I am not going to try to pretend that cleaning the large carcass was not a nasty experience, but I made the best of the water flow and, between my claws and the eating knife, I managed to get the hide and a number of strips of skin out of the creature. I didn’t have a fire, and doing a thorough tanning job was out of the question, but I did manage to make a sort of tunic out of the hide, tied around my waist with the fur facing inside, with a piece of hide like a belt holding it closed and as a place to tuck my knife.

Without a fire, I was going to have to brave the raw flesh, but this lizard had more cutting teeth and only a couple of grinders, so I assumed that it had a better system for handling raw meat. I peeled back some of the thigh meat and chopped it into small pieces, and tried a bit.

It was surprisingly pleasant, with little of the expected gaminess, but then again… Rats were not known for long lives, and while this Rodent may have been of unusual size, it wasn’t much worse than the rabbits I had hunted and cleaned as a kid. I slowly chewed and swallowed chunks of rat, and when I didn’t immediately feel sick I finally allowed myself to fill my belly. No, it was not a four-star dining event, but meat and water-filled and stopped the aching in my belly pretty effectively, and changed my whole outlook.

The place had what looked like an ecology, with rats and slimes eating whatever fell from above into what was clearly a sewer. There were channels leading from a relatively clean water source into the sewers, washing the nastiness out. It stands to reason that following one of those water channels if they didn’t get too narrow, would lead me to the water source and hopefully out of this place.

None of the rat’s bones proved particularly useful… huge it might have been, but it still had a flexible skeleton like a real rat, and I had mashed its skull pretty thoroughly. It took me almost twenty minutes to climb the wall beside the waterfall drain, but my claws proved surprisingly decent for climbing walls and I finally found myself perched on the stone lip above the drainage pipe.

The water in the drain was only a few inches deep and clean, and by bending over a little I could actually fit into the water pipe. The channel stayed smooth and even, despite the thin layer of some sort of aquatic slime in the bottom, and sloped upwards several times as I traveled. The slopes were challenging because of the algae and the fact that the stones were set tightly flush to keep a clear channel for the water, but eventually, I saw a real light ahead of me.

It was almost bitterly bright, so I covered my eyes as I crept forwards, back to being stealthy as I approached something more than just a slightly-filled pipe. I realized that the aching light was not even real sunlight, but rather the light of the moon reflected off of whatever water source fed the pipe. I finally peered out of the exit and discovered that I was on the edge of some sort of cistern built along the side of a river. Several other pipe heads were trailing off to either side of me, with the water level in the artificial pond just barely high enough to slop water into the pipes.

The cistern was an odd shape, maybe 30 feet wide, and I could see that one edge abutted a river beyond. There was a well-used wooden water gate holding back the much higher river, and I considered myself lucky that I wasn’t in the sewer when that water gate was lifted… it probably flushed everything out of the sewers regularly, and I bet I might have drowned.

I managed to get up on the edge of the tunnel I was following, and from there climbing to the lip of the cistern via the rough stone bricks was surprisingly easy. I peeked over the edge of the lip hoping that the darkness of the well itself was enough to keep me concealed until I got the lay of the land.

A few dozen feet away from the cistern was a neatly-kept stone cottage, built half-timber style with a thatched roof. Past that was a short wall, over which I actually saw a flash of bronze as someone walked past, probably wearing some sort of helmet.

The other direction passed fields of what looked like growing crops, and in the distance, I could see another tall wall, this one huge and surrounding what were multiple story buildings… it was several miles away, telling me exactly how far I had traveled through the cramped waterway to get to the cistern.

I might have popped out there to go talk to the guy in the helmet since helmets usually meant good quality armor, and armor usually meant someone official, except for one….very very big problem.

The short wall looked like it was about ten feet tall. The helmet poked over it like someone was walking on the other side, on the ground, and the entrance doorway to the cottage must have been at least 15 feet high!

I was in a city of Giants!

Now, I am not sure about how other people grew up, but my childhood had had more than a few fantasy books in it. In general, Giants didn’t care much for ‘regular sized’ people. Jack the Giant Killer. Fee Fie Foe Fum. Stories about ogres and trolls and other huge folks were not generally warmhearted feel-good features, Hagrid aside.

I may not be sporting the blood of an Englishman right now, but maybe these people raised lizard people like me as a food source. No one ever made a TV show called “My Little Ogre- Friendship is Magic” and the helmet definitely implied some kind of local threats. Police forces don’t wear armor without good reason.

Okay, treat it like unknown territory. The locals may or may not be hostile. Stay out of sight, try to get to a friendly border or communications, although I doubted very much a chopper would be dropping in to evac me. Maybe they had teleport spells or gates or friendly griffons or something.

Away from the city, I noted that there seemed to be a lot of trees, if I could get to a forest maybe I would be in a better position to figure out what was going on. If the oversize moons (moons? There were two of them?) moved the same way moons moved on earth, then the trees were south.

I waited for the helmet to move far enough away that I could probably get over the wall and towards the forest without getting noticed, and I figured the sprint from the wall would be way less obvious than trying to cut around it through the fields. I was small, but I was blue. No one ever used blue as the base color for camouflage for a very good reason.

Confidently I climbed the wall, looking around for other observers, but luck seemed to be on my side. The wall at the top was narrow, only a couple of feet wide, but the outside edge was lined with stone spikes sloping out and downwards from the top edge of the wall.

It looked like this was going to be a one-way trip. No way I was climbing up through the spikes once I got outside. I crept low and peered over the edge, and there were more downward-sloping spikes halfway down the wall. Crap.

I suddenly heard something ping against the wall right next to my head. What? I turned and saw that there was a giant at the now-open door to the house, winding up to throw another rock at me. It looked like a child, and it was yelling something.

I leaped off of the wall and landed past the spikes surprisingly lightly. Maybe this body wasn’t as bad as I thought if it could handle a drop that easily. I started running, trying to dodge from side to side as another rock hit the ground to my left.

Ahead of me, I spied the end of the short grass between the wall and the forest, which turned into a rail fence beyond which was taller grass leading to the very edge of the trees. Desperately I dove between the giant rails and cut to my right, trying to head through an open field filled with waist-high grass towards the forest. This time another ranged attack buzzed by my ear, and I realized that the helmeted Guard was winding what looked like some kind of a crossbow.

He was dressed in bronze chain mail, and a bronze cap helmet, and looked very… official, and he was shooting at me! If I hadn’t dived to the side at exactly the right time to get through the fence, he would have killed me! I bent over, putting on a burst of speed, and was able to almost crouch low enough to be hidden by the grass. He could see where I was based on the bending of the grass stalks but should have a tough time targeting me.

Good thing that the crossbow took a while to wind! By the time he finally got the thing loaded, I was nearly a quarter of a mile away, and I could hear him yelling something at the other giant with the ax as I cut into the forest, and I could hear both of them laughing.

Assholes. Giant assholes. Probably laughing about whatever was going to try and kill me in the forest.

Once I was in the cover of tall aspens, I slowed down, panting. Either lizard-things were sprinters, or I was right about being out of shape, as even my prior form had better wind than this. I finally found a nice, low fir to crawl under, edged with ferns, glad to find that the underside of the pine skirt was unoccupied.

I took some time to rest and collect myself. The laughter of the giants probably meant that the forest was filled with giant monsters matching their statures. This world, so far, felt a lot like one of the MMOs I used to play. Forests were dangerous, and the guard’s armor implied that the danger was sometimes courageous enough to assault a city.

As I walked through the forest I could see occasional glimpses of a large river to my left, apparently off to the east, and I decided to follow it to the south. With the level of technology displayed and the fact that it was a world filled with monsters, I doubted very much that I would be crossing any roads filled with cars, and settlements would likely be few and far between, with lots of walls and other defenses.

I walked stealthily, though. I had NO idea what kind of monsters and animals might be around here, and at one point I heard a loud huffing and puffing ahead of me. I quickly retreated underneath another skirted fir tree and buried myself up to my neck with needles quickly. Something huge was walking past, and it snuffled for a moment under the tree. I caught a glimpse of a snout like a bear, only the head was darned near up to my waist, and I held as still as I could before it finally moved on, crashing through the underbrush slowly. I could feel each heavy footstep thudding through the ground, and if the head was any indicator, even the bears in this part of the world were the size of panel vans.

This was not good. It would be very difficult to survive if everything were huge like this. I waited nearly 15 minutes after the monster passed by and retreated closer to the river as I traveled. Eventually, I noticed a bush, one I recognized. It was actually kind of odd since I wasn’t looking for food, but the bush actually attracted my attention. A lot of the vegetation I had been ignoring was edible, from both my experiences growing up in West Virginia and my training, but most of it would require cooking or other preparation, although I had tried a couple of sprigs of lamb’s quarter. Edible, but not particularly tasty.

I had earned merit badges back in the scouts for wilderness survival, but compared to the simple hunting and gathering tips my great-uncle had taught me as a kid, the badge itself had been something of a joke. That was why I had never actually gotten Eagle scout. By the time I was ready to go for Eagle, the scouts had devolved into constant sniping over gay scoutmasters, girls in the scouts, and political correctness badges, and I had just gotten sick of it.

But spending nearly every summer in Appalachian West Virginia with my admittedly poor hillbilly relatives was proving more than useful, and as I passed patches of Lamb's quarter, mint, and even dandelion, I wondered if I should go into full-on survival mode. The nasty hide I was wearing was probably going to be useless soon and was already stinky enough that I wished I could abandon it.

Near the river, I saw even more recognizable plants. Pigweed with its reddish coloration near the bases of the leaves, Lamb's quarter with its broad, white-shaded centers, and stubbly little clusters of purslane. Since I couldn't boil anything without a pot, I collected a lot of the things I could eat raw or pound into a paste using a couple of rocks.

I also spotted a few paper trees scattered amongst the firs, which gave me hope that maybe I could get some kind of hardwood spear or something. I didn't have anything to trade if I did manage to stumble across non-jerks willing to listen to me, but some of the bark shreds proved useful for collecting various edibles.

The bush, though, was blackberries. And inside the thorned vines were fresh, large blackberries nearly the size of my thumb. Clearly, birds and other animals had picked at the outer berries, but the thorns were large and spaced far enough apart, and I was able to crouch between the shoots to get to the fruits beneath.

I ate my fill quickly, reveling in the sweet taste and wishing I had some way to store them when I heard a clank. I froze, ever so slowly lowering myself to try and hide among the branches when I saw an almost normal-sized person leaning in to try and grab some of the blackberries.

He was very very broad. Almost twice as wide as anyone I had ever seen before, He was dressed in some kind of heavy bronze armor, Roman-looking, and a helmet. He was taller than me, by at least a foot, but not gigantic like the rest of the locals. I was relieved, but being the right height did not mean he was friendly.

Because of his breadth, getting through the vines to the berries, even with the armor protecting him, was almost impossible. He pressed forward, moving the entire side of the bush with him, and barely managed to grab one blackberry in hands that were bare of armor… They were overlarge, almost as big as the giant’s hands, and yet looked strangely dainty, with pink-painted fingernails.This could be my opportunity to talk to someone! I slowly eased myself and a handful of berries out of the side of the bush away from the armored figure.

Apparently, he wasn’t terribly observant, or my stealth was better than I thought since he didn’t even notice me disentangling myself from the bush. I scooted quietly opposite of him with the entire bush between us and prepared myself to drop the berries and run.

“Excuse me?” I whispered quietly, expecting to hear a gobbledygook response or many the figure to come charging through the bush.

A very feminine voice yelped suddenly and then went quiet, I heard a cough coming from the other side, but no charging noises, major clanging, or yelling in a foreign language. The first words that came out of my mouth sort of confused me, because they were definitely NOT in any language I recognized, and yet, somehow, they still sounded like a language I knew just as well as Russian, Spanish, or Arabic. Yes, it was a foreign language, but it was clearly one I knew.

A strange word was spoken, another cough, and then a feminine voice said, “Hello there. Does this bush belong to you?” Was the gigantic figure female? I always thought that females in MMOs dressed in armor that wouldn’t ward off a common cold, let alone an actual weapon, but her armor looked as fully functional as the SCA gear I used to help create before I joined up. Big girl. Gigantic hands.

“No, it is not mine. I was just gathering some fruit. You seem to be having some problems getting to it. Would you like me to help you? It is much easier for me to get to them.” I responded, “I am friendly. Are you going to try to kill me?”

“I would love your assistance, and I am happy to have a peacebond exchange. You are very well-spoken. What price will you charge for your help? I have little, but I am very hungry, I have not eaten in three days, and you know how we get when we are hungry.” The voice replied, and I heard a creaking as the figure moved back from the bush.

“No price. I am trying to make friends. You are the first person I have met that hasn’t been a giant or tried to kill me the moment they knew I was here. Fair warning, though. I am a person, but I look a little… odd. I don’t look very human.”

I slowly eased around the bush, and saw… I guess it was a woman. She was incredibly broad, even her face, but it looked like muscles, not fat. She was easing off her helmet and looked at me skeptically, and I offered her the handful of berries.

She held out her hand, and accepted the berries, smiling at me. “Yes, you don’t look very human at all. It would be very very strange if you did since most humans don’t speak your language. We do, but that’s because we sometimes have peaceful dealings with your tribes. And when we war, it’s best to know when the war is over.” She brought the berries to her mouth and carefully tossed one in, and I realized that her head was nearly as large as one of the giants. In fact, build-wise, she was a LOT like the giants, just… squashed. I wondered if maybe she was some kind of special nonhuman breed, as she looked extremely strong. Without her helmet, she had strawberry blonde hair in braids pinned to the sides of her head, sort of like a more complicated Chun Li haircut, and her broadly cute face had a thick burnishing of reddish freckles.

Okay, information time. “May I trade berries to ask you questions?” I asked her, and she grinned and nodded. “Of course, that sounds like a very fair exchange… but I cannot give you any military advice or secrets or anything, mostly because I haven’t even set foot in Sindaenaway yet. They have kept me waiting out here for four days, getting my paperwork cleared,” she answered, and I could almost hear her air quotes as she mentioned the paperwork.

“That sounds like normal Bureaucracy,” I sighed, slipping into the bush to gather more blackberries. “In all the books I read Giants had either these weird might-based societies or some kind of nature worshiping godhood. Bureaucracy is not very… fantasy worldish.”

“Giants?” She asked me curiously, “I am not sure who you are talking about.”

“You know, that city?” I asked, gesturing towards the north. “I always expected like… a city in the sky or some kind of savage society in the mountains full of ummm… goat herders or something.”

The lady started laughing, “Oh, those are not giants!” she exclaimed, “Those are humans!”