The giant's words reached him from all directions at once, reflecting off the flat surfaces of the gigantic cave he had found himself in. He looked all around, studying his surroundings while being peered at like a guinea pig by all those present.
Lit by blazing braziers placed evenly all around, this was the largest enclosed area he had seen since waking up. The ceiling was high, high up in the air. It was doomed, with the highest point being at least 70 feet from the floor. Behind him, a flat wall was pockmarked by at least 50 small holes exactly like the one he had just fallen out of.
As for the dwarves…there were so many that he could hardly count them. Still, a preliminary estimate was that at least 300 of them were present, and that raised all sorts of questions.
'What do they eat? Where do they live? How are there so many? And who the hell are they?'
The last one seemed to be the most pressing, but the only answer he received on further inspection was for the second one.
The giant was seated on a large wooden chair which was an architectural marvel on its own right. Banded with metal, it looked sturdy enough to even handle the weight of two giants.
What he was interested in was actually beside the chair. On both sides of it, they were large openings that hinted at spaces farther inside, and as he studied them with the intention of seeing a hint of what might lay within, he also noticed that the giant was studying him, in turn.
That was when he remembered that he had been told to 'come', so he lurched forward to the satisfaction of many of the little, bald men in front of him.
They clapped and hooted as if he was giving a performance, and their eyes shone with excitement.
"Quiet. Don't make our guest panic, little folk. The show is done. Go back to your little hovels."
There was quite a bit of discontentment when the giant's words rumbled in the cave again, but quickly, the dwarves began to walk in the direction of the opening on the left of the chair. Just like the one who had brought him here, their legs were swift, and they were gone in merely a minute.
Daneel walked forward even further as the space cleared. Soon, he was standing right in front of the colossal chair, and his puny size made him feel all the more conscious now that he was so close. But there were other details to notice, too, so he thought on them instead of dwelling on the fact that the hand resting on the armrest could crush him in a moment if it so wished.
The giant's skin was extremely wrinkled, as if he was a hundred-year-old man clinging on to life. He also had many scars all over his body, much worse than even what he had seen on Reese, and one of his legs was actually shorter than the other.
Seeing him studying that leg, the giant spoke again.
"When we were little, ages ago, our brother broke that leg so that he could take on the work we were doing. We used to be very good at mining; we could do the work of two good men on our own, but he was going hungry. It never healed well…"
A film of memories glazing over his eyes, the giant dwelled on his past, and Daneel, in turn, dwelled on everything the man had said so far.
It was hard to think of anything else except his overpowering size, so first, he wondered whether it was possible for anyone to grow so big.
'Is it something he was born with? Or, wait… he talked about power! But how can what he is be similar in any way to what that succubus was doing?'
The confusion in Daneel's face amused the giant.
"Ha! That's always the first question in anyone's mind. It just so happens that we can show you the answer, instead of telling you. Oh, and the fearlessness of children is really something to behold… most of the others who come here are convinced that they will soon die as soon as they see us. They try to run, they try to hide, but they never succeed… take, for instance, the one who is going to soon be here. Fenris! Get them in!"
Daneel could never have imagined that it would be possible for the man to raise his voice, and when he did, it grew so loud that he had to close his ears. Instead of echoing just in the cave they were, it traveled into the caverns beside the chair, and soon, a group of dwarves appeared.
There were 12 of them, arrayed into small groups of four each holding the limbs of a man on their shoulders. All these three men were struggling, bound with ropes and gagged with cloth, but no matter how much they tried, they couldn't move an inch.
To his surprise… Daneel saw that he recognized one of them.
The giant finally moved for the first time since Daneel had arrived when the three approached his throne. He bent forward and lowered his hand, which was so absurdly large that just by stretching it over one of the three, he was able to cast a shadow that covered them.
"This man has been very, very naughty. We been watching him for a long time, and cruelty is something that we've gotten used to seeing… but still, his deeds need special mention. You might have heard a little about what he does, but you don't know it all. He has twenty slaves under him, yes, whose food he steals to stay strong… But did you know that he also makes them breed, so that they give birth to children? In the pit, children always get additional food so they can grow and replace the slaves who die regularly, but seeing this as an opportunity, this noble individual right here starves them, too, taking all of their food, leaving them to die! By our count, he has killed thirty-three infants, so far. We were unwilling to move on him still, you see, because it is vital that we should stay hidden… but do you know what he was going to do when we laid our hands on him? Deciding that selling you out was better than waiting to see what you would accomplish, he was going to go to the Slavequeen and lay you entire plan bare… we caught him while he was on his way, or you would be on the way to a hanging by now, my friend. Now… what fate do you think he deserves?"
There was a moment of silence after the giant's long-windedness, during which Daneel registered what he had been told. When the feeling of being betrayed washed over him, though… he took a step back, his entire body covered by a layer of sweat as he imagined being hauled away by the succubus to have all of his ambitions ground into the dust.
He also felt all the more repulsed that he had worked with such a man, and even thought that they might have built a bit of camaraderie due to the exchange they had had in his cavern after the job. He felt like stomach turn when he recalled that, and right away, he wondered whether there Reese had known of this.
Meanwhile, the giant had begun to move each of his fingers slowly, up and down, to the left and right, in a way that seemed random, yet possessing a pattern that he would not have noticed if he hadn't spent all these days studying the patterns of those dots of light.
A few seconds passed as Daneel stared at the big man who was looking at him pleadingly. He felt no remorse, though, whatsoever… and he suddenly found himself thinking that it would be alright if such a man did not see the darkness of the next day.
As soon as he got this thought, a dim, white glow came to life right below the palm of the giant. Xander averted his gaze, then, and stared fearfully at the light.
While he watched, Daneel felt a flicker of recognition, and he wondered where he might have seen something like this before.
He got the answer… when a silvery mist started to arise from Xander's skin while the man howled into the gag, struggling against the bonds tying his hands and legs together with so much strength that he drew blood.
The dwarves who had carried him there had already run away, and slowly, ever so slowly, Xander began to… shrink.
Daneel watched, astonished, at this act that went against everything he thought he had known about the world. The same mist had been absorbed by the succubus, but there, he had been able to figure out what she was doing.
Yet, here, he was clueless… until the absorption began to speed up.
Xander's hair began to fall away. His muscles were sucked dry, and his body kept growing smaller, smaller, smaller until… only a dwarf remained.
The giant smiled as the process ended, leaving behind the big man as a drooling shell of what he had been.
'Does he seem… bigger?'
He didn't know whether that was true or not, but one thing was certain: the giant looked invigorated, and with a deep laugh, he spoke again, and as Daneel listen to him, the system spoke in his mind, too.
"Once, we could take in the energy of those crystals to seek the wonders of power. They barred us from that pathway…but we found another. Now, we take! And when the one from whom we take deserves it…oh, it feels so, so good."
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