The circle of stars above was halfway through its revolution of the night sky 
when Rustle woke up to begin his watch. He rose from his bedroll quietly 
after seeing the dwarf's bearded face with his out-stretched hand gently 
nudging him awake. To his right was the massive form of the goliath, his 
frame raising and falling. Each breath heard as a long soft torrent of air in 
and out. Behind him was Qinro and Thomindel both asleep as well.

"My turn I suppose?"

"Aye. But nothing going here but a couple of hares. Pity we couldn't risk the 
fire. This hard-tack is not sitting well with my dwarven taste-buds," he 
whispered while settling onto a bedroll next to the goliath and pulling up a 
light blanket.

"The consumption of hard-tack is a requirement of most armies of the North 
when they are in enemy territory, or indeed being pursued. I would imagine 
that the goblin horde passing through but a day before quantifies this as 
enemy…" His voice trailed to a whisper and then a stop when he heard the 
dwarf snoring behind him. 

*Ah well,* he thought as he pulled out his weapon kit, a drawstring bound 
leather pouch that he used to keep his oil, sharpening stones, and spare bit 
of leather cord in. He sat cross-legged on the edge of camp facing the vast 
grassland that had entered the day before. The horde supposedly had passed 
through here two days before, but if he was honest he had lost the trail 
yesterday and they could be following nothing more than wild horses at this 
point.

He laid his glaive on his lap across his thighs with the blade in his lap. 
The weapon was seven feet in length and had an eighteen inch single-edged 
blade on one end. The other had a special steel spike of four inches that he 
had a weapon-smith in Neverwinter affix. He pulled the oil and sharpening 
stones from the pouch, applying oil first to the stone, then to the blade 
edge on both sides. 

*A well-kept weapon shall never fail you,* he remembered his father's words 
well. They had been drilled into him often enough. The long steady sound of 
stone on steel was calming to him now. The sound to him defined peace, that 
it is a martial peace did not bother him. There was a time when that sound 
was feared more than anything else. Because it is violence itself. Death 
suspended in the ring of steel, waiting for a time when it would steal a 
life, possibly his own. But the thing about death, is that the more you are 
witness to it, the more you are a willing part in it, you realize Death is 
just the other side of the coin. Light and Dark. Life and Death. 

The night was deathly quiet with nothing moving for miles as he finished the 
blade and then worked a special oil he bought from an Elven trader into the 
haft. He was retying the leather grip as he glanced up and saw a horse 
staring back at him. He looked back down to the knot he was tying, and 
inspecting his handiwork when realization clicked in. *We don't have any 
horses.*

He was on his feet immediately, glaive conveniently in hand eyeing the beast 
when he noticed that it was not just a horse, but an entire wagon as well. 
"How did this beast come about being here, so close to camp?" He edged closer 
to the wagon and saw that it was unoccupied although it did contain bundles 
and packs. The canvas tarp that once covered the back was dragging behind it 
in the grass leaving the ribs on top to stand all to reminiscent of its 
namesake. Rustle peered at the seat and noticed that there was blood there.

*Shit. I shall never be able to live this one down.* Almost as if in reply, 
the horse turned its head and harrumphed.

"Wake up, my friends! We have a guest that has seemingly appeared as if by 
magic!"

His friends all arose and Bert had a stunned look on his face. "Were you 
asleep on watch?"

"Nay! I had but just finished cleaning my glaive and this horse and wagon 
seemed to but appear before my visage."

The bard, Thomindel, walked up to the horse and patted her on the neck, "Just 
admit you were asleep Rustle."

"Okay. Perhaps it was not magic, but it is a sneaky beast for certain." 

"The smell of blood is thick. Look the floor here is pooled with it. Fresh as 
well." The goliath held up a finger that had been dipped in the substance 
below the wagon seat for all to see.

Rustle stepped closer to the horse and examined it for a moment. "This beast 
has either ran for hours, or been scared deathly recently. Given the fresh 
blood, I would wager the latter rather than the former."

"Aye," said the dwarf from the back of the wagon. "This is family stuff." He 
held up a small doll for them to see. "Kids too."

*I suppose we should track it then,* thought the ranger. *Ah! Finally a skill 
with which I shall not falter!* The ranger made his way to the rear of the 
wagon where Qinro was and began looking for a trail. *Thing must have shown 
up magically after all, perhaps in one of those portals that mages sometimes 
use? There are no tracks-* His thoughts were cut off by Twice-Orphaned and 
Qinro both calling out that they had found the trail. They were twenty feet 
further back. 

"Ah yes! I saw those, but decided I should check to see if it was followed 
perchance, you see. Lead on!"

* * *



An hour's tracking had brought the group further into the grass plain just a 
mile or two south of the Desarin River. The grassland was such a change from 
the taverns, inns and whorehouses that Thom was used to. The city was his 
home until very recently. He thought fondly of the men and women that he had 
loved and left in Waterdeep. But his thoughts always shifted back to Paetrix, 
a halfling from The Singing Boar. She had been his muse for a time, her 
jovial glow had inspired in him at least two of his better works. 

A frown crossed Thom's face as he thought of the last time he saw Paetrix, 
bruised and battered. He went to meet her one evening as he normally did at 
the Boar, but she was nowhere to be found. The barmaid, Elel gave him 
directions to a hostel in Field Ward, just inside the new city walls where 
many of the city's demi-humans lived.

He wasn't prepared for the broken battered woman he found. He wasn't ready 
for the prejudices that had played out against her. For being a woman, for 
being a halfling. Her jaw had been broken and speaking was a test of pain for 
her. Even so, over the next hour and through many tears she related what the 
humans had done to her. She had asked him to leave after, and never return. 
She was his muse no longer.

For a time after, he thought that those humans had broken something 
beautiful. But now, years later, he realized that her beauty could not be 
broken. That it was his own delusions about the world that had been broken 
that day. He was ashamed of himself for leaving her. But not ashamed that he 
carved those three humans up like a roast turkey on Chauntea's Day. It 
inspired *Deadly Dirk come Calling*. 

They had traveled in silence unsure of what they might find along the way, 
and unwilling to give up their position too soon. It was all quiet work. Thom 
didn't mind the quiet work, he was good at it, but honestly, quiet meant 
quiet. And he wanted nothing more than to play a hunting tune on his lute at 
that moment. It took his prodigious amount of skill to turn that call away. 
Still, five deathly hunters tracking through the grasslands after an unknown 
foe? Yes, ready to avenge the honor of those slain unjustly in the night. It 
had the makings of a good tale.
 
Qinro motioned for the group to halt. Odd that he was leading, but it was 
dark work and that villainous bastard was good at it. Qinro was staring down 
at a dark spot in the grass, quiet. Then Twice-Orphaned and Bert joined his 
side. *That is a pair that raises questions,* he thought as he joined his 
party, glancing down. He didn't notice when Rustle had come up behind him and 
so was startled when he heard the ranger speak.

"Can you tell if it is man or woman?"

"Woman I think, I think that is a dress."

The thing at his feet, was no longer recognizable as humanoid. There was more 
akin with the remnants from the slaughterhouse, than with any person. Meat, 
blood, bone, bile, shit and fabric merged into something unholy. Scavenging 
animals had already started to tear and peck it to pieces. 

"Gods below," he heard himself mutter it without realizing he had done it. 
*It will have to be a dark ballad now. Perhaps like Glistner and the Lich or 
Bruchenbald's Balls* 

"There is another over here," the goliath said standing fifteen feet further 
along. He could tell by big man's words that it was another of the same. 

"Spread out, see if you can find the kids," Rustle said. The dark ranger 
loped off with his glaive in hand scanning the grass. *The Rowdy Ranger of 
Rawlinswood he is not,* thought Thom. *I wonder if he has ever tried to see 
up the skirt of a Githyanki, probably not.* 

Thom picked a direction and stared walking. The grass here came up to his 
knee and was such a dark green that it reminded him of an artist from 
Darromar that would only paint in shades of green. The artist had said it was 
a representation of nature overcoming all, but Thom was fairly certain it was 
because he could only see in hues of green. Either way, he still bought a 
painting off of him, although he couldn't remember to who he had then gifted 
the painting to. 

Thom found his thoughts drifting back to his current companions and their 
haphazard chase of giants and ogres across the countryside. *Perhaps it could 
be something comedic, something darkly humorous? A sonnet in bawdy humor of 
squishiness of flesh--* Then all thoughts escaped him, torn out of his mind 
by the scene before him.

He stood motionless staring down at the bodies, both of them girls of perhaps 
ten or eleven? He could see a hole through the chests of both. He had been 
around enough battles to recognize the wound of a javelin once removed. The 
older of the pair was face up at his feet, her younger sister was facedown a 
few feet away. Both of their woolen dresses pulled aside and their bodies 
violated. He saw the fingernails on one hand where she tried fighting off the 
attacker. Some of the nails had been forced out from the pressure of gouging 
at the flesh of the beast. 

He felt the others near him, and heard voices, but the meanings didn't 
register. They had all seen death on a grand scale in their short lives, but 
the murder and rape of children was something no one could get used to. He 
crouched down to pull the girl's dress back over her bruised and bloodied 
legs. Then reached up and closed the lids on her eyes. Eyes that had starred 
deep into him, searching for relief and and answers. 

"It will have to be a death dirge then. Something like *Tamarand's Lesson*, 
or a sequel to *Deadly Dirk come Calling*." The bard sat thinking of the 
rhyme and meter such a poem would require when he felt a massive hand on his 
shoulder. 

"I'm sorry Paetrix," he whispered.

"Think not on the dead, friend. Think on revenge." The goliath met his eyes 
then raised his hand to point off in the distance where the glow of 
torchlight lit the horizon. 

"Revenge yes." *Bah BA de de dum.. Dum Dum de dum…. Yesss. That will work*

* * *


Qinro could tell that the goliath thought the bard was grieving over the 
children's deaths, but he wasn't so sure. He'd known Thom long enough to be 
unsure of the things in that half-elven head. *Probably why we get along so 
well,* he thought. Even as they neared the glow in the distance, he heard the 
bard beside him humming a tune, one he couldn't recall hearing before.

The group stopped on a low hill overlooking an enormous pit in the ground, 
recently dug and surrounded by torchlight. But more importantly, it 
highlighted a flame-haired giant in full plate armor standing at its rim. 
Over his shoulder was a sword large enough to cut a dire bear in two. He was 
hollering at a number of ogres that were trying to lift some ancient artifact 
from the earth. He almost missed the lesser goblins laying around the edge of 
the rim, he could make out at least a dozen on all sides, likely more. The 
blood in Qinro's veins quickened.

*Allow me to release your souls upon the abyss dear beasts.* The thought of 
being able to help along so many of these cursed souls was invigorating. But 
he tried to stifle that down, to remain composed. 

"That's a lot of goblins," he said as Bert stopped next to him.

"Aye. But I might have been looking at the giant."

His thoughts were everywhere at once, torn by the two people he tried to be. 
The outwardly calm and thoughtful map-maker and sometime alchemist, and the 
bringer of death that only sought for a balance to the ennui of life. A 
return to the dark for those that thought they could escape it. 

"Have we mapped this area before? I don't recall." Perhaps they wouldn't 
notice his excitement.

*"It isn't murder if you kill beasts, friend"* The words of the old poisoner 
came back to him then. To this day he still wasn't sure if he had been trying 
to reassure Qinro, or to chastise him. Either way, it hardly mattered now. 
That mad bastard Kruppe had disappeared long ago.

*Back to the practical Qin. Stay with it man!*

"Looks like dark work first then. Rustle, Thom and I will ghost up and get 
rid of that bunch of lazy gobos there. You two hold back until we give the 
signal." He glanced about and hearing no other plans took off into the night. 
He was a dozen paces along before he realized he never mentioned just what 
the signal was. 

He ran hunched over, his back and head just black spots moving above the 
grassland. He made no sound as he moved, he wanted the beasts to be unaware 
of his presence. *No need wasting good poison on these bastards*, he thought 
as he slid the narrow pig-sticker from a sheath on his belt. The dagger was 
designed to pierce the heart of a fallen boar during a hunt, but many a 
killer had found that it just as easily will kill a man. And behind his 
trusty rapier, it was his favored weapon of choice.

The first group was laying in the grass with shovels and picks strewn about 
around them. They were all covered in dust and dirt, and many of their hands 
had the skin falling off from blisters. It was obvious that the giant had 
forced them to dig the massive hole a few yards ahead of them, and it had 
nearly killed them. He signaled to Rustle and Thom and and they took out the 
first three goblins simultaneously. No sound was given, no alarm was raised. 
They moved up and three more died. The next one he picked, a hobgoblin by the 
look of its canine like face, saw him coming and tried to reach out to a 
dagger at his side. Qinro slid over him like a shadow and grabbed his wrist 
with one hand while the other sent his knife deftly between the ribs. He felt 
the blade slide against bone as the tip pierced the goblin's heart and 
watched the panicked fear turn to pain as he stole the goblin's life.

"Shhh. Say hello to the abyss for me dear beast."

* * *



"I think we can take him." The goliath's words broke the imposed silence as 
they watched their three companions make short work of another group of 
goblins. The small group had reached the first set and swarmed over the 
downed bodies like a cheap dockside boy after being flashed a silver coin. 

Bert looked up at this friend and saw the goliath's gaze centered on the fire 
giant some distance off. It was easily twice the size of his friend, who was 
in turn twice his size. That sword on his shoulder had to be as wide as the 
dwarf was himself. "Well there is no reason to go charging in, I think we can 
wait for the signal at--"

"No we can take him. Let them kill goblins," he said motioning off to the 
distance where the others had disappeared into the night. "We shall kill 
giants." A smile broke the normally implacable face of his friend. A site he 
both longed to see and was fearful of. For Twice-Orphaned typically smiled 
only when he as about the loose all constraint and kill without impediment, 
and yet Bert couldn't help but be warmed by the sight of it. 

"You do make a compelling case." *Fuck it* Bert thought as he began prepping 
for battle and pulling on the power of his god.

* * *



Qinro had made the short work of the last group of goblins. His poisons were 
not even needed for this type of slaughter, and for that he was doubly 
grateful. *Always better when the enemy can't lift a finger to the knives 
opening their throats.* But Qinro was a practical elf, he knew why he liked 
it. After drawing his blade across the first in another group of exhausted 
goblins he heard Thomindel stumble behind him. But even so the man killed the 
goblin at his feet. 

Qinro looked down into the big shiny black eyes of his next target. *Yes 
little one. I'm death come for you. And you cannot help but welcome my 
blade.* He watched as the point of his long knife knicked the flesh beneath 
the chin, he held the terrified gaze as he slowly pushed the blade up through 
the mouth and tongue, into the soft pallet above. His body pressed against 
the goblin and he arched his back expectantly as a gentle open mouthed smile 
appeared as the bones crunched slightly in the beasts sinuses. The body 
beneath him began to shudder and Qinro gave a final jab with the knife and 
his hips that broke through the base of the skull. The life exited the 
goblin's eyes immediately. *"It's not murder if we kill beasts." Perhaps. But 
it is still as satisfying.*

Regaining his senses he noticed Rustle glinting past him in the night, he had 
to admit that the gloomy ranger was almost as hard to spot in a dark alley as 
he was. Another goblin was gone beneath his knife. He moved to rejoin his 
comrades further up. A large ogre was not fifteen feet ahead of them now. 
Completely occupied with the strain of trying to lift the immense relic from 
the pit. The three adventurer's moved up to flank the beast and Qinro deftly 
applied a poison onto the blade of his rapier.

The night sky across the pit blossomed in a blue light as a massive 
lightening bolt came from the heavens to electrify the unwitting fire giant. 
The shriek of anger then that pierced the air was bowel shaking. *I suppose 
we are done with the dark work then.* He looked back at the ogre to see it 
glancing over his shoulder at the three of them, completely helpless to their 
coming attacks. He felt the blood swelling him again.

*Stay focused! Stay focused!*

He heard Thom giggle next to him as he plunged his rapier into the ogre, 
"That must be the signal then."

"You know I don't think we have mapped this area, after all."

* * *


Bert's prayers to Talos had not gone unnoticed. *The Storm Lord, The 
Destroyer will look down upon me and smile at the destruction I shall cause,* 
he thought while arranging the power into shape, the energy into matter. 
Storm clouds gathered in the sky above him. Where but a second ago was the 
unending night sky, now there was a raging boil of greenish blue clouds 
bristling with energy. 

The dwarf planted his feet and reached up into the glory that was Talos. He 
bathed himself in his might. He head and arms stretched back to accept the 
blessing. When Bert looked back down at the giant in the distance, his eyes 
were bleeding a blue electrical energy. He uttered the word of power and a 
massive bolt of lightning struck down from the maelstrom above him and struck 
its target. 

The plate armor of the giant crackled as it glowed white from the fury of the 
attack and the heat that it generated. Lightning continued to spiderweb 
across sections of armor as the giant screamed in pain and anger. The rictus 
of pain then slowly transformed into a rictus of amusement. 

Bert could feel the goliath next to him pulling on a different, but not 
dissimilar power to his own. He wasn't sure what god had gifted it to his 
friend, but he happy to have him at his side. A long javelin of lightning 
appear to form in the man's hands. The charged javelin struck the giant in 
the chest staggering him. 

Twice-Orphaned then answered the giant's bellow of pain with his own war cry 
and charged forward with dual long swords whirling. Bert continued to 
concentrate on the storm whirling above his head and watched as the giant 
threw a rock the size of the dwarf himself plowing into his friend. He 
released his power again at his target, but the shock of the strike on his 
friend that must have broken bone caused him to falter momentarily and the 
lightning struck, but fizzled out over the plate armor. *Fuck me. I don't 
think he even noticed that one.* 

Twice-Orphaned had reached their foe and began attacking. He set up a false 
lunge with the first strike, but the giant stood his ground. Twice-Orphaned 
second attack tried to reach a slashing cut along the back of the giant's 
knee where the armor was less effective. The giant deftly rotated he leg and 
the goliath's sword slid along the blackened plate instead.

The giant's two-handed sword, itself bigger than most wagons was still 
resting on his shoulder. But in an impressive display of martial ability, he 
flicked the sword downward spinning the blade in his hand as a whirlwind. The 
first strike slammed into the goliath's left side, nearly breaking his arm. 
Then, using the momentum of that impressive sword to swing back down in a 
horizontal slash that also landed on the goliath's left-hand side. His friend 
buckled almost to one knee after the blow. Bert imagined that ribs must have 
been shattered. 

Twice-Orphaned boots gave off a slight glow and the goliath jumped backwards, 
avoiding yet another slash from the giant, to land a few feet from Bert. He 
gathered the power of Talos about him again and unleashed yet another bolt to 
singe the hairs from the giant's head. And with that, the giant's attention 
drifted from his friend and met the dwarf's eyes. Words were spoken in the 
giant tongue.

"I think we have angered him."

"You think so?"

"Do not worry little one. He threatens to enslave you, but I shall protect 
you."

Bert didn't even notice the stone that struck his head. The world went dark 
fading out around the face of his oldest companion.

* * *

Qinro registered the lightening going off again in the distance. But his 
concerns were more immediate. *Just don't get hit Qin. Don't get hit.* The 
last ogre proved a tough one but Rustle could be a holy terror with that 
glaive of his. Thom had moved up to his side and they began on another load 
bearing ogre. 

He saw Rustle fall off the side of the pit to land on a dirt ramp some 10 
feet below. 
"I'm alright!" the ranger bellowed as he got back on his feet another ogre 
not ten feet from him.

"Well that embarrassing," answered Qinro. As he spoke, he drove the rapier 
into the ogre screaming beside him and could see Rustle attacking the ogre 
before him. He plunged his rapier into the ogre that Thom had engaged with, 
coming up behind the beast and pushing the rapier through where its kidneys 
should have been. Thomindel flicked his blade across the inner thighs and 
blood poured forth, dropping the ogre to his knees, where another flick of 
the wrist from the bard opened its throat. The ledge wasn't far off, he would 
have to be wary of it lest he fall over like Rustle did. 

"Shit!" That was the only warning he heard from Thom as the butt end of 
Rustle's glaive spun past the bard and struck him in the temple. Searing pain 
blinded him momentarily. The abyss reached out to grasp his soul, to pull him 
back down into the waiting cold embrace of death. Searing light as the 
darkness retreated and his vision began to return. *Wait no! come back to me! 
Pleasse!* 

He caught glimpses around him. Rustle charging forward again with glaive in 
one hand and handing Thom back his rapier with the other. Shadows pooling 
around him, his hands falling into one, disappearing. A screaming ogre head 
was inches away from where he lay. Tendrils of living black reaching out and 
wrapping around him. 

His senses returned to see Thom and Rustle both fighting off an ogre a few 
feet away. As he staggered back to his feet, in the distance he saw the 
clouds clear, the maelstrom disappear and the night sky return as quickly as 
it had left earlier. In the flickering torchlight he saw Twice-Orphaned 
running towards them with a body in his arms. The impact of the club in 
Thom's side, jarred him fully awake. The bard had called out for help, but 
Qinro was never the healing type. The only relief he could ever give was the 
sweet succor of death. And so he joined the fray once again, stepping in 
front of his fallen comrade. 

His rapier shot out catching a blow meant for Thom and parried it away. He 
felt the bard behind him pull on his own magic and force heal the ribs and 
arm that had been shattered moments before. 

* * *



Twice-Orphaned had sprinted away from the giant towards the rest of the party 
with Bert's weight comfortably settled in his arms. A rock the size of the 
dwarf's own head had struck him. Twice-Orphaned had felt the softness of his 
friend's skull as he ran him to safety. He noticed the blood, but he did not 
see the clear thought blood that would mean that his friend's mind had gone 
and would never return. He would be lying to himself if he said did not worry 
about the dwarf, but Bert was tougher than he looked. And he knew that the 
hoary god of storms looked out for him. 

He laid his friend down in the grass at his feet. "Our bloods have mingled 
once again, friend. We are brothers reborn in battle yet again. They have 
made a mockery of my oaths, and for that they shall perish." The dwarf made 
no reply, but even now he saw the cleric moving and coming from his daze. A 
smile rose from his otherwise placid face.

A sound from the pit behind him showed an ogre approaching up a ramp with a 
club in hand. "You are no giant, but for now you will do." 

Twice-Orphaned waited for the ogre to attack and then parried and sank a 
blade across the shoulder of the beast. Blood erupted from the cut and the 
ogre staggered backward, attempting to put the club between himself and the 
goliath, but he was too slow. The goliath's follow thru had him spinning with 
his second blade slashing across the ogre's face carving a groove in the 
frightful face. The ogre dropped its club as instinct overrode whatever 
training it had and its hands moved toward its face. Twice-Orphaned's final 
attack plunged his primary sword deep in the ogre's chest. Blood poured from 
the terrible gash left behind as he pulled the sword free and the ogre 
collapsed face first to the grass dead.

"Definitely not a giant."

* * *


At some point Qinro realized that the giant was coming towards him. But there 
was still work to be done. An ogre had slammed a club into his chest before 
Thom and him both sank rapiers into his head. "Don't get hit remember? So 
don't get hit, then," he muttered to himself as a rock sailed past him and 
struck Thomindel. The bard screamed in pain as he fell again, this time 
pulling himself along the ground away from the giant.

Up ahead he could see that only three of the ogres remained still holding on 
to the ropes attached to the giant rock below in the pit. He ghosted up 
behind the closet of the three, the smell of the goblin's sweat was 
overwhelming. He could see the strain in the ogre's limbs as it tried to hang 
on to the item below. *You seem troubled. Let me help release you from your 
burden.* His rapier stabbed into the beasts neck and the gnarled visage 
turned a head to stare at him. Qinro watched as the poison took hold, the 
ogres anger fading quickly to pain, then its strength faltered. 

The weight that the ogre had been pulling against jerked it down over the 
ledge landing on a wooden palisade which had obviously been hastily 
constructed. The sudden shift in the massive weight sent the other two ogres 
off-quilter and they too faltered and fell downward. The additional weight on 
the palisade shattered it sending the ogres all toppling to the bottom of the 
pit amongst the rubble. Even through their screams, the bellowing of giant, 
and the clatter of their fall, Qinro could feel the immense object of their 
attention slam back into the earth.

There was nothing left between himself and a very upset fire giant. *A 
tactical retreat is not a defeat,* Qinro thought as he moved away from the 
giant. Lightning crackled again, and blue energy impacted the giant. 

* * *

Bert had not been hit that hard in quite a long while. It was a damn close 
thing, but the power of his god washed through him, mending bone and tissue. 
Forcing back together that which was forcibly ripped apart. Even as he felt 
life surging back into him, he saw the giant across the pit just before 
something made the ogre's falter and collapse into the darkness below, he was 
pulling on more power. "Talos weather me against my foes. Let not your storm 
break against this island of resistance. Lend me you power and I shall serve 
you up destruction." The prayer finished as lightning answered from the skies 
overhead once more. Crackling into the giant. 

They had seen the beast falter and he watched as he compatriots attacked the 
giant once more. Rustle's glaive was gone and the ranger had pulled on the 
bow releasing arrows. Qinro had decided that a direct approach wasn't the 
best after all apparently and had fallen back finally, switching to his 
crossbow. He couldn't see Thomindel anywhere near and he hoped the bard had 
survived the fray.

Bert could see Twice-Orphaned towering above two dead ogres a few feet away. 
His long swords held slack as he watched the battle ahead of him. A familiar 
thrum of a crossbow was heard, and the giant's left eye exploded in gore. He 
went down to one knee as a pair of arrows struck him in the chest, piercing 
through armor. 

A sharp intake of air was heard and then a gurgling sound. *Those had pierced 
his lungs at least, maybe the heart.* Then an eerie quiet descended on the 
pit as the hulking form pawed desperately at his chest trying to grasp his 
massive fingers on the tiny shafts to no avail. Then the arms fell slack, and 
the fire giant toppled sideways to the ground dead.

Bert let go of Talos's fury, the night sky cleared and the survivors stood 
staring back at one another.

"Told you we could take it," Twice-Orphaned said over his shoulder. Bert 
couldn't help but laugh.