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WHILE KATERINA HADN’T been in a lot of cave-homes to compare them, she had to admit that this one was quite nice. And for a giant’s home... she couldn’t even begin to allow herself to fathom that this was actually, truly, happening. Bernie had clearly gone out of his way to make things as comfortable and cozy as possible. Scavenging what little he could from campsites, and using flowers and strings of garland to make up the rest. There was a roaring fire in the middle, a pile of wagon covers shoved into the corner to make a bed, even a rudimentary table made from a giant tree stump.
Katerina was propped up on a stool as tall as she was, happily finishing her second bowl of broth. She set it down with a wide smile, licking her lips as she cheerfully applauded the chef. “It was wonderful, Bernie! Thank you so much!” As soon as she’d been sure she wasn’t going to be placed in the caldron, she’d embraced the idea of dinner wholeheartedly. “Another recipe of your mother’s?”
The giant nodded happily, helping himself to second leg of what looked like a giant sort of cow. “She taught Bernie when he was just a baby. Most humans don’t know all the spices and yummies you can find in the forest. You just need to know where to look.”
They had been talking happily for the last few hours as Dylan lay unconscious upon the hearth. It was a strange meeting, to be sure but, circumstances aside, Katerina had to admit that she was having a fine time. She’d helped him drag the ingredients to the mixing bowl, lobbing them over the side one by one to his fervent applause. She’d perched upon the tip of the spoon as he circled it around and around, trying to explain the finer points of chess. She’d even found the time to drag Dylan further away from the flames when the sleeves of his coat caught fire.
All in all...it had been one of her better days.
A soft moan made them both turn towards the fire. There was a hitch in Dylan’s breathing and he was starting to stir, his eyes fluttering open and shut. Katerina set down the piece of mutton she’d been chewing and looked on with interest, while Bernie leapt to his feet.
“He’s awake! He’s awake! Kat, look—he’s awake!”
In his excitement the giant started jumping up and down, waving around his arms in wild delight. Unfortunately, that was the precise moment Dylan opened his eyes for good.
“What the hell??” He yelped, and scrambled backward, only to hit his head on the wall.
“Careful,” Katerina said with a sympathetic wince. “Bernie thinks you have a concussion.”
Dylan’s eyes drifted from the giant to the princess, dilating wide with fear. They took a second more to focus—either from the head wound or from the impossibility of what he was seeing—before he pushed shakily to his feet. One hand went to the wall for balance. The other drifted up to his temple in a daze.
“What in seven hounds is happening right now?”
The giant jumped again, shaking the very stone foundation they were standing on.
“Bernie will get more wood for the fire!” he exclaimed. “Make the cave nice and warm for your friend.”
“Oh, that’s all right, Bernie,” Katerina said quickly. “He really doesn’t need special—” She glanced behind her but the giant was already gone, bounding away towards the woods. “—treatment.”
The door swung shut behind him, leaving the cave in ringing silence. Katerina looked at Dylan. Dylan looked at Katerina. For a moment, neither one spoke. Then the floodgates opened.
“Who the heck is Bernie? How long was I out? Where the... Where are we?” He paused his rant long enough to glance down at the meat her hand. “...why are you eating a ferret?”
Holy crap, is that what this is? Katerina set it down gingerly and started making her way back to the ground level. It was a laborious process. After she hopped off her stool, she was at a bit of a loss as to what to do next. Bernie had lifted her up onto the high table, and without his giant hands she had to shimmy down the wood face herself, digging her nails into whatever grooves in the bark she could find.
She made it halfway down before her dress caught on a snarl in the wood. A not-so-clever jump later, and her foot got stuck in a crevice. Dylan watched with increasing levels of irritation and restrained sarcasm, and by the time she fell in an undignified pile at his feet he was ready to explode.
“Are you good now?” he asked testily. “You ready?”
Up close, he didn’t look nearly as steady as he had from the table. One hand was twitching sporadically against his leg, and the other was half-reaching towards the wall, as if at any moment the blunt-force trauma might catch up and his legs would give way.
“Yes, I am.” Katerina straightened herself up with as much dignity as she could muster, trying her very best to project an air of calm. “And to answer your questions, you were only out for a couple of hours and Bernie is the giant you just saw. We’re in his house.”
There was a beat of silence.
“The giant’s name is Bernie?”
Another beat.
“Well...Bernard, really.” Katerina tossed back her long hair. “But you can hardly expect to be so formal. Not after he invited us over and cooked his mother’s soup.”
Dylan followed every word, then blinked several times and lowered his eyes to the floor. Not entirely convinced this wasn’t all a dream. “...his mother’s soup?”
The princess lit up with a bright smile. “Yes, well, you see, Doria had a knack for cooking that she got from her paternal grandfather. So from the time Bernie was just a baby, she tried to—”
Dylan closed his eyes and held up his hand, a wordless plea for silence. It was clearly taking every bit of restraint he had just to control his temper, and when he finally did speak it looked like each word was taking a physical toll.
“Okay...” he began slowly, “you’re not from around these parts, so there are certain things you can’t be expected to know. One might think common sense would guide you there, but in this case it clearly missed the mark.” His eyes flickered back to the cave door before burning into hers with a panicked sort of intensity. “Giants are savage, brutal creatures. Rip you in half for losing at cards kind of brutal. And you’re playing house in the middle of its freakin’ cave??”
“HIS freakin’ cave,” Katerina corrected angrily. “Don’t be rude. I don’t discriminate against you just because you’re an intolerable street urchin with a penchant for taking things that don’t belong to you.”
Dylan grabbed the chain around his neck in a muted rage. “This is for services rendered! I didn’t steal it!”
“Oh, really.” Katerina folded her arms across her chest with a smug smile. “I’m paying you to get knocked unconscious by a giant and make me nurse you back to health?”
Dylan’s face paled as his eyes flashed in the firelight. “You call this nursing me back to health?”
She resisted the strong urge to stick out her tongue. “I didn’t let you catch on fire, did I?”
In what was probably fortunate timing, the door to the outside world swung open again as the giant came back. He had what looked like half the forest piled up in his arms, and without a second thought as to his new little friends he threw it full tilt towards the flickering flames.
Katerina and Dylan dove out of the way just in time.
“Katy?” he called, looking around the cave. “Katy?”
Dylan raised his eyebrows, flashing her an accusatory look as fiery bits of ash rained down around them. “Katy?”
He hardly dared to speak above a whisper, and was discreetly pulling them both out of sight behind a fire poker the entire time. Katerina rolled her eyes and tugged herself free, whispering back.
“What? I call him Bernie, but he doesn’t get to use a nickname? Be reasonable.”
“Reasonable.” Dylan made a visible effort to rein himself in. “You’re going to lecture me about being reasonable when you’ve landed us straight in the middle of—”
“KATY!”
The fire poker they were hiding behind lifted straight into the air as the giant beamed down at them in delight. He crouched down and laid his open palms upon the floor, but while Katerina climbed right inside—holding onto his thumb for balance—Dylan held back, looking like at any moment the beast might dislodge its jaw entirely and swallow him whole.
“It’s okay, Dylan,” Bernie reassured him with a toothy smile. “I’ll be so careful.”
“It knows my name...” Dylan said faintly, backing away into the leg of the table.
Katerina pursed her lips to hide a grin. In hindsight, maybe the giant’s smile wasn’t so reassuring after all, not when it happened to show every one of his teeth.
“Bernie’s just helping us up onto the table, aren’t you, Bernie? It’s the easiest way to speak back and forth,” she explained. “Otherwise he’d have to lie down on the floor.”
It seemed so practical when she said it that way, when it was anything but. Her brave young warrior still looked like the world was about to end, but when it became clear that Katerina was going up with or without him, he placed himself hesitantly in the giant’s outstretched hand.
“And we’re up!”
The two of them jerked violently into the air before grabbing onto his fingers for balance. It wasn’t exactly ideal, and by the time they’d found their sea legs they were spilling out onto the table.
“There, you see?” Bernie beamed at Katerina before reaching down ever-so-carefully to pat Dylan on the back. He was clearly being as delicate as possible, even when he accidentally knocked him over a fork. “It’s not so bad.”
As Katerina smothered a fit of laughter behind her hand, Dylan caught himself gracefully and spun around to look the giant in the eye. Whatever was going through his head, battling a lifetime’s worth of experience must have been extraordinary. Because, after a lengthy appraisal, he nodded his head with a little smile.
“Not so bad.”
Bernie started smiling so hard Katerina thought his face might burst. Then his eyes welled up with tears, and she hurried forward to hold his hand. Life for something as ostracized and feared as a giant had to be very lonely. Especially so far out in the woods. She and Dylan had left the road behind more than eight days ago. No one came so deep into the forest. It was basically abandoned.
At least, it was supposed to be. But it apparently wasn’t tonight.
“Bernie is so glad he made new friends,” the giant wailed, trying and failing to keep his emotions under control. “Such good humans. Not like the bad ones.”
Katerina stroked his hand sympathetically, while Dylan stepped forward with a little frown.
“The bad ones?” he repeated.
In a flash, his entire face transformed. No longer was he the weather-hardened ranger, secretly plotting how to impale the giant and make his great escape. He was an open book. A shoulder to lean on. A gentle soul. If Katerina hadn’t been so disturbed by the whole metamorphosis, she might have been seriously impressed.
“What bad ones, Bernie?” he asked kindly, silently pleading for more information. “Did you meet some of them tonight?”
Bernie shook his head fearfully. A fairytale monster who didn’t know his own strength. “Not tonight. But there are bad tracks in the woods. Made by bad things.”
An image of her brother’s hell hounds flashed through Katerina’s mind, and she stepped closer to Dylan with a shudder. Was it really possible? Had they somehow picked up on their trail?
“What kinds of things?” she asked fearfully.
It was the giant’s turn to shudder.
“Bernie doesn’t want to say.”
She glanced at Dylan for help, but the man said nothing. His eyes merely flickered out to the darkness, looking decidedly grim. In the end, it was up to her to lift spirits.
“Well...you don’t have to say anything, Bernie.” She forced a cheerful smile, stopping the giant’s tears before they could begin. “You’re right. You made some good new friends today.”
It was the right thing to say. The second she said it, the tears in Bernie’s eyes vanished completely, replaced with the brightest of smiles. “Yes, Kat and Dylan are my friends, and Dylan was not killed, and would he like some soup?”
One sentence ran into the next, and it took Dylan a second to realize he’d been asked a question. “What? No, that’s...I’m fine. Thank you,” he added hastily, in an effort to be polite. And to stay alive.
“You should really try some,” Katerina urged. “He’s actually a much better cook than you.”
Dylan flashed her a chilling look, and she raised her hands innocently.
“I’m just saying...squirrel isn’t for everyone.”
Bernie obviously took the hushed argument to mean a ‘yes’, and snatched up a giant knife to chop up some more parsley. Dylan closed his eyes with a shudder as the blade whipped through the air, just inches above his head. When he opened them again, he was looking rather green.
“I think I’m going to be sick...”
“That’s the spirit.” Katerina clapped him cheerfully on the back, lowering her voice to a conspiratorial whisper. “But not until after the soup.”
* * *
THE NEXT MORNING, DYLAN and Katerina set out as soon as he was able to walk in a straight line. They were laden with gifts from their own personal friendly giant. Tubs of berries and butter. A loaf of bread the size of a small horse. Even a cache of herbs from his garden.
They thanked him profusely and dragged it all away with cheerful smiles until he was out of sight. Then they set it on the ground in front of them, and took stock of what could be used. While the sentiment was incredibly sweet, they simply didn’t have enough strength, or enough limbs, to lug around a giant-sized portion of food. So after packing everything they could possibly carry, they sat down beside a giant waterfall and proceeded to feast on the rest.
“I’m not going to lie,” Katerina said between mouthfuls of biscuit, “this is a lot more what I had in mind when you said we’d be living deep in the woods.”
Dylan spread a helping of butter across his toast with the tip of his hunting knife, chuckling all the while. “Biscuits and tea? Someone got used to the finer things back on the farm.”
She tensed for a moment, then let it go. It had become clear over the course of their travels that both of them had secrets. But as long as he wasn’t spilling his, she kept hers close to the vest.
“And what about you?” she asked with a rueful grin. “You used to the finer things?”
Dylan licked the butter off the blade before sticking it back in his jacket. “Clearly.”
“I’m serious,” she giggled, “you may act like this rough and tumble mountain man, but there are some things that you can’t hide. Literary references. Patterns of speech.” She cocked her head curiously, looking him up and down. Just the other day, he’d sarcastically quoted the Gutenberg Bible. “You’ve clearly been educated. How did that come about? For a travelling thief, I mean.”
He flashed her a grin. “I thought we agreed I wasn’t a thief.”
She grinned back. “Stop dodging the question.”
Perhaps it was the sudden abundance of food. A luxury that can’t possibly be overstated for two slightly malnourished people living in the woods. Perhaps it was the fact that they’d recently walked unharmed out of the cave of a giant. But something had loosened his tongue.
He set down a bottle of cider as the grin faded slowly from his face. It faded into something thoughtful. Something almost nostalgic.
“My mother taught me,” he said quietly. “My father wanted me to get a tutor, which was the custom at the time. But she wanted to teach me herself. Science and mathematics. History and literature. Whatever she could get her hands on. It was all there.”
His eyes warmed for a moment, softening with a tenderness that Katerina had never seen before. She couldn’t help but soften in return. “Where is your mother now?”
Just like that, the tenderness faded. The warm light vanished from his eyes.
“She’s dead,” he answered bluntly. “Both my parents are dead.”
That was the end of the conversation. Neither one of them said anymore. A few minutes after they’d finished Dylan pushed to his feet, surveying the remaining supplies with a trained eye. “We should haul these down to the nearest village, see what kind of price we can get.”
Katerina looked down in surprise, then realized the obvious practicality of his words. “Oh. Right.” She’d been planning on merely leaving it. A gift to the forest creatures.
Stop thinking like a princess, and start thinking like a fugitive. Waste not, want not.
“There’s one just a few miles down the road.” He squinted through the trees, trying to gauge the distance. “We should make it there before noon. Can you take the cider?”
“Yeah.” Katerina scooped up the leather straps and flung the bottles over her shoulder. The second they were balanced she grabbed up the deerskin blanket they used in the tent, as well as whatever cooking supplies she could manage before slipping them quickly into her pack. The cloak was the next to go on. Hair back. Hood up. The bottom of it tucked safely into the tops of her boots so it wouldn’t drag—a lesson she’d learned the hard way after getting stuck in some brambles.
It was a necessary routine, but a quick one. She didn’t realize Dylan was staring at her until she’d already made it to the bottom of the hill.
“Well, look at you.” His eyes twinkled as he brushed a stray lock of hair away from her eyes, tucking it safely back into her hood. “A seasoned traveler. Even survived your first giant.”
She blushed with embarrassment, but couldn’t resist a small smile. “It helped that he gave me soup.”
Dylan laughed shortly, then shook his head—staring off into the horizon. “It helped that he gave you soup...”
