Title: Seed of Darkness

Rating: T

Summary: A new threat descends upon Cloister and Jack must use the Crown of Erik to call on some unlikely allies. Fallon/Isabelle, Fumm/OC

Disclaimer: I make no money whatsoever off this story or any of the characters.

Chapter 12: Safe

{O}

The goose slept with its head tucked under a wing. Each feather was masterfully painted, each long, fluffy shaft tapered to points of shining gold. Isabelle stroked the ruff of feathers on its curved neck, marveling at how soft they were. So beautiful, she thought sadly. A shame its stuffed. She took hold of the folded wing, intending to pull it back so she could have a look at the goose's head. That was when the beautiful stuffed bird uncurled its neck, lifted up its head, and let out an irritated honk! The princess was so startled she yelped and fell over backwards. She flailed her arms wildly, struggling to pull herself out of a mountain of gems, gold, and other precious things that wanted to swallow her down. Around her she could hear Fallon's laughter booming off the walls, mingling with the throaty squawks of his second head.

"You woke him up," Fallon said, his amusement plain. He stretched out a hand and took hold of the princess before she could sink any deeper, lifting her out of the pile and setting her upright. His fingers lingered, brushing flakes of gold off her shoulders.

"It's alive!" Isabelle stared at the goose in slack-jawed amazement. The bird returned her stare with beady, amber-tinted eyes, then warbled amiably and settled down to preen itself. Soon she was transfixed by the play of light over the bird's wings. When Isabelle realized her mouth was ajar she shut it quickly, knowing that the giant watched and fighting to keep her cheeks from flaming."I thought it was dead and stuffed!"

"Creatures like him never die unless forced to, princess. Their magic keeps them alive." The giant sounded almost reverent for once. The bird continued to clean its dusty feathers with its long, golden beak, calm and untroubled despite having just woken from a thousand-year sleep. Then it squawked, flapped its wings, and squatted down, warbling to itself dreamily. When it rose again, a shining gold egg lay between its feet. The goose bent its neck and rolled the egg toward Isabelle with its beak. It took three nudges from the goose before the egg bumped against her outstretched hand.

Picking up the egg, the princess was distantly aware of the sound of Fallon's chuckle. "A gift for you, princess." Wondering, she tapped a fingernail against the shell. It rang high and clear, a sweeter sound than the bells of Cloister Tower. The weight alone told her that the egg was likely solid gold.

That's impossible, Isabelle thought as she set the egg aside. The goose had already gone back to sleep, its head once again tucked snugly beneath a wing. No more impossible than talking to giants or finding treasure or escaping from dragons. A sound like a stifled growl reminded Isabelle one of those impossible things was right behind her. Turning slowly, she took in the sight of Fallon staring down at her. A strange look was on the giant's face, but was gone as soon as she met his eyes, replaced by his usual stern mask. He was leaning back against a wall, his arms crossed, his legs drawn up before him. Despite his fearsome visage, Isabelle sensed he was content in a way he hadn't been for centuries. And why not? He's reclaimed his old castle, found fabulous treasure, and gotten a golden goose in the bargain. From its place on his shoulder the second head stared longingly at the sleeping goose, like a child wanting his favorite toy.

He's over a thousand years old. The implications were wonderful...and terrifying. With only seventeen years to her name, Isabelle couldn't imagine being that old. A million questions swarmed in her mind like raucous bees, begging to be asked. What was Albion like when he first came here? What was my ancestor the King like?

The giant had finally noticed her staring. "What?" he snapped.

She took a breath. Here goes. "Those...those giants' bones we found on the path here - did you know them?"

Fallon gave a slight shake of his head, dismissive. "Do we know the names of every warrior who falls in battle, princess? No. But they died fighting. They were good deaths."

"Did you ever meet King Erik?" Careful here, the princess reminded herself. King Erik was ever and always a touchy subject with her giant general.

Fallon narrowed his eyes and frowned down at her. Isabelle sighed, expecting him not to answer when, miraculously, he did. "We met him twice. In battle. The first time we made him and his army weep blood. The second time..." His shoulders rose and fell in a huge sigh. "The second time he had the Crown."

The King humiliated him. The same way Roderick did. No wonder he hates him so much. Isabelle had seen first hand how powerless the giants were before the Crown. No one likes being made a slave. For such proud creatures, robbing them of their free will would be worse than death. That was something the princess understood all too well.

Only they left us no choice, she reminded herself. They would've killed us all otherwise. She cast a wary glance at the giant, studied his meaty, long-fingered hands, his wide shoulders, the brutal look of his face. And the second head that forever marked him as a freak, even among his own people. The first time I saw him through the bars of that cage, I nearly fainted, she recalled. A monstrous giant with two heads, just like the legend said. But for all the rage in him, for all his ugliness, there was a drop of gentleness, too. She'd sensed it in the way he'd carried her through the mountains. And then she recalled a time, ages ago, where she'd sat thumbing through the brittle pages of an old, dusty journal, and wondered about the other captive princess and if she truly was the first to see a giant's softer side.

Quietly, she asked, "Who was the-"

It took only a second for the giant to reach out, for Isabelle to feel his fingers close tight around her waist, and before she'd drawn breath to cry out the sea of treasure flew away beneath her dangling legs and his snarling face was all she could see. "So you think to interrogate us now, do you?" His gray eyes bored into her, full of suspicion. "Well, go on, princess. Ask. What ignorant questions do you want answered?" His throat worked, issuing angry growls, and his curled upper lip exposed every one of his chipped teeth. "Well? Ask!"

But Isabelle couldn't speak. Panic left her throat too small and tight for words. Did I push too far? Is he going to kill me? Risking a glance at his second head, she saw its wide-eyed expression was as confused and frightened as her own. His grip around her waist tightened painfully, making her gasp. That's when the innate stubbornness that had gotten her into more trouble than she could recall finally took over. Maybe she was just a small girl in his eyes, but she was also the daughter of a king, and wouldn't be bullied like one of his underlings.

Swallowing down the fear that threatened to choke her, she forced herself to meet his eyes without flinching. "I want to know about the other girl you spoke of. The other princess."

A slight twitch of the giant's left eye was the only indication that her boldness had startled him. She could hear his second head nervously smacking its lips together, trying to speak, but she didn't dare take her eyes off Fallon long enough to offer it reassurance. Seconds stretched out like hot tallow. By the time the giant dipped his chin in submission and set her down in his lap, Isabelle's brow was damp with sweat.

"Are all human girls so foolishly reckless?" Weary resignation laced Fallon's voice. Isabelle was too preoccupied with trying to stop shaking any satisfaction over having won another fight with him. He continued, while the princess fought to hear past the pounding in her ears."The princess you speak of was King Erik's own daughter," Fallon admitted softly. "Young. Beautiful, in her own human way. She was among the monks who climbed the first beanstalk, almost the first one to reach the top. My brothers and I had seen the stalk rise over the edge of our world, its leaves unfurled as though it longed to touch the sun itself. I remember how we stood in a circle like a pack of fools wondering what this new thing was and why it was here. Then up came the little brown-robed men and one dark-haired girl."

"Our ancestors knew of mankind, and had left warnings that we might meet them again someday. The little men fell to their knees. We couldn't understand the noises they made, but they seemed to think we were servants of God. Perhaps they thought we were gods." Fallon chuckled, a black sound with little real mirth. Isabelle could easily guess what had happened next, even if she hadn't heard the story every night as a child.

"You attacked them."

"They were trespassers meddling with a power they didn't understand!" Fallon's lip curled in disgust. "I threw the first man back over the edge. Then my brothers started feasting on human flesh and urged me to try some. It was the sweetest thing we'd ever tasted."

"The girl was the last left alive. We could tell she was someone of importance, small as she was. My brothers and I argued over what to do with her when our Father arrived."

"He beheld the tiny, terrified girl, and his heart melted."

"It...melted?" Isabelle's asked, confused. It felt awkward sitting in his lap, but his hand clutching her prevented her from moving. Fallon seemed to stare off into horizons only he could see. His second head did the same, looking sad and wistful. "There are many ways to melt a giant's hard heart, princess," he finally said. "One way is with fire and smoke. The other way..." He looked at the girl in his hand then, and the princess saw a painful struggle going on behind his eyes, some internal fight that was leaving him raw and bloody inside. She was surprised at how much this sign of inner turmoil made her feel for him. "It had been a long, long time since Father had seen a girl. Of any kind."

All the giantesses were dead, Isabelle thought, recalling the dragons and the slaughter they'd brought to Gantua. The men were all alone. "You mean he...fell in love with her?"

Without answering her question, the giant pressed on with his tale. "Father took her back to his castle, and kept her there while my brothers and I climbed down the beanstalk to the world below." Some of the old hostility crept back into the giant's voice. His left hand reached up to rub at the corded muscles around his neck, while his right hand held Isabelle close. "We didn't know what to expect at the bottom, but we wanted more of that sweet human taste. We found a world even more vast and rich than our own. A world that had been forbidden to us...but was no longer!"

Isabelle cringed, inside and out. Thinking about what Fallon and his kin must've done during their first rush of newfound freedom made a cold, sharp blade twist in her stomach. The piles of gold throwing off innocent sparkles all around them were proof of how giant greed and desire had run rampant. Fallon must've sensed her discomfort. "We'll spare you the details, little songbird," he growled, "but those were the days when your ancestors learned to fear the thunder."

"But then our Father sent a messenger down ordering us to stop."

Stop? Isabelle knew the old legends forwards, backwards, and sometimes lived them in her dreams, but she'd never heard this part before. "He told you to stop? Why would he-"

"It was the girl's doing," Fallon said. "After so long, she had taught Father a few words of human speech, and she'd learned some of ours. Enough for her to beg Father to end the slaughter of her people, for the sake of his feelings for her. He agreed. And for a time we left mankind alone. None of us dared oppose him. Even those not bound to him by blood feared to anger Thunderdel." A fierce gleam awoke in the giant's eyes, a fiery shine Isabelle recognized as pride. "He was the closest thing to a true King our kind has ever had."

"It didn't last, did it?" Isabelle said, remembering the field of human and giant bones they'd crossed to get to the castle. "The peace didn't last?"

Both of Fallon's heads shook simultaneously. "No, of course it didn't. But we were content to let the peace stand for as long as it could. The little king did pay us tribute, after all."

Isabelle didn't like the sound of that. "Tribute?"

"Oh, we've come to something left out of your little story, eh princess?" Fallon grinned. His fingers around her tightened imperceptibly. "Pay attention then, little one. Your great King Erik was no fool. He feared us. So every so often he would send...gifts to keep us at bay."

I don't think I want to hear this. There was no way Isabelle could ever know what type of man King Erik had been, but she knew giants, along with the sort of things they liked. What "gifts" it would take to make them happy. I always thought he was like my father, she thought, then remembered what her father had always said: a king will do what he must to protect his kingdom.

Even if it meant a sacrifice.

"He gave you people to eat."

Fallon nodded. "Ten men every month. Picked by lot, we suppose. Or maybe they had broken laws and needed to be punished. We never asked." He watched her carefully, waiting to see her reaction. He could be lying, the part of her that balked at the very idea of good King Erik doing something so monstrous insisted. He could be saying this to hurt me. But another part of her that was made of cool, cold logic sensed there was truth in what he said. Your own father would've chopped down the beanstalk and left you to die for the sake of the realm. A wise king would sacrifice the few so that the many could live.

If the giant expected her to scream and curse him, call him liar, or beast, or any of a hundred possible names, he was surprised when all she did was ask in a flat, calm tone that held no hint of her true feelings, "What happened then?"

The giant opened his mouth, then closed it, suddenly uncertain. The hand holding her relaxed, one finger uncurling to stroke her arm. "Do you really want to know these things, Isabelle?" The use of her name got her to look at him again. He never says my name unless he means to. The lines on his forehead looked deeper, so did the darkness around his eyes. He looked tired, as though a thousand years of memory wrought in heavy iron chains were draped over his shoulders. "You have a soft heart and this is not a pretty story. We," he paused, seeming to struggle for words, "we wish to spare you more pain, if we can."

First my Father, then Jack and Elmont, now even a giant wants to protect me? Under better circumstances, such delicious irony would've made her throw up her hands and laugh. "Just tell me. Please."

Fallon growled, then closed his eyes. The princess counted her heartbeats until he opened them. "Something very precious to my kind was stolen." Isabelle cast a glance over at the golden goose asleep on its pile of treasure, then looked back at the giant questioningly.

"Not him," Fallon said. "There are thousands more like him." Then Fallon's eyes took on the shifty air of someone about to confess something they'd much prefer to keep to themselves. "It was a harp."

"A harp?" Incredulity made her almost forget that she was in the hand of a being who could crush her to pulp in bare seconds. A mental image unfolded of Fallon gently strumming the golden strings of a harp with a beatific expression plastered on both his faces. It made her head hurt. "You fought a war over a harp?"

A snarl underlay the giant's voice, a sign of either anger, exasperation, or likely both at once. "It wasn't just any harp, girl! It was a harp forged in Heaven by the angels themselves. A holy relic from the creators of our kind." Bitterness coated his words, heavy and black. "The last gift we ever received from them."

"When the harp was stolen, we all went mad. Nothing Father or his princess could do would stop us. Humans fled before us as we tore their villages apart." Fallon paused, appeared to choose his next words carefully. "Many and more humans were slain, but giants also fell. King Erik had learned new tricks since our first meeting. The giants he slew had their hearts cut out and their heads mounted on iron spikes. No other human had ever brought us so much suffering. And so we named him Erik the Terrible."

"I set out to free my brothers from this menace once and for all, but by then it was too late."

"He had the Crown?" Isabelle asked in a hushed voice.

Fallon nodded, while his second head croaked weakly. "We could do nothing against it. We had no choice but to bow before that monstrous king." Isabelle almost objected to hearing her ancestor referred to as monstrous, but thought better of it. Fallon had grown quiet, and his tense stillness was all she needed to know that now was not the time to argue over who had been the true monster all those years ago.

It was a moment before Isabelle rallied up the nerve to ask another question. "What...what happened to the princess?"

A pained look contorted the giant's face. His second head whimpered pitifully. Fallon reached over to pat his little twin in a rare display of brotherly affection. "After King Erik sent us back, he commanded that his daughter be returned to him. She went willingly, to prevent more strife between our people. But Thunderdel, he...he couldn't bear to let her go. He climbed down after her. He was climbing even as King Erik cut the beanstalk down and let him fall to his death."

The princess bit her lip, seeing a vivid image of herself and Jack clinging to each other as the beanstalk fell. Wind buffeting their faces, the ground rushing up to crush them, then the stunned look on Jack's face after he'd gotten them both safely down through sheer luck. That turned out better than I expected.

For Thunderdel there had been no one to help him when the beanstalk fell. And all he'd wanted was to be with the woman he loved. She imagined Fallon and his brother's standing at the cliff's edge, watching in anguish as their Father fell to a dwindling speck among the clouds, knowing there was nothing they could do...

With his fingers wrapped around her, it took a couple of tries before she was able to wriggle one hand free and pat the giant's thumb. "I'm sorry."

Fallon growled, but it seemed half-hearted, like he was uncertain of what else to do. Isabelle removed her hand from the giant's thumb and settled back against his palm, nervously studying each of his huge fingers. His thumbnail was bigger than her whole hand, yet another troubling reminder of just how small she was.

Around them, treasure gleamed in a million different colors. The golden goose slept on, oblivious to all. Isabelle drew a long, shaky breath. Fallon's glum expression said that he was done answering questions, but the princess wanted to know one last thing. "In all the villages you destroyed, did you ever find the harp?"

Fallon's mouth twisted up at the corner, as though tasting something bad. His second head groaned and looked down. "No. No, we never did. It remains lost." The giant gazed down at her, and Isabelle could've sworn she saw something like worry in those stormy gray eyes. "Do you hate us now, princess?"

To say the question took her by surprise was an understatement. She gaped stupidly up at the two-headed monster before realizing that he honestly did expect an answer. So she considered her feelings. There was no question she feared him at times. Only a fool wouldn't fear a two-headed, flail-wielding giant possessed of enough bottled anger to level cities. And there was no question he'd done horrible things during King Erik's reign, but those events were so remote they might as well remain a fairytale. She cared more about what he did now, how he treated her and her people. There were times when he angered her, saddened her, made her want to scream in frustration...but she didn't think she'd ever truly hated him. When we first met you were the one to hate me, not the other way around, she wanted to say. Instead, she said, "No." "No, I don't hate you." A querulous whine came from his little twin, and the princess smiled slightly, amending, "Either of you."

She'd expected the news to cheer him. Now Fallon was staring at her as if she were the one with two heads. "You don't hate us?"

"No."

"But we locked you in a cage!"

The princess shrugged. "I was trespassing on your land. You had every right to be suspicious."

"We killed your friend, Crawe!"

That made her wince. But she could only tell him what she honestly felt. "I know what you did and I still haven't forgiven you. But hating you for it won't bring him back."

Fallon blinked, then shook his huge head. His eyebrows drew together and he raised a hand to his brow, like he was trying to stave off an oncoming headache. "You make no sense."

The princess laughed. It felt like the first real laugh she'd had in days. "I know!" She raised her shoulders in an offhand shrug. "Maybe I'm going mad."

A sardonic chuckle came in reply. "Truly, that would explain some things." His second head finished the statement with a burble that sounded like "Crazy!" Glancing at it, Isabelle noticed its large eyes were crossed stupidly.

"So, are we staying here tonight?" Isabelle asked, a little awkwardly. The conversation they'd just had had given her plenty to think about. She felt drained, tired, and unsure what else to say still trapped in his giant hand.

The giant waved his free hand in a dismissive gesture. "Might as well. We are safe here."

"Are you sure?" Isabelle wanted to fidget. It made her nervous with the giant looking at her the way he was. Plus, her experience in the cave had made her jittery about staying underground. The last thing I need is a thousand-year old stone castle to come crashing down on my head. "What if the dragons find us again and-"

Cold air touched her skin as Fallon released her from his hand. Goosebumps prickled her bare shoulders, making her shiver and wish for the millionth time that she had a cloak to cover herself. Sounds of clinking metal drifted down from above and Isabelle brushed hair from her eyes while craning her neck, wondering what the giant was up to. She watched, confused, as Fallon unclasped the iron cuff from his right forearm. Before she had time to protest, the princess found herself plucked from his lap and dumped into the crook of his bare arm. It crossed her mind to struggle, until his finger pushed her back against the inside of his elbow, where the tough skin was softest. Wide-eyed, the girl stared up at his sharp-featured face, searching for any sign of hostility. He looks sad, not angry. For the first time, she became keenly aware of his scent, a musky mixture of pine forests and fertile earth that wasn't unpleasant. I always thought giants would smell filthy, she thought sleepily. He began to stroke her, gently running his finger down her spine, until all the pent-up tension inside her drained away and she found herself yawning. He isn't going to hurt me.

"Sleep. You are safe here, little princess," Fallon rumbled, even as Isabelle curled up in his arms and closed her eyes.

"You are safe."