Chapter 63 Brynn’s Confession & The Ice Giant
After dinner, Brynn and I were sitting alone by the fire.
Alina and Mavis were doing the dishes, Thornhold and Ray were huddled around the table with Rupert, playing a game of Cardos, which was apparently some sort of betting game, and Aisling and Sean were out in the shed, with Magdala, stringing up the carcasses they’d brought home to bleed them.
“What’s going on between you and Aisling?” I asked, keeping my voice low.
“What do you mean?” Brynn blushed.
I just stared at her, giving her one of those ‘you know what I mean’ looks.
She let out a sigh. “I like him,” she said, ducking her head. “I miss my boyfriend, I really do, but I feel so alone here and…Aisling is nice. He’s different.”
“You have to remember—he’s a Sym.”
“I thought we weren’t calling them that anymore,” Brynn said. “Remember what Otsiano said?”
“I know, I know.” And I did know. The Syms were real, they weren’t just bits of plastic and metal and programmed computer chips.
Here, in this world, they were as real as we were, and they lived their lives, they breathed and lived, and they died.
Just like we did. But it seemed so odd to hear her say she was falling for what was, essentially, the creation from some programmer’s mind.
“He’s not just a figment of imagination,” she said.
“Maybe in the beginning, but Erenye, we may never get out of here. We may only have a chance to have a real family if we stop looking at these people—except for the game employees—as constructs. Something about Aisling makes me want to be near him. He’s polite and courteous and everything I could want in a man. ”
I tapped my fingers on the table. “What about your boyfriend, though? What if we do make it out?”
“Then I’ll go back to him, happily. But what if we don’t? Should I just throw away what could be a budding relationship on technicalities?” Brynn rubbed her forehead. “I don’t know what to do. We’ve only known each other for a few days, but it seems so...”
“Perfect?” I asked. The thought occurred to me that—since there were so many female players in the game that the devs had played on the romance side as well. Not that men didn’t need or want romance, but women could be easily engaged.
“Perfect doesn’t exist, but he’s as close to it as I think I’m going to find.” Brynn sighed. “Don’t judge me? Please?”
I didn’t know what to say. “I’m not. Not really. But…are you coming with us when we leave? Are you staying here? You’re not one of the lycanthroids. You can’t shift into wolf form.”
“I saw Aisling shift,” she said, lowering her voice.
“Out by the woodpile. He sensed something nearby and shifted to run off into the woods. When he came back, he said he thought it might just be some goblin or kobold or something. He was gorgeous—a snow-white wolf twice the size of a regular one. He was so gentle, he sniffed my palm and licked it.”
She had the dreamiest look on her face, and I realized that she had a mad crush on him.
There wasn’t anything I could say to break through that haze right now.
I wondered how Magdala would feel about it.
After all, Brynn couldn’t have children with him, could she?
And that opened a whole new slate of questions to which I didn’t have the answer.
“I don’t know what to say,” I said. “I think it’s a mistake, Brynn, regardless of how nice he is, but you have to make up your own mind. But please, let us know in advance if you decide to stay here.”
She nodded. “I promise,” she said, a solemn look on her face. “I don’t know what to think, really. But there you go.”
I was about to say something when a scream from outside echoed through the night. I leaped up, as did Sean, Thornhold, Reggie, and Ray.
“That was Magdala!” I grabbed for my boots and jammed my feet into them.
Then, sliding my cloak on around me, I grabbed my weapons and headed for the door.
Brynn and the men were right on my heels.
We spilled out into the night to hear shouts from the direction of the shed.
As I pulled my sword—the night was no place for a bow when you couldn’t see that far ahead to tell companion from foe—Sean pushed ahead, rounding the corner by the shed. He came skidding right back.
“It’s the ice giant—it’s breaking into the shed. I can see Aisling fighting it, but I don’t know where Magdala or Rupert are.” He quickly turned again and charged back around the corner. Alina stood to one side and began an incantation. Reggie joined her and Ray, both muttering spells.
Thornhold, Brynn, and I rounded the corner in time to see Sean in the fight of his life.
He was grappling with the ice giant. His sword rested on a nearby snowbank, and he was in the clutches of the giant, who was lifting him up, reminding me of the T-Rex going after the insurance guy in Jurassic Park.
The giant must have been at least twelve feet tall, and heavy as a troll, but it had a different look to it—I could see that by the light of the moon shining through the clouds to reflect against the snow.
Another moment and the giant would be biting his head off.
“No!” I shouted, racing forward. I ducked around the back of the ice giant and swung, bringing my blade across the ice giant’s calves. Thornhold and Brynn darted over, one to each side of the giant, who was looking annoyed.
He raised Sean toward his mouth, apparently intent on grinding his bones to make his bread, or some other fairy-tale nonsense that was all too graphic in reality. I brought my sword back and—instead of trying to sideswipe the ice giant, I stuck my sword directly into his calf.
The blade was sharp, and it slid neatly into the giant’s flesh, biting deeply.
The giant let out a roar and dropped Sean to the ground. Brynn slammed her hammer against the giant’s left leg, and simultaneously, Thornhold brought his axe to bear, swinging it across the giant’s right leg. The blade cleaved into the giant’s shin, and he bellowed even louder.
The giant kicked, trying to shake us off, and it worked for the moment. Nobody wanted to be in the path of that massive foot. But we had given Sean the chance to pick himself up off the ground and get away.
At that moment, Reggie, Ray, and Alina entered the arena—so to speak—and Reggie finished his spell. I could tell it was magical protection—that cushioned feeling surrounded me; it happened every time I was around a protection spell that had been cast to include me.
Alina’s spell flared, a massive orb of light that blinded me, but it also blinded the giant because he rose, reaching to cover his eyes. And Ray came in, hurrying over to Sean to make certain he was all right.
The giant lurched again, then let out another roar as he tripped over a large boulder.
“Run!” I shouted as he began to waver.
And sure enough, the next moment he tipped and fell right toward the shed.