Chapter 18 - Sleeping Giant

By James Attwood

“How much further can it be, I’m so tired!” Hope slumped up against a wall, sliding slowly down to sit and rest on the same cold stone she’d been traversing for hours.

            Their detour in the mines had taken them deep into the bowels of Gwyddfa Rhita, through long abandoned shafts and rusting machinations. The bitter cold of these depths didn’t help, neither did the ominous warnings of every coblyn they’d passed. They’d arrived at the next guidepost on their path so to say, a dusty old sprite of a man leaning out of his cubby hole to observe who was complaining outside of his den.

            “Oh, it’s you lot.” His first words ruffled his carpet of a moustache, disturbing the sheet of dust that adorned it. “In answer to your question, a hundred feet or so down, that’s all. That’s where you’ll find that contraption of theirs, the old miners lift. Then it’s straight up missy, no bother there.”

            “Thank you mister...” Hope wheezed, staring at the ceiling, the same old cavern roof she’d grown so weary of, “...can we have a rest Uncle Idris?”

            “Sure.” Idris held out a hand to stop the coblyn from tapping away at the wall as every other had done before him, “Give them a minute.”

            The coblyn slipped his minute hammer back into the line of his belt. “Of course, I’m guessing my brothers have warned you about what’s been following.”

            “Yeah...” Idris stared down at his nephew who stood inquisitively next to him. He figured there was little point in hiding the truth from them now, they were smart children, they’d probably overheard the first time he’d had this conversation. “Every time one of you signals the other, after every three taps, you get the taps back as expected but you also hear something else down there. Some response you weren’t hoping for.”

            “Indeed, something big stirring with our every whimper, like the mountain itself has eaten something rotten and its stomach is ill with it.” The coblyn scratched the inside of his ear, dislodging a lump of hardened wax. He managed a feigned grin, “Of course it could just be our hearing.”

            “Or it could be Rhita Gawr...” Fred uttered the name the others had been dancing around, “...I heard you talking about him before.”

            Idris let out a sigh of admittance, “It could be, you’re right. But we haven’t heard anything have we, so how close can he really be?” He smiled, “I reckon if we rest up and move on we’ll be out of here before you know it. Heck, once we’re at Ceridwen’s nothing will be able to touch us, you should see what she can do.”

            “Really?” Fred struggled to share his uncle’s optimism, still squat in the dark without a glimmer of light to follow.

            “For sure, she practically resurrected your uncle Lewis remember, plus she owes me a finger.” Idris felt his positive charade waning, but much to his relief help arrived from his niece.

            “Mum and dad will be there too right, and Maeve?” She knew just what to say to qualm the doubts in her brother’s mind.

            “Absolutely!” Idris proclaimed, patting Fred’s shoulder before he huddled down next to Hope. “Lewis and Orson, Gelert too. Just you guys wait, once we’re out of this mountain everything’s going to be alright.”

            Fred nodded in agreement and sat down, repeating his uncle’s sentiments verbatim, “Just one more hurdle right?”

            “That’s right.” Idris’s acknowledgement was a weary one, but enough to satisfy them for now.

            They huddled together in the dark for a while, the coblyn tucked away waiting for when they felt up to the last leg of their descent. The collective silence went on, each of them taking the time to catch their breath and reflect on what had been a tumultuous few days. Hope’s eyes were already closed but Fred clasped around his knees as tightly as he could, trying as he might to hide his shivering, nose still running with the cold of their dank, uncomfortable surroundings. Idris rustled off his leather coat and placed it around his nephew’s shoulders, leaving him with nothing but an old black knit jumper. The chill crept through the worn holes it was laden with, yet he shirked off Fred’s worries, pulling up his sleeves in some act of foolish affirmation. This simple gesture had him pause in thought for a moment however, as if he were reminded of something he’d hoped to have forgotten. Coming back to himself he saw Fred still looking glum despite being wrapped up.

            “The cold isn’t going to kill me, don’t worry.” Idris joked but Fred’s face remained despondent, “Hey, you alright?”

            Fred barely made a noise as he stared ahead into the empty chamber.

            Idris looked to Hope, head rested on his shoulder. He whispered, “Your sister’s asleep if it’s something you want to keep between just us two.”

            Fred glanced at her to make sure before he quietly shared what was plaguing his mind, “I’m scared.”

            Idris was surprised it was something so simple, or so he thought. “We’re all afraid here. Nothing to be ashamed of.”

            “No, it’s not like that...” Fred had to quiet his own voice before elaborating, “I’m always afraid. I have been the whole time, ever since that man took Maeve and we followed her. I thought it was just nerves but I can’t stop it, everything we come across is worse than the last, and it never ends and-”

            “Hey, come on, you don’t think I’m afraid too Fred? These past few days have been so screwed up I haven’t had the slightest idea what I’m doing. You’re not alone.” This Wales had been a nightmare in many respects for him, he couldn’t imagine how bad it must have been for a child.

            “I know that but...I was so afraid I-I-I ran away. When the mice came for us I ran away, and they almost got Hope because of it. But she’s never stopped being fearless, she just carries on like it’s nothing. She must be afraid; you must be too. But you carry on.” Fred was embarrassed to be saying all this to his uncle, yet he felt he had to. Now that he’d finally sat down for a moment the weight of the situation might stop him from ever getting back up.

            Idris sighed, he felt as lost as his nephew in this foreign, parental terrain. No doubt this was a conversation Zoe or Raymond had been privy to in the past, but then again none of them had dealt with monsters and magic before either. He struggled to articulate some nugget of wisdom as he attempted to avoid the platitudes Fred had heard before. Finally, he landed on something, “But you’re still here aren’t you.”

            “Well...yeah.” Fred struggled to see how this was worthy of mentioning.

            “You said you ran away, but you’re here now, so you obviously came back.” Idris’s evident deduction didn’t exactly appease Fred’s troubles, but at the same time his nephew couldn’t argue the point. “Listen, everybody gets scared. But you can’t let one little thing hold you back. Orson said you saved him from those blood thirsty frogs, that you’d been leading the group every step of the way. Hell, you walked right through the tree after your sister. You’re twelve years old Fred, and the craziest kid I know.” Seeing that his point wasn’t quite landing he tempted his nephew in, “You want to know a secret?”

            “Okay.” Fred shyly agreed.

            “Remember when we were on that climbing wall? I think it was last summer, or the summer before? I followed you up to the top, but you know what? I was terrified, heights have always scared me. Only reason I went all the way was because you did.” He’d never dreamt of telling his nephew the truth, realising now that he was just as guilty of adopting a courageous facade in his company as Fred was.

            Fred giggled at the irony, “The only reason I climbed so high was because you were with me!”

            Idris let out a raucous laugh, we’re as bad as each other. “You’re kidding me! See, we all act like there’s nothing to be scared of but there always is. I bet you Hope’s the same, everybody is, it’s just a matter of knowing how to use that fear. If you’ve got to run, you’ve got to run. If someone needs help, you’ve got to help. There’s no use agonizing over it, as long as we’re together we’ll figure it out.” Even Idris was surprised by his own impromptu speech, speaking as much to his own self-doubt as he was the boy’s. “And if it does become too much, I’m always here Fred, just let me know.”

            Fred nodded sombrely yet was content in the moment, “Right, and you let me know too.”

            “I will.” Idris nodded in turn. He reached his father’s knife from his back pocket and flicked its blade out, “Don’t you dare tell your mother but...take this, just in case we run into anything.”

            Fred hesitantly accepted the gift, both bewildered and awe stricken at the offering. He’d seen it many a time, after all his grandfather always thought it handy to carry around. It had always struck him as a mundane tool, but after his grandfather’s passing it had an almost mythical presence to him. “Are you...are you sure?”

            “Your aunt Aria gave it to me right before...” Memories of the previous night struck Idris as he mentioned them, the blade he palmed practically still in his sister’s hands. “I’m sure. But it’s not a toy, you only use that if you absolutely have to, okay?”

            “I will...thank you.”

            “Ah, thank your grandad.”

            A contemplative silence followed as Fred studied the knife, slowly opening and closing the blade from its hand carved handle. Reassured, he brought up the pressing reason behind his fears, “Could it really be Rhita Gawr that’s making the noise though?”

            Idris shrugged his shoulders, he knew the legend all too well yet here, in this place, he knew it could be anything. “Who knows.”

            “But what if it is?”

            “We get out of here and make sure he never sees us.” Their uncle had never been one to plan ahead, “He’s bad news, so we play it safe. Simple as.”

            “Did he really tear people’s faces off?” Fred spoke out of morbid curiosity, wishing to know more now rather than find out later should the monster reveal itself.

            “Just the beards.” Idris scratched his own subconsciously as he said so, “They were trophies I guess; he’d weave them all together into this nasty cloak. But apparently he became a little too confident, killed so many, stole so many beards, that he drew the attention of king Arthur. And like most monsters that draw Arthur’s attention, he wound up dead. They buried him here, underneath a cairn so enormous it became the very mountain itself. Or so they say. But hey, he’s very much an ex-giant. It’s probably just some rocks moving down there or something.”

            “I hope so...” The horror story had both inspired and mortified Fred, appealing to his zeal for the macabre whilst also undoing some of the hard-earned courage their talks had built.

            Unbeknownst to them Hope had been awake the whole time, and now glanced at her brother from half closed eyes. Bundled up in the overly large coat, so small and helpless in this hovel yet still holding a brave face for his uncle, she felt guilt stricken.

            “I’m sorry.” She apologised out of the blue, though her doleful tone signalled it had been weighing on her for a while.

            Idris rolled his eyes. There’s more? I can’t keep up. He shot back, “For what?”

            “If I hadn’t insisted we try and help those two cursed princes back there we wouldn’t be stuck in this mess. We’d be halfway to the others by now.” She glumly spoke to the floor in front of her, “It was stupid...I was stup-”

            “Hey enough of that. You’ve got nothing to be sorry for, it was a team decision.” Idris felt his mistakes piling on top of one another, their collective weight plaguing his mind with worry as they made their way under the mountain. Yet what he truly couldn’t bear to think was that he’d failed as an uncle, that he was the reason they felt this way. Perhaps if their parents, or grandparents, were here things would be different. Better.

            “But the way out was right there.” Hope emphasised how close they’d come, and how far they’d fallen.

            “I would’ve walked right out of there and who knows what would’ve happened to those two, your sister would’ve been so cross if she’d heard I’d dragged you away from them.” Idris waxed on about how narrow minded he’d been but turned his focus to Hope, “You cared though Hope, you knew how special they were. Heck it doesn’t matter, you just knew they needed help. Sure, we’re setback a little but who cares, we’ll get out of here knowing we did the right thing with another story to tell. Aaall because of you.” He wound a finger whimsically through the air and landed it on her nose as if she were a toddler again, eliciting an embarrassed giggle much to his joy.

            “Quit it!” She grabbed at his finger as he whisked it away. Fred playfully grabbed at his other hand and before they knew it the three of them were prodding one another with glee. The laughter settled and Hope reminisced about their time as a family, back in the safety of their Wales. “When all this is over you should stay for a while!”

            “And visit more, or just never leave!” Fred excitedly added.

            Idris agreed. Back together, with his family, these were the best times he’d had. “That’s not a bad idea. You’ll see, I’ll hang around so much you’ll be sick of me before the years up.”

            “Let’s get home then!” Hope sprang to her feet, suddenly filled with energy.

            Fred leapt up second, and together they heaved Idris up by his outstretched arms.

            “One last thing Hope. This Pwyll Pen Annwn, was he a magical type of guy?” Idris had one last thought he wished to impart to his nephew and niece.

            “Um...no I don’t think so. I think that’s why he was one of Maeve’s favourites.” She thought back on what her sister had told her.

            “I don’t think we’re descendants of his if that’s the case...” Idris contemplated what exactly might have gifted him that vision, I should’ve asked them when I had the chance.

            “Huh, why?”

            “Oh, just a hunch.” Idris played it off as nothing more than speculation, though he felt his instinct might prove important down the line. “Nonetheless, tell your sister when you see her.”

            Hope scrunched her face; her uncle wasn’t making a great deal of sense. “Why don’t you tell her yourself?”

            “I meant remind me, you know what I mean.”

            “Okay.” Hope wasn’t convinced, perhaps the caves had taken their toll on her uncle’s sanity. Regardless she smiled at the coblyn and politely asked for him to guide them onwards. His smile in turn was warm and heartfelt, as he knew he’d be the last of his kind they’d see before they breathed fresh air once more. With three taps of his hammer, they were on their way, down into the inner most chamber.

*

The coblyn was right, they’d barely walked any distance at all before the narrow winding tracks had opened into a towering shaft. Before them lay a ramshackle platform, seemingly having crashed to the bottom rather than landed in any graceful fashion. Regardless, it was intact, its thick wooden beams bound by rope and chains that stretched straight up, pulled taught by the weight of a large counterbalance stone that hung some distance above. The edge of the dangling slab was illuminated by a crisp natural glow, a far-flung promise of sunlight at the apex of this lofty contraption. How such a thing had been built, let alone survived, eluded them, yet it would surely be their ticket out of the mountain. They would simply have to dare to ride it first.

            Idris ushered the children onto the centre most point of the lift, cautious of the fact that there wasn’t a single rail between them and the edge. Only the redundant ropes that hung from the rafters offered anything to cling onto as he yanked the ancient lever loose at its base, the rusted mechanism almost breaking in his hands before it released its lock on the chain.

            “Just one more hurdle.” He quietly told himself, his stomach still uneasy at the prospect of this final step.

            With a laboured clunk the chains ground into motion as the platform rose slowly from its bed of rubble, the infinite stretches of the shaft filling with the roars of this awoken engine. Creaking like some beast in pain the lift swung and tilted as it was drawn into the air. Soon the machinations quieted, the chains humming as they settled back into the motion they had so long been denied, and with it the platform steadied.

            “Hey this isn’t so bad.” Fred said, wobbling to his feet as he dared to stand upright.

            “Speak for yourself.” Hope was planted on all fours, staring anywhere but down.

            Idris’s eyes did the same, squinting up at the shafts illusive end rather than down at the chasm they’d left behind. “There’s definitely light up there guys, this is it.”

            Hope stumbled to her feet and clung to her uncle’s arm to steady herself, her unease fading as she caught a glimpse of daylight far above. In these few fraught minutes they must have climbed hundreds of feet, the shaft widening and splitting into gaping crevices around them as they ascended, but finally the pinprick of light seemed to be nearing. She managed a relieved smile as she stepped backwards to find her own balance, bumping into her little brother. He didn’t respond however, he stood there as still as a corpse, only his trembling lips letting them know he hadn’t been petrified completely. His eyes looked to something behind them, along a fissure’s wall.

            “Fred?” Idris muttered before he turned to gaze at what had shocked his nephew so, yet it was already upon them.

            From within the gaping crack stretched out a gargantuan hand the size of a man or more. Grey fingers gripped the edge of the platform as if it were a plaything and pulled them closer to the dark of the hole. The three of them fell to their backs as the already precarious lift was tugged beyond its means. Hope flashed her torch towards the opening, hoping to illuminate what horror attacked them. She immediately regretted doing so.

Before them, wedging as much of its girth through the crack as it could, was the hideous form of an enormous man, a giant. The light caught his face for but a moment, illuminating the decaying state of what had risen from the depths of the mountain. Half of it appeared long dead, its skull exposed and rotten, the other was living but barely so. The flash caught both his blackened eyes as he recoiled back into the dark, reeling from the bright. With a deep unsettling moan his grip loosened, sending the platform careering back into the opposite wall.

            The rear end of its frame cracked on impact, sending splinters of wood and stone their way. Fred, the lightest of them, found himself flying furthest into the air. Hope screamed for her brother, but he was already out of sight having plummeted over the edge. Idris hadn’t seen it however, his focus solely on the re-emergence of the ever-reaching hand. He pushed his niece to the floor, out of the way of its grasping fingers, only to find himself forced by the girth of its forearm to the lift’s edge. Thick, calloused skin and grisly hairs spoke of the obstacle’s organic nature, yet he felt as if he fought against a brick wall. With another blind nudge he could hold on no longer, catching but a fleeting glimpse of a cowering Hope as he slipped from the side.

            You failed them. But damn it, they should survive.

            Flinging his arms wide he reached for the rusted links of the wrought iron chain that ran the length of the shaft. His arms bounced off bulky link after link until he finally caught hold of one, he felt as though they’d almost been ripped from their sockets, but he was alive. He frantically gazed around; the light was that much brighter here. We must be close to the top. To his surprise he saw another figure some twenty feet below him, tangled amidst the ropes that hung loose from the many rickety cranes that ran this caverns shelves. It was Fred, clinging to the safety of the net for dear life above the pitch black of the chasm below.

            “Fred! Stay there, I’ll come get you!” Idris tilted his head up towards the platform, realising both he, the chain, and it were still ascending. It was practically half the construction it had been before, yet it had risen beyond the fumbling reach of the giant. “Hope! Just hold on!”

            Clambering as quickly as he could down the rising chain Idris realised Fred was gesturing towards the crevasse, silently warning him of something. Above them he saw the broad shoulders of the brutish giant force their way through the jagged rock that blocked its path, tearing pale flesh from the back of his arm as he bent the cave to his own will. The giant’s bulk was revealed in full as it began to climb the shaft walls with its bare hands, a fibrous cloak of a thousand woven beards draping in its wake. Seeing this resurrected colossus almost brought Idris’s heart to a stop. It was Rhita Gawr, in what remained of his flesh, and he was after Hope.

            “Okay, just...” Idris paused as he saw the wide void between him and his nephew. Tentatively stretching out one arm whilst trying to keep level with Fred, he gestured for him to come across. “...Just swing over here and we’ll climb up.”

            “Are you kidding! I’ll die!” Fred panicked, suspended as he were his every shiver saw the tangle of ropes he clung to quiver in turn.

            “Listen Fred, this is it! Your sister needs us! If we don’t get up there soon it’ll just be her and that monster.” Adrenaline rushed through him as he appealed to the boy, he felt a pang of guilt but there was no time for delicacy.

            “And how are we meant to stop him!” Fred’s voice cracked. He wanted nothing more than to save his sister, to be the hero. But heroes had gone down in his estimations of late, and down here he was safe.

            Idris had no idea what they could do against such a titan, but he knew in his heart that his nephew had it in him to try. “I don’t know Fred, but you know damn well we can’t help her from here.”

            Fred didn’t say a word. I have to be brave for her. His face was white with fear, but the trembling stopped as he nodded, his chin nervously shuddering. Loosening his grip from a half a dozen or so ropes down to one, wrapping his little legs around it like a vice, he began to sway his body back and forth. Gradually he swung further and further until finally he was within Idris’s grasp.

            “I’ve got you!” His uncle exclaimed assuredly, pulling him in close with his one free arm.

            Hope peered over the edge nervously, she could hear the approaching storm swelling from the depths below, but she had to see how her brother and uncle were doing for herself. The shaft was obscured however, eclipsed by the tenacious pursuit of the hulking giant. His gnarly grimace was lit up once more but this time he didn’t shy away, in fact he hastened his dogged pursuit.

            “YOUR LIGHT WAS THE FIRST I’D SEEN IN AEONS CHILD.” Rhita Gawr’s voice enveloped the cavern with its deep disturbing timbre, “BUT IT WILL NOT BE THE LAST!”

            Hope couldn’t believe the monstrosity could speak, but its distaste for her kind was palpable, its every broken word laced with ghoulish spite. She rolled back from the edge and prayed that he was nothing but a nightmare, just another bad dream they’d escape without a scratch. Thoughts of those she’d lost came to mind, her aunt, her grandfather. This is real Hope. As the narrow passage above revealed itself, its depths pouring forth with the gloriously crisp light of day, she realised that she was at the apex. This is real, and you have to run!

            The platform jolted to a standstill as the counterbalance slammed to the cavern floor far below. Before her was the exit, the dusty remains of another mine entrance, cluttered with carts and tracks aplenty. Coming to her feet she found herself flung onto her back as the tips of the giant’s fingers grabbed at the structures edge, buckling the beams as the weight ripped it from its fixtures. Go, go, go. She staggered into a mad dash, leaping off the lifted side onto the jutting rock’s edge. She rolled and banged just about every inch of her body but rose with unfettered haste, limping and breathless as she fled towards the light.

She could hear the chaos behind her, the thumping of heavy feet landing as the hell-bent fiend stooped through the passageway, but she didn’t look back. Crooked slats held up an entrance large enough for all sorts of equipment, yet surely it would be too small for such a lumbering giant. She blindly ran until her feet touched the soft bed of the snow, a far cry from the hard slab of the mines, and kept running, stumbling. Finally, she thought it was safe to turn her gaze backwards, but what she saw filled her with dread.

*

Fred resembled an ape in its element scaling the chain as his uncle tiredly tried to keep up, but a rowdy crash from above stopped the boy in his tracks. Plummeting down towards them were the broken remains of the platform, now a cascade of loose ten-foot beams.

            “Oh no, it’s coming down!” He shouted back.

            “Jesus Chri...” Idris gawked, “We’re going to have to jump to the other chain!”

            It was easier said than done, the gap itself a dizzying distance, the target another chain dangling amidst nothing but a sheer drop.

            “It’s too far!” Fred clung to the link as if he hoped to weather the oncoming storm.

            “No choice, on three! One-” Idris gazed up at the debris that bounced off the walls directly above, they had to move now, “Three!”

            Together they leapt impulsively towards the other side. The chain they had clung to rattled as length after length of the deconstructed platform chimed off its sturdy holds. The two of them found themselves almost bouncing off the opposite chain as they floundered for a grip, but soon enough, almost miraculously, they were safely wrapped around the swaying pulley. They could barely believe it as they both smiled with giddy disbelief.

            “That was so close!” Fred was buzzing with adrenaline, his chest beating frantically.

            “Yeah, you don’t need to tell me.” His uncle was less lost in the wonderment and more chilled by the thought of what horrible a fate they’d just narrowly avoided. Through laboured breaths he ushered the boy onwards, “Come on buddy, keep climbing. You’re the only thing keeping me going here.”

            “Right.” Fred remembered his uncle’s confession as he saw the whites of his knuckles, he was clinging on for dear life. Determined, he resumed his climb. Hold on Hope, we’re almost there.

            As they neared the exit however a dreadful sight made itself clear. The top was now practically awash with daylight, and the ruined entrance a gaping, giant sized hole.

*

Hope could barely breathe as she kept up her retreat. The mountain top was eerily silent, devoid of life, but she knew he was close behind. The terrain muffled the brute’s pursuit, but she knew he wouldn’t soon give up. The snow was deep across these peaks, deeper than before. Even so, jutting crags of blackened rock paved her path like obelisks sent to remind her of the way. Sure enough, she soon happened upon the very same lodge she’d seen sealed from her not hours before, the same prison she’d saved her dear sister from days ago.

The two oxen princes loitered aimlessly outside, stood mere feet from where they’d escaped amidst a mess of spears Hope couldn’t remember being there before. What intelligence they had as men must have surely been lost in these bestial forms, grazing in these arid heights. Nevertheless, she didn’t fear for their safety any more with the giant on her tail, she needed some place to hide. Gwydion could be sheltering within those wind battered walls for all she cared, she had no other choice.

            She slipped down the same incline as before, the precarious shale now carpeted in pillow-soft snow. The oxen paid her no mind, but the nature of those spears became hauntingly apparent. Beneath what drifting snow had coated their tips peered the familiar features of those helpful critters. Oh no, the bwbachs. She’d noticed the awkward look when she’d told her parents of the bwbachs, she thought they were humouring her, yet they must have known what became of them.

Their features were now gaunt, frost bitten and pale. Those once fidgeting eyes stared back at her in deathly stillness, their inquisitive glint greyed over with untimely demise. Even dressed in the clean white of winter she could see how they’d been tortured, defaced. I’m so sorry. She gazed around at the dozens that hung from these spikes, each a pitiful beast slain for no good reason besides helping a little girl. Helping her. Perhaps it was only right that she fell to the giant here, in this graveyard of fallen friends. She wanted to fall to her knees and cry, but the booming crash of a heavy landing startled her back to her original intent. As if by instinct she fell low and skulked around the back wall, slipping through the bwbach’s burrow and into the cellar.

            To her astonishment she lifted her head from the drab ruin of the basement to see a bwbach, alive. She could have sworn it was the first she’d met. It cowered behind the old dusty shelves, too timid to approach as it had done the first time. But those eyes still gleamed with curiosity even now. On all fours she slowly approached it, whispering sweet assurances. Another thunderous shout from outside saw it jump into her arms, the poor thing as scared as she was.

            “COME OUT LITTLE ONE, I KNOW YOU’RE IN THERE.” Rhita Gawr’s voice shook the foundations of the building as he taunted his feeble prey, “I CAN SMELL YOUR STENCH, THE STENCH OF A HUMAN!”

            She hugged the quivering bwbach tightly as the giant began to tear away at the roof of the lodge, the noise of the destruction deafening them both. “It’s going to be okay, it’s going to be okay.” She repeated, rocking back and forth on her knees.

            “OH, HOW I’VE MISSED THE TASTE ALL THESE YEARS.” The giant continued to boast as he plucked away at the rafters as if they were weightless.

            Finally, the damage reached their shelter, splintered floorboards beginning to let in what little light Rhita Gawr’s mass didn’t eclipse. Hope’s only comfort wriggled free from her arms and darted up the remains of the cellar stairs, towards their attacker. The bwbach meant to protect her.

            “No!” She cried, terrified of seeing another die in her name. “Don’t help me, please don’t!”

            Even if the bwbach could have heard her words it wouldn’t have mattered, the very notion went against its nature. The girl in the basement had offered it food in return for help, and the faithful critter still considered the debt unfulfilled. She couldn’t see where it had run off to, yet the giant’s baleful cry told her all she needed to know.

            “YOU LITTLE PEST, WHEN I CATCH YOU I’LL USE YOUR BONES TO PICK MY TEETH!” Rhita Gawr ceased his demolishing as he turned to find what had just bitten deep into his heel.

            Hope could barely see what was going on between the cracks, but she prayed her helper had escaped, that was until she heard her uncle’s crass remark.

            “Hey! Eyes over here you big stupid piece of-”

            “WHOM HAS THE HUBRIS TO BOTHER ME NOW!” Rhita Gawr turned the other way, towards what must have been Idris, “ANOTHER MAN, GROWN YET STILL SO TINY.”

            Hope listened so intently on what occurred above that she didn’t see her brother approaching from the side. A bag of nerves, she jumped out of her skin as he grabbed her.

            “It’s me! Calm down.” Fred held a finger to his mouth.

            “Oh, thank goodness, I was so scared.” The colour returned to her cheeks as she embraced her little brother, perhaps this wasn’t the end after all. “What’s going on!?”

            “Come on, we have to hurry.” Fred deflected her confusion as he pulled her to her feet.

            “What are we going to do?”

            “We have a plan!” Fred whispered harshly, tense beyond measure at the thought of what his uncle had entrusted to him and his sister. “But we have to hurry, uncle Idris can’t distract him all day.”

*

Idris stood before Rhita Gawr on the precipice of that cliff edge, where he’d battled Efnysien with his brother before. How he wished Lewis was beside him now. He plucked up an old, rusted pickaxe from beside the lodge as he wandered closer, painfully aware it would do little against this foe.

            The giant towered twenty feet high, the crown of his bare skull faded in the winter haze that coated the mountains, the blackness of his eyes the only thing piercing this veil. As rancid as his appearance was now, he was no mindless monster. He still wore what adornments had survived his burial with fierce pride, even if his warpaints had faded into obscurity during his time trapped within his cairn. The grizzled strands of his hair and scraggly beard were braided through the skulls of various livestock that hung around his shoulders. Copper bands wrapped around thick gorilla like arms that stretched to his knees, some hanging loose where the flesh had yielded yet the bone remained strong. From his back hung that macabre cloak of beards, a mangled weave of hair and skin that remained as threatening and foul now as the day he’d set to assembling it.

Despite draping to the floor, it appeared incomplete, patchy in parts. Rhita Gawr had cared little for its upkeep during his life, seeing rips and holes as an excuse to murder more men for their beards. He could snatch Idris up in his gargantuan palm to do so right now, yet he stood still in the confrontation for the moment, those blackened eyes emotionless as they sized up the fool that stood before him.

            “Yeah it’s another tiny man, just like the last one...that killed you!” Idris shouted at the top of his lungs as he threatened the giant who’d haunted his imagination since his childhood. Seeing him now he was far more horrifying than he’d ever dreamt.

            Rhita Gawr let out a raucous laugh, its bellowing echo parting the snow from the slopes themselves. “HA! YOU’RE NOTHING OF THE SORT, ARTHUR HAD MAGIC AND MIGHT AND ARMIES BEHIND HIM, AND EVEN THEN HE WON THROUGH SHEER LUCK. YOU ARE SMALL AND FRAIL AND PATHETIC.”

            “Look who’s talking! Back from the dead and the first thing you do is chase an innocent child across the mountains, please.” Idris gestured his arms wildly in some fruitless attempt to appear larger than he was, “I thought you fought men? Kings! Can’t help but notice your little cape has a few holes too, you want a patch? Come and get it.”

            “YOU AMUSE ME LITTLE MAN! I WILL GLADLY TEAR THAT SCRAG YOU CALL A BEARD FROM YOUR FACE AFTER I’VE CRUSHED YOUR SMALLER FRIENDS.” The giant plodded back and forth, his steps beating the mountainside like a drum. “HOPELESS MEN STAND AND FIGHT BUT THE CHILDREN, I MUST WRING THEIR NECKS BEFORE THEY FLEE. I WILL NOT REPEAT MY PAST LIFE’S FOLLY.”

            “Oh yeah? And what’s that?” Idris couldn’t believe how talkative the brute was, then again he’d been confined in silence for aeons. Either way he’d gladly keep him talking whilst his nephew and niece set their trap.

            “WHEN I FIRST SET OUT TO RULE, I DID SO WITH HASTE AND BRUTALITY. YET I OVERLOOKED THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE DOWNTRODDEN, THE PEASANTS. I SLAYED KING AND QUEEN, YET IT WAS THE NEGLECTED FARMHAND THAT WAS MY UNDOING, THE MUNDANE FOLK WHO SPREAD WORD OF MY CONQUEST TO THOSE WHO WOULD OPPOSE ME.” The giant strode past him as if he were nothing, focused on the land that stretched beyond the precipice. Idris slowly backed away from him and the deadly drop as the walking corpse began to reminisce. Rhita Gawr stared out to the horizon as he boasted of his crude strategy, surveying the lands he’d have under his rule soon enough. He turned with a homicidal smile, a handful of gnarled teeth the size of fists jutting from his split lips. “SO, I HAVE LEARNT FROM MY MISTAKES. NO HUMAN, GREAT OR SMALL, WILL SURVIVE MY WRATH THIS TIME. TALES OF MY RULE WILL BE TOLD WITH NAUGHT BUT BLOOD.”

            The giant’s declaration of his ideals had rubbed Idris in an unexpected way as he cracked a smirk, and soon he found himself laughing at the absurdity of it all. The proud colossus was taken aback. “I’m sorry, it’s-it’s too much.” Idris bent over and waved at the befuddled giant, asking for a moment to collect himself. “So, you’re telling me you’ve been dead for who knows how long, and with all that time to think on your life’s missteps, this is what you come up with? Kill more?”

            “YOU MOCK ME!?” The giant’s throat brimmed with his loudest roar, filling the depths of the valleys with his voice.

            “No, I wouldn’t dream of it. I’ve made my fair share of mistakes in life too.” Idris wiped his face and sternly uttered. “But I don’t care about what you feel you deserve; I don’t give a damn about your rule. That’s my family you’re after, my blood, and so long as I’m around your ignorant, depraved, idiotic hands aren’t going anywhere near them.”

            Rhita Gawr stooped as close to Idris’s level as he could without falling to his hands, obsidian eyes brimming with quiet indignation. He was so focused on this nuisance he barely noticed the brittle cracks appearing beneath him. “PERHAPS I WILL KILL YOU FIRST THEN. WHAT’S ONE MORE MISTAKE IF IT SILENCES THAT INSOLENT MOUTH OF YOURS EH?”

            The stench of his rotten breath was overwhelming, but Idris had him right where he wanted him. “Do you know what the worst kind of mistakes are? The one’s that come back to bite you in the arse!” He dove backwards, flat to the ground as he yelled, “Now!”

            The ear-piercing cry of two enormous oxen filled the air behind them, as what remained of the lodge seemingly buckled in between the bulk of their linking chain. They stampeded forwards in a blind panic, their rumps bloody with the fresh piercings Fred and Hope had given them. Their hooves beat down either side of Idris, the chain glancing above, yet as they reached Rhita Gawr that restraint pulled tight across his waist. Even the might of this resurrected giant couldn’t withstand the oxen he had cursed, their united strength far beyond the measure of his own. It was a titanic struggle as he roared and pulled, yet the oxen maintained their resolve, perhaps they knew who they worked against. Then, after mere moments had passed, the precipice crumbled under the combined calamity of these behemoths, and with it the three of them tumbled over the edge in unison.

            Fred and Hope came rushing to their uncle, astounded that it had worked. Fred tip toed to the precarious edge and glanced over, yet there was nothing to see beyond the swell of dust and debris above the fog.

            “I can’t believe it worked! It really worked!” He turned back and smiled giddily, his grandfather’s knife in his hand.

            “I thought we were doomed for sure.” Hope could finally rest easy, though she quietly mourned the oxen under her breath. “I’m sorry princes, at least you got your own back.”

            Idris smiled in disbelief more than joy. “I know, we did it…” The facade of bravery had abruptly dropped, revealing a confounded man as white as a sheet. Where he should be relishing in victory he found only doubt. How am I still alive?

            The question plagued his thoughts so thoroughly that he was blind to the crumbling ground on which his nephew stood. It was too late. The rocks slipped out from underneath the oblivious Fred in another cascade, sending him dropping from sight with nary a whimper. Idris pulled his niece back as the edge continued to recede, until finally the landfall ceased.

            “FRED!” They both cried out, crawling forwards on all fours.

            “I’m okay!” His alarmed voice coughed back, startled but alive, “I think!”

            They caught sight of him, practically camouflaged in ashen soot, huddled on top of a boulder in an alcove some thirty feet down.

            “Thank god, just hold on, we’ll find a-” Idris’s hopes were dashed when he saw the unthinkable.

            Rhita Gawr still clung to the cliff face, his vice like hands digging deep into the rock below Fred. Despite the dead weight of the two oxen princes still wrapped around his waist, he snarled and fumed with tenacity as he endeavoured to hold on.

            “THIS MOUNTAIN WILL NOT BURY ME AGAIN!” He grit his teeth, veins bursting with herculean effort like worms writhing beneath the skin as he scaled the tenuous climb.

            The severity of the situation seemed to swell in Idris’s lungs, clogging his throat as he tried to speak. His nephew would never make it back up the sheer drop left by the collapse, but the giant would. His undying fortitude would be their undoing, he’d throw the boy from the mountain’s edge as they watched in despair. You idiot, how did you think it’d be that easy. Devious plans were no longer an option, decisions had to be made now.

            “He’ll never climb back up like this…” Idris shook his head, it was hopeless. “Hope whatever happens, you wait up here. We’ll figure something out.”

            Hope was stunned, locked in a stupor, unable to take her eyes from her brother’s predicament. A shake of her shoulder elicited a stuttered response, “O-o-okay…” Suddenly she was hit with inspiration. Dashing back to the collapsed lodge she explained, “No, wait, I saw rope inside there!”

            Idris reached out to grab her arm, but she was already on her way. He doesn’t have time.

            Fred could hear the laboured complaints of the goliath below but wasn’t expecting Rhita Gawr’s hand to land upon his ledge so soon. He pressed himself flat against the wall as the giant levered his left arm higher across the ridge, plunging his right towards the boy. First those plate sized knuckles clasped over the boulder in the alcove’s centre, then they stretched for him, gnarled fingertips brushing his coat as he quivered in fear. He pushed into the rock face as far as he could, but the death grip of the giant inched closer still.

            Pebbles began to pepper the fingers from above however, followed by his uncle, diving down with an unhinged ferocity, pickaxe held high above his head. He brought it down with everything he could, straight into the back of Rhita Gawr’s hand. It tensed with pain as the makeshift weapon pulled from its decaying skin, slipping back but not before it grabbed at what had caused it such pain. The pickaxe chimed off the floor as Fred saw his uncle pulled down against the back of the boulder, pinned to it underneath the colossal grip of Rhita Gawr. Idris’s gritted teeth were all that held back his blood curdling cry as the weight of this monster unbearably pressed down against his body.

            Fred kicked and shoved at the fingers to no avail, screaming at the top of his lungs as he tried to free his uncle from the agony. Each second he failed seemed to impart a lifetime of pain, but then he drew his grandfather’s knife. He plunged it beneath the yellowed overgrown nail of its index finger and drove it deep until the hole wept an unsightly undead ichor. Rhita Gawr howled in agony. The fingers reeled, and then slipped, and almost took Idris to the edge as well had Fred not clung to him.

            Rhita Gawr’s right hand still hung on the precipice, yet he suffered assaults anew on his left. The bwbach returned, dancing across the cliff face, and landed upon the other hand. It gnawed at it in a frenzy, leaping from knuckle to knuckle as the giant struggled to hold on. Then came the rocks from above, the heaviest stones Hope could muster dropped like nails into Rhita Gawr’s coffin. Soon enough one struck true, cracking the exposed skull and sending him down further still. But he still clung on with the tips of his right hand before the uncle and nephew.

            Idris coughed a smattering of blood across the ground as he limply came to his feet, picking up his axe with grim determination. He staggered the few steps it took to reach the precipice above the void and stared down at the giant. He couldn’t speak, he wasn’t sure why. The unsettling dread within had become all too physical a reality as he felt his own faculties failing him. But he had it in him to bring that pickaxe down on those fingers, again, and again, and again. Until finally a mangled tip of that murderous hand fell loose, and with it Rhita Gawr and his indentured oxen disappeared into the nothingness below. Idris’s eyes flared with defiance as he watched the giant fall into the abyss, standing strong until its baleful howl fell silent. The crash below could be heard for miles as Gwyddfa Rhita reclaimed Rhita Gawr.

            Satisfied he was truly gone this time, he turned to his nephew. First his leg gave way, then as he slumped against the wall he could feel every part of his body slowly giving in. Fred kneeled beside him, mouthing words he wished he could say but nothing came to be. It was clear now that Idris was a wreck. The black of his jumper deeper than ever with the blood of a dozen wounds, his arms and legs limp, unmoving. Only his eyelids fluttered as he tried to focus on Fred.

            “No, no. Idris please-we have to get you to Ceridwen, she can fix you. You said she could…just hang on...please just hang on...” The words that came were meaningless, protests against an inevitability Fred couldn’t accept, would not accept. His pleas turned to frantic cries, “Hope! Hope please hurry!”

            “I-I…” Idris sputtered some words, though most of what he managed was barely comprehensible. “I-I’m done Fred. You...you...have to be-be-brave for your sister.”

            Tears swelled in the boy’s eyes, “No, we can-there has to be something we can…please.”

            Idris looked as sternly as he could at the boy, one last time, for he had to know they’d be alright without him. “You’re going to take your sister down the mountain, to Ceridwen’s, back to your parents. You’ll do that for me won’t you?”

            “I-I-I…” Fred could barely face his uncle in this state, it was unbearable. But he couldn’t let Idris down in his final moments, he looked into his eyes, the only windows that had any life left to show now. “I will, I promise.”

            Idris’s chin quivered with the failed efforts of a nod to his nephew. He struggled for a moment to think of some parting words fitting of the moment but gave in as he felt what dregs of life he had leaving him. “That a boy. Tell them, tell them I said hi…” Last words were released calmly on the bitter cold winds, the pain eased now. Idris’s eyes remained open to the very end, watching Fred with quiet vigilance till his head slumped slowly forwards and he finally fell to rest.

            Fred whimpered at his side until eventually a rope fell from above and Hope slunk down. Seeing what had happened she collapsed in turn, crying into her uncle’s shoulder. They took what time they needed, huddled on the edge of that secluded alcove, but eventually it was Fred that decided they must move on. After all he had promised his uncle he would. And so, they trudged on through the snow with the dutiful bwbach in tow, following the trail that their uncle had lain out to them. The path was precarious and obscured at best, but given what they had overcome to get here, it was nothing but one last hurdle they thought. Grief hung heavy on their hearts as they ambled down in silence, though soon they would be reunited with their parents, they were sure of it. And they would tell them of how together, they slew the giant.

            On that frigid alcove where Idris lay, the snow had settled anew as the land buried him in its own grace. Yet a keen eye could still see where he was laid to rest, as did a tawny owl that circled above before landing atop him. The owl knew that there were lost children in need of guidance somewhere on these slopes, and it would surely help them soon. For now, though, it would sit here a while, atop the aftermath of the broken mountain and fallen giant, to say its goodbyes.