Total pages in book: 101
Estimated words: 92771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 464(@200wpm)___ 371(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92771 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 464(@200wpm)___ 371(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
“My wife has no need of anything,” Quint said and motioned for her to get behind him.
Shade did so without question, seeing anger flaring in his eyes and tension tightening his jaw. Something was wrong.
“How many?” Quint demanded.
Burgess scrunched his brow, confused. “How many what?”
Controlled anger could be heard in Quint’s every word. “You truly intend to continue to play the fool?”
“I do not understand, sir,” Burgess said, sounding confused.
“I always make sure fools die slowly,” Quint said.
Shade jumped and barely got out a gasp, shocked at how swiftly Quint reached out to lock Burgess back against him and rest a dagger at his throat.
“I’d say three men in the cart. What say you?” Quint challenged.
“I do not know wh—”
“Out of the cart or Burgess dies!” Quint shouted.
“Get out! Get out!” Burgess screamed. “I’ll not be dying today.”
Three men climbed out of the cart clumsily, each drawing their sword once on their feet.
“If you kill Burgess, there will still be the three of us to fight,” one brave soul said.
“You’re right,” Quint said and flung his dagger catching the man who spoke up in the chest and he dropped to the ground dead. He had another dagger pressed against Burgess’s throat before anyone could react. “Now there’s only two of you since cutting Burgess’s throat will take no time at all, giving me time to take one of you down with another dagger waiting at my waist. That leaves one of you and the last one will suffer the most since I intend to get as much information out of him that I can. So, who wants to be the last one to suffer the most before he dies?”
Shade saw the anger in her husband’s eyes, yet he spoke with a calm confidence that terrified. It made her realize he felt nothing for what he had done so far and what he was about to do. There was not an ounce of remorse or regret in his words. The opposite was heard. He seemed pleased with his plan.
“I don’t want to die today,” one man shouted and sheathed his sword.
“That’s not an option,” Quint said. “You intended to take my life and, no doubt, harm my wife. You will pay for that.”
“She’s spoiled goods being with The Monk. She doesn’t deserve to live,” the other one shouted, wrinkling his nose in disgust.
The dagger hit him in the throat sending him to the ground, his life gurgling out of him.
Shock had Shade staring at the man dying on the ground and by the time she turned to look at Quint, he had his last dagger at Burgess’s throat. She continued to stare, realizing it wasn’t her husband she was looking at but the notorious Monk. A man she did not know at all.
“I want no trouble. Please, I beg you. I know nothing,” the last man of the three pleaded. “I was forced to fight for Lord Torrance and relieved that I lived through the horror. I thought I would be allowed to return home to my wife and two daughters when it was done but I was forced to go with Burgess and told when the task was done, I could return home. Please, I just want to go home to my family.”
“Lord Torrance will make you pay for your cowardness,” Burgess said and spat on the ground. “He will see that you hang.”
Quint didn’t hesitate, he released his final dagger, the blade sinking into the man’s stomach, and he stumbled back to collapse to the ground. Then he snapped Burgess’s neck, flung his body aside, and went to the two dead men to retrieve his daggers, wiping the blood off them on the dead men’s garments before sheathing them. Only then did he go to the man moaning in pain from the dagger in his stomach.
“It’s going to take you a while to die, and it will be painful. Tell me what I want to know, and I will end your suffering,” Quint said.
Shade stood frozen and silent, too shocked to move from seeing her husband kill a man who begged for his life and kill the others without the slightest hesitation or doubt. What kind of man could kill so indiscriminately? No wonder people thought The Monk utterly mad or utterly evil.
The man struggled to speak. “I’m dying.”
“Aye, you are,” Quint confirmed without an ounce of sympathy for him. “If you don’t want to suffer even more you will tell me who sent you after me?”
“I don’t know. Please don—” A pain stole his breath and had the man cringing.
“Tell me something or that pain will be nothing compared to what I will do to you,” Quint demanded.
The dying man took a needed breath before he spoke. “We were to meet up with the men you killed at the abbey.”