for the man.
"Not now," Cadderly called to them, turning them about. "Will the window hold him?"
The dwarves turned to study the broken structure.
"For a hunnerd years," Ivan decided.
"Hee hee hee," Pikel chuckled and patted his trusty club, the compliments to his mighty clubbing bringing a blush to his cherubic, fuzzy cheeks.
"Then let it hold him," Cadderly said to them. "We have other business." The young priest turned and nodded to the barn door, realizing that his spell of whirling blades would not last. If they did not get to the giant soon, they would likely wind up in yet another fight.
On Cadderly's command, Ivan and Pikel each took hold of one of the barn doors and pulled it wide. The dwarves remained behind the doors, out of sight, for Cadderly knew that most giants were not particularly fond of the bearded folk and that the sight of the brothers might send this one into a rage that would be quieted only by the monster's death.
Vander wasn't up for any fight, though. Vander wasn't up at all. He lay on his back, helpless below the magically conjured blades. The firbolg lifted his head at the sound of the opening doors and looked across his prone form to see Cadderly and Danica regarding him.
Cadderly studied the giant intently, studied the forms on Vander's shoulders. He saw again the wide mountains, the great boat in the iceberg-dotted bay, and he knew that this was the same being (the same spirit at least) the assassin had switched bodies with when Cadderly and the others had cornered the evil little man.
"I will release you," the young priest promised, "on your word that you will attack neither me nor my companions."
%nder growled at him.
"By my estimation, we have no quarrel with you, mighty giant" Cadderly went on, "and we want none. It may be that I can aid you in your struggle."
The growling stopped, replaced by an honestly perplexed expression.
"Aid it?" Ivan bellowed from behind the shielding door. "Ye didn't say nothing about aiding any stupid giant!" Before Cadderly could react, the dwarf stormed around the barn door, axe in hand, Pikel rushing in from the other side to join him.
"Ivan!" Cadderly started, but Pikel's sincere, "Oo oi!" and the look of amazement on Ivan's face stopped the young priest completely.
"Let him up," Ivan snapped at Cadderly, giving the man a push. "Ye got no cause to keep one o' his kind in the dirt!"
"Wfell met, good dwarves " the giant said unexpectedly. Danica and Cadderly exchanged stunned stares and helpless shrugs, Danica blowing away a lock of her hair and blinking.
"Let him up, I say!" Ivan demanded, pushing Cadderly once more. "Can't ye see the flames of his beard?"
Cadderly mouthed the words silently as he regarded the prone giant, wondering what the red color of this one's beard had to do with Ivan's apparent approval of the monster. Cadderly had seen Ivan and Pikel go after giants with wild abandon in Shilmista Forest. What made this one so different?
"He ain't no giant," Ivan explained.
"He looks pretty big to me," the disbelieving Danica remarked.
"He's a firbolg," Ivan answered impatiently, "a friend o' the land - and a friend of the elves. \\fe'Il forgive him that, since firbolgs and dwarves get on well, too."
Ivan seemed to be winding up for a long dissertation on the subject of firbolgs, and would have continued, but Cadderly motioned for him to stop, needing nothing further. The images, the aurora of this strange giant, made perfect sense to Cadderly now, and he understood, too, beyond any doubts, why one of this being's honorable weal would be in league with an evil wretch.
The giant was a prisoner.
A wave of Cadderly's hand removed the magical blades. Vander growled at the indignity of it all, took up his huge sword, and got to his feet. For a moment, it seemed to Cadderly and Danica that the monster would attack, but Ivan and Pikel, nodding and smiling, walked right into the barn and struck up a conversation - in a voluminous, grumbling language that sounded like the roll of boulders down a rocky mountainside.
The giant, talking with the dwarves, kept his sword up in front of him and seemed even more nervous when Cad-derly and Danica joined their companions.
"He's not to trusting us," Ivan whispered to Cadderly. Then, louder, he announced, "His name's Vander."
"If we had wanted you dead, I would have lowered the blades," Cadderly reasoned.
Finder's thick lips curled back, his giant teeth showing