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Message: <blockquote data-quote="Lazybones" data-source="post: 7236859" data-attributes="member: 143">Chapter 90As soon as Kors vanished, Bredan blinked as if coming out of a dream.  The giant still filled his vision, the hulking creature somehow more horrible than even the cyclops, but it made no move toward them.  As he watched it reached into its bag and drew out something.  Bredan could see that it was a rock twice the size of a man’s head.A scream yanked his head around, and he saw that his companions had already moved to engage the ogres.  Haran and the last of the riders, an old veteran everyone called Ironjaw, were already fighting one of the huge creatures.  Mounted they were almost as tall as the things, but as he watched the ogre shrugged off a thrust from Ironjaw’s sword as if it was nothing.  The ogre lunged forward and toppled the man off his horse, animal and rider crashing to the ground together with bone-jarring force.  Haran drove his spear into the ogre’s side, causing it to scream in rage.  It reared back and tried to sweep him from his saddle with its massive club, but with an expert tug on his reins the rider pulled just barely back out of its reach.  But there was a second ogre already rushing forward to pin him between it and its companion.  Bredan could just make out the last one further back among the wagons.  For a split second he caught a glimpse of Quellan, for once the half-orc looking small against the sheer bulk of his enemy.Bredan absorbed the whole scene in an instant, but even that momentary distraction cost him.  He spun back to see the giant’s arm already raised, the boulder cupped in its huge fist.  He was kicking the horse’s flanks but the animal, no doubt possessing more sense than him, was already moving.  He hardly had to tug the reins at all; the horse was clearly willing to go anywhere as long as it wasn’t closer to the giant.Bredan tried to reach for his sword, but he had to focus all his efforts on staying atop the horse.  He tried to think himself small, trying not to think of that huge arm coming forward…Even expecting it, the impact came as a surprise.  One moment he was atop the horse, charging back toward the wagons, the next he was flying through the air.  He barely had a chance to realize that something had changed before the ground rushed up to meet him.  He slammed into the hard surface with enough force to knock the wind from his body, and his face struck the ground hard enough to embed bits of gravel into his skin.A voice in his skull that sounded like his uncle was yelling, Get up! but it was all he could manage to lift his head a bit.  That was enough to see a grim sight; one of the ogres, the one that Haran had wounded, looking hardly the worse for wear as it slammed its club down two-handed into Ironjaw’s body.  The soldier, still trapped under his fallen horse, had no chance.  The blow killed both of them, and when the club came back up it was messy with their blood.  A spray of it covered the ogre’s face, giving the creature’s features the look of a garish mask.  Its jaws cracked open in a grim smile as it fixed its eyes on Bredan, then it started forward toward him.The lead wagon burst into flames.It wasn’t quite an explosion, but it wasn’t tentative either.  Fire swept over the tarp and around the bed of the wagon, burrowing into the half-exposed crates and barrels under the cover.  For a moment it surprised both Bredan and the ogre menacing him, but after that moment passed the monster resumed its approach toward the stricken warrior.But the participants in the melee weren’t the only ones startled by the unexpected conflagration.  The horses in the team in front of the wagon had been alarmed by the battle swirling around them.  They had been jumping in their traces, straining against the tack holding them in place.  But the fire right behind them pushed them over into panic, and as the four big animals lunged forward together they overpowered the wagon brake and charged forward up the road.Right at Bredan, who was still lying in the middle of that road.The sight of a four-horse team coming at him at a full sprint jolted him even more than the approaching ogre, and with a curse he sprang up and rolled to the side.  It was hardly an elegant maneuver, and the sword still strapped to his back jammed into his neck as he completed the roll, but the clattering hooves passed him by with scant inches to spare.  He only just barely yanked his arm back before the wheels of the wagon would have crushed it, but then the burning vehicle was past.  Blinking through a sudden haze of smoke, he watched as the panicked horses headed right for the boulder and the giant that blocked their way.  The team seemed to realize that they could not go that way, and with the drop-off to the right an obvious hazard they turned together to the left.  The horses in their terror somehow managed the rocky slope, but the wagon could not.  It tipped over, spilling its burning contents onto the road behind it.  The horses, burdened now by the full weight of the fallen wagon, could not escape as the giant strode over to them.Bredan didn’t have time to watch what was going to happen to them, for the ogre was coming at him again, the smoke swirling around its massive body as it crossed the road.  The young fighter was still dazed from being flung from his horse, but he managed to get his sword out and rise into a fighting stance.  The ogre paused a moment, perhaps wary of a sword almost as big as its own weapon.  It had to be feeling the effects of its wounds, especially the puncture in its side that had matted its mangy furs with blood, but it didn’t look any less imposing for that.  Bredan could only make out bits and pieces of what was happening back at the rest of the wagons through the smoke, but it was impossible to miss the other two ogres, still fighting his friends.  He couldn’t tell who was winning.Abruptly the ogre stepped forward and lunged, its club sweeping around toward Bredan’s head.  He ducked under it and slashed with his sword at the ogre’s forward leg.But the leg wasn’t there.  Too late he realized that the ogre’s lunge had been a feint; it hadn’t followed through and instead took a step back.  Bredan stumbled, drawn off-balance like a novice.  He had just enough time to hear his uncle’s stern voice in his head before the ogre stepped in again and smashed him in the chest with its club.This time the attack was no feint.  The impact lifted him off his feet and flung him to the ground.  His head dropped farther than it should have and he realized he was right on the lip of the drop that descended a hundred feet at a sharp angle to the forest below.As stars flashed in his vision he saw his sword glittering in the late afternoon sunlight as it toppled end-over-end through the air before vanishing much like Kors had earlier.For a moment he could only lie there despite the crushing pain in his neck.  He could feel echoes of that pain stabbing through his torso; the blow from the club must have broken a few of his ribs.  It took a heroic effort, but he managed to lift his head enough to see in front of him.What he saw was about what he’d expected.  The ogre was there, standing over him just as it had stood over Ironjaw just moments before.  It seemed to be waiting for him to notice, then it smiled a toothy grin and lifted its bloody club to finish him.</blockquote>

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