Concealed in the forests surrounding Vandan’s castle, two individuals kept watch as the guests at Valerie’s feast began making their way home later that night. Even though the journey here had been long, Bargar and Shalmat had managed to cover the distance with incredible speed, thanks to the conjuror’s giant enchanted suit of armour. They had also travelled mostly at night and kept away from any settlements that lay in the way, so as not to give away any news of their surprise attack on Vandan. Now that they had finally arrived, however, they were at a disagreement about how to proceed next.
“I believe we should attack now, while no-one as yet knows about our presence here,” Shalmat argued. “We can despatch with the villagers in a matter of minutes and capture Princess Valerie unawares as she lies in her bed. Then I can finally claim that which I’ve sought for so long…”
“I say we wait!” Bargar snapped back. “We’ve come this far; we can be patient a few hours longer. I want to see the faces of the little vermin in the light of day when I stride into their town, destroying their wretched houses with every step I take. And I don’t want to catch Valerie when she’s asleep, I want her to come running out of her castle and beg me to stop harming her people. Then I can make my revenge on her so much more satisfying! Besides, I need to catch some sleep as well. Your precious items will still be there in the castle’s cellar tomorrow morning, Shalmat.”
“All right…all right, I agree – but we must wait no later than dawn, Bargar! Once daylight arrives, we run the risk of being detected here, so close to the village.”
“Who cares? With this armour and this sword, I can take care of anyone who dares to oppose me, day or night! You can keep watch if you want, but I’m getting some well-earned rest.”
With the giant suit of armour leaning upright against a vast tree trunk, the two of them were safely out of reach from any normal humans on the ground below them. Only Valerie herself could have stood any chance of defeating them while they rested in the forest, but she had no idea, that an old enemy from her past had returned for vengeance. Instead, she went to bed with Alban as she did every night, hoping that her nightmares would spare her tonight. Until she was sure she was rid of them, she insisted that Alban sleep beside her on her bedside table, and not in her bosom as he usually did. He agreed, although he secretly thought she was being unduly concerned. But, unlike Valerie, he had drunk quite a lot of wine during the feast and was having difficulty staying awake for the last hour as the final guests said farewell and returned to their homes in Rismark. By the time Valerie was ready for bed and was carrying him upstairs, he had already begun to snore. She smiled and gave him a quick kiss, then folded up one of her dresses, placed it on her bedside table and lay him down on it. She herself was asleep within minutes too.
Valerie was awake early the next morning, and she wasn’t surprised at all to see Alban still lying fast asleep on the fabric of her dress. She yawned and stretched, then stood up, slipped on a robe and walked over to the window. She always enjoyed looking out over her little town each morning, before taking her customary bath and getting dressed before heading downstairs. Nothing made her day brighter than reminding herself what she and Alban had accomplished here. But on that specific morning, she was in for a shock.
Instead of the peace and quiet that usually lay over the landscape this early, she could hear the faint sounds of people screaming in terror. She looked down and saw that the inhabitants of Rismark were fleeing towards the castle in droves. Streams of people were rushing out of the village and she could see at once why. A giant stood on the other side of the town! Valerie couldn’t believe her eyes; she had never expected that any other giants would ever show up here, and now one had simply arrived on her doorstep, completely out of the blue. He was wearing a suit of armour and brandished a lethal-looking sword in his hands, but – and here Valerie was sure that her eyes were deceiving her – he appeared to have no head!
“A ghost…a ghost of a giant warrior, who had died long ago…no, that’s impossible!” she said to herself. “No, there has to be an explanation for what I’m seeing…but first, I need to make sure the people are safe. Whatever that thing is, it’s clearly hostile. Oh, what do I do? What can I do?”
She knew she needed a closer look at the apparition, whatever it was, and she urgently needed to make sure everyone in Rismark managed to reach the safety of the castle. She proceeded to wake Alban, not even giving him a gentle prod first to ease him out of his slumber, but picking him up by the waist and shaking him awake. Luckily, he was still wearing his clothes from last night, having fallen asleep before he could get undressed.
“What is it?” he yelled, clearly upset at being woken in such a rude manner. “Valerie, what on earth is going on? Put me down! You’re hurting me!”
“Oh, I’m sorry!” she blurted out, immediately loosening her grip on him and dropping him in the palm of her hand. “Alban…Alban, something strange is happening out there! Here, come and see!”
She took her husband to the window, where they were both alarmed to see that the armoured, headless giant had moved into Rismark itself, and was busy demolishing its houses with his feet, one-by-one, in a slow and deliberate manner. They were too far away to see if any people were still in those houses, but Valerie knew she couldn’t risk staying up here another second. Whoever or whatever this being was, it clearly wasn’t friendly.
“I’m going down to the village right away!” Valerie said. “Maybe I can stop this giant…if that’s indeed what it is…from harming or killing any of the people. Maybe he came here expecting to find other giants, and instead found humans living in what used to be the giants’ land.”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea, Valerie,” Alban cautioned her. “That thing looks even bigger and stronger than you are, and if it means you harm as well, then – well, there isn’t anything you can do about it, is there?”
He took another look at the strange visitor. Now that it had moved closer, he thought he could make out a tiny figure – or perhaps two tiny figures – standing on a platform just above the shoulders. He had never seen anything like this monstrous apparition before, but he could see that it was no ghost – and he didn’t think it was another giant come for a visit either.
“There’s something very strange about that thing,” he said. “If I didn’t know better, I’d say there was magic involved in it somehow.”
“What do you mean? Are you saying that…that it’s some kind of magical entity, that can’t be hurt by ordinary weapons?”
“Maybe…or maybe it’s just a regular suit of armour – albeit a giant-sized one – that’s been brought to life with some kind of sorcery. Either way, we need to stop it somehow, before it destroys the entire town!”
Valerie thought hard about her options, realizing that every minute she spent up here could potentially mean that another citizen of Rismark was crushed beneath the giant visitor’s boots. She knew that, in the end, she couldn’t avoid confronting it. But first, she had another priority to take care of.
“The people must be taken somewhere safe, as soon as possible,” she said. “I can take care of that: they’re already fleeing to the safety of the castle’s outer courtyard, so I can just open the doors and let them all in. I can even carry those who have been injured, who can’t move quickly enough to escape.”
“Yes, yes, that’s a good plan! The whole town’s population can easily fit in the throne room. Then you can lock all the doors, which’ll hopefully slow that monster down until we can figure out what it is and how we can stop it. Maybe…yes, that’s it! I’ll sneak right up to it and get a closer look, then make my way back to the castle and tell you what I’ve learned.”
“Alban, no! What if that thing sees you? It could crush you to death in an instant!”
“See me? How’s it supposed to see me if it doesn’t have a head?”
Valerie didn’t laugh at his attempt at a joke, and he quickly caught on that now wasn’t the time for humour.
“Don’t worry about me, darling,” he told her, taking one of her fingers in his arms and kissing it. “I’ve faced foes that were much larger than me before I even met you – ogres and such creatures – and I know how to be careful around them. I’m not trying to be a hero or to take any unnecessary risks. I just want to find out what we’re dealing with here, then I can pass that information on to you when it’s time for you to face that monster and save the day.”
This time she did smile, but she also felt herself shiver at the thought of having to deal with an unknown, possibly supernatural, enemy. She quickly put on some shoes and a cloak, then, with her beloved held firmly in her closed hand, she ran downstairs to open the castle up to the villagers. She remembered her fighting lessons with Alban from a few weeks ago and secretly wished that she hadn’t given up so quickly in learning how to handle a weapon. Then she remembered something else: the sword she’d used in the practice sessions. It had been one of many swords that were hidden away in the castle’s cellars and dungeons, far below the main level of the building. There had been other weapons in there too, as well as suits of armour very similar to the one currently terrorising the village. Most of them were too large for her to wear, having been made for the male soldiers of Vandan ages ago, but there might be one that fit her.
“I have to take a look down there, once all the people are safely inside,” she thought. “I can’t fight whatever that thing is like I am now, unarmed and vulnerable. I don’t want to fight it at all…but what if it’s the only choice I have?”
Outside the castle’s doors, a large crowd of people had already gathered, having fled the village in a state of panic. They were relieved beyond words when Valerie opened the immense wooden doors and ordered them to come inside at once. She put Alban down at her feet, where he was quickly surrounded by the men of the newly-formed town guards of Rismark.
“Prince Alban, what are your orders? Do we attack?” asked Ansur frantically. Alban’s young second-in-command was already dressed for fighting, as were almost all of his soldiers, making him felt rather out-of-place in his fine clothes from last night’s party.
“No, we don’t attack, not yet,” Alban replied. “We have no idea what that being is, and even if we did, we don’t stand a chance against an opponent of that size, not even if we had a thousand men.”
“But it’s destroying our town! It’s already begun levelling the houses nearest the forest! If we do nothing…”
“We’re not doing nothing either! Ansur…I know it’s hard for all of you to hear this, but you and I both know that Princess Valerie is the only one here who’s strong and powerful enough to deal with this threat. She’ll try her best to stop that giant in its tracks, but first she has to make sure our people are out of harm’s way.”
He looked over his shoulder and saw Valerie busy picking up groups of people – small children, elderly men and women and any others who couldn’t keep up with the main mass of the crowd as they hurried to the throne room. But her time was running out. Although the castle’s outer walls blocked their view of Rismark, they could clearly hear the giant out there stomping on the ground, as well as the distinct sound of buildings being destroyed. He turned back to his men again.
“You’ve all seen that the monster has no head? Then you must have realized that it’s no ordinary giant, like the princess is. Some kind of dark magic is making that behemoth move, but we’ll need to take a closer look in order to find out. Ansur, you and one other come with me! We’ll sneak around behind it and see if we can’t figure out what it is. Maybe we can even find a weak spot in its armour, if it has any. The rest of you, make your way into the village, but try as best you can to stay out of sight. If there are any other people still trapped in there, they’ll need our help in rescuing them. Apart from that, there’s nothing more we can do, until we know more – so let’s not waste any more time and go!”
All of the men were more afraid than they’d ever been, but none of them refused Alban’s orders. Spreading out into a dozen little groups, they set off in the direction of Rismark, hoping there’ll still be a town standing when they got there. Valerie watched them go, but she was too caught up in the task of helping her people to safety to say goodbye to Alban.
“Please come back alive, my love,” she said silently to herself. “Please don’t make me have to go on without you after today.” But she had no time for further regrets, and quickly resumed helping her subjects. Before the day was over, she knew, she herself would have to risk her own life as well.