Sir Brenly could not help but hold on tight to the mast when Emmaline had worked her magic to save from the Dark Elves, but with the carpet? The old man refused to get on it outright and it only took a minute in the cold rain to get him to lose some of his stubbornness and reluctantly hop on to what he considered possibly chaos magic. The carpet went somewhat slow at Amal's insistence, though there was still a need to get out of the rain. Luckily they had cut a bit of the sail they had taken and rolled it up to possibly be used later. Unfortunately, a dense fog had risen up to block their sight as if the land wished to protect itself from prying eyes.

"Can you see anything!?" Amal called to Emmaline, squinting to get a better look. 

Even through the fog, the rain splattered on their faces enough to keep their gazes downcast. Brenly held on to the carpet for dear life, not daring to look around at all.

"No, nothing yet!" She replied, holding her golden hair and keeping it out of her field of view.

The carpet rode the wind as steadily as it could, floating past the strange, sparse trees and rising up until suddenly they flew past the fog and drank in the land that lay before them. As far as the eye could see, the country was filled with bogs and fens and scattered woodlands that stubbornly clung to the land. Mountains rose in the distance, but they were nothing that could rival the range that protected Araby from the great southern desert, or any large mountains Emmaline had seen. Gripping the lower slopes were highlands and foothills of dark green and grey as boulders stood here or there like unwanted guests. 

In the sunlight that poked out of a small fold the clouds, the land had a ghastly beauty about it. Small landlocked lakes within the foothills of the mountains stood calm just as small rivers below connected the marshes and bogs. Somewhere to the east, Amal spotted smoke wafting into the clouds. He followed its origin and saw a village or primitive town made of timber among the lowland woods not a dozen miles away.  

"There's a village, I think we can-" 

[i][b]Brrrrrruuuuuuuuuuugh[/b][/i]

The air thickened and sudden heat accompanied by a dank stench hammered them from below. Amal leaned over the side to look below them as the other two did, and they all began to cry out in alarm and fear when they saw the cause of the noise was a titanic, grotesque being clad in only a loincloth large enough to be a ship's sail itself! 

"A Giant!?" Emmaline screeched as Sir Brenly yelled an oath. The thing was perhaps fifty feet in height with its arms adding another twenty, nearly catching hold of the carpet in its massive fingers. The trees it stood among only reached its swollen paunch of a waist. Amal almost laughed at the sudden turn of events before he quickly grew somber and took hold of the situation. He felt Emmaline wrapped around his waist like a vice, which he found worked. 

"Hold on!" He cried, directing the carpet to fire forward like an Imperial rocket battery. A giant arm swung to block them, but the carpet was far too nimble. It twirled around the arm with ease and zipped away down below into one of the many bogs that lay stretched over the land. The giant might have a long stride but the carpet flew faster than a horse could gallop on its best day, zipping around trees and over fallen logs at just the last moment. 

"Down sir Brenly!" Amal yelled as Emmaline tried to poke her head back up just as a branch flew into their way. Amal grabbed her head and pushed her back down, her face shoved into his groin and his torso over her to protect her from the leaves and twigs that scythed bits of his skin across his bare arms and neck. What seemed an eternity only lasted a few seconds before the carpet flew free of this set of trees and they found themselves within the rolling hills. 

"Lad...were the Elves truly so bad?" Sir Brenly complained. 
[@Penny]