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The giantess' burp echoed over the city like a war horn. The foreign girl was done for. Arva could not have saved her. Or had she done what Arva had said and done as the giant she-monster wanted maybe she would still be alive. Except for her though, no one had been killed in a while and that was good.


But why had the brown-skinned girl not answered, she thought. She didn't understand. The giantess had been much friendlier with her than Arva had expected. Perhaps she was tired of living as evident by her fearsome tirade against Thorwal and it's people. Arva hoped that the curse didn't stick. It was a grave thing to be cursed and curses uttered by the dying were worst of all. She clutched the whale necklace on her chest.


They had started to clean up from the east gate where the giantess had entered. It was one of the worst places and many corpses looked as though they had been trodden on multiple times by the unfathomably huge and heavy giantess who looked so much like an innocent girl from afar. What her weight did to their bodies surpassed anything men and women were capable to do to each other, even in the worst of combat. The smell of meat, blood and bowels hung heavy in the air.


They met people in all states of having been crushed. Crushed partially, crushed to pieces, trodden flat like a frog in the streets or crushed to a messy pulp. They gathered them up and threw them on wagons and carts. The worst they had to dig out with spades or scrape off the ground. A few flies were already buzzing around.


And what when all the carts and wagons were full, Arva thought, throw them over the cliffs or bury them somewhere within the walls? There were a few places where mass-graves could be imagined but it would be better to give their bodies to the sea, to Swafnir, so that they might find their way into his halls more easily. If those who were fleeing when they died would go there, she didn't know. In any case, the crabs and fish would have all hands full with the newcomers.


A man started screaming and crying further up the road. Arva dropped the mutilated torso she was carrying and ran up, thinking that maybe he had lost his mind in sight of all this horror. Screaming could catch the giantess' attention and had to be stopped, she decided.


“No!” The man cried, cradling the crushed remains of three people in his arms.


He kissed them one after the other in turn, uncaring of the blood sticking to his mouth.


When she was close enough she could see that one had been a grown woman, the other two had been smaller and male. The man was holding the dead remains of his family in his arms.


Bera arrived, just when Arva had.


“Quit your screaming!” Bera hissed at him. “Throw them onto the cart and move on, there's naught you can do!”


“Bera!” It broke hoarsely out of Arva's throat.


Her vision blurred and she felt tears run down her cheeks. She worried about her own family but had forced herself to deal with the general mess at hand first, hoping that she wouldn't come across someone she loved like this man had.


She put a hand on his shoulder and looked for a way to comfort him. She had to blink a few times to be able to see and grabbed the first thing at hand. It was an axe, though it's shaft had broken underneath the giantess' weight.


“Do you see?!”


His face was a grimace of unfathomable pain when she tore his head back to lift his eyes to the blood-encrusted blade. It wasn't the giantess' blood, she knew that deep within her heart, and the axe had most likely been someone else's, but the truth did not matter so long as he believed.


“They attacked her!” She told him, shaking him. “They are in Swafnir's halls now!”


His eyes looked up to her and his sobbing ceased: “Do you think so?”


“Yes!” She cried bitterly. “Yes, certain as sunrise!”


His face lit up into a tearful smile when a young voice shouted: “Father!”


It came from one of the houses nearby and a girl, a barefooted child, came cunning over.


“Inga!” The man spread his arms to receive her. “You're alive!”


They met in a close embrace, crying with joy and misery together. Everyone had stopped their gruesome labour and watched, the wave of emotions washing over them plainly written on their faces. All at once they started wandering off and shouting for their loved ones in turn.


“No, there will be time for this later!” Bera angrily balled her fists.


“Hey, hey!” A young man came running from behind them.


Arva recognized him for one of the bold and swift-footed youths her sister had sent into the city to look for survivors and tell them of the deal they had made with their terrible conqueror.


“It's the priests!” The lad shouted. “They want to make an announcement in the market!”


He came to a slithering halt on the blood soaked ground.


“To the market, now!” Arva shouted after a short and startled pause and Bera and others picked up the cry.


It seemed the only thing that could bring the people back together and maybe the priests could instil some courage back into them. It was strange for them to do this however and Arva feared that the priests had plans of their own, toppling over the momentary peace Bera had won for them.


“Do the priests know?” She pulled the lad close on their way over.


“Aye, we told them.” The lad replied insecurely. “We found them in the harbour. Thorgun Swafnirson told us to bring everyone to him.”


Thorgun Swafnirson was the most renowned of the priests in Thorwal and a real servant of his god. His name was unique and said it all, everyone in the city knew the story. One rough, west-wind day, an old priest had been out fishing. When he pulled in his nets, he found a squalling babe in them, along with the largest load of fish he had ever caught. They had called him Thorgun Someoneson for a while but the child rejected the name, pronouncing it Swafnirson in it's young mouth.


And so the name stuck and many believed him to actually be the son of their god. His deeds and exploits were many and famous, almost the stuff of legend, and he did have a mouth for boasting though he was never arrogant. Men admired him and strived to be like him. Women and girls wanted to be with him and many did if he would have them. He had the power to move anyone.


That he was alive was good news indeed. The word priest never did the servants of Swafnir much justice, Arva thought. They had little in common with the priests who served the twelve gods most most foreigners prayed to, with the exception of Efferd and Rondra perhaps. Rondra priests were fearsome fighters all and the Thorwalsh well respected that. Priests of Efferd had a healthy appreciation for the sea and water in general, and sometimes it seemed as though they had simply misunderstood Swafnir's name and given him eleven unworthy consorts.


There were hundreds of people already on the market square. The stands where people used to cry their wares had vanished under giant feet just as the two huge market halls had been reduced to rubble. Dead people where here too, and the fish of the fishmongers had been trodden into the ground just as much and many other wares had. The market bridge had been destroyed, but some people had laid three long wooden masts over the almost twenty meter wide canal and bound them together to create a makeshift bridge.


She looked for Thorgun and the lad pointed her towards the sea and east side of the harbour, through in between the remains of the older market hall that had been built of stone and a smashed storehouse. From market to harbour it was less than a hundred meter walk.


It was an even greater mess than the market. Sunk boats and ships floated in the waters, getting washed against the docks by the waves along with a few corpses. What had happened here was evident by the trampled mass of people on the ground. Who had not been on board of a ship already setting out to sea when the giantess came here had been crushed beneath her feet. The docks themselves were damaged too. Made from huge boulders, rocks and cement they had been able to withstand storms, floods and endless tons of cargo and plunder for centuries, but the giant girl had that had conquered their city had simply been too heavy for them as evidenced by large cracks, running here and there. Water splashed through some of them with the up and down of the incoming waves.


Thorgun stood alone, watching out at sea where a few ships were visible, laying in waiting.


'The lucky ones that got away.' Arva thought and hoped that her kin was save and sound aboard.


“He drowned himself as a sacrifice.” The priest said after hearing her approach.


A grey haired, naked man with a picture of Swafnir tattooed on each shoulder blade floated face down upon the waves.


“Do you think Swafnir will come and save us from her?” She asked from behind his back.


He chuckled: “Gods always help those who help themselves first.”


Arva wasn't surprised. Though Thorgun performed his priestly duties with much enthusiasm, she knew him more for a practical man than a preachy one. Also, he was brave beyond belief, and wise as well, if anything that was said about him was true.


His body was covered in rune-tattoos that gave him wisdom, strength and intuition and was lean and hard otherwise. He wore nothing but a fish-skin vest, exposing almost everything of him to the sea he liked to go swimming in. He could not have seen more than three dozen summers, and yet he was more renowned than any of the older ones who shared his profession.


“Do you know what happens when we die?” He asked, still looking out at sea.


“We go into Swafnir's halls?” She asked in reply, expecting the answer to be easy.


“If we die fighting, yes.” He answered ominously. “Else the seagulls peck out our eyes and the crabs eat our flesh and we go to nothing.”


A cloud crept in front of the sun, a foreboding omen for what Arva feared was the meaning of his words.


“So, you mean us to fight her and die?” She asked insecurely.


His head was unmoving: “If we were true of our convictions, then yes, we should.”


She felt her heart drop. Bera would scream with rage and this was not a course Arva meant to set sails to either.


“It didn't seem like we ever had the slightest chance!” She reasoned feebly. “I wouldn't even know how...”


“This decision is for you to make, not me.” He interrupted her with a raised hand. “You are the consorts of hetmen. You and your sister will be hetwomen some day, most likely. It is not the place of priests to make these decisions.”


“Then what do you mean to tell the people?” She asked him.


“We priests give people guidance when there are questions that cannot be answered.” He replied vaguely. “We give consolation when their hearts are broken and give them the strength to follow our leaders and our god.”


“I don't understand...”


This sounded decidedly less than the man who could make crying children laugh with smile, who could teach those who did not want to go on living back to life and happiness with a few words.


“Do you think I tell a grieving mother that her drowned child was not qualified to enter Swafnir's halls?” He went on. “Do you think that I tell a child whose parents passed to a fever anything other than that they have gone to a better place? Do you know what happens when we die?”


The blood felt freezing cold in Arva's veins. She did not know how to respond. Thorgun turned around, his eyes wide and pale like the foam on the waves.


“It's all a lie.” He explained. “It's all a lie to make ourselves feel better. It's a lie we tell ourselves to fight better, to work harder, to forget our fear of death!”


She felt the ground vanish beneath her feet. He couldn't actually mean that. Not he. And yet she remembered what she had told the grieving man. Perhaps that was the answer.


“It is what we need right now.” Arva felt like she was beginning to understand. “Else the seagulls peck out or eyes and we go to nothing. That's what you mean to tell the people, that everyone slain by the giantess' is in Swafnir's halls now. You knew they would worry about their loved ones most of all.”


“Aye, and why do they do that?” He smiled queerly, giving his short, braided beard a stroke. “Why fear death?”


“It's a test.” She offered uncomfortably. “A test of our convictions.”


“What good are convictions when you and your kin lie rotting beneath the ground?” His smile grew even wider. “Our deaths only serve purpose if we die for the living! Life is what matters, not what comes after!”


Arva gave him a careful look trying to determine whether he had lost his mind. Maybe it was unwise to let this gibberish-talking man loose on the city folk. Perhaps his naked head had spent too much time in the cold waters of the sea. She thought to have seen a queer swelling behind his ears, such as that could befall people spending too long hours inside the water.


“You know it deep within your heart, you and your sister both.” He continued. “You are wise beyond your years, it is why you opted for life when you had the chance! You are wise leaders, the both of you, and you shall take us through this.”


He bowed his head and it all made sense to her at once though it left her shaken to the core.


“Then tell the people what they need to hear.” She said but knew that that had always been his intention.


A completely exchanged Thorgun Swafnirson climbed the ruins of the old market hall shortly after. Bera beckoned Arva over to the group of people she was standing with. Arva knew their faces. They were members of hetmen's families all. Old Ingvar Ragnarson had been a member of the Ottaskin himself before his love for forging axes had claimed his hearing. Lingard Oriksdottir was a cousin to hetman Olaf's wife, the hetwoman Jurga Trondesdottir and she clutched her youngest son Eric by a hand. Angrima Brydasdottir was only sixteen and wild of spirit. She had wanted to join the raid against the Horasians but was thought to be with child because her monthly blood had been withholding. She had almost killed poor Isleif Hallarson, some lad she must have thought or known to be the father. The way her hand subtly caressed the area above her womb showed that it was right that she had not gone, or terribly wrong, considering what had happened.


Except for Bera, Arva did not see any of her own kin and that worried her. No actual, current members of the Ottaskin were in evidence either. The Ottaskin had thirteen members, only three of which had not put to sea with the fleet. Terribly few to begin with, the odds of all of them having been killed or fled increased dramatically, given that they were not present.


“I had a vision!” Thorgun Swafnirson proclaimed loudly and the market grew hushed at once.


“I was out, swimming in the sea when a large wave gripped me and smashed by body on to the rocks! I sank to the ground and met our god himself and he told me of the enemy that was coming!”


The flaw in his story was obvious and someone shouted it from the crowd: “Then why didn't you warn us, priest?!”


His smile told Arva that Thorgun had forseen this however: “When I opened my eyes it was already too late, but it was not the only thing that Swafnir told me!”


“What else did he tell you?” Someone else screamed to keep him going.


“He told me of two heroines in our midst, two women of steadfast beliefs and unwavering courage!”


“Arva! Bera! Arva and Bera Hjettisdottir!” It came from a number of mouths.


“Aye!” Thorgun agreed. “Upon their shoulders our god has laid the great duty of saving this city, which they have already begun to do! Anyone who died or dies in the course of this great deed shall have entrance into Swafnir's halls and feast with their forefathers in all eternity!”


A cheer went up at that as Arva had expected.


“Do not throw your lives away, my friends, and do not abandon our god's city! It is precious to him that we remain, though we are conquered, and see a future of prosperity and riches as we have never seen before!”


The cheer grew even louder and just like that Thorgun's deed was done. In the span of a few words, he had transformed a flock of worrying, beaten dogs into a cheering, howling pack of wolves again.


'That's what priests are for.' Arva blinked full of admiration.


They had just witnessed the closest thing to a miracle they would ever see, if Thorgun's earlier words could be believed.


Bera grabbed Arva by the hand and rushed her up to him, standing above the crowd, bathing in their approval. There were more than a thousand people all together, rubbing against each other, the children save atop the elders' shoulders. If that was all that remained it was horrible news though. Arva could only hope that most of the rest of the city folk had been able to escape, but judging by the amount of bodies she had seen it seemed unlikely.


Bera spread her arms to bid them silence to begin the more practical part of the gathering. She basically told them what more than half of them already knew. Find food, get rid of the dead, do what the giantess wants and tell any survivors still yet undiscovered. Breathe life into the city again and do not flee.


Their hearts emboldened by Thorgun's affirmations it all seemed to go much less painful however. Their conqueror was sitting in the winter-harbour, unmoving, eyes closed. The sun had come out again and the giantess seemed to bathe in it for what ever reason. Perhaps she was praying to Praios, the sun god of the twelve, Arva thought, or perhaps she was just resting from all her killing.


They determined to throw the dead over the cliffs and into the sea when the tide would wash them away in the evening. It would lend symbolic reaffirmation to the priest's words. Thorgun helped, as did the other kin of hetmen and even deaf Ingvar Ragnarson understood what had to be done. They did not begrudge Arva and Bera their new status like that fool of Ragnoldson had.


It was terrible to think how little time had gone by from when the giantess had stepped over the east gate until now. Armies, even if they captured a city entirely in one attack, most often took days to do so. Arva and Bera took a walk through the city to asses the damage. The Ottaskin of hetmen was completely destroyed as were many houses most of which were closer to the sea. The wharf and storehouses in the harbour lay almost all in rubble and no doubt most of the goods within were spoiled. Food might not be the only thing they needed. They didn't know how many were without homes now, without blankets and furs for the night, torches, tallow and beeswax candles, mead and ale to help them forget for a while. Finding these things was important.


There would be things in the still many houses left standing, but they had no idea how long the giantess meant to stay and Arva feared that it would not be enough.


The west gate was blocked, they had seen that, and the east gate was smashed to a pile of rubble that would be near impossible to pass, but the Bodir gate was intact and open. Bera marched out in front but Arva hesitated.


“Wait!” She called. “What if she sees us, does this not count as leaving the city?”


Bera took a look outside: “There's no boats and there's only through the swamp if you want to get away.”


Just before it entered the sea, the Bodir was joined by a small river, ten meters in width that crossed in front of the city from the north. Where it joined the big stream there was a swamp, three hundred steps wide, two hundred long and treacherous. It could swallow people and things that did not float. Thus, the Bodir gate served only as a means to get to the three tiny fields, the meadow by the river and a number of sheds and barns as well as small wooden landing bridge.


On the other side of the Bodir there was another, small part of the city with a bigger landing stage, more houses, boat-sheds and the like, almost like a small village on it's own. Arva saw that it had not been touched at all, though the people seemed to have abandoned it. With the Bodir two hundred meters wide here, perhaps the giantess' couldn't cross it. She clearly didn't fear water, but if she was able to swim was another question. Arva did not know how deep the river was, however. Perhaps the giant girl would simply be able to walk through, but if truth be told this portion of Thorwal was too unimportant and unreachable to care about know.


Cows, chickens and goats grazed and pecked on the meadow, which was good, and a look into one of the barns revealed some stored hay, oats and barley too. Nearby the Bodir gate was one of the hetmen families' homesteads. This one was larger than the other two, not because of more houses or riches, but because they liked to grew food within their own stockade. The palisades had suffered a few giant feet land on them and none of the houses had been left standing although some of the crop-fields seemed to be intact. The first hetman's homestead they crossed, the one closest to the harbour, had been in a similar state, completely destroyed, no one left alive.


Whoever Jarl Kalf was, he had committed a great treachery. Arva shuddered when she thought about where they had to go next, the final stop of their inspection, the homestead of their very own. Everything within her fought against having to go there. She did not want to know or see, but remember the place as she and Bera had left it, a place of life and happiness, home, family.


From the destroyed entrance of the compound her eyes wandered south instead. There was the smugglers quarter, not really a quarter but merely a collection of a dozen or so buildings that occupied a small bulge within the city walls. As with the pirates, not few Thorwalsh around the world earned their coin in smuggling, using their skill at seamanship to get past blockades, embargoes and tariffs.


In Thorwal, the smugglers quarter was the second dirtiest and poorest part of town, trumped only and notably by the south eastern side of the main harbour, where the stranded people lived in their sheds and tents. When smugglers came home, they often brought foreigners with them, foreigners that were hunted as criminals where they came from, standing to lose fingers or hands if they were caught. In Thorwal, smuggling earned a man the dungeon for a year, but criminals were criminals and the smugglers quarter, along with the tiny pier at the Bodir gate, played a huge role with any goods entering the city illegally, circumventing the small harbour fee meant to fill the city's coffers.


The Ottaskin was well aware, but divided over it. Some wanted to root the place out and confiscate any goods in the storehouses that had been put there so obviously where it didn't make any sense. So far from the harbour and main roads, any big loads had to be hauled on many detours to get there, far off to the last corner of the city, which meant higher transportation costs to be sure. But the hetman of hetmen and his supporters turned a blind eye to much of the activities there, claiming that they were vital for the city's supply in winter when ice and storms blocked the sea. How the smugglers were supposedly able to get food into the city when regular traders could not, Arva did not understand. The possibility of blockade by a Horasian fleet was real however, especially now when Thorwal's ships were almost all away. Then, smugglers would come in handy, but only then, as her aunt and mother agreed as well.


“Look.” Bera said next to her. “I know you don't want to go, but you cannot escape it forever. What's done is done, not looking at it won't change that.”


Arva squirmed inside. She didn't want to. Not yet. Instead, she pressed on the other way towards the outer walls and into the smugglers quarter.


“Arva!” Bera called after her.


“Perhaps there's food!” She called back feebly, desperately trying to keep her mind from thinking of their home.


If she saw it destroyed she didn't know if she would have the strength to go on. Finding food was more important, she told herself. That way, they might be able to save people yet. With enough food, maybe they could feed the giantess and their people both. The more food, the better, assuming the giantess ate regular food at all. She had to, Arva thought, people were made of meat too and perhaps she'd prefer the well salted, dried kind over the bloody, squirming men, women and children she had already consumed so many of. That would be a major victory of sorts.


The smugglers quarter didn't look like it had suffered a single giant foot falling down on it and Arva found that terribly unfair.


“Then at least wait for me!” Bera called in annoyance.


She was still looking for something between the rubble of the other family's destroyed home. When finally she came running towards Arva, she had two axes in hand.


“What do we need those for?” Arva asked when she arrived looking at the nicely ornamented blade of the weapon she had been given.


“That's a shady place.” Bera nodded ahead. “With shady people. You never know what they might be up to.”


That was true, Arva recognized. Where one evil was, the other waited just around the corner. The town's most dubious tavern was there too, tellingly named the Misty Tankard. Some said it was the closest thing to a brothel for foreigners, other swore there was a lot of gambling going on, even the kind frowned upon by the Thorwalers, then others suspected it was a place were one could buy and enjoy illegal substances.


But as it turned out, the rats were always first to flee a sinking ship. The smugglers quarter looked all but abandoned. Some houses had obviously been entered into, others been left in haste and still others barred up. There might still have been people here somewhere, Arva judged, but except for a sailor sprawled in front of the entirely plundered Misty Tankard there was no one to be seen. Bera gave the sailor a rude kick against the head to wake him up, but he was either too drunk to wake or had been knocked unconscious by a thief. Either way, the man had no evidence of a purse about him.


The tavern was a three storied house in dark colours. Someone had painted the crude contours of a naked woman onto a lantern of red glass, but that was by far the most decorative thing about the place Arva could find. A peeling sign hanging from a single rusty chain displayed a tankard full of something foggy and the name Misty Tankard in Kusliker letters, the most common writing on the continent from Brazen Sword to Efferd's Wall.


Arva could read it barely, having learned a little from a Hesinde priest taken captive on one of the voyages she had partaken. She did not remember how all the letters were spoken but it was easy enough when she knew what the words were before hand. Bera had laughed at her for learning it.


“Who needs these crude letters when you can read elegant runes?” She had asked.


But the Thorwalsh runes proved terribly cumbersome when it came to anything other than religious inscriptions.


The lowest story was half buried in the ground and the second began at head level, so to get into the common room they had to climb down a small flight of creaking steps. It was a mess of overturned tables and benches inside. A dead woman lay on a table, a dagger in her chest, all the food and drink appeared to be stolen.


“Rats.” Bera matched Arva's previous thoughts. “Let's go. It doesn't look like they left anything useful.”


“Let's try the storehouses.” Arva concurred.


If they went higher up they were likely to find only more chaos and maybe one or another raped and murdered whore.


The storehouses looked as though they had not been used in ages. Moss and weeds grew from some of their timbers and the walls looked wet, rotting and in ill repair. They were all barred up, and even though they looked in bad state, the incredibly thick and sturdy locks did not show a single spot of rust upon closer inspection. Bera gave one of the doors a measuring look and went to work on it with her axe.


She had not swung for the third time before someone banged on it from the inside.


“Fuck off, private property!” A rough and low, manly voice said. “Go away or I'll come out with an axe of my own!”


“Open the door!” Bera shouted back. “I'm here to confiscate your goods!”


There was scratching in the lock from inside before the door opened and a huge, fat man stood in it, a short wood axe in hand.


“Fuckin' Phex!” He scowled. “You're a hetman's daughter!”


“What's in this kontor?” Arva demanded to know and his tiny, squinting eyes moved over to her.


“Mould.” He shrugged. “And I think a few mushrooms is growin' from the wood some places.”


“Step aside.” Bera commanded him and to Arva's surprise the man lumbered off to let them in.


The air smelled of mould and rot, just like he had said. It was dark, except for the light that fell through roof truss. The entrance door was part of a gate that could be opened towards the inside, large enough to lead a wagon through, but it looked as though it had not been used in ages either. There was a higher story that could be loaded with a chain through a hook in the ceiling, but judging by it's rusty state, Arva doubted there was anything up there. There was some straw on the ground that seemed to have been grain once, but it had almost decayed to dirt by now.


Besides that, there were two wooden boxes that looked to be empty, a smaller one the man had been sitting on and a larger one with a small cup and a glass bottle of a pale green liquor standing on it, three quarters full.


“Haven't seen any cargo in years.” The man grumbled. “Ain't likely gettin' any this year either.”


“I arrest you for smuggling!” Bera turned to him, angered by the disappointing contents of the place.


He chuckled deeply and calmly. Even though clearly not of Thorwalsh heritage, he stood just as tall as Bera who was still taller than Arva by the width of a finger or two. His body was thick and fat but there would be mountains of muscles under there, just by constantly carrying his weight around. He did not assume any aggressive stance though. If truth be told, he looked much calmer than Arva felt inside, much calmer than he had any right to be which no doubt had something to do with the drink he had been enjoying.


“Smuggling what, missy?” He gestured into the emptiness with a hand as large as a bucket, fingers thick as sausages.


Bera growled and clutched her axe tightly.


“Then for that!” She gestured at his makeshift table and the green snaps. “It's Boron's Tears, isn't it?!”


“Aye, it is.” He shrugged, not even denying it. “And I have some Mibeltube as well. Will you put me in the hole for that, eh?”


He had good cause to be unconcerned. Mibeltube was a small offence and it was rumoured that some Thorwalsh even grew their own supply in the small swamp next to the city. It dulled the senses a little, could make hungry, happy and sleepy, but nothing worse. Boron's Tears was a liquor that was very strong. It could make a man forget that he was a man if he consumed too much too quickly and sometimes there were ingredients to it that could cause horrible hallucinations. That was the common knowledge about it at least. It was worse than Mibeltube but far from anything serious, especially since he only had one, not even entirely full bottle.


But there had to be something going on here, she thought, otherwise this man wouldn't be guarding it.


“I bet if we go digging around here we'll find more?” She offered cheekily, just to lend her sister a hand.


If he had a cache of the stuff hidden around here somewhere that would earn him a larger sentence to be sure, but in light of what was going on in the city, smugglers selling illegal substances was the least of their concerns.


“Oh, you're welcome to dig.” He chuckled again. “This ground straw should have been thrown out months ago!”


Something about the way he said it told Arva that it was the truth. They'd find nothing, not that it mattered, but it seemed to frustrate Bera quite a bit.


“But you had something here, didn't you?”


He shrugged again and pursed his lips.


“Might be.” He said finally, utterly without care. “Might be, we were sellin' it too. Might be, the other lads made off with the stuff and left me here to look after the place, hehe.”


And then he chuckled again. Indifference and amusement seemed to be the only things he was capable off, and he even swayed a little as he stood.


“Now how many weeks in the pen must I go then? Haven't been there a while, got some good friends there. Miss the lads something terrible.”


“I'll execute you on the spot!” Bera roared through her teeth.


The man looked at her, weary eyed: “For smugglin'?!”


“The dungeon is closed to us and I won't suffer you lot within the city!” She replied with a sadistic sense of satisfaction in her eyes.


He squinted to her, then out the door, then back to her.


“Are we in the Bornlands?” He asked, raising his hands in a gesture of mock defence. “My apologies, I thought this was Thorwal.”


The Bronjaren of the Bornlands were infamous for their cruel and radical punishments where the Thorwalsh were renowned for tolerance and leniency instead. Maybe that was just a saying, Arva didn't know, for the Bornlands were at the exact opposite side of the continent. To reach it, one had to go all the way south around Cape Brabak, up the Pearl Sea and either through the Gulf of Tuzak and the Maraskan Sound or around the island of Maraskan itself, all of which was being called the Demonic Sea as of late. Then it was still further north through the Tobrian Sea to reach it.


The much shorter northern route past the Firncliffs and Yetiland had always been neigh impossible on account of too much ice and heavy storms. Since some evil-worshipping ice witch had supposedly settled down in the Grimmfrost Badlands with her followers sitting naked in the snow, day in and day out building and worshipping ice sculptures in her likeness, there had not been a single report of any ships successfully making the trip.


The man before them might still be a Bornlander, Arva judged. The Bronjarens' cruelty was said to have driven tens of thousands from their lands, seeking their luck elsewhere. He lacked the accent though, but that could or not mean anything.


“Bera.” She said calmingly. “We can't kill him for this. It's not right.”


“I knew that big bitch was trouble when I heard people screamin'.” The man grumbled into his multitude of chins. “Is it that bad, aye?”


Bera flared her nostrils. She had always had a wild temper and was quick to anger and quick to lash out at anyone, especially where her pride was concerned. Arva had to reason with her softly or risk her starting a fight with this mountain of a man. Fat and slow as he was she'd knock him out or kill him easily enough, but that wouldn't make anything any better. They could not execute him for his offence as Bera suggested. In Thorwal, sometimes even murder and manslaughter wasn't punished by death if the deed could be reasonably explained.


“Come, maybe there's food in the other kontors.” She urged her.


“Oh, there is!” The man's pig eyes blinked with mischief.


“Where?”


His lips twisted a little, but Arva couldn't tell whether it was from discomfort or ill-hidden amusement.


“Oh, I shouldn't tell.” He grumbled. “It's ill luck to rat on fellow smugglers, eh? Can't steal from a thief, Phex and all that?”


“Tell me or Bera here is going to cut herself a slice of bacon.” Arva threatened with an unimpressed smile.


He swallowed hard, looking ridiculous on account of him not really having a throat to do it with. His tiny eyes went from Bera's long, well forged axe to the short thing in his hands, more meant for cutting wood that people.


“Try the largest one.” He resolved with a sudden, eerie smile. “That old cunt Clank has been sittin' on his damned pickles since last summer. Swears he can make a fortune if the next winter is as hard as the one two years ago.”


He went over to the table, dropped his axe and poured himself a cup of Boron's Tears. Before he drank he sat down ponderously, wood creaking under him, and after he downed the green liquid his eyes bulged and a hiss came from his throat.


“Feels like burning from the inside, ha, I like it!” He said though his face looked pained.


“Will it be guarded? Won't it be rotten?” Arva asked at once.


He shrugged again: “Might be, but more like his lads ran off as mine did, Blackfoot, Stain, Dicer and the lot. Clank might still be there though. He's like me, you see, doesn't run very fast, but that's because he's old and has a wooden leg. Nah, I don't think it would be rotten. Defeats the purpose of their operation, hehe.”


“And what purpose is that?” Bera asked, still scowling.


“Oh, I don't understand any of that.” He grinned, peering into his bottle. “Something about pickled food and hard winters, that's for sure.”


“They bank on the sea closing up and rising food prices.” Arva guessed. “Horasians have been known to pickle lemons and oranges against scurvy, and meat and fish as well, but they're not allowed to trade in our waters.”


“Clever girl.” The man grinned. “Nothing's worse than when pork gets worth it's weight in silver, eh? Hehehe!”


He leaned back and slapped his belly, making it ripple beneath his sweat-stained shirt. To look at him and hear him talk it was easy to mistake him for a fool, but this man had a fox's cunning, Arva thought, and he was not entirely truthful with them yet.


“You don't like him very much then, him and his crew?”


He shook his head as far as his chins allowed him to: “Can't say that. They is always cheatin' me at dicin', them lot. And Clank is a niggardly cunt, though he swims in coin, to hear him tell it. They get paid in advance, you see, not like us.”


“Paid by who?” Bera briskly asked before Arva could.


“Ahhh.” He smiled a broad smile. “Now let's see, are you as clever as your sister?”


Bera's eyes darkened and her face foretold that she would like nothing better than to beat it out of him. Arva wanted to seize the opportunity to show that wits could count for more than ferocity however. She set her mind in motion to solve the puzzle.


“It doesn't make any sense.” She pondered aloud. “An operation such as theirs must require a lot of protection and pickled Horasian goods aren't cheap either. Granted, it might pay if they can sell at high enough a price, but why run the risk of smuggling? A Garethian or Nostrian trader could do the same legally, with smaller protection cost and only the small harbour fee to pay else wise.”


Bera looked at her with bedazzlement on her face: “Then why don't they?”


Arva turned to the fat man who had just swallowed another cup of Tears. He smiled and mouthed Bera's question without saying it. There was another question though, and that was what game this man was playing. Was he just drunk and passing his time, or was there more, was it a path he was leading them down, to some conclusion he wanted them to reach.


“Why don't you?” Arva looked at the man, beckoning to the empty storehouse. “The trade-houses of Weyringer, Engstrand, Gerbelstein and Zornbrecht might do it, but their stores are in use, oft as not. You sit on an empty kontor, why? You may not have access to Horasian pickles but you could store grains, stockfish, salt pork and mutton?”


“Ah, that's the stuff a hetwoman is made of, or should be.” His smile had something sour to it.


Her eyes fell on the rotting reeds on the floor. They had done it, she realized. Theirs had been the same scheme as that other smugglers' lot, at some point and on the side at least. No one needed such a large storehouse to run a little Mibeltube and Boron's Tears, that much was certain.


“But keeping others from doing the same thing they do must be even more expensive.” Arva argued. “Why do that, if there's market enough for everyone? Hard winters come often, this far north.”


“Oh, the prices are good, aye.” He allowed. “But what do you think the price becomes, when you're the only one sellin'? And you hetman kin are so rich from all that raidin' and bordin' you do.”


He stopped and his face lit up before he started laughing heartily.


“What's so funny, fat man?!” Bera barked at him.


“Oh, hohoho, I just realized something!” He held his sides. “Those sneaky bastards, aha, ha!”


“Who?!” Arva demanded to know. “What's the meaning of this farce you play? Why don't you just tell us the answer to your question?”


“Call it codex, call it honour.” He was still chuckling. “But you're good fun too! You, lassie, you were so close when you mentioned them trade-houses, hehe.”


“Weyringer, Engstrand, Gerbelstein and Zornbrecht, yes!” She angrily listed the companies with kontors in the city. “But they have no business in the smugglers' quarter?! Or do they?”


“Uuuh, cold trace!” He shuddered for effect. “Think now, who has enough coin, power, connections and lack of conscience to hold an entire city hostage to their food supply? Eh?!”


“Stoerrebrandt!” Bera let loose, her voice full of hate.


“Aha!” The man seemed more than satisfied. “Who's the smarter sister now!?”


“The Stoerrebrandts, in Thorwal?!” Arva was utterly aghast.


The Stoerrebrandt Tobacco Company was the single largest business in the world and they peddled far more than pipe-weed. Even though they were based in Gareth, they had their dirty hands in every business south of Salza, the Nostrian city on the border, or so Arva had believed. Notorious pirates by culture, the Thorwalsh were the natural enemies of the unfathomably rich patricians and thus the two were linked by mutual distaste for one another, especially because Stoerrebrandt did not bog off the evil practise of slavery where it was legal.


'Those sneaky bastards.' She thought, echoing the fat man's words in her mind. 'Of course they could not let off their share of money to be made in Thorwal!'


The large trade-houses who dabbled in slavery were forbidden in the city, their ships attacked on sight when possible, which also included Terdilion, Liegerfeld and Sandford and any Novadi trading-houses such as Dhachmani and Alshera. Other trading houses were allowed, but not entirely protected from piracy. It was complicated and sometimes the Ottaskin would agree to have the traders compensated by whoever had stolen their ships and cargo.


“Oh, you have to appreciate the cunning!” The man said dreamily. “The way it works, you steal from Stoerrebrandt where you can and they steal it right back from you, right from under your noses, and with the jarl's blessing, if what I heard is true.”


Technically the city of Thorwal and the surrounding lands were a jarldom and Olaf it's Jarl, but since it was by very far the most important jarldom of all, it was ruled by the Ottaskin and not the jarl alone as other jarldoms were, though his vote counted for a lot and he held the most power amongst the hetmen.


“The hetman of hetmen agreed to you smugglers being in the city to provide food in times of need!” Arva cautioned him. “He'd never agree to Stoerrbrandt enriching themselves on our hunger?!”


It had not been meant to sound like a question, but already the doubts lingered in her mind. Could it be true, could Olaf have been bought to be made a part of this scheme? Was that the reason he protected the smugglers after all?


“Ask yourself...” The man poured himself another cup. “Why does the Ottaskin not solve the problem itself, eh? Hehe.”


“Bloody corruption.” Bera hissed, and looked like Arva felt, utterly full of revulsion.


“We will attack this problem in it's due time.” Arva decided. “You may fill your stores again, I promise you that much. For now, get off your fat arse and help clean the city! We have a giantess to deal with!”


“I feared you'd say that.” He grumbled and downed his cup. “Hrgh! But I won't have it said, I'm not doing my part, eh? It was nice, making business with you.”


He stood up, swayed, staggered and finally set himself in motion towards the door.


“Word to the wise.” He gave them both another thorough look. “When Clank offers you wine, don't take it. You'll find yourself waking up in places, you did not wish to go.”


Arva and Bera looked at each other in puzzlement but the man was without and when Arva marched after him, it was as though he had vanished into thin air. The giantess was not in sight either but Arva decided she'd rather not know what she was doing right now. If Thorwal was in luck she was still sitting in the sun and not on a prowl, killing more people.


“What a queer place, and right within our city.” She mentioned, walking over to the storehouse he had named.


It was the largest one, though not by far, and looked just as rotten and ill repaired as the others. But on a second look, Arva could see that the timber had been purposefully painted grey in places and the moss and reeds were dry, looking as though they had been placed on top to make it appear as though they grew there. The door to the place had the single largest and most formidable lock, Arva had ever seen. The door looked just as ordinary and flimsy as on the fat man's kontor but she knew by now that it only looked that way from the outside and wood be made of thick and sturdy oak, all the way.


But when Bera pushed down the iron handle, the door opened, and light came through from inside. A candle was burning on a copper disc, attached to one of the supporting pillars, it's light throwing a dim twilight onto the wealthy contents of the place. Barrels, chests and firkins were stacked in abundance atop of each other, and it looked as though the entire kontor was full except for a small place at the entrance and two small paths that allowed for passage further inside. It had something of the fabled labyrinths from the stories, that high and massive was the wealth of goods.


On a table beneath the candle, a thick ledger was sprawled open. Arva tried herself at working out some of the words on the opened page. It was a list of contents, it seemed, names and numbers, but the book had not been used for so long that the page had gathered a thick layer of dust.


'They are still waiting for the right winter.' She knew. 'When ice and storms shut us off from the sea and the land trade does not suffice to feed the city.'


This place did not stink at all, she recognized.


There was a clank in the darkness between the heaps of cargo, and then another and a footstep and then another clank.


'Clank's wooden leg!'


There was a dagger on the table, next to some boned fish, and she seized it, putting it on her belt. Clank was a tiny man, even for a foreigner. The years had bent his spine and he moved on a stick together with his wooden leg. His cloak was a dark grey, his vest black, spotty velvet and there was a leather cap on his grey, balding head. His mouth was tight and hinted of a neigh toothless mouth and a pipe was in between his lips, breathing thick, white smoke. His eyes were clear blue, sharp and mistrusting, but as soon as he spied the two women standing in his kontor, his features turned sweet all at once.


“Pardon, milaidies.” He bowed, which put his head on one level with Arva's belt. “We are closed.”


“Save your words, Clank.” Bera spat coldly. “They might be your last. All your goods are confiscated.”


He gave her a misunderstanding look: “Is it to do with the giantess and the gates closed? Why, in that case we are open! How much gold and silver have you brought?”


His smile was toothless indeed, except for a single rotten one in the upper right hand corner.


“You did not hear me right, smuggler!” Bera snarled. “Confiscated, I said. The only thing you get is punishment for your crimes!”


He understood then, Arva could see it clearly on his face, but he did not look as though he giving up either.


“I see.” He said, taking a sad look to the ground where he tapped his stick two times in quick succession, tap, tap.


“Of course we will try our best to aid in this dire situation.” His words were slow and sweet as poison. “But I'm afraid I must insist on compensation. I have a letter, you see, from the Jarl, protecting me from any capriciousness.”


He produced a parchment from his vest, unfolded it and handed it to Arva. She had half expected Kusliker letters but remembered that Olaf could not read or write such, just as Bera couldn't. Instead, it was written in Thorwalsh runes.


'To steal with a clear conscience makes ones hair fall out.' She read perplexed.


The man still looked at her, certain victory in his eyes.


She read again: 'To steal with a clear conscience makes ones hair fall out. To complain about the jarl with your neighbour brings bad luck when the tide is low. Swearing to your father's face when the moon is new, leads to illness. The hero went into the castle and murdered the fish-lords wife.'


It went on in that fashion. After that, Olaf had made his mark with three crude crosses, that he apparently could not be prevented from turning into crossed axes after that, like a playing child.


“You see?” Clank asked sweetly.


Arva smiled and handed the letter to Bera so she could read it too.


“You don't understand our runes, do you?” She asked the old man.


“That cunt.” Bera whispered and crumbled the parchment in her hand.


“Huh?” Arva made, thinking that maybe she had overlooked some hidden meaning.


“Your letter is nonsense.” Bera told Clank without hesitation.


It fell like a brick from Arva's brow: 'Of course! Of course Olaf would not be so foolish as to provide anyone with a written confession as to his connection to all this?!'


Clank's face wrinkled up with fear.


“Ba...ba...but we ha...have an agreement, he and I.” He stammered. “Y...you can put me in a cell and wait for him to come back, he'll set me free, see if he don't...”


His eyes darted to the table, the dagger Arva had wisely taken away. He sucked on his pipe, gathering himself up.


“Ah, of course, hehe, I was only japin'.” He cackled. “Of course we offer our help to the city, free of charge.”


'You're going to demand your money back from Olaf.' Arva thought hatefully in her mind.


He limped to the side into a nook behind a pillar and Arva could hear him pouring before he produced a tablet with three stone-clay cups with a dark, red liquid. It all took mere seconds.


“Here's to our understanding.” He offered it happily. “A cup of wine, eh?”


That was what the fat man had warned of, though all three cups looked the same. Was it poison, she thought, or something else? She took a cup and raised it to her nose, sniffing. It smelled distantly of wine, true, but more mouldy, sour and more foul. He couldn't get out of this if he poisoned all three of them, so one of the cups would have to be normal wine, she concluded. But that didn't matter, they knew his ploy.


When she poured the cup empty on the ground, it was thicker than wine and darker than it had any right be, even in the candlelight. Clank's face hardened and he reached for his walking stick with his left hand.


Steel scraped against wood as he drew the hidden blade from within. It was cunningly crafted, Arva did not fail to note. To look at it, one might never have suspected it for what it was. She lurched back, escaping his blow as he drew but fell and the hilt of the axe slipped from her fingers. He was left handed, she saw, giving him an edge in combat during the first few moves as most fighters trained against right handers all their life. But he was old, one-legged and tiny and Bera only laughed at him.


The tablet had fallen to the floor with a crash and the cups had shattered, spilling their contents. It looked as though there was the exact same thick, dark, foul stuff in all of them. Clank stood before them, thin, blank blade in hand. It was good steel, not a spot of rust upon it but as Arva looked at it from the ground she saw the reflection of a moving shadow on the left. That was why all cups were the same. Clank would knock out all three of them and his man would slit Bera and Arva's throats before bedding his master to awake unscathed.


“Left!” She bellowed while Bera was still laughing.


The man that stepped into the candlelight was another foreigner, a haggard, bony man, though young, and with a wooden club in his grasp. Clank launched forward, hacking at Arva's feet and she scurried back a few inches. On the right, there was a light and another man emerged there, Thorwlash by the looks of him, tall and strong.


“Ahya!” Bera attacked the man on the left with two large steps, axe swinging in the air.


He raised the wooden club to defend himself but misjudged the axe's path in the twilight and it came crashing down on his head. The blade crunched through his forehead and the upper part of his nose, killing him in an instant. Bera had always been a ferocious fighter, always on the attack.


Arva twisted sideways, dodging Clank's blow to her chest. His tiny frame had moved close, close enough that she could kick his good leg out from under him the next instant. He went down, losing grasp of his blade while Arva used his body to help herself up. There was no time to keep him alive for questioning while there was still a far more dangerous enemy to content with. Her boots were thick, brown leather, with a crude, plank-wooden sole. As soon as she had found her feet she stood over him, giving him a last, disgusted look before the heel of her boot came crashing down on his face. His old, brittle skull broke at once and he was dead.


'Is that what she feels like, killing people underfoot?'


No, her victims were much smaller to her, like cockroaches, crickets or the smallest of frogs.


The Thorwaler looked at them, Bera with blood dripping from her axe and Arva snatching her own weapon back up from the ground. He was barefooted, she saw, his feet dark black with dirt.


'Blackfoot!' She remembered, and maybe the one behind them was Dicer or Stain, or someone else.


“...and the lot.” The fat man had concluded his list, but at the time it had not been clear if he was speaking of his own people or Clank's.


That would mean one more person at least. The fourth person came, and went, running in between the opposing fronts on swift, scurrying toes, making for the door. A huge, fat shadow blocked it a moment later and the fleeing man could not halt in time. The two crashed into each other and the much smaller man bounced away and died, a short, rusty wood axe in his head.


Bera laughed with pleasure and Arva knew her sister well enough to know that she'd be damned before Arva or the fat man got the last enemy instead of her. The red haired Thorwaler had but a fish knife in hand and Bera was on him without a second thought. With her opponent unable to parry, she swung at his head but he caught the axe's shaft mid-swing with his off hand and drove the knife's blade towards Bera's throat.


Arva screamed but Bera caught his hand at the wrist in turn. Then they wrestled with each other. He was not a bad fighter and strong, but lacked Bera's training and ferocity. With a horrible crack, her forehead slammed into his nose, then again, and again, Bera screaming, until he was but a wet sack in her grasp. She could let him go and split his head in two with her axe, Arva thought, but Bera kept butting her head into his face until blood ran down her own and his was jelly.


“Err, I had a gut feelin' you'd let one escape.” The fat man laughed as the Thorwalsh smuggler hit the ground with a thump. “My gut feelin's can always be trusted.”


“You were told to go and help clean the city!” Bera scowled at him.


No doubt she would have liked to hunt down the last one herself, but Arva was glad he came back.


“Err, I wanted to see them dead for me self.” He grumbled with a smile. “Blackfoot's a real nasty bugger. It was him, doin' the intimidatin'.”


“Stain here sold Clank's other stuff on the side.” He nodded to the corpse before him before looking at the one to the left. “And Dicer kept an eye on the city, seeing if anyone tried to do the same as them.”


“What other stuff on the side?” Arva asked with a point.


It was wise to listen closely to any word coming out of his mouth, that much she had learned.


“Ah, did he offer you any wine?” He asked in reply, squeezing through the door.


“Yes.” Arva nodded. “Foul stuff, I'd never drink it.”


“Hehe, that's wise.” He chuckled. “Some are not so lucky though, and they usually water it down so it passes for the cheap piss you can buy at the Tankard. Ohhh, this stuff is not cheap though, no, hehe.”


“What is it?” Arva asked. “A stronger form of Boron's Tears?”


He had lumbered past her to the nook from where Clank had retrieved the tablet and produced a black, label-less bottle, regarding it in his hand.


“No.” He grumbled. “This is the solution to your giant problem.”


He looked up and smiled: “Boronwine.”


Arva was shocked. Mibeltube and Boron's Tears were one thing, but Boronwine was the worst if the stories could be believed. Even a single cup could turn a man into a sack of meal, unable to move or comprehend or react to anything that was happening for hours on end while his mind was captured in mist. That wasn't the worst part though. After waking from it's grasp for the third time, the consumer needed the substance regularly, else pain, insomnia and madness consumed him. There were many twilight taverns, cellars and sheds in the harbours of the south, supposedly, where sailors and others would lay, day in and day out, consuming it until their coin was spent before they were kicked out and stole or killed to get more.


“How is this the solution to our problem?” Bera asked with a frown.


The man's smile made an ice cold shower ran down Arva's spine. They had planned to feast the giantess anyway, to keep her from eating people, and now she would be in for an extra treat she was not expecting. Troutman, that was the fat man's name, also swore that he had heard someone speak of the giant girl, eating the people of a village inland. She did eat regular food and consumed drink as well, if the story was to be believed.


“Everyone thought he was mad.” Troutman shrugged. “Me too, though I had a gut feeling that he wasn't.”


Bera misliked the idea of poisoning the giantess to sleep and killing her, but had no better plan to offer. The very idea of using poison was utterly foreign to the Thorwlash. Arva would never have thought of it. She wondered if this had been Troutman's plan to begin with, on top of getting rid of the competitors holding him down. She wouldn't put it past him. He found a whole case of the stuff soon enough, though he did not seem to have known exactly where it was to begin with. That seemed to mean that they could trust him, their interests aligned in this in any case, and one could argue that he had saved their lives in some way.


When the giantess got up from the winter-harbour and stood over the city, naked as she was, Bera decided to finally go see their homestead before she would have need of them again. Arva followed, full of fear, and Troutman was charged with preparing the drink to add to the giantess' supper.


When the sisters arrived at their homestead however, Arva felt like she lost the ground beneath her feet again, and the world started to tumble before her eyes. Then, all she could feel was grief and hate. She had been unwilling to even face the possibility before, but now, reality hit her like a ram. Bera had to help her off the ground. It would be in her hands now, both of them knew. Arva would try her best to help, but feared she could not, and the giant steps were already returning.

Chapter End Notes:

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