Karn gave a shuddering sigh. "I couldn't dance with more than three."

Where were Hanna, Orim, and Takara? They talked a big talk about responsibility and all that, but then they get themselves lost. And look who was left holding the bag? Look who got to save the day time and again! Squee, that's who. He'd faced down the cateran enforcer that first day, and he'd been saving Gerrard and the others ever since. Today was a perfect example. He'd played his part perfectly. He'd saved the whole crew. But did anybody talk about Squee, giant killer? And why not? Did anybody ever One of the best-looking bugs in Mercadia scuttled along the gutter. Squee stooped to watch it wobble. The wobblers were the tastiest. They had the most meat under their shells.

"Come on, Squee! It's right up here! No time to waste!" Atalla said, yanking on his arm.

Now, there was an impatient lad-Atalla. Nice, but impatient. He'd also helped the crew escape twice now, which was plenty nice, but he'd gotten paid a thousand gold for it. Did anybody ever offer a thousand gold to Squee for anything in his whole stinking life? Maybe if he got impatient once in a while- "Come on!" Atalla said, bodily dragging Squee from the gutter.

For his part, Squee snatched the bug up and gobbled it down.

Atalla hauled him down a twisted lane to three huge wagons that stood side by side in stalls at the end of the road. Each wagon bore a massive bin brimming full of rubbish. Vegetable peels and hunks of splintered wood formed a slurry with broken plates and raw sewage. Above each of the bins swarmed ecstatic flies. Their tiny bodies jittered against the lemon sky. Just beyond the refuse wagons hung empty air-a drop of almost two miles straight down. Gerrard would be at the bottom of that drop, shackled and waiting to be slain by filth.

"Do you remember what you are supposed to say?" Atalla asked, shaking the goblin. "Do you remember?"

Squee tried to answer, but his mouth was full of bug. Clutching Squee's arm tightly, Atalla approached the giant workers that milled about behind the wagons. "You see, Master Squee? These are the brigands I told you about!" Atalla said dramatically, pointing at the lead giant. "Illegal dumping!"

Gray-faced and massive, the giant jutted his jaw downward and compressed his brow. Beneath putrid locks, his eyes gleamed in confusion. "Illegal dumping? Ain't no such thing!"

"It's new," Squee replied, and then hastily added, "ain't it?" The giant scratched a knobby torso. "We was told to bring this load of crap to this here street and dump it when we seen the flare."

"This-Here Street? This isn't This-Here Street." Atalla shook his head. "This street is That-There Street. Dumping's not allowed on That-There Street."

The giant shook his head, bedeviled. "This here street isn't This-Here Street?"

"No," Atalla affirmed. "This here street is That-There Street." He pointed to an adjacent road. "That there street is This-Here Street."

Gaping, the giant said, "I'll be damned."

"Is it not confusing?" Squee interjected.

"No-it is confusing," the giant replied.

"Don't it get more confusing with lots of street names?"

"I don't know what to say-"

"Don'tcha think we oughta call all streets by one name?"

"Now you're talking!"

"Wasn't Squee talking before?"

"Enough talking!" Atalla interrupted urgently. "By order of Master Squee, move these wagons to This-Here Street and prepare to dump them!"

"This here street, or This-Here-"

"Just do it!"

Gerrard, Tahngarth, and Karn knelt side by side in rubbish. Chains bound their wrists and necks and legs. To either side, a great wall of garbage rose. They would soon be part of that wall. Before and behind them stood whole regiments of men. Above it all, standing cockily atop the wall of filth, was none other than Xcric.

The cateran enforcer carried a crossbow and strolled idly back and forth along the mound. His talons gripped and released the pestilential muck. He relished this moment. As the officer who had captured Gerrard, he was given the honor of presiding over the execution. An execution by muck. It was an honor no Mercadian noble would have wanted.

"And now, we see the man for what he truly is! No giant killer, but rubbish!"

The cateran lifted his crossbow, lit the pitch-tipped quarrel, and fired a flaming shot into the sky. The bolt raced upward, disappearing except for the bright glow of fire it carried. All eyes except the prisoners' followed it upward. In time, even the fire was lost against the lemon sky.

Something else appeared to take its place. Along the rim of the city directly above, three bins of rubbish suddenly tilted. The vile stuff that disgorged from those bins sloughed down in a black and shapeless mass. Three muck-loads became one, spiraling toward ground like a black demon. It dropped straight down, not seeming to move but only to grow slowly larger.

"Won't you look up? Won't you see your coming doom?" hissed the cateran. "Judgment from the sky falls on each of us but once. Do you truly wish to miss the spectacle?"

Whether from the goading or from some impulse of their own, the three condemned men raised their eyes in unison. They saw the black monster of filth rushing down from sky. Faint smiles formed on their faces. Even Karn's jaw seemed to grin.

"Defiant to the last," Xcric growled, staring at his happy prisoners. "Smiles won't save you! Farewell forever, Giant Killer!" The cateran enforcer raised his arm in an angry fist.

And then Xcric was gone, buried under hundreds of tons of filth.

Chapter 11

"The new giant killers!" hissed a nobleman near the door of the magistrate's chambers. He startled from the bench where he had lain, scooped up a half-finished hunk of cheese, and withdrew among tapestries and tiles. The four women who had just entered the chambers were a forbidding sight. Sisay wore black-metal armor and an indomitable look beneath her saffron riding cloak. She was clearly the warrior of the group. Beside her strode Orim, swathed in turban, veils, and healer's cloak. She shimmered with the silvery light of a Cho-Arrim mystic. Hanna wore an artificer's jump suit-the mastermind. And leather-armored Takara was the fiery will that united them all. Swords and tridents shone naked in their hands as they marched toward the magistrate's seat.

It wasn't weaponry or armor that made nobles scurry back and guards cringe. Since the women's escape, their fame had swelled. It was said each had slain twenty giants, hoisted a twenty-ton wagon of refuse on her back, and hurled it twenty yards beyond the rim to crash down atop the cateran, Xcric. Or was it forty giants, forty tons, and forty yards? Numbers are tricky but inconsequential. What mattered was that these women were unstoppable, cheered by the rabble and feared by the soldiery.

The deadly ladies passed by broad columns and entered the round glow of the rotunda. Unopposed, they came to a stop before the magistrate's dais.

He eyed them with trembling dread, and his gaze flitted hopelessly toward the guards at the door. They made no move.

Takara spoke for the foursome. "We come to bargain."

A Kyren appeared from behind the throne and began to speak.

Takara pointed angrily at it. "Get back! We've no time for nonsense. We deal with the magistrate only!"

With grinning fear, the Kyren backed away.

Corpulent and tremulous, the man on the dais said, "We are honored by the presence of the new giant killers and would be pleased to hear whatever bargain you might offer. Do you seek your freedom?"