“I don’t seeher!”
“We can’t lose her!”
All three giants ran onto the bridge, each one now clutching a sword in his hand. Whoever the giants were, they didn’t want me to leave the woods alive.
They just didn’t realize that I felt the exact same way about them.
I palmed one of my silverstone knives, curling my fingers around the hilt so that the spider rune stamped into the metal pressed into the largermatching scar embedded in my palm. The sensation comforted and steadied me the way it always did.
I studied the giants, plotting the best way to take them down. Normally, I would have just dived into the pack and hacked and slashed my way through them until they were all dead. But we were still fairly close to the ren faire, and I didn’t want anyone to hear the men’s screams and come to investigate—orworse, call the police. No, this needed to be done as quietly as possible.
Good thing quietly was one of my specialties.
“Let’s split up,” the golden-haired giant suggested. “She can’t have gotten far. Arthur, you come with me. We’ll check the trail and the woods up ahead. Galahad, you stay here in case she comes back this way.”
Galahad nodded. “Got it, Lancelot.”
Lancelot? Arthur? Galahad?And here I thought the Knights of the Round Table were supposed to be the good guys. Seemed like the giants were determined to stay in character right up until they killed me.
The three giants split up. Lancelot and Arthur jogged off the bridge and back out onto the trail, disappearing deeper into the woods. Galahad stayed behind, his head snapping back and forth in time to his quick, worriedpacing.
“Where are you?” Galahad muttered. “Where are you?”
He kept pacing back and forth, his bootssnap-snap-snap-snappingagainst the flagstones. But he quickly grew tired of that and headed toward the opposite side of the bridge, as though he was going to check the trail we’d all used to get here.
I waited until his back was to me, then eased around the support, climbed up the creek bank,and crouched down beside the bridge.
I paused a moment, but Galahad was still turned away from me, so I tightened my grip on my knife, got to my feet, and sidled forward, determined to bury my blade in his back before he realized what was happening.
But I wasn’t quite quick enough.
Galahad must have heard the softthud-thud-thud-thudof my footsteps, or perhaps he spotted my shadow slinkingup on the bridge beside him. Either way, he turned around before I could strike.
Galahad sucked in a breath, probably to scream for his friends. Not very brave or knightly of him. I surged forward, closed the distance between us, and sliced my knife across his neck. The giant let out a choked, bloody gurgle, then pitched forward and landed in the middle of the bridge with a loud, heavythump.
“Hey! There she is!”
“Get her!”
I whirled around.
Lancelot and Arthur must have realized that I hadn’t gone deeper into the woods, because they’d doubled back. They raised their swords and rushed onto the bridge. I growled, palmed another knife, and stepped up to meet them.
Clash!
Clash-clash!
Clash!
Lancelot and Arthur swung their swords at me over and over again. I spun, whirled, and twirledbetween the two men, using my knives to keep their blades from cutting into me. But the giants were much bigger and stronger, and their arms and swords gave them a much longer reach than I had with my knives. Despite all my years as an assassin, I barely managed to keep the giants from skewering me.
I blocked an attack from Arthur, but Lancelot came up beside me and lashed out with his sword.I twisted my body to the side, avoiding most of the blow, but the edge of his blade still sliced across my left forearm, opening up a deep gash.
I hissed and staggered back, moving away from the giants and their swords.
“Not so tough now, are you, Spider?” Lancelot sneered, twirling his sword around in his hand.
Arthur grinned and did the same thing. Then the two of them advanced on me again.I was really starting to hate these so-called knights.
