the melee. Man and gnoll alike spent more time snarling, yelling, and pushing each other with their shields than swinging their weapons. Until pockets of space would open up for someone to swing one down to brutal effect. The helpless targets had nowhere to move, no way to raise their shield overhead. That was all there was to it, just whoever got lucky enough to get the space to swing their weapon in all the madness.

Pyke cranked his crossbow while watching in helpless horror as a gnoll lifted a spear above the crowd, sliding it just above the shield of one soldier, the tip pressing against his chainmail. The gnoll didn’t have room to thrust it forward, but he didn’t have to. The press of bodies behind the man kept jostling him and pushing him. “No! No! No!” He shouted. But it didn’t do him an ounce of good. No matter how loud he yelled, that wasn’t going to stop all the other soldiers from pushing behind him. His panicked shouts of protest turned into cries of pain and then finally ended in a wet gurgle. The gnoll just had a jagged grin on its face as it watched the man wriggle helplessly on the end of his spear, flopping like a fish. Pyke heard the satisfying click of his trigger, then watched his bolt sail through the air and hit the grinning gnoll in the throat, cutting its mocking laughter off in a howling croak.

Before he could take any time to admire his shot. He heard a whistle, then a crack as an arrow ricocheted off the battlements next to him. “Bastard!” Pyke hissed as he ducked his head. Still safer up here than down there, but those arrows just kept coming. They stopped lighting their arrows, so there was no way to see them coming now. Just had to pray to the Blind Goddess you wouldn’t be hit, but he doubted Vesenia gave a flying shit about any of them out here. Pyke started cranking again. No time to think about how bad things were, only on loading the next bolt. That’s what Sergeant Clark had taught him, and he had survived the siege of DeGaullis. Pyke had lost count of how many times he’d heard that story, but the number of bolts Clark claimed he had fired went up by at least a dozen each time.

Pyke looked over, most of the other crossbowmen up here had been picked off by arrows one by one, but he was reassured by the snapping of at least one other crossbow just down the wall. New kid, Garrett or Gareth... something like that, from Fennec Mill. Which wasn’t far from his home actually, now that he thought about it. Used to get some of his lumber from Fennec Mill, back when he’d been a carpenter, but that all seemed like a lifetime ago now.

He finished cranking, loaded another bolt, and then peered over the edge of the wall. There were still scores of gnolls pressed against the wall outside, waiting to replace any of their fallen members.

Something caught the corner of his eye, shifting in the distance by the trees. He looked up, and for a split-second thought, one of the tall pine trees was moving around. Then he saw it, for it was that damn giant. He had nearly forgotten it was still there. It had smashed the gates like they were just a child’s toys and now it was just sitting back in the trees watching, like it was bored with the entire affair. Pyke didn’t understand why it didn’t just come in here and smash them all to bits and the whole fort to rubble.

It looked so close, as it big as it was, but he knew it was just barely in crossbow range all the way out there by the tree line. Even if he managed to shoot it right in the eye, he doubted it would do much more than piss it off, and only a marksman like Sergeant Clark could make that shot from here.

There was a crack like a whip and a flash of sparks as metal splintered against stone right next to his face. Pyke fell back, accidentally squeezing his trigger and sending his shot sailing wildly into the night.

“Dammit!” Pyke spat, as he picked himself up, then ducked behind the battlements. He took a few steadying breaths before peeking back over the ramparts again. He could almost pick out the one down there shooting at him. Bastard with a hood and longbow, on a hill in back behind the gnolls swarming the gates. Pyke started cranking again. He’d show that bastard.

“Hey! Garrett! That was your name, right?” Pyke called out. There was no response. Pyke looked over as he kept cranking his crossbow. He saw the young soldier lying down on his side, an arrow sticking out from his eye socket.

“Fuck...” He muttered. If he did one thing tonight before the gnolls picked the meat from his bones, it would be to put a bolt right between the eyes of that son of a bitch. His windlass locked into place, and he loaded another bolt. He gripped his crossbow tightly to his chest and took several sharp breaths. Over the battlement, find the target, take the shot, back down. Time to take out that fucking archer.

Before he could peer over the battlement, he heard a terrible, monstrous noise echo in the distance. As inhuman as it may have been, it was unmistakably a cry of pain. It came from behind him, over by the western tower. He looked in that direction, but could only see plumes of thick, black smoke obscuring his view. Then he heard it again, a horrible roar of agony that made the hairs on his neck stand up. The roar turned into a gurgling cry before fading away. Everything seemed to freeze at that moment. Even the fighting below him seemed to pause for a few seconds as both sides tried to make sense out of that dreadful noise.

The confusion and silence was broken by another ear-splitting roar, this one much closer. The giant in front of the keep yelled. There was a somber, haunting tone in its cry. It paused, waiting as if it were calling out to something. After there was no response, it bellowed again, this time so loud Pyke had to drop his crossbow to cover his ears. It growled in furious anger and started swinging its fists, pulverizing the tall pine trees next to it in a shower of splinters, as effortlessly as if they were just kindling.

Then, the wailing howl of a horn cut through the air. Pyke looked down and saw a pale, white gnoll standing between the giant and the gate, blowing the war horn. It was him, the one the others were calling Ghostface, the gnoll chieftain.

After the horn’s cry faded, the mocking laughter of the gnolls change to frantic yelps and howls. They started scrambling over one another to get out of the fort.

“They’re retreating!” He heard the men below him whoop and cheer as the swarm of gnolls kept running. “Push them back!” A man yelled, then they started cutting down the panicked gnolls. Pyke couldn’t believe it. The gnolls still had so many more numbers. He didn’t know why they were retreating, but he was grateful.

The giant’s roar and the shaking ground robbed him of his newfound elation. Pyke peeked over the wall and saw the giant stamping its feet like an angry bull getting ready to charge. The entire wall shook each time its foot pawed at the ground, digging deep trenches in the earth. Then it started charging at the wall, right where he was standing.

“Dammit!” Pyke swallowed as his hands fumbled uselessly with his crossbow. He thanked Vesenia after seeing that it was somehow still loaded, then gripped it in his trembling hands. Fragments of Sergeant Clark’s crossbow sermons played through his mind. One shot. Right in the eye, or else he’d be smashed to a paste. Probably still would be, even if he’d managed to hit it. He gritted his teeth, resting his crossbow on the battlements to steady his aim.

Below him, he saw Ghostface step right out in front of the charging giant, blowing the horn again. The giant roared in defiance but stopped its charge just short of the white gnoll.

Sweat poured from Pyke’s forehead as he stared down the length of his crossbow. His finger trembled and his eye kept focusing and unfocusing on the target in front of him. It would be a hell of a shot, but he knew Sergeant Clark could have made it, so he knew he could, too. Could end it all right now, once and for all. He squinted as he moved the crossbow’s sights from the giant’s eye to the smaller white target in front of it. He adjusted the height of the crossbow slightly, to compensate for distance, just like Sergeant Clark had taught him. He held his breath, closed one eye, then slowly squeezed the trigger...

Then his head snapped back and his vision suddenly went black. He opened his other eye and saw a long stick with a feathered end on it. How silly, why would there be feathers? Feathers sticking right out of it. That doesn’t make any sense. Then he was looking at the ground below the wall. He didn’t remember looking down. Why was he falling? Feathers in his eyes and a tickle in his stomach as he fell to the ground. How very silly.

*******

Morten’s legs dangled over the yawning abyss. He clung onto the ledge as if his life depended on it, because in fact, it did. He saw Finn running toward him, eyes as wide as silver coins. Morten tried to cling onto the ledge, but his hands were slipping... slipping fast.

“Morten, hold on!” Finn yelled, but he was still so far away. Morten felt himself slip further. Stupid, heavy chainmail weighing him down.

Now that he was here, about to die, he wasn’t scared anymore, not angry, or sad either, just... disappointed. Morten sighed, he hadn’t really expected to survive the night, but he thought his death would be a little more heroic than falling down the side of a cliff. Oh well, at least it will be over quickly. He tried to remember his mother’s face, but there was nothing there, just Giles’s bloated face still staring back at him. Morten let out a wry, hollow laugh at that. Then, as his hand began to slip, he felt something wrap around his legs.

“Don’t worry, I’ve got you.” Morten heard a voice call out from below.

Morten couldn’t bend his head to look down, but he felt the prisoner hoisting him up by the legs right as he was about to fall. Morten tried to say thanks but couldn’t do much other than grunt at the moment. Finn slid forward, kicking up dust and scattering rocks to get to Morten to help too. The prisoner pushed him upward from below while Finn grabbed his hands and pulled him back onto the ledge.

The two collapsed there for a second to catch their breath. Then Morten heard the wood creak and a rumble from above as the tower began to sway slightly.

“Come on! We have to get out of here!” Finn yelled.

“No, wait...” Morten said.

“Wait?!” Finn asked, already taking a few steps toward the door.

“We have to save the prisoner.” Morten said as more bricks fell from the gaping hole in the wall.

“What? How? Why?” Finn stammered. The tower was shaking now.

“He just helped save me!” Morten said. “I can’t just leave him.”

“Well, how? We don’t have time! Or the key!”

Morten looked around frantically. “Here!” He grabbed a long piece of rope and started running back toward the ledge. Finn groaned as he looked at the tower above them, leaning further and further, but reluctantly followed Morten anyway. Morten threw the rope over the ledge and yelled, “Grab on!”

There was nothing at first, just the sound of the tower groaning above them. Then Morten finally felt the rope pull taut.

“Pull!” Morten yelled. Then they pulled for all they were worth. After a few strained steps back, the rest came much easier. Luckily, the prisoner had the build of a scarecrow. Morten saw his pale face and long, black hair appear over the ledge, and heard the rattle of metal chains as they slid against the stone.

“T-thanks...” The prisoner mumbled, as he picked himself up off the ground. His eyes widened slightly as he surveyed the carnage on the ground... and still stuck to the walls.

“Come on!” Finn squeaked, running for the stairs.

Morten and the prisoner ran after him. The wooden beams above them creaked and snapped and bricks started falling from the ceiling behind them. Something glinted on the stone floor, catching the moonlight as Morten ran. Morten reached down to grab it before running down the steps, right behind the prisoner. The stairs were shaking so badly Morten nearly fell on top of him.

Finn was the first out the door, the prisoner and Morten were right behind him. Morten nearly collapsed on the ground after he made it outside, his heart thumping like a blacksmith’s hammer, his lungs burning like a furnace.

The tower collapsed behind them, seeming to happen almost in slow motion. First the top of the tower leaned further away from them and then there was a rumble of bricks that grew into a dull roar as the tower fell over the cliff like a wave crashing to the shore. Morten, Finn, and the prisoner took several cautious steps back during the whole affair but couldn’t help but do much other than watch in silence as the tower fell.

The prisoner was the first to speak. “Thanks for the rescue. I can’t say there is too much value in saving someone condemned to death, but I am grateful nonetheless. And I’m sure the Inquisitor will be most pleased, if he’s still alive...” The prisoner said. Morten noticed there was a faint glimmer of hope in his eyes.

“T-thanks, you saved me too.” Morten said, unsure of what else to say to the strange person.

The prisoner made an ostentatiously elaborate bow. “Don’t mention it. My name is Malfus, by the way. Although it looks like names don’t seem to last for very long around here.” Then he smiled and extended a chained, manacled hand.

“Private Morten.” Morten said, shaking his hand. He had so many questions for the strange man. He wondered where he was from. He had the hint of an Akkadian accent, but there was something else there, too. More importantly, he wanted to know what he did to gain the ire of the Vesenian Inquisition. He had a strange demeanor, and it was difficult to read much from his mirthful disregard for the horror around them.

Finn’s hands were still on his knees. His breath came in short, rapid gasps. “How did we... a giant? I can’t believe we’re alive...” Then he shot up suddenly, looking around in panic. “The gnolls!”

Morten looked up too, fearing what he might see, but the courtyard wasn’t overrun with gnolls like he’d been half-expecting. He could hear men yelling from the other side of the fort, but it was different from the frenzied yells of combat he’d heard earlier in the night. They were cheering. Had they actually pushed back the gnolls?

Morten held out his hand. Heimrich’s shattered dwarven spectacles lie in his palm. The moon reflected in the broken glass. The reality of everything that had just transpired crashed into him as hard as the tower falling off the cliffs.

It had probably been less than ten minutes since he had first entered the tower, and now one dead giant later... and half of his squad was gone. He had known them less than a year, but they had become his only friends, even his family, in this forsaken place. A lot can happen in just a few moments.

Finn cleared his throat and gave the prisoner a suspicious look, then turned to Morten. “Come on, Morten. We should go to the front ga...”

Finn’s voice trailed off as a dark figure approached them, silent as a specter, cloak whipping behind him. His black clothes were wet with blood. He held a blood-covered sword in one hand, and in his other, a metal chain dangled behind him. Morten noticed there were still several pieces of furry gore stuck to its spikes. Morten swallowed. He was pretty sure Finn and Malfus did at the same time.

“I believe you have something of mine.” The Inquisitor said.