Resistance is futile, and they are .

After crushing and stomping the highwaymen, the bestial giant smashed his club around into the panicked horses. A single blow stilled their screaming with an awful liquid crunch. The hoofbeats of the one escapee receded into the distance.

With all quiet, he turned and peered suspiciously into the carriage. Vilea and Jileen were staring, frozen in terror. The giant's massive central eye glistened wetly in the light of the moon. His angry expression lightened. His mouth crooked and he leered at them.

"Women!" he said in a low voice. "Ha. I do as Master say." He dropped his tree-trunk club which thudded heavily to the ground. He untied the great pelt with which his body was wrapped and shook it out flat on the ground. The creature's rank odor fllled their nostrils. The world swam dizzily before Jilleen's eyes.

Vilea finally found her voice. Spitting with anger, she hissed, "Get thee gone, vile ogre! Hast not killed enough meat?" She held up her dagger, gleaming in the moonlight.

Jilleen found herself staring at the brute's lolling member, illuminated by the moon. Even flaccid, it was a cubit long and as big around as a man's arm. She saw it slowly swelling and felt her gorge rise.

"Hh-ungh, hh-ungh, hh-ungh!" the cyclops laughed. "Here, little cat. I take." It reached out a great hand, grasped Vilea round the waist, and pulled her out of the carriage. Vilea slashed out and buried her dagger in the giant's arm, but it just laughed. "Ha, cat have claw," it said. "Bad cat."

Jilleen screamed in anger. "You let her go! You let her go now!" She leapt from the carriage and stabbed at the giant's wrist.

The creature grunted and shifted its arm, knocking her flat. "Bad girl." it said. "Master say take, no hurt." It plucked Vilea's dagger out. "Bad cat, itches and burns." He rubbed the wounded arm on his belly, then snorted and went back to work.

As Jilleen lay on the ground, gasping with the wind knocked out of her, the great cyclops lay Vilea down on the giant animal skin he had removed. He rolled her up in it like a carpet, then caught Jilleen with one hand and rolled her in after her mistress. She coughed, trying to hold her stomach down as the rank, bristly fur enwrapped her. The last thing she glimpsed was their coachman, lying on his side on the ground. His fingers were twitching and his lips moved. Would he survive?

But the bestial giant shouldered its crude game bag and stumped off into the forest, setting a bumping, thumping pace that left Jilleen no thoughts other than how to keep breathing as she jounced against the shoulder of their cyclopean abductor.