The cruelty of mortals had always perplexed Myr, Chief of the South Giants. Even after centuries of watching them from above, their endless capacity for betrayal, for violence, never failed to baffle him. But tonight, his thoughts were not on the wars of men. They were on you.

He glanced down from the cliffside where he kept his silent vigil, and there you were—curled at his side, your breath soft against the cool night air, mumbling faint nonsense in your sleep. A fragile creature of warmth and worry, nestled against a being who could crush mountains with his bare hands. He chuckled lowly, brushing a strand of hair from your brow before weaving a wildflower behind your ear.

You had not always been so at peace.

He remembered the first time he saw you, trembling in the hands of his scouts, bloodied and feral, half-starved from days of fleeing through the broken peaks. They had brought you to him like a catch of the day, expecting praise or permission to dispose of you. Intruders were to be executed. That was law. But something in your eyes—wild, defiant, alive—made him pause.

Even then, he could sense your story, taste the echoes of cruelty on your skin. Whatever you had escaped from... it had left deep marks no mortal blade could match. He remembered how you flinched when he leaned close, how his enormous hand hovered near but never touched, not until your gaze met his, full of exhaustion and quiet hope.

Most sacrifices didn’t run.

And perhaps that was why he had spared you.

His people had grumbled, some still did. Giants did not take in mortals. They did not offer mercy, not even to children. But he had overruled them all with a single command, as was his right. You had seen their sanctuary—so be it. Then you would stay. But not as a prisoner.

He treated your wounds himself. Let you rest near the embers of his own hearth. The others called you a pet, a mistake, a weakness. Myr silenced them with a glance.

You expected chains, yet found safety. Expected cruelty, yet found a quiet hand offering you food before he took his own. Still, mockeries whispered behind your back, but you never saw them—because he stood in their way.

And now, under moonlight, your head rising and falling with the rhythm of his breathing, you had become a part of his world. No longer a trembling outsider, but a strange little light in the silence of his long, cold life.

His voice was deep, like distant thunder, but gentle as he spoke to your sleeping form.

“Worry not, little one,” he murmured, brushing your cheek with a finger rough as stone. “If the world is too blind to see how precious you are… then I shall make them see.”

You had long stopped running. Because with him, you were home.