Sihil felt hunger gnaw at the pit of her stomach, tiredness drag at her eyelids, and aching pain throb throughout her body. She figured that she probably looked like one big, malnourished bruise. Teagan was foraging what food she could, but Sihil could only stomach so much of the ubiquitous slightly-sweet grass that she’d been eating for longer than she cared to remember now. Over all the pain and discomfort, only the constant jostling reminded her that she was nestled on Teagan’s shoulder, clinging weakly to a stray lock of hair.

“Teagan…” Sihil whispered, but she doubted that she’d been heard. How long had it been? Did Teagan already kill, no - devour - the captives? Sihil felt her gorge rise at the thought of their fate, not an uncommon nightmare of hers at this point.

She tried to force herself up to her feet, but between the jostling, wearied movement of Teagan and her own tiredness, she could only manage to push her upper body up, leaving her sore legs splayed out over the rear edge of Teagan’s shoulder.

“Glad to see you’re awake. Well, er, glad you’re feeling better, but I don’t think you woke up at a particularly good time. I’m starving, same as I assume you are, and while I scrounged up a few bland roots that should do you some good after I cook them up, it’s not nearly enough to keep me going. You of all people know what that means.”

So she hadn’t yet eaten anyone, but she seemed dead set on proceeding on with it regardless. An equally chilling prospect, and one she wouldn’t have the slight mercy of sleeping through.

“Teagan,” Sihil began again, “I don’t need to eat. Just, please, don’t fall back into your old habits… I really thought you changed. Maybe I was arrogant to think that it was because of me, but whatever caused it, you’ve started becoming more compassionate. More human. I’m scared you’re going to lose that, that it’s already slipping away.”

“Relax, kid!” Teagan exclaimed, jubilantly enough to draw Sihil’s ire at her indifference, “If you’re scared I’m going to do anything to you, forget that. I think I’ve already proven my commitment to keeping your little hide safe. Alternatively, y’know, if you’ve got a problem with me - the only one on your side, from what I can tell - not starving to death, there’s really not much I can tell you other than the fact that it’s me or them, and I don’t plan on dying just yet. Not until I figure out just how doomed this world is for my people.”

“So that’s what you’re up to?” Sihil asked, half out of genuine curiosity and half out of a desire to buy time. She bit her lower lip in frustration as Teagan’s pace kept on all the same even as she answered.

“Oh, uhm, yeah, I figure I haven’t told you what I’m after, have I? I hear there’s a place out there, a real city, still standing after all this time, as of yet undiscovered by - or at least defended from, although I find that prospect a bit harder to believe - your nasty, aggressive little kinsfolk; no offense to you.  If such a place is real, then I still have a shot at living a real, normal life, where I don’t have to feel uncomfortable every time I eat around you, given that I’ll likely have access to actual, real, DELICIOUS food. Something that might help wash away the sadistic streak I’ve grown after all these years running wild in the forest like a rabid animal with hardly a soul to talk to. You’ve helped me come a long way, no doubt, but I still feel lonely sometimes; like we’re the only two people in the world, and everyone else is just, kind of, more of an object than another person, you know? That doesn’t even apply to just your kind, everything just feels so transitory and non-permanent. A real home where I can meet real people and live a real life might help fill that hole in me. I got a little piece of paper with a crude map and directions, and while I’m fairly certain I lost it a long ways back, the directions on it are practically imprinted on my mind. There’s a brook I was told to follow, something that coincides with the piece of advice I just got, and my destination should be within reach. Finally.”

“In these lands?” Sihil asked, now wholly curious, “I thought you said it’s undiscovered. I’m no worldly person, but everyone I knew could tell you by heart that the flatlands on the outskirts of the Selcenian border are the home of Agopolis, capital of the old empire, and probably the most populated settlement. Period.”

This notion did give Teagan pause enough to stop her interminable pace towards the interior of the bandit stronghold, for which Sihil was rather pleased. It probably didn’t make much of a difference, but procrastinating seemed a better alternative to inaction.

“So you’re telling me I’m heading further INTO tomki-, ahem, your people’s lands? Not the situation I’d hoped for, but I’ve staked my life on these shaky, baseless instructions for long enough that I’m not going to give up now. I’ve developed a seemingly preternatural talent for the arcane, and made friends - I hope - with the best person I’ve ever crossed paths with; kind, virtuous, and gifted a similarly arcane talent for the linguistic. I’ve seen so much, learned so much, [i]felt [/i] so much! Even through all the pain, all the death, and all the suffering, I think this is the best thing that’s happened in the past ten years of my miserable life, and I’m not about to stop now.”

Teagan paused, out of breath from her passionate and spontaneous outburst.

“...not that I don’t appreciate the tip. I won’t let my guard down. For now, though, I’ve still got to eat.”

Teagan stepped past the bodies of the slain, until she found a small, unroofed enclave wherein the surviving landsknekt, Adalina, was sound asleep next to a sturdy-looking wicker cage filled with at least fifty huddled, despondent, and weary tomkins. A lot less than the landsknekte promised, but it didn’t take long to figure out what so harshly tolled their numbers. A ramshackle pit was dug into the mud-slicked ground directly adjacent to the cage, wherein the bodies of more than a handful of mangled and dead tomkins were entrapped in what appeared to be a makeshift gladiatorial arena, accompanied by rusty weapons and makeshift armaments likely crafted by the bandits. Sihil was sickened by the sight, wondering if she had ever beheld a worse cruelty from Teagan, and nearly coming up blank before she remembered Teagan’s earliest ventures, right after the two had “met”. Teagan popped the top off of the cage, drawing stares from the tomkins within, mostly of fear. An appropriate reaction, as Teagan’s hand immediately descended and grabbed a squirming handful of around 6 or 7 individuals without a moment’s pause.

“Wait!” Sihil exclaimed, drawing curious murmurs from the prisoners who had prior been unaware of her presence, “Let me at least, I don’t know, apologize for you. Promise them that we’ll set most of them free. Do something to, at the very least, comfort them.”

Teagan paused, gaze flitting from the cage to the pit, from there to the tomkins in her hand, and lastly, with a turn of her head, to Sihil.

“Alright.” she thoughtfully conceded, “It’s the least I, or rather you, could do. Not much, but I do feel bad, believe me. I have no qualms about doing what I will with soldiers and the like, but these people have evidently been through a lot.”

Without further ado, Sihil looked at the throng of prisoners under her, cleared her throat, and spoke, “My name is Sihil, and this here is my accom… no, my friend, Teagan.”

Sihil paused, expecting murmurs, accusations, insults, and threats. The weary-eyed prisoners offered none of these, and so she continued.

“You are free now, but as you can likely tell, we have endured great sacrifice in your liberation. Teagan is starving, and while she is extremely distressed about the need to do so, s-she… she needs… she needs to eat. I’m so sorry. I hope you can forgive me, or, at the very least, understand.”

“Done?” Teagan asked, snapping her attention, and gaze, back to the tomkins half-heartedly resisting her grasp.

“Yeah, I guess. It doesn’t feel like it did much, but I supp-”

Sihil was interrupted by a loud, attention-grabbing shout from one of the prisoners. A muscular, olive-skinned woman with a mane of unkempt black hair was waving furiously at her. Sihil looked questioningly at Teagan, who shrugged and gave her a nod of approval to entertain whatever the prisoner had to say.

“Oi! You, kid, you can talk to that thing, right?!”

“Her name is Teagan, as I said, but yes, we can talk. If you want me to talk her out of this, believe me when I say that I’ve already tried.”

“That’s crazy! The part about you being able to talk to her! But in a good way, kind of! Anyways, listen close, before she eats those poor bastards! I know these lands like the back of my hand, and I know the back of my hand pretty damn well after being stuck in this hell for so long! I swear to you, on my life and the lives of every one of my men, I can take her to a grove with enough food for a big ‘un like her before the sun moves an inch in the sky!”

Sihil paused to think. This could be good.

“That’s not a bad idea. Let me talk it over with her.”

Sihil whispered over to Teagan, conveying the situation to her, keeping her voice down to hide her emotion, even if the prisoners couldn’t understand what was being said. A few seconds of hushed communication later, Sihil leaned back over Teagan’s shoulder and looked back at the energetic woman, while Teagan set the tomkins she’d been holding back down in the cage.

“Teagan likes the sound of it too. Say, can you point out all of your aforementioned men to me? We’d like to aptly reward you for your offer.”

The woman obliged, chattering on about her prowess as a tracker, navigator, and scout, while rounding up all but around ten of the prisoners. When she was done, she looked back expectantly towards Sihil.

“I don’t suppose we’ll be gettin’ our reward until she gets a full belly, huh? And that means we’ve got to stick with you?”

“No and yes, respectively.” Sihil replied, “You’ll only get it if she doesn’t find the food that’s so conveniently nearby. If you can’t lead us to that grove in your promised instant before the sun moves, you’re her next meal, along with the lives of those you recklessly staked on such a bold claim. Do your job, and your reward is leaving intact. As for the rest of you, you’re all free no matter what happens to them. We’ll take you closer to civilization and send you on your way. We ask in return only that you keep quiet about our specific whereabouts. Your lives are in the balance, though, and should you fail, we won’t [i]need[/i] to worry about you bringing more soldiers our way. You’d better find her some food, now, and fast. ”

Sihil didn’t like speaking so harshly, especially when the groans and agonized wails of the betrayed turned into a general sense of ire focused on the blushing, trembling self-proclaimed scout, who seemed to lose all of her bravado in the time that Sihil responded.

“W-well, I guess we can’t quite refuse… no time to waste then. Not sure how you’ll take all of us with you, though, given tha-”

The woman yelped as Teagan, with a surge of reserved arcane strength, pulled the cage from the ground and into her grasp without so much as a laying a hand on it until it had already settled. Teagan was almost immediately winded by the effort, but she certainly enjoyed the reaction her stunt got from the crowd she held in her hands, secretly relishing their exclamations of wonder, fear, and surprise.

“That’ll just about do it. So you’re taking us all with you. Well, let me propose an alternative, then. It’s rather rainy, and the noise and smell are dulling my senses, so I’m not too sure if I can take you to this grove. That being said, the giants that lived here, they had to keep food about, right? They certainly devoured a few of our number, regrettably, but I’ve seen ‘em eating their fill from bowls of rice aplenty. They also even gave us a few grains, very occasionally - the victors in the pit got to eat - so I’m sure they had enough to go around. Let’s take a look around here.”

Sihil wasn’t enamored by the woman’s blithe attitude, but she had already found a degree of respect for her; it was obvious that she was lying about the grove, but in doing so, she was prepared to sacrifice her own life to try and save those of her comrades. A respectable act, if not a foolishly reckless one. Her gamble didn’t pay off, but now that she was on the spot, she proposed a far more feasible idea.

Much to everyone’s relief, a few minutes of ambling around and digging through junk yielded a few fist-sized pouches of long-grained, black rice, as well as clothes to supplement those that Teagan got from the landsknekte, and a new backpack to help her lug things around as she pleased without having to deal with the ragged holes and shoddy patches that plagued her current bag. Teagan, hoping to sate her hunger as quickly as possible, started gnawing on a small handful of the uncooked rice before putting the prisoner cage down again, and, with a hiss of breath released through her closed lips, ripping away one of the cage’s wicker walls before transferring the various objects of her old backpacks, starting with Hassan, Aaliyah, and Rhaea, who received but a brief glimpse at the world around them and an empathetic wave from Sihil before returning into a dark, soft interior much like the one they’d exited, albeit far cleaner and less rough for wear.

~

Zoe exulted in the wearied cheers and congratulations of her comrades, breathing a heavy sigh of relief as the strange and frankly terrifying giantess popped uncooked rice, rather than people, into her mouth. She watched closely as the giantess lifted a trio of people, all of them seemingly healthy and well-fed, albeit beleaguered in countenance, out of her old massive bag, and transferred them to the one she’d taken from the other giants, who were now strewn about the area, all dead, along with a few unfamiliar other giants clad in similar apparel to this Teagan character. What really caught Zoe’s eye, however, was when the giantess reached into one of the two pockets stitched into the side of her old back, and pulled something truly amazing from within; treasures of every variety, gemstones and goblets and swords and platters, bossed shields and bronze muscled cuirasses, gemstones the size of a person’s head and necklaces strung with silver beads; the sight was appallingly tantalizing, so close yet so incredibly far out of reach. That haul would put to shame everything she’d earned in her career with ease.

“Hey, kid!” Zoe shouted up to the girl perched on the giantess’ shoulder, “I didn’t catch your name yet! I’m Zoe, by the way!”

“My name’s Sihil. Nice to meet you, I suppose.” she flatly responded, seeming more than a bit uninterested in conversation. Zoe wasn’t going to let herself be so easily deterred.

“Can I ask how you got in this particular circumstance?” Zoe queried, hoping to ascertain whether it was Sihil or Teagan who was in charge. She had seen her fair share of mindless, enslaved giants, and she knew for a fact that this one acted under no such influence as that of the slavers’ magic.

“Long story. To sum it up, I can speak their language, and Teagan here really isn’t all that bad of a person. It was hard getting through to her, but I think she’s demonstrated that she means you no ill will. Spread the word, if you please… the sooner the senseless violence ends, the better,”

“That’s super neat!” Zoe shouted back, enthusiastically, “Say, though, it’s gotta be pretty dangerous travelling through these lands. I heard that a coalition force was tracking a particularly rampant giantess down, headed this way… I myself was hoping we could find some manner of work with that force when these beasts snatched us up. I figure it’s been around a week now, but to my point, I don’t suppose that’s you they’re after, is it?” 

“Probably.” Sihil responded, “Teagan isn’t popular with the Orestians or the Selcenians at this point, and I vaguely remember us having an unfortunate run-in with a Q’thumani outpost.”

Score! Zoe tried to keep a straight face, but couldn’t help grinning just a little.

“Well, I [i]did[/i] notice all that treasure your friend Teagan has stored up there, and I figure - me and my companions are mercenaries - maybe you could use an escort? We can keep up a brisk jog for good long time, and I figure we’d be able to keep up with her stride. I don’t see her using it any time soon, and frankly, I don’t see you using it either. Word travels quick, kid, and people won’t take kindly to your friend. Some people. Not me. I’m fine with it! Really!”

Zoe felt her heart pounding as Sihil and Teagan talked in that unfamiliar tongue of theirs, Sihil’s face turned away from her and Teagan’s wearing an unreadable expression. After a few minutes passed, Zoe’s impatience got the better of her, and she waved up at Sihil.

“Oi! Can you fill me in on what’s going on? What does the big gal think?”

“To be truthful,” Sihil said, a little scornfully, “She’s a fan of your idea. Me, not so much. We’re talking it over, and I’m trying my best to figure out what’s compelling her to even think of hiring an entourage of half-starved, weaponless, former prisoners. I doubt you’d do much good against whatever force they’d deem necessary to bring my friend here down. That being said, if you really do know the surrounding lands like the back of your hand, she thinks you could be helpful as a guide alone, and she’s just as keen on having you facilitate peace between us and the giants as I am.”

“Well... “ Zoe could tell Sihil was half-convinced herself, and went in for the figurative kill, “Who does that treasure belong to? I’d like to think they have the full right in dictating how it’s spent.”

Sihil turned to Teagan, talked a few seconds more, got a nod of approval and a chuckle from the giantess, and turned back.

“That settles it, I guess. You said you could keep up with her pace? Let’s put that theory to the test, and get out of this horrid place as quickly as possible.”

~

It was dusk when it was visible. Icaria was mute at the sight, striding forward the same as ever even as the structure, far too large and crude to be the handiwork of anything but the giants, came into view. Dead bodies - also those of giants - were littered about.

“Commander Icaria! Our scouts found a giantess, still alive, asleep within the structure. She’s pretty badly wounded, so if we strike now, we ca-”

“Enough, Laeron. You’re not our strategist.” Icaria scolded, “Volkhard and I will handle it alone. Get everyone else ready to continue moving.”

“Y-yes, Commander Icaria!” Laeron stuttered, shocked by her flippantly bold decision. He knew better than to question it, and wasted no time in passing on her order. Volkhard stretched his arms, twirled his spear, and entered the massive door, followed by Icaria. Laeron watched as they turned a corner and disappeared from view, tense with worry.

“Looks like this was an internecine skirmish.” Volkhard commented, gaze settling on the numerous dead, “Judging by the prints we’ve found, only one giant made it out. They were accompanied… by humans. A large group of them, no less, numbers at least twenty to thirty, although it could be far more. I think we both know that’s got to be our quarry.”

“Yeah.” Icaria noted glumly, “I think we know.”

“What do you think she could possibly be doing? She’s headed dead on for Agopolis, she’s got a small crowd at her back, and she’s leaving a mess for you to clean up everywhere she goes. At this rate, everyone’s going to hear about the arcane giantess and the girl who can talk to her, not to mention whoever that small crowd she’s gathering consists of.”

“I’d say we ought to question everyone here, but that’s out of the picture at this point. We’re running out of time. We don’t know how much time she squandered in this place, but we need to capitalize on every second of it. Let’s follow those tracks, you and I ahead of the army.”

“Understood. Do you intend on us…?”

“Us killing her by ourselves? Yes. I think I can put my faith in myself, if not you. The soldiery can clean up her ever-growing retinue of heresiarchs if we’re successful, and can help us finish the job if we aren’t. If things turn out unimaginably, and she really is capable of unleashing such strength that she survives all that, I have a last resort, and I’m fairly certain you have one too. And Volkhard?”

“Yes?”

“If I die, you’re in charge of killing her, as I’m sure you’re already aware.”

“Understood.”

“You’ll have to kill the girl, too. Wring her traitorous neck for me. She alone is the true threat.”

“Understood.”

Volkhard wondered if Icaria knew he was lying. There would, eventually, come a time where he would find out. It seemed that time was fast approaching. Today, however, didn’t seem to be that time. It was just another job, quick and easy. Volkhard shut off his mind as the surviving giantess, still fast asleep, came into view.

“For all. For us. For you, Aelia. No matter the cost.”