Sigrid's Story - Tundra Predator's Slaughter

Snow hisses around Sigrid's boots as she tears the last meat from the ruined field of armor. The campfire gutters low beside the dead and the broken.

On the ridge, four mounted scouts crest into view, then freeze as one. Their horses stamp and snort, white breath whipping in the wind.

The scouts stare down at the giantess standing over the slaughter. Hands dart to reins, horn, and sword hilts all at once.

One rider swings his horn up, but his horse sidesteps in terror, nearly spilling him into the snow.

Sigrid's prey lies silent at her feet, while the scouts gather themselves on the ridge, fearful, armed, and too late to mistake her for anything but the danger.

Sigrid hurls the boulder upward with both hands. It whistles through the snow and smashes into the ridge where the captain sits, blowing horse and rider apart in a burst of ice and grit.

One mount screams and rears. Another skids sideways, hooves scrabbling for purchase as the line breaks into panic.

The captain slumps against his saddle, not dead, but struck hard enough to lose the horn.

Shards of rock sting Sigrid’s forearm as the shattered stone rains back into the camp, and the dying fire coughs sparks into the wind.

Sigrid hurls another boulder straight at the captain’s wavering horse. The stone smashes through the ridge line, and rider, saddle, and mount pitch apart in a spray of ice. The captain is thrown hard into the drift.

His horn snaps loose and spins away over the broken edge. The surviving scouts flinch at the blast, their mounts dancing sideways on the shattered ground.

The captain slumps across the saddle, bleeding and dazed, while grit and ice pepper Sigrid’s arm from the second impact.

Below, the camp fire gutters low beside the unconscious knights, and the ridge above buckles under the frightened horses.

Sigrid whips a third boulder from the snow and sends it skyward. It smashes into the ridge where the scouts are trying to turn, exploding ice and rock across horse and rider.

The captain’s mount drops out from under him, and he hits the broken slope hard. The First Scout yanks his horse sideways, barely avoiding the falling stone.

One terrified horse bolts downhill, dragging its rider off balance, while the others rear against the shattered edge. Below, the camp fire gutters beside the unconscious knights, red and weak in the dusk.

The Fourth Scout stares down into the camp, sees the butcher’s work, and freezes long enough to lose the reins.

The line breaks into chaos, half the riders turning to flee, half still trapped by their panicked horses, and the ridge is theirs for the taking if Sigrid strikes again.

Sigrid answers the broken ridge with one more heave. The stone leaves her hands like a thrown siege weight and slams into the riders’ scramble, showering the slope with ice and splinters.

His warning comes too late. One horse whirls, riderless, and another crashes broadside into the captain’s dazed body, driving him deeper into the shattered snow.

The First Scout’s mount bucks free of the ridge edge, rears, and flings him toward the slope. The Fourth Scout stares at the camp fire below, then at Sigrid, and his reins slip from numb fingers.

But he is already choosing flight. Above the camp, the ridge is no longer a line, only wreckage, panic, and two surviving riders deciding whether to leap or die.

Sigrid wades up the shattered slope and closes one massive hand around the Scout Captain’s armor. He tries to kick free, but her grip lifts him from the snow like a trophy.

His words break off as she hauls him down beside the wrecked ridge, the broken line below them now only a fall of ice, blood, and panicking horses.

The First Scout scrambles for his reins, but his horse bolts sideways at the edge and nearly takes him with it.

The cry snaps the ridge into motion. One rider commits to flight, the other loses the last of his courage, and below, Sigrid stands with the captain in hand while the camp remains strewn with the unmoving Lead Knight and Third Knight.

Sigrid drags the Scout Captain close and the fight goes out of him in a wet, choking gasp. Her jaws close on him with brutal finality, and the ridge above her goes suddenly still.

The First Scout’s horse skids at the broken edge, white eyes rolling. He fumbles his reins, but his mount shies from the smell of blood and the sight below.

The Fourth Scout hammers his horse around and bolts from the crest. Snow and grit spray behind him as the ridge keeps crumbling under the panic.

Below the shattered ridge, the Lead Knight and Third Knight lie unmoving in the trampled camp while the remaining horses tear at their tethers and rear toward the dark.