It had taken Shaella most of the night, and had cost the Staff of Malice all of its power, to undo the magical barrier that King Balton had created around the island of Coldfrost, but the deed was done. Once the boundary’s soft, static hum finally ceased, the breed giants came stampeding off of the island like the half intelligent, half feral beasts that they were.
Straight across the deep and sluggishly powerful river channel they came, with little to no regard for the freezing temperatures and the deadly current. More than a dozen of the hairy man beasts ended up floating stiffly out to sea, trampled, drowned, or frozen solid by the icy-cold water. The smartest of them, the older males, and the naturally protective mothers, waited on the other side with their children. They came across in the sunlight, at a safe, shallow ford. There was a narrow place, a few miles upstream from where Shaella had vanquished the barrier. There, one of the younger, brighter males boasted that he could make a bridge. It turned out that one wasn’t needed. The water there never reached more than knee deep.
The wildest of them, the toothy, crazed males, driven by rage, and testosterone were already ravaging the nearby villages and towns, and we’re slowly working their way south in small packs. The biggest and meanest of them though, the smarter, more terrifying self-proclaimed leader of all of the Breed Giants, was leading a band of his kind to Locar, to complete the bargain they had made with the Dragon Queen.
Bzorch was nearly ten feet tall, and like all of his kin, his body was covered with a thin, yet course fur, everywhere save for his face and palms. Bzorch’s fur was light brown in color, and still thick enough for him to be considered young; but the grayish white patches along his spine and chest, showed his maturity.
A lot of the breed giants were born with white or silver fur. It was much harder to tell the ages of those beasts. All of them were large, had wide, wet snouts, and jutting lower jaws. Their mouths were full of ferocious looking teeth that tore into raw flesh easily, sometimes the flesh of their own kind.
Bzorch had fought ruthlessly with dozens of contenders to become the alpha male. Lately though, the challenges had ceased. His hard, and violent victory displays, where the loser was dismembered and consumed before those that chose to watch such combats, had gone far to dissuade further attempts to take over his role.
The breed giants hadn’t been cannibals until King Balton had imprisoned them on the island. Up until then, they had hunted the northwestern arctic for bear, wolf, and lazy tusked seal. They eventually ranged far enough inland from the icy coast, to stumble upon some of the true giants’ herds, and some of Westland’s northern most villages. Herds were devoured, women were raped, and men and giants were killed. Eventually, the breed started eating the flesh of the two-legged creatures they had killed. This wasn’t cannibalism yet, for they were neither men, nor giants, and the taste of man flesh was succulent. It drove them mad for more.
Lord Brach and his hearty northern troops, hunted, tortured and did everything they could to dissuade the beasts, but the Breed eventually lost all fear of humans. They were the hunters, and the men were their prey. That’s when King Balton stepped in.
The kingdom folk thought the Breed were half-bears, or the fabled Yetin. The fact that they were obviously two-legged, mannish creatures that were capable of semi-intelligent thought, was the only reason that King Balton and King Aldar had agreed to spare them from complete annihilation.
The giant king claimed that they were a mutated form of a race called the Wedjakin, which hailed from beyond the other side of the Giant Mountains. What had caused them to turn so violently feral was unknown to the Giant King though. There was a hope that the wildness would eventually breed out of them.
Bound to the island of Coldfrost, the beasts couldn’t kill, rape, and savage the good folk of Westland, or plunder the giant herders’ flocks any longer, and that was all that really mattered to the two Kings. On the island, there was little to hunt, and the bitter climate made growing anything impossible. Soon, the Breed beasts were forced to resort to eating each other to survive. The transition from human and giant flesh to the flesh of their own kind was easy to make, but the fact that they had been forced to that extreme wasn’t easy for any of the sentient ones to forget. Especially Bzorch.
The Breed had been hunted, killed, captured, and tortured, by Westland’s King, his Northern Lord’s. Like animals, they had been herded out onto the island of Coldfrost and imprisoned there. Until then, the Breed hadn’t understood the idea of borders and property lines. The beast in them, the instinct that drove them, was to feed, to claim territory by way of scent marking, and to mate. There had been no evil intent to their raiding and marauding. There were no greed driven designs of conquest involved. They were just creatures migrating and feeding.
Now all that had changed. Now, they were driven by hatred and vengeance. Now, they knew what it was like to be caged and forced to eat each other to keep from starving. The imprisonment had only lasted a few years, but what, to a half wild animal, is time? Especially in a place that is bitter cold and icy white year round; a place where the changing of seasons is a barely conceivable notion.
The Breed giants were loose now and they were having their way. To the people of Northern Westland, this was a most terrible thing. There was no one left to protect them. Almost all of their capable men had gone off to war. The rampaging groups of huge wild creatures left a trail of blood and death in their wake. As for the more intelligent group, led by Bzorch, who had a specific mission to accomplish, the savaging was no less horrible. In fact, it was worse.
After gathering his chosen, and leaving the Isle of Coldfrost, Bzorch led his band eastward, through the town of Riverbend. They stopped, only to feed on a few of the townsfolk there. No women were raped, no children pulled apart piece by piece, but only because Bzorch had more meaningful victims in mind.
The group of chosen consisted of thirteen of the most brutal of their kind. Bzorch had chosen them, not only because they were strong and vicious, but because they weren’t bright enough to plan and think on their own. They were the most primal of the Breed beasts, and the most obedient to his role as alpha male.
Bzorch himself was fairly intelligent. He had negotiated himself something more valuable than land or gold from the Dragon Queen. He had gained two of the most important things one could have among the humans. He had gained a position of authority, and he had garnered respect. Once he completed his end of the bargain, the city of Locar would be his to rule. Lord Bzorch, the Lord of Locar. He relished the sound of it, on his thick, wide tongue as he led his chosen on a south-easterly course, for the town of Greenside.
Bzorch had some unfinished personal business there, and his pack needed rest and food. Three days of nonstop travel had taken its toll on them. A night of pillaging and feasting, followed by a day of rest, would do them all some good. Greenside was the perfect place for it. The man that had earned the nickname “The Coldfrost Butcher” resided in that town. It was the home of the heartless torturer, Duke Fairchild.
Queen Shaella had explained to Bzorch, that the Duke was most likely off on the new Westland King’s fool’s quest, but Bzorch didn’t care. His father, and two siblings, had been captured, and taken to North Watch back before the imprisonment. They had been tortured, and then displayed, like some macabre artwork, to serve as a sort of warning to the Breed. They had been laid out in the bloody snow, in so many pieces, among giant loops of their own entrails.
Bzorch remembered looking on that scene all too clearly, and for all of the winter months. He had an inclination to display the Coldfrost Butcher’s many women in a similar fashion. The warmer climate this much further south, wouldn’t preserve his exhibition, like the frigid north had preserved his family’s remains. Not being able to see such a sight, for weeks and weeks on end wouldn’t have the same effect on the humans, as seeing his family had had on him. He couldn’t waste that much time anyway. He had a city to take, a bridge to destroy, and a title to claim.
A night and a day of rape and torture would have to quench his thirst for vengeance. Maybe Duke Fairchild’s wife would bear him a child. He would try his best to plant his seed inside her, and maybe eat one of the many sisters she was rumored to have, right there in front of her. He could make her eat some of the meat too. The idea caused him to let out a low, guttural growl as he loped along.
The stronghold at Greenside wasn’t hard to find. The half dozen armored men guarding the place fell like frightened penguins before the Breed assault. While most of them tore through the village, Bzorch and two others brought the wrath of the Breed into the Duke’s stone-walled home.
The Duke’s wife, and her gaggle of sisters, screamed, pleaded, and begged for mercy, but none was given. The plumpest of the women had her face bitten off by one of Bzorch’s companions, who then raped her body, while her feet sputtered and thumped on the floor.
One of his other raiders sunk his teeth into an ample bosom, and didn’t stop until the floors were soaked in blood and gore. Women fainted, whimpered, and huddled in the corners. A few made it out of the stronghold, only to find as much savage chaos outside.
Bzorch singled out the lady of the house, who had collapsed into a heap on the bloody floor. Her jeweled necklace, and the many rings on her fingers, gave her away. He carried her to the dining hall, and none too gently laid her out on the heavy walnut table. With a single rake of his hand, he tore way the front of her dress, revealing pale goose-pimpled skin and heavy breasts. He didn’t rape her then. First, he went back into the sitting room, and grabbed a whimpering girl up by the hair. Before the terrified girl knew what was happening, her neck was twisted to the point of tearing free of her body. Bzorch was hungry, and he tore into her, as if he were a starving dog. He drenched the half conscious Coldfrost Butcher’s wife, with blood, as he feasted on her niece’s raw flesh, and then savagely penetrated her, again and again.
When he was done with her, he swept her body from the table, into a pile of cool, sticky human remains as if she were so much trash. A good while later, he ordered his chosen to get some rest. It was a long way to Locar, and only the small trading town of Halter lay in between. Once he had made sure that the chosen would comply, he lay down upon the Coldfrost Butcher’s table board and slept.
At Lake Bottom Stronghold, where Lord Gregory had once taught Mikahl how to ride and fight, the Dragon Queen’s Zardmen had rooted themselves in thickly. The watery lowland terrain was comparable to the swampy marshlands, and the warm water of Lion’s Lake agreed with their slithery scaly skin.
The Breed would not come this far south. Not only had Queen Shaella forbidden it, but the Breed preferred the cooler climates of the north, just like the Zard wouldn’t, and couldn’t for any extended period of time, suffer the colder northern portions of the Dragon Queen’s kingdom. She had allowed some groups of the primitive man-beasts, to terrorize the cities of Portsmouth and Castleview.
The city of Castleview was built around Lakeside Castle. By road, it was a few days journey on geka back, from Lake Bottom to Lakeside, but to the Zard, it was only a short swim across the lake. Having the Breed so close kept the Zardmen at the Stronghold constantly on edge.
Shaella had made it clear that she wouldn’t tolerate fighting amongst the Zard and the Breed, but that didn’t stop the Zard from feeling the internal instincts of hatred and fear that the Breed instilled in them; nor did it stop the Breed from wanting to kill them and eat them.
The Zard soldiers, and their Sarzard captains, loathed the idea of Shaella loosing the Breed giants, but they understood the need to protect the north, and they had faith in her judgment, if not faith in her ability to use her dragon to keep the primal savages in line. Still, the idea of chancing upon one of the wild packs of tree-tall monsters ranging this far south was driving the Zard mad. The not so exaggerated rumors they were hearing about the Breed giants’ rampage through the north, had distracted them enough for Lord Gregory’s messenger, Wyndall, and a few others, to escape from the cellar where they had been held prisoner for some time now.
After receiving Lord Ellrich’s disturbing message, Lady Trella and Lady Zasha had begun preparing to flee the kingdom by ship. Being well bred ladies, they went about it all wrong and spent far too much time worrying about all the wrong things. They wondered what plates to save, which paintings, and dresses to stow in their trunks, and then they ran out of time. Now, they were slaving away in Lake Bottom Stronghold’s kitchen, scrubbing pots, and cooking slugs, turtles, and other strange bug-like things for the Zard who had taken command there.
Wyndall had grown up around Lion’s Lake, and knew every step of ground around its shores. He had hunted every stretch of the thinly wooded hills around the area too. His father, he had learned, had died fighting futilely to save the family’s farm during the initial Zard attack. His mother had been sold to a Dakaneese slave merchant a few weeks later. These things he learned from other captives at Lake Bottom, and from those who were forced to serve the Zard there.
He had delivered Lord Gregory’s message to Lady Trella, but it hadn’t been a timely delivery. He had run into the musters of soldiers gathering in the villages around Eastwatch. Mistaken for the page of one of the attending lords, he was forced to carry out a few miscellaneous orders, but quickly got himself away from there.
After that, he had traveled on foot and off of the roads. Groups of Lord Brach’s men were on keen alert for those who tried to sneak past their call to arms. It was no easy task to avoid them, but somehow, he had managed.
He had gotten to Lake Bottom only a week before the Zard had attacked Settsted. He had fought them when they came, but there’d been swarms of the slithery Skeeks, far too many to hope to overcome. Along with several others, his life was spared, and he was locked in the cellars. The rumor was that another Dakaneese slave ship was coming, and they, and several of the women, including Lady Zasha, and Lady Trella, were to be put on it in exchange for supplies that the Zard needed.
Wyndall enlisted the help of the young rider from Settsted, and a few of the locals, who were loyal to Lord Gregory. Together, they were about to risk their lives, as much for the two ladies, as for their own sake. The only thing that might hinder the scheme, the only thing that worried young Wyndall, was the ladies themselves. Already, their foolish desire to hold onto things from the past had cost them their freedom. He hoped they had learned their lesson, because what they could carry in a pillow sack was about all they could bring with them this time, and only if it was ready when he came for them.
That night was rainy and dim, which was all the better for their cause. Wyndall, and Bryant, the Settsted rider, huddled in the drizzle, the precipitation doing little to ease their nerves. The summer nights weren’t much cooler than the sweltering days around the lake. The rain though, did keep the insects away, and that alone was enough to be thankful for. Not to mention the fact that it made the two young men nearly impossible to see.
“There it is,” Bryant whispered harshly. A lantern was shuttered twice in a row in the stronghold’s kitchen window.
“I see it,” Wyndall confirmed. He took a deep breath, and checked to see that the rusty sword he had found hanging in old man Gander’s barn was still at his hip. “Set them off then.”
“I’ll see you at the boat, Wyn,” said Bryant. His eyes held Wyndall’s, searching for something. “You’ll wait for me won’t you?”
Wyndall smiled reassuringly. He understood Bryant’s concern.
“On my word, I’ll wait until we can wait no longer. That’s all I can swear to.”
“Aye,” was all Bryant could reply to that.
Wyndall waited until Bryant was gone, then he said a prayer. When he finished, he made the sign for luck, and moved toward a little supply gate at the rear of the stronghold. He counted thirty paces from it, along the wall to the right, and after a panicky moment of searching, found the tiny wooden door hidden there. A few moments later, he had the old rusty sword slid through the jamb, and was jimmying the bar loose.
Just as the Lion Lord’s ancient priest, who had died in the cellar cell next to him had told him, he found himself in the back of the stronghold’s chapel.
Outside the main gate, four men draped in cloaks made of burlap and goat hide, approached on jury-rigged stilts, howling, snuffling, and demanding entry. They growled, yelled, and pounded wooden clubs together insistently, trying to make as much racket as possible.
The Sarzard on command stood atop the wall and hissed at them.
“Comesss closersss.”
He was terrified of these breed giants that had defied the Dragon Queen’s orders, but he wanted to see how many of them there were. He wanted to see if the rumors were true, about them being twice the size of men. The Zardmen that had recently returned from Lakeside Castle had all been saying all sorts of things about the ferocious creatures they had seen there. The whole stronghold was astir. Already, a group of Zard was gathering in the yard, below the Sarzard Captain, making a clamor. Some of them had been ordered there. Others came out of curiosity and concern.
“Wilds savages at the gates,” a Zardman hissed.
“The ones from Portsmouths, that ates all those humans,” added another.
“Breeeds giants from Lakesides!”
The whole ordeal lasted only a few minutes. The savage breed giants cursed about the drenching rain, and finally gave up, when it was clear that the gate wasn’t going to be opened for them. They stalked away into the rainy darkness, leaving the Zards inside the walls hissing a breath of relief.
“Where’s Lady Trella?” Wyndall asked Lady Zasha, in an exasperated whisper. He had only found one of the women he was trying to rescue waiting for him in the chapel, and was furious about it.
“She had to get something while the lizards were distracted,” Zasha responded fretfully.
At the moment, Wyndall’s expression was easily as terrifying as the prospect of getting caught by the Zardmen.
“It’s important,” she added in a mousy whisper.
As terrified as she was, she couldn’t help thinking how handsome this brave boy was that Lord Gregory had entrusted with his dying words. Without realizing it, Zasha inched closer to him. He made her feel safe, a feeling she hadn’t felt in quite some time.
Fargin women, Wyndall thought.
One had boiled his blood already, without even being in his presence, and the other had melted his heart with her timid voice and liquid eyes. He was pleased that he didn’t have to wait long. Lady Trella soon eased through the double doors that lead to the corridor beyond the chapel. She was struggling with a pillow sack, which appeared to be far too empty to warrant such effort. As she drew closer, the dull clank of precious metal explained why the sack was such a burden to the gaunt woman. Wyndall took it from her, and noticed her hesitation before she finally released it.
“Come, milady,” he said, forgetting his anger.
He knew that the value of the jewels and gold in the little sack he now held might make the difference in the success of the escape in the grander sense of things. There would be more to surviving than just getting away from the Zard.
“Follow me, and hurry. It is slick, and we’ve not much time.”
His voice was soft and reassuring now, and the strength and surety of it, went far in easing the angst the two women were feeling.
Through the dark drizzle, they made their way down to the river, to a place just a few hundred yards from where the head water came spilling over the natural dam that had formed Lion’s Lake. The roar of the powerful waterfall filled the night, but the darkness hid its beauty from the eyes.
Clayton Widden, a local farmer’s son, was waiting with the little boat. It looked to be a struggle for him to hold it there in the roiling current.
Wyndall helped the ladies into the craft, and then handed Lady Trella her bag. She nodded her thanks to him, but wasn’t sure if he saw. A moment later, he handed each of them a makeshift shield. They were old wagon wheels, with fence pickets nailed to them.
“If we are fired upon as we drift out, these will help protect you,” he said, over the sound of the waterfall.
Worriedly, he glanced back up the hill they had just descended.
“Lady Zasha, could you please hand up that bow?”
His tone had become suddenly urgent. He took it from her, strung it, and then threw the quiver of arrows over his shoulder.
“Clayton, be ready to shove off at my command,” he ordered, then moved off the dock back towards the hill.
“It’s past time to go,” Clayton was saying, but Wyndall didn’t hear him. Bryant had topped the hill.
There were two dark shapes, and only the slight glimmering reflection off of their rain soaked clothes as they ran, made them noticeable. One was Bryant. The other, was a young stable boy of about ten years of age, named Dort. Three, maybe four, Zard were not too far behind them. As soon as Wyndall had a good aim, he loosed an arrow. One of the Zard tripped forward, and went into a tumble of scaly limbs and tail.
“Don’t wait! Go!” Bryant yelled.
“We’ll swim for it!” added Dort.
Wyndall loosed another arrow, but missed his mark. He was drawing back a third, when he felt the gut bow string stretch to uselessness. The rain had gotten to it.
Clayton was urging him back to the boat, and as soon as he got in, they were off, swept downstream by the raging current. Already, Bryant and Dort were being forced to angle their mad dash down the hill towards them.
“Hold up the shields!” Wyndall commanded, as he drew his sword, and moved to the boat’s prow, which was momentarily facing the unfolding scene of the chase.
Dort leapt out over the water, his small legs churning, as if he were running through the air. Arrows rained down from above, some thumping into the wood of the boat and the shields, others plunking into the river’s dark water. Bryant barely escaped the claws of a Zardman, and dove headlong into the river. That Zardman, and a few others, came in after him.
From beneath the surface, a slithering, snakelike wake formed just behind Dort, who was swimming towards the boat with all the effort he could muster. It was all Wyndall could do to plunge his rusty blade blindly into the river behind the boy, as he reached the boat. The sword felt like its tip grated across the river bottom, until it violently shook itself free from his hand, and sank away.
Bryant surfaced just behind the boat, but a leaping lizardman came splashing down into the river right on top of him. The huge sheet of water thrown up by the splash, and the swell of the impact, rocked the boat violently. Wyndall fell awkwardly onto the floorboards, but Dort used the motion of the wave to pull himself up. The two women did the rest, and hauled him over the side, like he was an oversized fish. The last thing Wyndall remembered, before slipping into unconsciousness, was the gasps of horror from the two women, and Bryant’s blood-chilling scream as the swift swimming Zard tore him apart in the water.
Bzorch’s thirteen chosen tore through the trading town of Halter with a sickening fury. After feeding on the slower of the townsfolk, they spent two nights raping, and recuperating from their long trek through the fields and forests of central Westland. Then they were off again, loping away towards Locar. What they found when they got there was more daunting than anything their simple minds had ever conceived.
The size of the bridge city was overwhelming. It was bigger than ten of the other towns they had seen put together. Why anyone would dwell in a place so crowded and noisy, none of them, save for Bzorch, could fathom.
As they had been ordered to do by the Dragon Queen, they waited on the outskirts of the city for nightfall, killing anyone who ranged too close to their hiding place. That night, just as planned, the dragon came.
As Claret set upon Locar with Queen Shaella riding proudly on her back, the Breed giants tore into the city with a vengeance. While most of the chosen wreaked havoc in the city, Bzorch, with Claret’s help, went about doing the important work. Together, they demolished the crossing bridge. Claret, with her massive claws, crumbled, and crushed, huge sections of the stone worked archways, and burned anything flammable to ash, while Bzorch bashed away the smaller parts of the structure. It wasn’t long before the deed was done. The only bridge over the wide and mighty Leif Greyn River, which crossed from Westland into the eastern kingdoms, was un-crossable. Westland was isolated now, and Shaella’s conquest was complete. No army could march into the west, without first going through the Giant Mountains, or swimming the Leif Greyn River, or sailing around the great expanse of the Marshlands, and those three occurrences would be easy to defend against.
Just as Bzorch became the undisputed Lord of Locar, Shaella, Dragon Queen and Master Sorceress, leader of the half beast Breed giants, and the Mastress of the Zardmen of the marsh, became the sole ruler of Westland. And her Westland, unlike Glendar’s, was a kingdom that no one could take from her.