“Also, Declan, what do you need for your golem project?”
“I need everyone who wants one to write their name on a piece of paper, sign it, fold it, and put a hair from your head in the fold,” I said.
“Wait, give a witch a hair? I don’t think so,” Janek said.
“If he wanted a hair from you, wolf, he could just pull it from your sweater or your coat,” Katrina said, handing me a folded piece of lined notebook paper. “If you mess with me with this, I’ll hurt you,” she warned quietly. I gulped, took the paper, and nodded.
“In light of recent events, I’ll give you until tomorrow night to turn in your essay, Declan. Don’t rush it,” Gina said, openly amused at the exchange.
Having dodged yet another bullet, I thanked her and spent the rest of class outlining my essay. And piling up folded papers.
Chapter 28
“Blyat!” blasted out of the darkness of the factory’s first floor. I don’t speak Russian but somehow I didn’t think Arkady was happy with the results of his attack.
My guess was backed up by the four shattered support beams strewn about the concrete floor. He’d been blasted through them after assaulting me from behind.
Caeco’s reactive armor idea had worked out rather well. Ignoring the stream of other Russian words that were most likely not congratulatory, I ran across the floor to the far side. My rules were the same; traverse each floor till I reached the top.
As I ran, I worked up the next surprise, one that would take advantage of the cold, dry, dusty air around me. Earth Craft let me control the buildup of negative ions on the outside of my shields, the dry air helping immensely. Climbing the stairs, I took a quick glance around, pressed my witchy senses outward and then, feeling nothing, started across the open joists. Halfway across, I felt the passage of wind just before a loud snap cracked at the same time a flash of blue light lit up the room around me.
The image of Tanya’s surprised face burned onto my retinas, her form briefly frozen by the huge static shock that had discharged when she touched me. Super fast vampires moving through dusty winter air created tremendous potential for static. The wood joist floor was a natural insulator, and my own consciously charged shields had boosted the resulting arc of electricity.
I didn’t think it would slow her for long, so I instantly thrust a kinetic burst in her general direction while still picking my way over the dangerous flooring. I made it to the stairwell just as she hit me from behind. Again, my shield reacted, blasting force back at her strike. I had layered my shields, putting a spell between them that would essentially explode outward with any disruption. Despite the protection of the inner shield, I was thrown forward hard enough to stumble into the stairwell.
Jumping up, I looked around. Tanya was gone again. I turned and took advantage of the pause to head upward. Rushing up the stairs, my head met a wooden beam that appeared across the opening. Or rather, my shield met a beam and blasted it. But the beam was wedged into place across the stairwell and had nowhere to go. I, on the other hand, had no such restriction, my body being completely free to go flying back down the stairs and hit the floor. Which set off the shields on my lower body, exploding me back up to hit the ceiling. Again I was thrown back down hard, then up, my constantly reacting shields bouncing me up and down until I thought to take them down and stop the insanity.
No sooner had my battered body settled to the floor when a single finger touched my head and a voice said, “Bang… you’re dead.”
“Thank you. I needed someone to put me out of my misery,” I muttered, lying in place and attempting to take stock of my aches and pains. Chris smiled at me before reaching a hand for me to take. As soon as I grasped it, I was hauled up with the force of a crane.
“So cool. What was it you did?” Tanya asked from the spot next to Chris that she had just appeared in.
“Caeco thought I could make my shields into reactive armor. It would be a counter to your speed. The static was my idea.”
“Clever. Both defenses overcame our speed,” Tanya said, smiling.
“But not the building itself,” Stacia said, peering down from