Containing explosion

[u/ghostgabe81]

I waved at Fitz and Matias and shouted to them, “There’s going to be an explosion! We’re going down the stairs not long after! Get into the doorway and hold the stairs!”

Fitz shouted something mostly lost in the gunfire, but Matias, flinching as a ricochet went somewhere near him, held up his thumb in acknowledgment.

“Bob,” I said, “I want the energy from the blast contained to just the gates. Absorb as much of it as you can.”

“Uh,” Bob said. “If I do that, the gates are going to come down.”

“That’s the idea,” I said. “Get to it.”

“Will do, boss!” Bob said, and the blue light zipped off through the transparent stone of the castle. As he did, the stone became real and opaque again, and my eyes stopped burning.

Bear was frowning at me. “You want them inside.”

“Come on,” I said. “They’re Black Court. Why do you think I invited them in? ‘Come and get some’ wasn’t an accident.”

Bear’s frown turned into a fierce grin. “You think you can handle them?”

“Time I get done with them, we’ll need a lot of mops,” I said darkly. “This is my house.”

She nodded, understanding. “You want to handle the lightweights first.”

“Yep. Scatter the riffraff, then I’ll deal with the rest in the main hall.”

Bear reached up over her shoulder to flick a snap on her leather strap and take her double-bladed axe down, setting it near at hand. “Sounds fun.”

Someone shouted something below. The gunfire abruptly stopped, and I slammed my hands over my ears and opened my mouth. Bear mirrored me.

There was a sound so big that it blew back the branches from the trees across the street, shattered the windows of houses and parked cars, and made everything lighter for a second, as if a wave had come along and lifted me a little up off the stones of the roof. The runes of the castle flared painfully bright. It was followed by the sound of stones rattling, smaller rocks bouncing against enchanted stone, and a cloud of dust and powder billowed out from the front of the castle, filling the already misty air. The resulting mixture condensed almost instantly into a kind of mucky, grimy rain.

Then there was a single, rasping, inhuman howl, instantly echoed by dozens of yowling ghoul battle cries, and my enemies came for me.

Twelve Months Chapter 53