“It spied on the town for a few days you, say?” Ekhar had his face scrunched up in a look that Jag knew only too well. “Please, finish your tale, and I’ll be out of your way.”

“There isn’t much to tell,” Jag continued. “It stopped showing up about three days ago. I figured that it’d grown bored with whatever game it was playing and gone back into the hills. Then, this morning, it comes screaming down the main road. I mean, we could hear it coming a good ten minutes before it got here. It was waving its hands in the air and shouting about how mean we all were and how it was going to wreck the town.

“You can see all the damage the damned thing did. It kicked in the front of the schoolhouse, tore the roof off M’Greely’s general store, and was absolutely wrecking the Dancing Roc Inn when we finally brought it down. I figure the confounded thing was mad, or maybe it ate some brainfever berries.”

Ekhar, who had been gazing at the buildings that had been ruined, or perhaps at the half dozen or so intervening ones that had not been touched, was struck by this last comment.

“Bainfevered, you think? Or under a spell? What makes you say this giant was unwell?”

Running his hand through his short-cropped gray hair, Jag accepted the fact that the gnome, like his headache, was not going to just go away. “You mean besides the fact that we peppered it with at least six dozen arrows before it fell? Man, I’ve never seen anything take that much punishment without even batting an eyelash. But, my first big clue was that it started foaming at the mouth just before it fell over.”

Ekhar tapped the stem of his pipe against his thin lips and raised one eyebrow. Tyr save me, Jag thought, he’s got a theory.

“The mad giant’s rampage was a tragedy nearly, but no murder’s been done, you’ve shown me quite clearly. You’ve much work to do, Jag, and I’ve no wish to delay. May I look at the giant, before I’m away?”

The constable nodded mutely. The gnome had listened to reason. He was going to leave. Jag’s prayers had been answered.

Ekhar bowed deeply, clamped his clay pipe in his teeth, and walked purposefully toward the lifeless cyclops. He stood there for a while, hands clasped behind his back, and stared at the dozens of arrows sticking out of the body. He paid particular attention to those around the giant’s face and neck, especially the one poking directly out of its sightless eye.

All of this would have been interesting, possibly even amusing to Jag Dubblspeir, except that he still had so much to do. He called four of his men aside and they huddled around him as he squatted in the muddy street.

“Three of you go around to every barn, stable, and manger in town” he pointed to the three newest recruits. He knew it was best to send them on an assignment together. It just about guaranteed that they’d stay focused on the job at hand. “Gather up every plow horse, oxen, and mule in Minroe and bring them to the hitching post in front of the Dancing Roc. While you’re at it, grab every coil of rope you come across. Make sure they’re strong and at least twenty feet long, though. We’re going to drag that cyclops out of town before it has a chance to start stinking up the place.”

The three young men stood up, saluted, mumbled “yes sir” at least five times each, saluted again, and headed off toward the Happy Horse Livery repeatedly tripping over one another the whole way.

“You, stand guard over the body” he said to the remaining deputy. His name was Riktus, and he was a few years older than the other three. While not a born soldier, Riktus had learned a lot in the three years since Jag took him on. “People are already gathering around and poking at it. If the cursed thing really was brainsick, I don’t want anyone cutting slices off it to take home as souvenirs.”

The lad snapped off a crisp salute and trotted over to his post. He could handle responsibility, Jag reflected, which meant that the Purple Dragons were sure to snatch him up when next they passed through on a visit. This job was never going to get any easier if he couldn’t find some way to get the qualified soldiers to stay. Still, knowing that the things were beginning to come under control eased the throbbing in Jag’s head. The worst of the day was surely over. Now all the constable had to worry about was that no one got too rowdy in the celebratory atmosphere that pervaded the unaffected quarters of Minroe.

As if on cue, a crowd of cheering people rounded the corner and marched toward the wreckage of the Dancing Roc. Kethril Fentloque and his son Abril led the way. Jag met them at the barricade.

“Where do you think you’re going?” he asked. He made sure to keep his posture civil, but spoke in the voice he mastered as a Purple Dragon commander, the one that made raw recruits wet their tabards. Kethril flinched.

“W-we’re going to remove the head of that giant. The Dancing Roe may have been destroyed, but I’m going to rebuild the inn and name it ‘One Shot In The Eye.’ We’ll get the head stuffed and mounted to hang over the bar.” The frail man pulled his even frailer son close against him. “My boy killed that giant. We have the right to a souvenir!”

Jag knew it would come to this.

“I’m sorry, Kethril, but we’ve reason to believe the giant may have some disease. You wouldn’t want to hang a trophy that would poison all your guests now, would you?”

The sour old man looked unconvinced.

“If it’s so dangerous, why is that gnome touching it?”

As the constable turned, the pain in his head surged again. There stood Riktus, obviously at his wits’ end, helplessly trying to convince Ekhar to stand away from the corpse. The gnome, for his part, tut-tutted and poohpoohed the guard, continuing to merrily poke and prod at the cyclops.

Jag’s eyes narrowed. “He won’t be for long!” the constable muttered half to himself as he stalked over to the site.

“Sir!” Riktus almost whined. “I tried to stop him, but-”

“Don’t worry, son” Jag said. “Ekhar! What the hells do you think you’re doing? I already told you we think the thing was brainsick. How am I supposed to keep the citizens away from it when here you are sticking your damned hands in its mouth? By the gods, that’s disgusting!”

“Oh, my friend, that you’re here I am glad. I’m quite certain now, this giant was not mad.” He held a finger aloft and it was covered with some of the frothy yellow foam that still clung to the giant’s lips. “A brainfevered or sick thing might spew a white lather, but only a poison makes this foam I gather. It may seem I do this just to be bold and defiant, but the truth is I know someone murdered this giant!”

“Blessed Torm, give me strength-of course it was murdered! I shot it half a dozen times myself!!” The constable turned to the crowd. “How many of you shot the giant?”

Several dozen hands shot into the air along with a resounding “Huzzah!”

“See the arrow that sticks from the poor creature’s eye? It felled this great beast-who let that one fly?”

The crowd shouted, “Abril! Abril! Abril!” and the frail boy flushed with pride.

“That fragile youth killed such a monstrous attacker? Not a well-seasoned knight, not a slasher and hacker? Come now you Minroeans, you’re all genteel folk. Such an end to this battle seems like a poor joke.”

Jag looked at Ekhar in bewilderment. “‘Slasher and hacker?’ What the hell is a ‘slasher and hacker?’”

“It’s true!” came a shrill voice from the crowd. Kethril Fentloque broke the barricade and walked straight up to Ekhar Lorrent. Jag marveled at the fact that next to an elderly gnome, even the spindly Kethril looked hail and hardy. “My boy did it! Everyone else was shooting the blasted thing in the arms and chest and back. But only my Abril was smart enough and brave enough to wait until it turned to look at him, then shoot it square in the eye.”

“A Wise move it’s true, and not easily done. The boy stood and fired when most others would run. It’s an action to be considered uncommonly brave, since the boy’s family and home were in danger so grave.”