“Please. Just take what you want and go,” I snapped, more anger than fear swelling inside of me I scrambled backward on my rear, my ankle shooting lightning bolts of pain outward.
“Oh, we’re going to take what we want, that’s for sure.” Carmichel sneered, showing two barely-held rotting teeth in his bottom jaw as his tongue lapped at his upper lip. Before he could make his next move, an otherworldly sound bellowed from the dark entry of the cottage and both men turned, blocking my view as I heard them draw sharp breaths over low curses.
“What the fuck is tha—” The first man started.
My heart seized at the sound that followed.
A growl, low and menacing, then the thunder of heavy foot falls moving towards us. A wolf? A bear? Neither seemed likely, not here in the safe Aramoor valley, where the most vicious thing I’d ever seen was a rabid badger.
The thieves scurried backward, nearly toppling over me as I pulled myself up against the wall and felt a wincing bolt of pain from my ankle, forcing my eyes wide as I gasped for breath. But all pain was forgotten when I saw the third figure filling the remainder of the hall, standing to the ceiling, shoulders bumping the sides of the entryway as he ramrodded forward into the midst of the two thieves.
One enormous hand reached out and grabbed Carmichel, hurling him against the stone wall hard enough to crack the mortar between the stones, as the man I’d found in my room dropped to his knees, a puddle of urine forming between his legs, clasping his hands together as he suddenly found God.
But the face that turned his way was no wild animal. No. It was a man.
And what a man.
My eyes had adjusted to the low light, and I saw him in more detail than if the sun shown upon him at mid-day. He must have been somewhere near seven feet tall, and his hard face, covered almost entirely in scars, should have been shocking but it wasn’t. It was beautiful. The most beautiful face I’d ever seen.
I could see that the man from my room was terrified, but I felt nothing but safety. I knew the giant wasn’t there to harm me. He was there to protect me. And whatever the world threw my way, I knew that he would be more than a match for it.
Vague stories from the village and my youth returned as I took in the behemoth making our small cottage feel impossibly smaller. Stories of a beast-man of the woods that stole small children and virgins, cooking them on a spit over his fire far up into the mountains filled my mind. He was said to be part bear, part warlock and part human. A horrible curse befell his mother as she carried him and all that looked upon him were horrified.
That is where the fable fails.
I was not horrified. I was transfixed.
I watched as he stooped, whipping up the intruder like a rag doll and shaking him, a grunt of disgust falling from his lips as his mouth curled in a snarl.
“You’re the beast, aren’t you?” Carmichel’s terrified voice reverberated from the walls, thrumming through every nerve in my body. “Take her! I’m sure she’s a virgin, that’s what you came for right? The virgin?”
The huge man roared, slamming Carmichel against the wall again, then throwing him to the floor, where he landed in a heap.
“Please… I didn’t… I thought the place was empty…” the other thief sobbed, turning his face away so he didn’t have to look into those nearly glowing silver-green eyes. “Take her, we’re mere thieves...”
There was a rumble of thunder from the large man’s chest as his eyes fell on me, the room seeming to close around us. His gaze took me in, face to feet, and everywhere it touched I tingled in a way I’d never felt before. I had to tense every muscle in my stomach against the urge to explode, making me dizzy, shifting my weight to square myself, and when I did my ankle stung with pain, making me wince and hiss through gritted teeth.
“You’re hurt,” he finally said in a low voice like the creak of trees in the wind, his teeth grinding so hard I could hear them crack against each other. “They’ve hurt you.” He twisted his head to look at the men, that horrific animal-like sound emanating from him again, shaking the very walls of the cottage.
I shook my head. “No, he’s telling the truth, he tried to flee. I fell. Please let him go.”
He shook with fury as he turned his face to the man in his grip. “You hurt her. I will start by tearing your arms off, then your legs. I’ll twist your head off and kick it into the sky for the crows, then I will heave your limbless body into the woods for the animals to finish.”