“You’ve said the exact same thing three nights in a row now.” Mikahl shook his head. “Are you getting forgetful in your old age?”
Loudin laughed at this, and sat down by the blaze Vaegon had created.
“What about you elf? Does it get this cold in the Evermore Forest?”
Vaegon put down the small leather-bound journal, which he sometimes wrote in while the others carried on around the fire. He tilted his head thoughtfully, as if he were remembering something fond.
“Not so cold in the Evermore, no,” he answered. “But there are places that my people travel, places we visit that have a climate very similar to this one.”
He pointed at the old cavern’s roof. It had been blackened by hundreds upon hundreds of campfires.
“…places far less hospitable than this cozy cavern.” The last was said with a slight grin at Loudin.
“Bah!” Mikahl blurted. He finally felt warm enough to open up the front of his fur coat. He eventually stood and removed it. “I can’t imagine any place less hospitable than these mountains.” He plopped down on a rock near Loudin, with a long, loud groan.
“You dare call me old, boy?” Loudin laughed. “You’ll never make half my age if you’re in such bad shape now. That sounded awful.”
Mikahl gave him a severe stare, but couldn’t keep his mouth from curving upward at its corners.
“Bah!” he said again, with a roll of his eyes.
“These are but foothills, compared to the heart of this mountain range,” Vaegon told Mikahl. “There are places so high above the sea, that even the valleys stay frozen year round; places that none of us could survive an hour in, much less a whole day.”
“Well, the giants can keep those places for themselves. I’ve already gotten my fill of the Highlands. If I didn’t have to be here, I would’ve left long ago.”
“Aye, we shouldn’t have to be up here this far anyway,” said Loudin. “Old Borg is either caught up in something nasty, or he’s grown lax and forgetful of his duties. I’m fairly certain that his old mind hasn’t begun to slip just yet. I imagine that somewhere along the border, something has attracted him, and is keeping him occupied for the moment.”
Loudin shrugged off his fur coat and piled it into a cushion, and then leaned back into it.
“The two other times I came up here, he met us after the first big pass. No one travels long in these mountains without his knowledge, I assure you.”
“You said that the last four nights as well. How can one giant guard the whole of the giant kingdom?” Mikahl was skeptical. He had asked Hyden the same question one day, but all he had gotten for an answer was a shrug and, “I wish I knew.”
“He doesn’t,” Loudin answered, with a sly glance at the elf. “He just guards the southern border.” They chuckled at the frustrated expression that came across Mikahl’s face.
“Bah!” Mikahl growled. “You know what I meant old man.” Then to Vaegon, who was struggling to bite back his laugh. “You too Cyclops. I want to know. How does one giant guard thousands of miles of foothills all by himself?”
Whether stunned by the well-placed, but good natured insult to his one eyed condition, or maybe just pondering his response, Vaegon paused with raised brows for a moment before responding. The elf looked angry, and possibly a bit wounded by the jab. Seconds turned into hours as the tense moment passed. Finally, as he started to reply, a grin crept across the elf’s face.
“Well Mikahl, he’s only guarding his kingdom from mere humans. How many more giants do you think he would really need?”
Mikahl didn’t realize, at first, that the elf had mocked his humanity. His mind had gone back to a memory of the bloody ordeal at Coldfrost.
He, King Balton, and Westland’s Northern Muster had battled the giants there for most of a winter a few years back. Mikahl had been told that those weren’t full blooded giants. They were a wild and primitive cross-breed, driven by an animalistic instinct. They had been eight and nine feet tall, overly hairy, with slightly snouted faces, and mouths full of sharp carnivorous teeth. They fought like they were demon-possessed.
He had just been promoted to King’s Squire then, and hadn’t earned King Balton’s full trust yet, so he hadn’t been privy to why the battle was being waged. He hadn’t been allowed to fight, even though he was one of the better swordsmen on the field, but he had seen the carnage firsthand. He had also seen the power of Ironspike. King Balton had taken quite a few giants down with it, before using it to create the magical boundary that still imprisons those Breed Giants to this day. Mikahl couldn’t realistically imagine a single giant being able to stand against Ironspike’s might, so it took some time for the joke to register in his mind. When it finally did, he didn’t think it was all that funny, but since he liked the one-eyed elf so much, he faked a laugh.