When Tavis reached the battlements, he stopped behind Brianna and peered over her head into the deepening twilight. He could still see the sentries on the outer curtain and the reflection of torchlit windows gleaming off the black waters of Lake Cuthbert, but very little else. If any giants were lurking on the dark lakeshore hills, the purple shroud of evening had already hidden them from sight Even the distant mountains were hardly visible against the murky clouds beyond their summits.
“This is no use,” said Arlien. “The light’s too dim. We’ll have to send out scouts.”
“That would be both dangerous and unnecessary,” said Basil.
Arlien turned to see who had contradicted him. His jaw clenched in rancor. “A verbeeg!”
“You don’t seem very fond of giant-kin,” Tavis observed.
The spite in Arlien’s eyes did not fade. “In my land, verbeegs are not to be trusted.”
“And in our land, people are judged on their merit-”
“Basil is no ordinary verbeeg, I assure you,” Brianna interrupted. She stepped between Tavis and Arlien, then faced the runecaster himself. “What have you prepared for us, my friend?”
Casting a haughty smirk Arlien’s direction, Basil took the mirror in both hands and turned the silvered glass toward the lakeshore hills. The reflection showed the rocky slopes as though the hour were noon instead of dusk. Tavis saw the stoop-shouldered figures of several hill giants scattered among the crooked scrub pines. The brutes sat on boulders or squatted atop rocky outcroppings, calmly watching the lakeshore below as a steady trickle of humans fled toward the castle bridge. Although it would have been a simple thing to toss a few boulders at the haggard serfs, the giants made no move to harass the refugees.
“Wasn’t it fog giants you battled in High Meadow?” asked Avner. “Those look more like hill giants.”
“They are,” agreed Tavis. “No doubt the same ones that have been laying waste to Earl Cuthbert’s hamlets.”
“They’re not ferocious enough.” The earl stepped closer to Basil and squinted into the mirror. “If those were the giants who have been razing my villages, they’d be slaughtering my serfs, not allowing them safe passage.”
Tavis shook his head. “Someone wants those people to reach us,” he said. “The more crowded your castle, the more uncomfortable we’ll be during the siege.”
“Siege?” gasped the earl. “Here? Already?”
“I’m afraid so,” Tavis said. “We know giants from at least three different tribes are converging on Cuthbert Fief-the hill giant marauders, the frost giants who ambushed Prince Arlien’s caravan, and the fog giants in High Meadow. That can’t be coincidence, nor can it be happenstance that the hill giants encircled the castle so quickly after our return.”
“I’ve never seen giant tribes work together like that,” Arlien objected. “They’re too imperious. The chiefs would start a war over who gets to be leader.”
“Not if they were taking their orders from a higher authority,” Tavis countered.
“The Twilight Spirit?” Brianna asked.
Arlien furrowed his brow. “Who is this Twilight Spirit, and what does he want with the queen?” he asked. “My, ah, informant has told me little about him.”
“That’s because we don’t know much,” Brianna replied. If the prince’s mention of his spy irritated her, she did not show it “From what little Basil has learned, the Twilight Spirit is a ghost or phantom haunting someplace called the Twilight Vale. The giant chieftains rely on him for advice and counsel.”
“And what does he want with you?” inquired the prince.
“I don’t know,” Brianna said. “And I’m not sure I want to.”
The queen was being less than forthright, but Tavis understood her reluctance to be entirely candid. Their best guess was that the Twilight Spirit wanted to use his magic to get a giant’s son on her. Such a child would give the giants a claim to the throne of Hartsvale, which was an important trade center for all their tribes.
Tavis felt a guilty hollow forming in the pit of his stomach. “Milady, I’ve led you into a trap,” the scout said. “I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. It’s not your fault.” Despite her brave words, the queen could not keep the quaver out of her voice. “I’m the one who wanted to inspect the damage personally. You told me it would be dangerous.”
“But a good leader goes where she is needed,” Arlien said. “You were right not to shy away. It would have set a bad example for your subjects.”
“Yes-um-well, at the moment we’re all at risk.” Earl Cuthbert’s voice had a nervous edge to it. “And I fear my wife and daughters are not as courageous as our queen. The peasants’ reports have already terrified them. What will they think when we start preparing the castle for a siege?”
“They’ll think we are in grave danger, which we are,” Brianna said sharply. “But I suggest you don’t underestimate them, Earl. Women are made of sterner stuff than men realize. Tell them the truth and put them to work. They’ll be fine, and you can see to the defense of your castle, which is what an earl should properly do at a time like this.”
The earl’s eyes flared at the rebuke, but he bowed to the queen. “Yes, of course, Majesty,” he said. “It’s been three hundred years since Cuthbert Castle was assaulted, so the shock of facing a siege so suddenly may have caught me off guard.”
“How off guard?” Brianna demanded. “Cuthbert Castle does have an ample supply of stores, does it not?”
Cuthbert’s face reddened. “The winter was a hard one, Milady,” he muttered. “My serfs were starving-”
“How long?” Brianna demanded, cutting him off.
The earl looked out an embrasure. “We have ample water, of course,” he said. “But food is another matter. There is enough to feed us and our soldiers for perhaps a month. But with all my serfs in the castle, the supply will last no longer than a week.”
“One week.” Brianna shook her head in disgust. “The winter wasn’t that hard, Earl.”
“I’m sorry, my queen,” Cuthbert said. “But how was I to know? We didn’t have this kind of trouble when Camden was king.”
Brianna’s face turned crimson, but she made no reply.
Tavis turned a thoughtful eye on Cuthbert’s cringing face. Shortly after the giants had razed their third village, the earl had sent a frantic messenger begging the queen for a contingent of her best troops. She had complied immediately, yet now the man blamed her because his castle was about to be sieged. To the scout, such ingratitude spoke volumes about the fellow’s character. The earl would bear watching in the days to come.
“Perhaps you should try to escape tonight, Your Majesty,” suggested Cuthbert. “Before more giants arrive.”
“Are you that much of a coward?” Tavis snapped. “Would you turn your own queen out to fight three tribes of giants?”
The color drained from the earl’s face. He backed away from Tavis, as though he feared the firbolg would hurl him off his own keep. “That’s n-not what I m-meant,” he stammered. “But tonight’s your best chance to escape. By tomorrow, we’ll be s-surrounded.”
“We’re surrounded now,” Tavis growled.
“Almost certainly,” agreed Arlien. He pointed at the giants in Basil’s mirror. “Otherwise, they wouldn’t be sitting there. I’d say Tavis’s grasp of the situation is absolute.”
“Then we should shut the gate,” suggested Avner.
“Don’t say such things, boy!” Tavis scolded. “Don’t even think them!”
“Why not?” the youth pressed. “The giants aren’t bothering the serfs. It’s Brianna they want.”
Brianna laid a gentle hand on Avner’s shoulder. “Your idea has merit, but if we lock the serfs out of the castle, the giants will turn Lake Cuthbert red with their blood.”
The queen looked across the dark waters, staring at the mountains in the distance. Their summits marked the southern boundary of Cuthbert Fief, and, save for a single narrow pass, their steep flanks formed an impassable wall of stone and ice.
“Our only hope lies outside the fief, I fear,” Brianna said, turning back to the others. “Tavis, you’ll have to sneak over the mountains and fetch the rest of my army.”