Tava Lenn's sling throw should have killed the giant. Instead it only grazed its skull, and now the wounded thing was climbing into the highlands. She watched from her tower window, a hand on the cold stone. If that giant reached a herd, it would lead the whole pack back down the slope. Down to her tower. Three giant teeth hung from her belt. She wanted a fourth, and a seat among the slayers who guarded these passes. A limping giant did not earn that. It ended it. Her owl shifted on the windowsill, stone-grey and silent. "I missed," Tava told it. "So I have to catch it." She grabbed the one weapon that could drop a giant fast. The throwing spear's tip gleamed wet and green with poison. One good hit anywhere would stop the heart before the beast found its herd. She ran from the watchtower into the broken hills. The blood trail was easy. Dark drops crossed the stones, then wide smears where the giant had stumbled. Tava climbed hard. Her lungs burned. Above her the owl cut silent circles, then dove and screamed. It had found the thing first. The giant stood in a gap between two ridges. It swayed on tree-thick legs, one hand pressed to its bloody head. Beyond it, far down the far slope, Tava saw the small dark shapes of a herd grazing. The giant had almost made it. It turned its huge face toward her and roared. Tava planted her feet. The throw had to be perfect. Miss again, and the roar would carry, and every giant below would look up. She drew her arm back. The giant charged, each step shaking loose stones down the ridge. She waited one breath longer. Then she threw. The spear struck the giant's chest and sank deep. It took three more steps. Its knees folded. The huge body crashed down an arm's length from her boots, and the ground jumped. Green froth bubbled at the wound. Then the giant went still. Tava stood over it, shaking, her breath loud in her ears. She had done it. No herd would come down tonight. She knelt and worked a tooth loose from the dead jaw, then hung it on her belt beside the other three. Four now. The owl landed on the giant's shoulder and stared past her, down the slope. Tava followed its look. The herd below had stopped grazing. Dark heads lifted, one after another, all turned toward the ridge where the giant had fallen. They had heard the roar after all. Slowly, the first of them began to climb.

The dead giant cooled at Tava's feet, its fourth tooth now on her belt. But the herd below was climbing, and she had a worse problem. She had killed alone. No slayer had seen the throw. Without a witness, her claim was just four teeth and a story. Slayers did not open their order to stories. She needed proof the whole order would believe. She pulled her poisoned spear from the giant's chest, wiped the green tip on her leg, and thought. The herd would reach the ridge soon. When it did, a giant pack would follow. If she ran, she saved herself but kept no proof. If she stayed, she might die with four teeth and no one to tell it. Her owl dropped from the sky and landed on the giant's shoulder. It stared at her with its pale face. Tava had an idea. The owl flew the passes every night. The slayers knew her bird. If she sent it ahead, a tower would see it and send a rider to look. "Go to the far tower," she told the owl. "Bring one of them back here." She flung her arm up. The owl opened its silent wings and swept down the ridge toward the stone watchtowers along the cliff. Then Tava turned to the climbing herd. She could not wait and do nothing. She gathered dry brush and a pale moonflower from a crack in the rock, something a slayer could not miss from a distance. She piled it on the giant's chest and struck sparks until smoke rose. A signal. A marker. Here lies a kill, and here stands the one who made it. The herd crested the slope. Huge shapes moved between the ridges, drawn by the roar and now by the smoke. Tava stood her ground beside the body. Her hand shook on the spear. One throw left before they reached her. Hoofbeats. No—boots on stone, fast and heavy. A slayer came over the rise behind her, breathing hard, the owl circling above. Tava did not turn. "Four teeth," she said. "That one's fresh. Watch the slope." The slayer looked at the smoking giant, then at the herd climbing toward them, then at the green-tipped spear in her hand. "You did this alone?" "The bird found you. Now you've seen it." Tava drew her arm back as the first giant of the pack stepped into the gap. "Help me, and you can tell them what you saw." The slayer drew a spear of their own and set their feet beside hers. For the first time, Tava was not looking up at a giant alone. She had her witness. She also had a whole pack coming, and only two of them to meet it.