One Head as Tribute

A young man has won his trophy, but can he escape with it?

Taurin looked down at the dead giant and tried to steady his breathing. Wintry mountain air misted all around him. He knew he had to hurry. Dusk was only hours away. There could be more of the monsters nearby.

Sir Merogad, his guide, had gone off to scout the lower ridges, but Taurin and his footman Derengar had come upon the giant and had decided to strike. 

It was done. Merogad—and more importantly, Taurin’s father—would be proud. The mountain’s shadow is long, the king had declared. A lord who cannot fight these monsters is no lord at all. If a son is to succeed his father, if a lordling is to become a lord, he must bring me a giant’s head as tribute. The County of Sombrefal asked much of her sons, but with this trophy, Taurin could inherit his father’s titles.

The price had been steep.

Taurin looked at the other corpse: Derengar, the squire. Taurin had only managed to kill the giant because it had been too busy strangling his companion. It had not died cleanly. Neither had Derengar.

He wanted to stay and mourn and wait for Merogad, but time was against him. He went to fetch the ax from Derengar’s grasp. 

Removing the giant’s head was tougher than expected. The giant was only half-again as big as a man, yet its muscles were like oak and its spine like iron. The severing took so long that the giant’s herd of goats began to forget their fear and approach the body. With numbing hands and stiffening muscles, Taurin hoisted his trophy. It was an ugly thing, uglier for being dead: a huge brow, a chin the size of a cobblestone … but the eyes looked frightened. Taurin could almost believe this brute had been human. Almost. As he lowered it into the bag and drew the laces shut, he allowed himself a single moment of relief. Father would be pleased. Where his eldest son had already failed, the youngest had now succeeded.

Well, nearly, he thought. I must still make it back over the mountain. 

He stood to look around for Sir Merogad. Then he saw it: another giant on the next ridge. Another herder.

If not for the sheep around the giant’s legs, looking like cats for how small they were compared to the thing, Taurin might have mistaken the giant for one of his countrymen. It was as if a stout, squat man were enlarged in every dimension until his hands were the size of barrel-lids and his legs as thick as a mule’s neck. Except for the eyes. Their eyes were always beady little things.

Those eyes spotted him though—how could they not, with Taurin standing amid blood upon the fresh snow? The brute pointed straight at him; another figure came pounding up over the ridge. This one held a spear. Immediately upon seeing him the spear-carrier put a fist up to its mouth and—

—a shriek assaulted Taurin’s ears! High pitched and rattling, the screeching sounded like the twisted offspring of a carrion bird and a girl screaming for her life. Taurin flinched. His heart skipped a beat. 

The shriek lasted until the giant ran out of breath. Then it blew the bone-whistle again: three long shrieks.

Taurin shuddered, turned, and began to run.

He passed poor Derengar’s body and felt a pang of guilt, but he knew he could not try to retrieve him and live. His boots slipped in the slush. He scrambled back up and went on. There was no sense of triumph now. Only fear.

He made for the trees where they had tied the horses. The whistling shriek followed him. The head bounced in the satchel against his back.

Taurin ran into the trees and tore through the pine boughs. He saw the horses, and ran to untie them.

“Merogad!” he shouted. “Where are you? You must help me!” 

There was no answer but deep, shouting voices from the other side of the copse. Then another scream from the bone-whistle—it was close now. How did they cover that distance so quickly? Taurin thought. Merogad said the creatures were slow! 

Merogad’s warhorse strained against its tether, eyes wild from the noise. Taurin couldn’t abandon the knight here in the wilderness, but he would need a spare mount, besides his own. He chose Derengar’s, leaving Marogad’s. The knight would be fine, Taurin told himself. 

A moment later he was mounted, the footman’s steed in tow; they burst through the pine-branches and along the game-track they had followed in. Another triple-shriek spurred the horses faster than Taurin ever could. Taurin looked over his shoulder and saw the two giants running after him. They plowed through the branches and pounded over the snow without apparent effort.

Taurin followed the hoof-tracks from earlier, winding uphill, further into the mountains. Eventually, he knew, it would go through the high pass, then back home. It would take hours, but that wouldn’t matter if he could outrun his pursuers.

The horrible skirling sound was bouncing off the hillsides, but Taurin noticed it was growing quieter; he was getting away. The wind picked up. The trees grew thinner. 

The path narrowed to an escarpment. To Taurin’s right was a sheer wall of stone, to his left a craggy slope down. Nothing was visible down below except trees and boulders—a labyrinth. The path ahead curved around the wall and out of sight, so Taurin slowed his horse. Steam emanated off its muscles. A cloud appeared around its head.

At a walk now, they followed the bend.

As Taurin came around, a figure appeared in the distance, following the track-line towards him. He thought it was Sir Merogad, but hope turned to dread when he noticed its size: another giant, bigger than the others. He tried to back his horse, but the spare mount was in the way. The path here was too narrow to turn without risking a fall. 

When his horse noticed the giant, it reared and whinnied. The giant’s gaze shot up and the thing cried out a mighty bellow. Another screech came in answer, as if from the mountain itself. 

The giant pulled out a sling. It hefted the leather thongs and whipped the weapon around.

A stone—bigger than a man’s fist—tore through the air like lightning. A sudden zip gave way to a loud crunch. Taurin hurtled to the ground and slammed into the frozen earth.

Scrambling up, the young man saw a crumpled pile of bone and gore where his horse’s head had been. The giant was readying another stone.The shrieking whistle was getting closer now. Man and beast were both starting to panic.

Taurin lunged for the reins of the second horse, but nearly got a hoof to the jaw. 

A blur passed in front of Taurin’s face. The whip of the rock through the air made him flinch so hard he fell backward. The horse fled, half-falling and half-running over the edge of the slope, anything to escape.

Taurin looked back around the bend: the giants from before were far in the distance, but they were relentless, and they had now been joined by another spear-carrying behemoth. He looked to the path ahead: the slinger was loading again. Taurin’s hand drifted to the sword at his side, but his mind brought up the image of Deregar’s corpse and the sound of snapping bones.

“Merogad!” Taurin cried again. “I need you!” There was no answer. He looked down into the gorge where the spare horse had disappeared. 

Then he leapt.

The descent was painful. Taurin tried to keep his feet under him, but the best he could manage was a clumsy slide. Gravel and ice ripped his cloak, tore his tunic, and scraped his ribs with a pain that both burned and froze. The slope carried Taurin into the woods; he tried to run at the bottom, lost his footing, and tumbled. 

Once he stopped, Taurin forced himself to stand. He groaned in pain. Nothing felt broken, but nothing felt right.

It was quieter now. Derengar’s horse was nowhere to be seen.

Taurin’s pursuers were still far behind, for now. They would catch him eventually, especially on foot. He could hear them shouting—deep voices rebounding to one another—but the horrific shrieking signals had ceased.

Looking around, Taurin realized that he was lucky that he had stopped when he had. There was a precipice a few paces further. Such was the height of the cliff that his head—already pounding from pain—began to swim when he looked over it.

Not that way then, he thought.

Off to the right: another steep and craggy slope, and a dark mess of rock and boulder beneath, flanked on all sides by the mountain’s spurs.

Not that way either, then.

To the cliff’s left: a gentle hill down. Trees abounded, but conifers gave way to their leafless cousins just below where Taurin stood. And there—through the twiggy branches: the Sombrefal River! If Taurin could get down there, he could follow it south out of the mountains. There were no rapids this far south, but the current would be fierce; he could even swim with it and away from the giants. 

He took a long breath. He could see the way out. To Father. To triumph.

Taurin prepared for this last sprint. He lifted up the sack from where it had fallen and—his stomach dropped—found it was weightless.

He whipped around, scanning everywhere for his prize. He spied a patch of bloodied snow near where he’d fallen. He ran over and saw a rolling groove and a trail of spatter. His gaze followed this trail down, down, down into the dark valley. There at the bottom: his giant’s head.

Taurin sniffed. His breath caught.

Despite teary eyes and pounding aches and the cold assailing his every limb, one thought dominated Taurin’s mind at that moment: a memory from years ago. His brother had just come home from his own hunt. Mother had rejoiced, but not Father. It mattered not that Alibert had nearly died, nor that a giant’s club had broken his sword. It only mattered that the young man had come back empty-handed. Most of all, Taurin remembered the despondent look that his father had given his brother.

Taurin remembered the river behind him, and with it safety and home. But with home, a waiting father.

He started down the slope as fast as his footing allowed.

A shout came from above. Taurin saw a silhouette pointing down at him. He pressed on. The death-whistle pierced the air again, but Taurin paid it no heed. Even when the shriek was answered by a twin scream from another ridgeline, he just kept running.

Taurin reached the bottom, grabbed the head, opened his sack, discovered it was torn at the seams, and discarded it altogether. He laced his fingers through the hairs of the trophy, gripped for all he could, and began to climb back up.

By the time he reached the top, Taurin was panting from exertion. His sides were on fire. He bent over, lowering his trophy to the ground, keeping a firm grasp of its hair. He tried to spy the distant Sombrefal. 

“Let go of that.”

Taurin froze. The voice was so deep that it took him a moment to understand there had even been words. In Taurin’s native tongue, no less. 

Six giants emerged from the trees right in front of him. For a heartbeat he thought of flight, but flight to where? It was a dead-end behind him, and already two of the monsters were moving to the edge of the decline in case he should fling himself back down.

The giant in front was dressed unlike the others. Where they had goat-skins, this one had a tunic of wool and a belt decorated with beads and bone. A shield-rim peeked over his shoulder. He held in his massive hand a colossal club with a head of stone.

This titan addressed Taurin again.

“Let. Go.”

Taurin let his fingers slip away from his trophy, and he stood. His head was level with the giant’s stomach.

“Tell me,” the rumbling voice demanded, “you abandon all your dead friends, but desecrate ours. Why?”

“All my…?” Taurin drew a shaky breath. “I don’t…”

The giant motioned with his free hand. One of his fellows came forward carrying a crumbled mass of chainmail and blue cloth. Taurin recognized it; terror rose within him. The porter came forward and dropped, without ceremony, the body of Sir Merogad at Taurin’s feet. 

“I ask again,” the leader pointed to the trophy. “Why do you take this?”

Taurin decided honesty was the surest path to safety. “It is our custom. I am honor-bound to slay a giant in order to be considered worthy of my father’s lineage.”

The chief giant gave a quizzical look. “Who is your father?”

“Count Rorgon of Sombrefal. And so,” he stammered, “it would be unwise—most unwise—to harm me.”

At this the giant laughed, and the booming sound of his voice reverberated around the grove.

“I know this name!” he said.

“You do?”

“Indeed. Do you know her name?” The giant pointed to the severed head. His face had flashed back to seriousness. The change made Taurin shudder.

“Her name?”

“Adogunda.”

Taurin couldn’t say anything.

“It’s a good name for a mother like her, is it not?” the giant said. Then he lifted his massive club, and placed the end of it gently on Taurin’s shoulder. The young man could hardly stand straight under the weight of it. The stone was as big as his head.

“Don’t worry, little man,” the giant said. “Your father will hear all about your deeds.”

“He will?”

“Yes. When I deliver him your head.” 

☙─  ─❧

Thank you for reading. 

I originally wrote and published this story as a part of the Gibberish Writing Competition 2024. (I’ve made a few minor changes since then.) The specific challenge was to write a story of about 2,000 words, over the course of five days, from the following prompt: 

Write us a story depicting a chase scene! In any genre, help your readers forget “fight” or “freeze”—make them feel the urge to flee! Or, if not flight, then to give chase! Either way, take your readers on a journey that puts them on the run. […] build a world and then travel at-speed through it, and dragging the readers along behind, willingly or not!

You can see the full challenge here. The other challenges included…

… a “bottle episode,” with one character, for which I wrote “The Encircling Cells” (and won the highest score for that round).

… and an expansion of a prior micro-fiction story, for which I wrote “For Want of Safe Harbor” (which I’m proud to say was only out-scored by one other story across the entire competition). 

If you’d like to read a bit more about my process for these stories and my thoughts on the competition, you can read The Story Behind the Stories: Takeaways and Lessons Learned from GWC’24.