Before They Were Giants (34 page)

There was a keyhole high above him and, fortunately, a stately, high-backed chair against the wall beside the door. Homer glanced all about, then scrambled up the chair. Drawing one deep breath to steady himself, he peered in through the keyhole and saw. . . nothing.

“Confusticate it,” Homer mumbled under his breath, for apparently the key was set into the lock on the other side.

He reached up cautiously and grasped the doorknob, meaning to use it for support as he slipped his hand inside the lock and fumbled about. Unknown to him, though, the door was not locked, and as soon as he leaned forward, the knob turned under his weight and the door swung in.

You can imagine the look on the giantess’s face, sitting in her claw-footed bathtub with bubbles all about her a dozen feet from the door and staring back at the helpless halfling, dangling, kicking, from her doorknob. But you cannot, I assure you, fully appreciate the expression on Homer’s face when the blue-skinned giantess, all spectacular, fresh-smelling, and abundantly curvy, eighteen feet of her, jumped up, twisting and moving her arms about in a futile attempt to cover her bigger-than-life, bigger-than-Homer’s-wildest-dreams, naked body.

~ * ~

Bags took a deep breath and slapped his banger-chopper-thruster across his open palm. “The gods of battle be with me,” he growled and burst through the door, hoping that his estimation of the giants’ whereabouts would prove accurate.

The giantess, wearing a satiny, lace-trimmed peignoir, sprawled languidly across the bed; her companion stood at the window, leaning out and looking out for some clue as to the identity of the intruder.

Though he had spent many seasons in the Wilds, battling all sorts of nasty things, Bags had never before seen humanoids of this size. Fearlessly, the rugged halfling ignored the shock and followed through with his original battle plan. He charged the bed first, swatting out one, and then a second, canopy support with his banger. The heavy canopy dropped down on the reclining female like some giant net before she even had time to scream.

Bags paid her no more heed at that moment. He charged the other giant, arriving just as the towering humanoid spun about in surprise.

Bags barely knew where to hit the thing; it was simply too tall for him to hope of getting in a critical strike. Always ready to improvise, he slammed, again with the banger section, down on the giant’s toes.

“YEEEEOWW!” the giant howled, and grasped at his foot and hopped up into the air. “You chicken-stealing...”

“Goose-stealing,” came a muffled correction from under the canopy.

Bags wasn’t hearing any of it. Now using his thruster, he charged ahead, driving the stooping giant backward. Unbalanced and too startled to respond, the giant recoiled, and tumbled out of the window. More agile than his size would indicate, the giant did manage to grab the rope as he fell, but his momentum was simply too great and the act only snapped off the desk leg securing the rope’s other end, and it followed him in his drop.

Bags watched the giant plummet down into the misty shroud, then reappear above the fog for an instant on his first bounce. Thinking himself quite clever, the hobbit spun back toward the bed, spinning his weapon about to bring the chopper ominously to bear.

The giantess had risen and had managed to rip one of her arms through the canopy’s cloth. But her thrashing had only tightened the cloth’s hold on her and she stumbled and fell, hopelessly entangled.

Bags’s warrior instincts told him to rush up and finish her. He might have done it, though the idea of killing a female, even a female giant, did not please him. Bags was no slaughtering warrior, no matter how he blustered about his adventures in the Floating Cloud in Inspirit Downs. He had always preferred the thieving style of adventuring; that way, no one really got hurt, least of all himself! Now he found himself in a dilemma, though. Could he dare to leave a giantess unharmed behind him? Before he could work things out, a shriek from down the hall caught his attention.

~ * ~

“Eeek! A mouse!” the naked giantess in the bathtub squealed. “Somebody step on it! Kill it! Kill it! Hit it with a broom!” She squirmed and twisted, kicking up bubbles every which way.

Homer had not lived an adventurous life, but in The World, so full of spice and variety, he had witnessed (or thought he had witnessed) many wondrous spectacles. But the flummoxed fellow had never seen anything to match the magnificence of the sight before him now. He tried to babble out an apology for his intrusion, or a warning for the giantess to be silent, or anything at all.

Whatever he was trying to say, the giantess could only guess, for his words came out as simply, “Hummina hummina.”

While Homer hung transfixed from the crystal doorknob, the giantess leapt into action. She scrambled out the back side of the tub and grasped it in her huge hands. Giant muscles corded and flexed (and poor Homer verily swooned at the sight, dropping down to the floor and barely holding his balance) as the great lady hoisted the side of the tub.

Hundreds of gallons of soapy water poured out under Homer, knocking him from his feet.

The snarling giantess came on, flipping the tub right over the prone Homer. Then, though he couldn’t have hoped to lift the tub anyway, the giantess sat down atop it and started calling for her husband.

Hopelessly trapped, Homer just rolled to a sitting position in the soapy puddle and put his back to the side of the tub. He should have been thinking of a plan of action, but he could not shake the image of the giantess, of the suds rolling wide and long around her curves.

“Coming, Homer!” Bags roared, charging down the corridor, his banger-chopper-thruster waving high above his head, readied to throw.

“Oh, dear,” the giantess replied to the yell, and she rolled off the far side of the tub just as the wild-eyed halfling loosed his weapon.

Bag’s aim was almost always perfect, but he, too, became a bit distracted at the sight of the naked and soapy giantess, and the throw came in just a tad low. The heavy weapon slammed into the side of the metal bathtub with a resounding “BOOOOING!” A stunning, deafening peal that shook even the incredible image of the giantess from the mind of poor Horatio Hairfoot.

Unable to slow on the slick floor, Bags slid in heavily against the tub. His weapon lay on the ground beside him and he quickly scooped it up. Seeing the frantic, and embarrassed, giantess making no move toward him, and guessing the fate of his reluctant companion, Bags slipped the thruster part under the edge of the tub. With a great heave, Bags brought the side up and Homer, recognizing the scruffy, fur-lined boots of his rescuer, quickly scrambled out.

“Are you unharmed?” Bags asked, truly concerned.

“Huh?” was Homer’s reply. He wiggled a slender finger into his still-vibrating ear.

Alarms rang out all through the castle. In the doorway down the other end of the first corridor appeared the tangled giantess, dragging the bed behind, and the thunder of a dozen giant boots resounded down the corridor to the side of the bathroom.

“Run away!” Homer cried. He looked around, confused, at how distant his own words sounded.

“But we’re heroes, lad!” Bags protested. “Run? From mere giants? Whate’er might the bards write?”

Though Homer, again wiggling a finger in his ear, could hardly hear his companion, he read Bags’s lips well enough to understand the protest. “Our epitaphs,” he remarked, then he was off. He stopped at the bathroom door, though, and turned back to the huddled giantess. Again wanting only to apologize, Homer managed to utter, “Thank you.”

The giantess crinkled her surprisingly delicate features, covered herself as best she could, and looked around for a broom.

Bags came into the corridor casting a scornful glare at the back of his retreating companion. “Heroes!” he muttered grimly, and he set his feet firmly and started down the side passage, his banger-chopper-thruster waving menacingly.

Then a half-dozen eighteen-foot-tall (and nearly as wide), blue-skinned giants, wielding the biggest swords and clubs that Bags had ever seen, appeared from around another bend.

“To Hell with the bards!” Bags gasped and he set off after Homer, whose respectability so suddenly seemed an admirable trait.

~ * ~

“Oh, no, you don’t!” the bed-dragging giantess sneered at Homer. The deafened fellow barely heard her, but words didn’t seem necessary at that moment. The giantess rushed out from the bedroom and Homer recoiled.

The bed caught sideways in the door, abruptly ending the giantess’s charge. The remaining canopy supports snapped off after the initial jolt, and the giantess tumbled headlong. Homer took off at once. He leapt atop the back of the giantess and ran right over her, scrambling and diving over and around the blocking bed.

Bags came next, leaping the prone giant in a single bound, then dipping a shoulder and bowling right into the bed. He promptly bounced off and landed on his butt in the middle of the hallway. Growling in defiance, the halfling took up his weapon and charged headlong, tearing and chopping wildly.

“Finesse,” Homer remarked sarcastically when his companion crashed through amid a snowstorm of feathery mattress filling.

“Finesse, Bagsnatcher style.” Bags promptly and proudly replied without missing a beat.

“The rope?” Homer asked, noticing the broken desk and the missing leg.

Bags shrugged helplessly and charged to the window, scrambling up to the sill, the thunder of giant boots fast approaching the doorway behind him.

“Climb?” asked Homer, terrified, but moving up to join his companion.

“Sort of,” Bags tried to explain. Thinking an action worth a thousand words (and not having the time for a thousand words), he grabbed Homer by the collar and heaved him over and out. Then Bags leapt after his dropping companion, hoping the cloud to be as pillowy as he remembered.

“I will pay you back for that one day!” Homer, puffing angrily, promised fiercely when he and Bags had finally stopped bouncing. Bags let the threat go without reply, not having the time to pause and debate the issue just then.

Great horns sounded all throughout the giant castle.

“Where do we go?” Homer, suddenly timid again, cried.

Bags threw his hands out wide and ran off into the mist. “Any way,” he answered as the castle disappeared into the fog behind them. “Just beware of...”

“Holes!” Homer cried, and Bags spun about just as Homer dropped from sight. The adventurous fellow dove to his belly, thinking his companion doomed.

But fat little fingers, grasping wildly at the edge of cloud stuff, showed Bags differently. “Holes,” he agreed, hoisting Homer back up to the cloud.

“Long way down,” Homer remarked weakly, trying futilely to smile.

“But sure it be a beautiful day!” Bags replied, trying to brighten things up.

Homer was glad to realize that his hearing had returned, but he really didn’t appreciate Bags’s lame attempt at levity, not with a horde of angry giants chasing them! “But how are we to escape?” he asked.

“There must be some way,” Bags replied, turning serious. “Might that the cloud’ll find the top of another mountain.” He looked back toward the castle. “Or might it be that the giants possess something. . .

“Beans!” Bags cried suddenly.

“Beans?”

Bags produced the leather bag and waved it at Homer’s uncomprehending stare. Then, as Bags revealed the small sack’s contents and handed one bean to Homer, Homer’s expression turned curious. Legends of the properties of magical beans were not so uncommon.

“Surely, it cannot...” Homer began, but now the giants had apparently come out of the castle and the cry of “Release the beast!” took away any logical protests he might have had.

“Plant it!” Bags yelled at Homer.

Homer dropped a bean onto the cloud and stood back, seeming confused.