Hana was on her bejeweled throne. Across her lap was the body of her daughter. Red Molly’s head lolled on one side of the throne, her legs hung down on the other. There were no songs about Joe my love this morning. Hana stroked Molly’s orange bristles, then raised her lumpy face into the rain and let out another howl. She put one meaty arm beneath the fallen woman’s neck, raised her head, and covered Molly’s forehead and the remains of her blood-spattered mouth with kisses.
Leah pointed to her, then raised her hands to me, palms out: What next?
This, I thought, and began walking across the square toward where Hana sat. One hand was on the butt of Mr. Bowditch’s gun. I didn’t realize Radar was with me until she began to bark. They came full-throated, from deep in her chest, with a snarl each time she drew breath. Hana looked up and saw us coming.
“Steady, girl,” I said. “With me.”
Hana cast the body aside and rose. One of Red Molly’s hands landed in a litter of small bones. “YOU!” she screamed, her bosom rising in a groundswell. “YOUUUU!”
“That’s right,” I said. “Me. I am the prince that was promised, so kneel before me and accept your fate.”
I didn’t expect her to obey, and I wasn’t wrong. She came at me in leaping strides. Five would bring her to me. I allowed her three, because I didn’t want to miss. I wasn’t afraid. That darkness had come over me. It was cold, but clear. I suppose that’s a paradox, but I stand by it. I could see that red-rimmed crack running down the center of her forehead, and as she blotted out the sky above me, screaming something—I don’t know what—I put two bullets into it. The .45 revolver was to Polley’s .22 what a shotgun is to a kid’s popgun. Her boil-infested forehead caved in like a snow-crust when someone stamps on it with a heavy boot. The brown snaggles of her hair flew out in back, along with a fan of blood. Her mouth fell open, revealing filed teeth that would no more rend and chew the flesh of children.
Her arms flew up into the gray sky. Rain ran down her fingers. I could smell gunsmoke, strong and acrid. She blundered in a half-circle, as if for one more look at her dear one. Then she collapsed. I felt the thud run through the stones under my feet when she landed.
Thus fell Hana the giantess, who guarded the sundial, the pool, and the entrance to the Field of the Monarchs behind Lilimar Palace.
4
Iota was standing in front of the right wing of Hana’s house—the kitchen wing. With him was a gray man with almost no face left; it was as if the flesh had come loose from his skull and slid downward, engulfing one eye and all of his nose. He was dressed in a bloodstained white blouse and white pants. I assumed he was—had been—Hana’s cook, the one she’d called a cockless bastard. I had no problem with him. My business was in the palace.
But Leah’s business with Hana wasn’t done, it seemed. She walked toward the fallen giantess, drawing her sword. Blood was pooling around Hana’s head and running between the stones.
Eris stepped forward and took Leah’s arm. Leah turned, and her expression needed no words: How dare you touch me?
“Nah, my Lady of Gallien, I mean no disrespect, but stay just a moment. Please. For me.”
Leah seemed to consider, then stepped back.
Eris went to the giant and spread her feet in order to walk up one of those enormous splayed legs. She hiked up her filthy skirt and pissed on the slack white flesh of Hana’s thigh. When she stepped away, tears were rolling down her cheeks. She turned to face us.
“I came south from the village of Wayva, a place no one has heard of nor ever will, because this devil-cunt laid waste to it, killing dozens. One was my grandda’。 The other was my mother. Now do what you will, my lady.” And Eris actually dropped a curtsey.
I went over to stand with Iota and the cook, who was trembling all over. Eye brought his palm to his forehead as he looked at me and the cook did the same. “You brought down not one giant but two,” Iota said. “If I live long—I know the chances are small—I’ll never forget it. Or Eris pissing on her. Surprised your dog don’t want to have a go.”
Leah stepped to the giant’s side, raised her sword high above her head, and brought it down. She was a princess and the heir to the throne, but she had been doing the work of a farmwoman in exile, and she was strong. Still, it took her three swipes of the blade to sever Hana’s head.
She knelt, wiped her blade on a swatch of the giant’s purple dress, and re-sheathed it. She stepped to Iota, who bent and saluted her. When he straightened, she pointed to the twenty feet of dead giant, then to the dry fountain.