Excerpt: Mirror to Alfima

"I really don't know what's taking so long, now," Nurse Elda finally said, peering over everyone's head from where she sat, which wasn't too difficult for her to do. Then her face lit up brightly in a smile that made her look years younger, and she raised one of her three meter long arms to wave happily at someone.

Lily turned right on time to see a male giant straighten from a crouch as he entered the room. He was several feet taller than Elda was, even taller than the cook, and his hatted head fairly scraped the roof. He was wearing a uniform that was reminescent of a granadeer's outfit back home where not the coat blue and the hat a sort of cross between a beret and a bowler hat. Knee high brown boots clanged as they took him quickly from one side of the room to the other, where he soon arrived beside Nurse Elda, crouching down to give her a loving peck on the cheek with his mustachiod lips.

"Busy as usual tending to an injured bird today, Elda?" He said fondly, his cheeks rather rosy and his brown eyes twinkling teasingly.

"Am I not always, according to you?" Nurse Elda replied with a laugh. Lily soon realised, as banter and friendly needling when on, that this man was probably either the Nurse's husband or someone close enough to that in giant lore by the looks of it. Nurse won an argument with practiced ease and turned to Lily looking quite happy and rosy in the cheeks herself.
"And how is our little guest, then," asked the new comer, plucking off his hat and taking a seat at the table. Another dish laden with all kinds of food, this one also containing a bowl of steaming porredge, was settling in front of him as he turned to sit ascque on the table. Lily blinked back at him foolishly for a moment before she stammered a reply. "Ah, a shy one, is she!" He laughed, and though it was loud, it didn't boom uncomfortably like the cook's voice. "You'll get used to being more spontanious here in Alfima, little foundling," he went on, "It's almost a law here, to be honest with oneself." Nurse Elda sipped a glass of steaming fragrant tea and nodded.
"Yes dear, its true. It really isn't your fault that you got mixed up with such horrible fellows as the faye when you came here first, but you'll see, when you meet our King, you'll understand just how lovely Alfima really is!"
While to two giants looked at one another fondly and convinced, it left Lily with a distinct sense of unease growing within her stomach. She did not want to meet this King, so famous and infamous with whoever she spoke with since she'd come here. Who, exactly, was telling the truth here?