Read Online Giants by Vaughn Heppner - Free Book Online Page A

young. You don’t yet know what a precious thing life is. To throw it away on a vengeance quest, that’s folly.”
    Joash frowned. What had caused this shift in her? What was she thinking? He didn’t like her calling him young. He knew very well how precious life was. “What do you mean?” he asked, a bit stiffly.
    “Wait until you’ve lived two hundred years, or five hundred years, then life will become almost too precious to bear. Old humans should know this.”
    She was confusing him. Was she saying that she was two hundred years old? Not with skin that soft. A thought struck Joash. “What about Nephilim?” he asked. “Don’t Nephilim live longer than true men?”
    “It is said so.”
    “Then, wouldn’t they feel the sting of life more than people?”
    “What do you know of the bene elohim ?” she asked, sharply.
    Joash shivered, thinking back to Balak and Gog, who ruled the pirate city. Gog was supposed to be a child of a bene elohim . Since those days, Zillith had taught him that abominations like First Born, and horrible powers, like the bene elohim, were subjects best left alone. Evil fates awaited those who delved too deeply into those arcane mysteries.
    Herrek called from atop the long, slow slope they’d worked up the entire morning. Adah shook the reins. Their stallions broke into a gallop, thundering toward Herrek. The wind whipped Joash’s hair, as he held onto the vibrating chariot rail. He closed his mouth after the chariot bounced over a rock, painfully clacking his teeth together.
    This was wonderful and glorious, almost divine. Joash loved the ride, and he laughed as Koton, Adah’s hound, raced beside them. Adah finally pulled the reins. The stallions snorted and slowed to a high-stepping prance.
    Joash wondered how a warrior could keep his balance to snatch and hurl a spear while at full speed. It would be years before he learned such a skill, if he ever got the chance to train.
    “What is it?” Adah shouted.
    With his chariot parked on top of the slope, Herrek pointed at something just out of sight. Then Adah pulled up beside him.
    Joash whistled in awe.
    Gens nodded, saying softly, “It’s beautiful.”
    Adah’s head swayed back as she viewed the enchanting scene.
    Spread out before them was a wide descending plain of lush grass. Far down at the bottom, perhaps ten miles away, was a small lake that sparkled with the sun’s light. Beyond the lake, maybe twenty miles, it was impossible to truly judge the distance, stood a rocky lichen-colored range of hills. From the hills flowed a ribbon of river. The most awe-inspiring sight, however, was the host of animals filling the plains. A vast horde of steppe ponies roamed to their left. Dust clouds rose above the ponies, and the thunder of their hooves was loud. On the horse-horde’s flank worked a pack of dire wolves. To the ponies’ right milled a mindless horde of long-horned bison, a seething mass of brown shaggy bodies with huge horns. To the bison’s right, and this horde extended out of view, were yellow-skinned antelope. A pride of lions followed them, although that section of the plain was presently peaceful. Dotted here and there were lone trees, and sometimes a stand of them circled what seemed like coin-sized waterholes.
    “How many animals are there?” Joash asked in wonder.
    Herrek shook his head.
    The effect of the animals, the lush grass, the pristine lake, and the rugged hills, all added to a marvelous beauty. A huge flock of birds, dots from here, flew above the lake, while long-winged eagles soared high above everything else.
    “Where are the mammoths?” Joash asked. “Surely by now we should have seen mammoths.”
    Gens shrugged, but Adah asked, “What do you mean?”
    “He doesn’t mean anything by it,” Herrek said for Joash. “He’s simply dying to see mammoths. Ever since we came to Giant Land he’s been unable to ask about anything else.”
    “There should be mammoths,” Adah said