WHEN THE SIEGE began Perrin would have taken Elspeth and the children upstairs to lock them in the solar, but the laird’s wife refused to leave her husband. In the end she and Kanyth barricaded them in the dining hall with the poisoning victims. Before they secured the doors, her lover carried out the revenant, chair and all. Wynda didn’t move or speak when he shut her inside a hall storage room.

By then Ross McAra arrived with ten other stable hands, each armed with a sword. Her heart ached when she saw how young they were—hardly more than little boys—and the uncertain way they held their blades. Yet they wore the hardened expressions of men prepared for battle, and not one wavered as Kanyth began issuing orders and passing out torches.

“We cannae permit the enemy to invade the great hall. You must stand ready at every entry to repel them. Use the torches, no’ your blades.” He beckoned to one of them. “Ross, I shall lower the gates. You assign your men their posts.”

Perrin looked up as Kanyth began untying levered ropes and lowering heavy iron barriers over the thresholds and windows, where he’d secured them with chains. She hadn’t even noticed them hanging overhead. It must have taken him and Alec hours to hoist them in place. Once lowered into position he demonstrated to the stable hands how to thrust their torches between the bars.

“Strike them in the face if you can,” Kanyth told them. “If no’, ignite their garments. My lady, come with me.”

Perrin followed him back to the forge, where he began piling ore in two large buckets.

“We can’t hold them off for long, can we?” she asked, though she suspected the answer.

“No, lass.” He hefted the ore to one side and reached for her, pulling her into his arms. “I’ll barricade you here. ’Tis a cabinet in the back large enough to hide in, should they get inside.”

“Oh, no, you’re not. I’m going with you.” She went to grab one of the buckets, yelped as she tried to lift it, and let go to shake her throbbing hand. “But I’m not hauling anything for you. That weighs like two, three hundred pounds.” When he didn’t reply she picked up one chunk of ore. “All right, I’ll carry this one. Come on, let’s move it.”

Kanyth caught her chin and kissed her. “You’re mad. I love you, but you’re mad.”

Now she would die for him. Probably with him, but that counted, too. “Where are we going?”

He grabbed his tartan and wrapped it around her before he lifted both buckets as if they were filled with cotton balls.

“Out onto the ramparts.”

Perrin didn’t waste time asking him what he was going to do, but held the ore against her chest and hurried after him. When she opened the outer door for him the wind smacked her in the face, but only a little snow came with it.

Kanyth dropped the buckets by the outer edge of the defensive wall, which stretched out directly above the furrows. As Perrin glanced over the edge she saw the famhairean emerging from the snow and standing as if waiting for something. Then she felt heat roll over her, and turned to see her lover’s tunic lighting up as he channeled his power into his hands.

Now she understood the buckets. “You’re going to hit them with molten cannonballs?” When he frowned at her she held out her chunk. “Never mind. Go to work.”

The ore began glowing the moment he touched it, and quickly began to change shape. Kanyth formed it into a rough sphere and then suffused it with more power, until the surface turned white-gold. He leaned over the wall, looking down, and then hurled it at the head of one of the famhairean. A grating cry came in response as the giant went down, his head half-covered in steaming iron.

As furious shouts came from below, Perrin stationed herself by the buckets to pass him more.

“You cannae touch my hands,” Kanyth warned her when she dropped another chunk into his palms.

As they worked together the scent of molten iron grew strong, and Perrin began to sweat from the heat Kanyth generated. He uttered a low, satisfied sound with every hit he made, but soon the famhairean began to watch and dodge his volleys. She could hear them trying to break through the barriers below and hoped the stable hands were using their torches to set them on fire.

She turned to Kanyth with the last piece of ore.

“We need more iron,” she began but saw the burns streaking up his arms. “No.”

He’d been using his power continuously for at least half an hour. His hands would be burnt to the bone.

“’Tis naught,” he told her as he hurled the final sphere he’d made. “You cannae carry the ore by yourself, and the bastarts begin to climb now. Fack.”

He doubled over as his hands cooled and began to blacken.

She had to do something about his massive burnout, or he’d be crippled by the pain. Snow had collected in the buckets and melted from the heat. She picked up one.

“Water,” she told him, and poured some onto his hands.

Kanyth sighed with relief. “’Tis good.” He jerked as she splashed him with the remainder, soaking his burned arms. “And cold.”

“I’m not giving you back the tartan, no matter how much you whine.” A cracking sound made her look at his hands, afraid to see his fingers falling off. Instead it was only his clan ring, which broke and fell into three pieces on his palm. For the first time that she could remember, there was fear in his eyes. “It’s okay, Ka. We’ll glue it back together after the battle.”

The pieces dropped from his hand as he leaned over the wall. “We maynae have a chance, lass.”

She took a look, and saw the famhair that had climbed up halfway to them. On impulse she picked up the second bucket and emptied it onto his head. The giant shrieked as if she’d doused him in acid, and immediately began sprouting branches and leaves out of his cracked face. As his head turned back into a tree, he lost his grip on the snow-covered castle wall and plummeted down to the ground.

She and Kanyth watched as the other famhairean backed away from him. As they did Perrin felt her palm grow hot against the cold stone wall, and she looked down to see rivulets of water running out from beneath her hand. It wasn’t a vision. She was actually melting the snow on the wall with her scar. Without any fanfare the forge was showing her how to defeat the giants.

“We don’t need fire or cannonballs, Ka,” Perrin said. “We need a moat.” She grabbed his arm. “Come on.”

“Aye,” Kanyth agreed, following her to the stairs. “Naught would be better, but–”

“Stone doesn’t burn,” Perrin told him as they hurried down the stairs into the great hall. “But it gets hot, and this place is wall-to-wall fireplaces.”

At each barricade the stable hands still held their ground and shoved their torches at the famhairean. Ross glanced over his shoulder as Kanyth approached, his young face streaked with soot.

“They come at us two and three now, Skaraven,” he told him. “The iron, ’tis bending and splitting from their blows.”

“Stand fast, warrior,” Kanyth told him before he went with Perrin to the first hearth. In a lower voice he said, “Without the servants most of these hearths have burned down to ash now. We cannae build up fresh fires so quickly. Even seasoned wood needs time to catch and build a burn.”

“Not if you add molten iron to the mix.”

She threw some split logs onto the flames, and then handed him back the dagger he’d given her earlier.

Kanyth grinned at her, heating the blade white-hot before tossing it on the wood. It caught fire at once. She added more wood, and after another minute they had a roaring blaze.

“We have to do that to every one of them, and shove in enough wood to make the biggest fire we can.” She grabbed a pail and went to the next hearth. “Grab some of those blades the laird has on the wall.”

They worked feverishly to ignite the massive fires they needed to heat the walls of the keepe. While they did the giants kept coming, ramming into the barricades, over and over. One jerked the torch from one of the boys, tossing it away before he hurtled at the badly-dented iron. The stable hand drew his sword and stabbed him in the eye, sending him reeling backward and howling with rage.

“They feel pain,” Perrin called out to their young sentries. “If they take your torches, hurt them.”

The hall grew so hot that sweat began to drip into her eyes. Perrin also had to stop and regularly douse Kanyth’s hands with water to keep him from burning them off. But as they finished stocking the last blaze with wood, she saw beads of condensation swelling and rolling down the inside of the heated stone walls.

Suddenly the giants stopped charging at the barricades, and the hall fell silent. The stable hands peered out, and Ross shouted for Kanyth.

“They retreat from the castle, Skaraven.” He turned to beam at him. “Look.”

Perrin joined them and peered out through the battered bars. All of the famhairean were retreating from the keepe, which now had become surrounded by huge pools of meltwater running down from the outside walls. When the first giant turned and ran a cheer went up from all the boys. Elated, she hugged her lover.

“You made them run like drippy noses,” she told the boy, and kissed him on the cheek as she winked at Kanyth.

Ross blushed. “The Gods favor the bold, my lady.”

“Work well done, brothers,” Kanyth said, looking at each young, tired face. “You’ve defended your home and your clan against the direst of enemies, and you’ve made your laird proud. Now we must tend to the sick. Ross, go and fetch the salt water from the kitchens. We’ll need empty buckets to catch the boak.”

Perrin went with him to take down the furniture barricading the dining hall, and when they opened the doors they were greeted by Lady Elspeth herself, who held her husband’s jeweled sword ready to strike.

“Och.” She lowered the blade. “Never tell me you’ve saved us?”

“The gates and the lads from your stables held them off, my lady,” Kanyth said. “My lady and much meltwater did the rest.” He looked past her at the still bodies she’d covered with linens from the tables. “How fare the fallen?”

“I havenae yet roused them.” She put down the sword and nodded toward the children, who sat clustered around the laird. “Maddock woke briefly after the spewing, but he drifted away again.”

“It’s all right,” Perrin said and took hold of her hands. “Help is on the way.”