Oatey was faster than she looked.  She fairly flew down the ridge and repeated the same attack that had killed the first goat.  For some time there was no chance for questions.  Lugh kept with the girl and the charging goat and not much more.

“The problem as he saw it,” Lugh mused, “was too much riding and not enough running.”  Still, he was close to her when they burst into another clearing dominated by an unlit bon-fire.  The goat looked worse than he did, head down, panting, but not for long.  With a deft slash Oatey put the goat out of its misery.

Oatey turned to the stacked wood.  Lugh was panting, hands on knees, watching her as she struck a spark in tinder and blew it into flame.  She thrust the flame into the wood and the bonfire flared to life.  Without hesitation she turned back to the goat.  With practiced ease she cut the legs free and threw them, one after another, onto the growing fire.  Smoke billowed.  “Help me with the body.” Oatey commanded.

Lugh grabbed the blood soaked animal and with Oatey threw it onto the bonfire.  “How is this going to kill a giant?”

Oatey stood, bloody to her elbows, hair, sweat matted to her head, and for all that, beautiful.  She smiled, “This is for confusion.”

“Wonderful, the giant and I are both confused.” 

“We stand over there.  The giant is drawn to this, burning meat, destruction of burning.  Then he smells us, sees us, comes for us.  We run down that defile and as he pursues, mad with hunger and hatred, he dies.” Oatey beamed her pride, “Come, the giant is near.”

Oatey, running like the wind, dashed off with her purpose clearly in mind.  Lugh, blowing hard, followed as he could.  As he followed he saw that there was indeed a cut in the rock ringed clearing.  Oatey slowed and stopped at a sort of edge where the grade turned steeply down.  Lugh slowed and was shocked to hear a booming, as of a drum, from his feet as they struck the earth, as if it were hollow. 

“A false floor, we can cross, but the giant will break though and his feet will find copper thorns but no better purchase to keep him from falling there.”  Oatey grinned mischieviously, “Have a look.” 

Oatey pointed down and standing next to her Lugh saw men of the Norfolk standing below.  Each of the men was manning a wicked looking pike rigged among the trees in the creek bed below.  There were others standing by thick ropes farther into the trees.

Oatey nudged Lugh, “For now we are the bait.”  She pointed back toward the fire. “See, he comes.”

The creature was every bit of fourteen feet and frightful in its wrath.  It was a man in everything but size and yet this similarity to a man made it seem all the more alien to Lugh.  The skin, that had been grey and stone like as it rose from the hillock that had covered it, was now pallid white.  Red hair covered its head and a matted beard covered its jaw and chest.  The giant howled its rage in deep booming Rus that Lugh knew from his travels.

“Lugh, when I say so, run down the ramp with me.  Keep your feet as long as you can.  When we hit the soft ground at the base we must roll aside.  Do you understand?  Oatey searched his eyes and seemed satisfied with his nod.  “He is hungry, angry, but he begins to speak.  Do you know his words?”

Lugh nodded, “aye, yes, tis Rus.  He spouts threats and dark promises.”

“Yes, he is human now, no longer stone.  His wits are returning, but we must catch him in his rage.  Lugh, you must wait with me until I go, else he may realize the trap.  But now he is flesh and we can kill him easily.”

“Oh gods, how can you say easy?”

The giant held in two huge hands an uprooted tree.  Most of the branches were torn free and the man thing swung it like a maul with the remains of the root ball, the head of it.  With one wild swing he shattered the bonfire, sending its parts across the clearing.  Then his eyes fell on the pair.  His howl convinced Lugh all the more that this thing was no human.

Oatey’s grasp caused pain, “Wait!” she commanded as the giant charged howling its rage.  The giant swung its tree-club into the air and pounded toward them impossibly fast.  Its strides ate up the intervening ground and Lugh’s blood ran cold.  “Come,” Oatey said and dragged him after.

The track was steep but he had almost made it to the base when he tripped and began to roll.  Oatey was already down and rolling toward what Lugh hoped was a soft landing.  The impact was was jarring, stunned he tried to figure out which way to roll. 

Oatey yelled, “Quickly here.”  He scrambled after and was stunned again as he was thrown aside by opening gates buried in the ground.  He lay looking up the slope horrified to see the giant stumble and fall. 

The tree bound pikes were swinging into position to meet it.  Armored men, with copper axes, were boiling out from cover around them.  The huge man was pierced shoulder, chest, and gut, but his weight could not be stopped.  The pikes shattered, and the creature turned as it fell.  Lugh feared he might be crushed, but he was far enough away as the thing went behind the huge doors onto which he and Oatey had fallen.

He looked around for her.  Trying to gather himself he clambered to his feet searching for her.  She was gone.  Armed and armored men were rushing into the defile where the body of the giant had fallen, surely dead with the wounds.  He followed expecting that he might find the girl at the center of mayhem.

As he rounded the door, following in the wake of the axe men.  He caught a glimpse of the man-thing impaled among a forest of copper clad and barbed spikes.  “Easy she’d said, what creature had a chance against her?” he had the chance to think.  The axe men were pushing through the spikes from all sides now.  Lugh couldn’t understand the urgency.

Suddenly, the thing moved, pinned as it was through almost every part of its body, the movements were slight and somewhat aimless.  A big six-fingered hand rose near Lugh, but only just off the ground as the arm was pierced with many barbed spikes.  It smashed down and the arm strained against the piercings.  “I’ll eat you all, damn bugs.  You’ll pay!”  The thing howled its protest.  The giant’s face turned to Lugh and its one undamaged eye focused on him.  “I’ll pop you like a maggot too Gael boy!”

“The head! Strike off its head!”  Oatey cried, she was in the thick of it, moving toward the giant’s shoulders.  Lugh saw rage turn to fear on the giants face.  It redoubled its efforts as the Norfolk soldiers clambered onto its back.  Lugh watched as stroke after stroke bit into the thick corded neck of the giant.  Men lost their balance and fell only to rise again and seek to climb up onto the giant.  Lugh marvelled at how much damage it absorbed before it grew still, but even then Oatey harangued and cajoled until the head was completely removed.

A ragged cheer went up and injured axe men began to be tended to.  None of the injuries that Lugh saw seemed severe.  Easy, like she’d said.  Lugh expelled a tension filled breath and went looking for the girl.

The goat was dead, but Oatey dragged it along after her.  Lugh nearly laughed at the comic look of the small woman straining to pull the dead weight of it along.  Nearly, but then he remembered how she had caused the wound that caused its death, how quickly and how offhandedly.

She turned, sweat and dust stained, to look at Lugh, “Here, make yourself useful.” she said and tossed him the rope.  Lugh made an awkward grab for the line but missed it.  He noticed her brief contemptuous smirk as he picked it up off the dirt, but also how the sweat glistened on her body.

Perhaps Oatey noticed his regard as well because she turned and separated her doe skin shift from the bundle she carried.  Items attached to her loincloth were tossed on the remains of the bundle and she quickly shrugged her way into the dress.  She bent again, catching up a belt, and anchoring all at her waist.  She quickly turned to what remained of her bundle and wrapped it together with a thong that let her throw it over her head to rest across her shoulder.  She turned back, hands on hips and the same amused curl of her lips, “Its a rope Lugh.  Pull it.”  Her eyes laughed at him.

“Its not my rope.” Lugh began.  But for reasons he couldn’t pin down he threw it over his shoulder and  walked  toward her.  She turned and began to stroll along a trail that he’d been finding the blood that led him to her. 

“I bled the goat too quick,”  Oatey sighed, as if it was a mark on her professional pride.  She let him draw even with her and then glanced over at him to say, “That or I picked the wrong goat.  I would have had a real hard time of it without your help.  Thanks.” 

Lugh was almost as surprised by her expression of thanks as he was by her casual bleeding of the goat in the first place.  He dragged the goat, mulling that revelation before asking, “Oatey, why are we dragging the goat?”

“We. . .” Oatey chuckled, “. . . are dragging the goat to the next goat unless you don’t have the strength.”

Lugh trudged along, dragging the dead goat behind, and mulling her answer.  She had ignored his question and stabbed his pride to make him continue to do something that made no sense.  Now he was sweating as much as she had been and climbing a little rise was making him breath hard.  “So Oatey,” he puffed, “How far to the next goat?” 

Oatey ignored his question, “Are you ready for a run?” She stood at the top of the rise and gazed back the way they had come.

“A run, what?” but as Lugh turned to look back the way she was looking his question died on his lips.  A huge figure, roughly man shaped, stood above the little trees that had surrounded the meadow where he’d been sitting.  The thing was walking slowly, but following the path they had marked in blood.  Even at a distance Lugh could see that he pushed aside the trees as if they were tall grass.

“When a giant wakes he’s hungry, real hungry.  There’s no room for anything but feeding.  No thought but the smell of blood and of woman.  He thinks I’m a giant wife, if he thinks at all.  Mostly he just wants the goat.”  She turned and pointed down the other side of the rise,  “And then he’ll want that next goat.  Here’s good for that one.”

Lugh dropped the rope and looked again at the giant.  “Its nearly twenty feet tall.”

“I don’t think over fourteen.”  corrected Oatey

“Fine, more than twice the height of a man.” Lugh blanched. “What are you doing with it.”

“Me?” Oatey laughed. “What happen to WE, Lugh of the Long Reach, god of the Gael.  I think you better stick with me now.  That giant is going to have the scent of you soon enough.  More than a goat, more than even a giant wife, that thing wants man-flesh and you look like a tasty bit to me.” Oatey grinned wickedly, and then started off down the slope toward her next goat victim.

“Fine, what are WE going to do with it?  Lugh called after her, looking back at the looming giant’s slow progress along their path.

“WE are going to kill it.” Oatey called over her shoulder.

Lugh ran after, hampered by the shaking ground.  He glanced back over his shoulder to see what was happening and nearly fell.  He saw ground cascading off of what looked like stone pushing up from the earth. 

The girl, Oatey, had reached her goat.  He hadn’t seen she was armed, but she took from the waist of her loincloth a knife.  She tossed away her bundle of items and approached the goat.  The goat was already struggling at the tether and Lugh expected that she would cut the goat free. 

Oatey used her body and one hand to shorten the lead, moving up the line until she could grasp the goat.  It was struggling madly from the shaking ground.  The girl expertly grasped it by one horn with her free hand, wrenching it around she plunged her knife into the goats neck and then twisted it as she jerked it out.

Lugh gasped, the sudden violence was not what he expected

Oatey released the bleeding goat that bucked and plunged to escape this new danger.  The girl slid back along the lead line and after wrapping it several turns around her arm stretched it tight from the peg and cut it loose.  She stuffed the knife into a sheath and gathered her things, all the while holding on to the plunging goat.

The girl glanced at Lugh, a fierce smile on her face, and then she let the goat have its head, letting it pull her along toward the treeline.

“What is that?” Lugh asked, looking back at what appeared to be stone ripping free of the sod.  He turned back only to see that the girl and the bleeding goat were nowhere to be seen.  Lugh shouldered his pack and settled his weapons for pursuit, then began to run toward where he had seen the girl and goat heading before he’d stopped to marvel at the geologic wonder that still shook the earth.

It was no difficulty to follow the blood trail that the goat was leaving.  Lugh decided that perhaps that was her intent, but he couldn’t help feeling disconcerted.  Oatey Moss, whatever else she might be, was unpredictable and likely dangerous.  “Why am I following her?” He thought to himself, but he already knew the answer to that.

The girl hammered a stake into the ground with practiced grace and quickly tied her goat to it.  With that task complete she marched directly toward Lugh where he sat beneath the tree. 

Lugh felt certain she hadn’t seen him, but perhaps the shade of the tree was as inviting to her as it had been to him, she marched straight as an arrow toward him.  He began to wonder how he should greet her as it was quite certain that she was heading right toward his resting place.

Suddenly there was a rumbling.  The tree shook and he was so surprised that he let out a yelp of alarm.  Almost as soon as it began the quaking stopped.  When he looked back it was clear that the girl had heard his outburst and was now aware of him in the shadows.

“Who is that sitting on my giant?” yelled the girl.

Lugh got to his feet and reached up to pull down his pack and then down to gather his things.  “So this tree is yours is it?” offered Lugh.

The girl snorted, “Not the tree, its the Giant ‘neath that I’m hunting.  You’re not from around here then are you?”

“Pardon me, my dear little giant hunter, I had no idea.”

“Don’t believe I’m hunting a giant or that a woman can, huh?  That just shows what you know.  You’ve been sitting on one and I bet you didn’t know that either.  So who are you?”

“People call me many things,” began Lugh.

The girl laughed, “I’ll just bet.”

“You know, I think I’d sooner believe that you are hunting giants than that you are a woman.” Lugh answered the girl in her own tone as he stepped out of the shade.

“Blind too, good thing I ran into you or you wouldn’t stand a chance out here, especially with a giant fix’n to wake.”  The girl shrugged a bed roll off her shoulder and tossed it on the ground.  Then with a twitch and grab she took hold of her shift and dragged it off over her head, dumping it in a pile with her bedroll.  “Better get away from that giant if you know what’s good for you.”

She was bare to the waist before Lugh realized what she was doing.  He couldn’t help but notice that she wasn’t exagerating her claim to womanhood.  She turned as if he wasn’t even there and untied what he’d taken for a bed roll.  She was sun brown on her torso and her legs and Lugh noticed what the shift had hidden, that she had the generous curves of a lovely woman. With a flip of the wrist she unrolled a small mat that held in it what looked like a threshing tool.  She grabbed it with practice hands and turned back to face Lugh.

“I’ve been called Fionn,” He said.

“Uh, huh”  said the young woman nonchalantly despite standing naked except for a beaded loincloth and her split staff. “Well, I’ve been called Oatey because of my hair.  Only difference is that it’s my name.  What’s your real name?” 

Lugh’s jaw probably dropped at her impertinence but with her dark brown eyes staring straight into his he answered though it wasn’t his intent, “It’s Lugh.”

“Lugh.” She seemed to roll the name around on her tongue to get the taste of it.”  Well, stand back, Lugh.  I’ve got work to do.”  And with out another word she began to dance, whirling the staff around her and smashing it rhythmically against the ground.  Lugh was forced to step back as the wooden links whirled very near his head hissing through the air as it passed him.

He stepped away to watch her dance.  The sun and her effort had put the sheen of sweat on her lithe form, she glowed, Lugh thought to himself.  He could not tear his eyes away from her and was totally unprepared for the earthquake that rocked him off his feet. Stunned, he looked over at the little hill and saw the old oak tree bending at an odd angle.  He looked back over at the girl, she was crouching and looking at the hill.  The quaking stopped and the girl stood up and gazed at the hill appraising. 

She began her dance again.  Faster and faster she stepped, her threshing staff raised a thin curtain of dust around her as she spun and leaped and thrashed the ground.  At the first sound of rumbling the girl smashed the staff once more against the ground and crouched, looking at the hill.

Lugh turned and looked at the hill,  the ground shaking was coming from the hill itself.  The tree bent even further, tipping toward them so that the lower branches nearest them already rested on the ground.  Lugh saw that parts of the hill were actually rising.

“Lugh!”  The girl shouted, “It’s time to go, now”

Lugh turned back and saw that the girl had grabbed up her things and, with only a glance to make sure he had heard, she ran back toward the goat that she’d staked out at the edge of the meadow.