Page 113 of Dark Lover

“Sam!” Brie cried in warning.

A new dread began. Sam realized that it had become shockingly silent on the ramparts. She whirled.

Ian stood where she’d last seen him, dozens of dead giants littered around him. The monk smiled down at him.

They were going to go at it.

Ian needed help.

He could not do this alone. Sam knew it. Ian flung a bolt of power at Carlisle. Sam grabbed the sword and started for the stairs leading up to where he stood in the tower. But just as she expected, Carlisle raised his hand and sent Ian’s power rushing back at him.

He was flung with crushing force into the wall.

She heard flesh and bone smack and crack.

“Ian!”

His face enraged, Ian launched himself forward and blazed his power upward at Carlisle again. On the stairs, Sam saw his power invert itself as the monk raised his hand. This time she screamed.

Ian was hurled back into the same ramparts wall again. This time, the monk followed up with a wave of his hand.

Black power sizzled across the ramparts, descending from the tower like a lightning bolt. Ian was struck in his chest. He collapsed, eyes closed.

Sam leapt off the stairs, running to him. He could not be dead.

“Sam!” Brie shouted again.

A giant who’d somehow survived seized her from behind. Sam turned, arcing her sword at his neck. As she did so, she saw an enraged Brie launching herself at him, a tiny dagger in her hand. As Brie’s dagger went into his back, Sam felt her blade go through tendon and cartilage. She jerked Brie aside as the giant’s head toppled away.

“A woman after my own heart, one I will truly enjoy,” the monk murmured in her ear.

Sam turned, stiffening.

The monk of Carlisle smiled at her. “My only regret is that you weren’t born a boy.”

She spat in his face. “I am going to take his pulse,” she told him, trembling. “And if he’s dead, so are you.”

The monk grinned, delighted.

She turned her back on him and stumbled over the dead giants, kneeling beside Ian. She didn’t have to take his pulse. She could see that he was breathing.

“Kennar,” the monk said, and it was an order.

Sam glanced up. Six giants had scaled the walls, and two approached her and Ian. She slowly stood, raising her blade.

“I wonder if you’ll ever defend me that way,” the monk asked. “Seize her. Impale him.”

Sam felt her heart stop in shock—and then she was fighting for her life and for Ian’s. She thrust, Kennar parried and easily. She needed her weapons, not a heavy sword which she wasn’t adept with! Brie had been grabbed, and Tabby was unconscious now. She struck again, was blocked and struck again. From the corner of her eye, she saw a whirl of movement. Brie screamed.

Sam turned, and her sword was knocked from her hands. “Brie!”

Brie stood by the stairs, clutching her breast so badly that Sam expected to see blood pouring from her chest, through her hands. She reeled backward, as if she’d been stabbed. But there was no blood…

Brie was an Empath. It was Aidan, she thought, turning away. Then she saw Ian and cried out.

He was impaled on a pike.

It had been driven through his chest and out of the other side of his body by the other giant, who was grinning.