Changes (The Dresden Files #12) - Jim Butcher Page 0,106

my left wrist, I noted that my shield bracelet was gone. Of course. They must have removed it so that the defibrillator’s charge wouldn’t have gotten any ideas, just as they’d taken the metal necklace from around my throat, and the rings from my fingers.

They were being helpful.

Clearly, this was just not my day.

32

I was tied down, but my hands weren’t. I flexed the fingers of my right hand into the mystic position of attack—holding them like a pretend gun—and snapped, “Arctis!”

The spell tore the heat from all around the gun and drew water from the air into an instant, thick coating of ice, heaviest around the weapon’s hammer. The shooter twitched in reaction to the spell and pulled the trigger.

The encrusting ice held the hammer back and prevented it from falling.

The gunman blinked and tried to pull the trigger several more times, to no avail. Forthill hit him around the knees. Both men went down, and the gun came loose from the gunman’s cold-numbed fingers as they hit the floor, and went spinning across the room. It struck a wall, cracked the ice around its hammer, and discharged harmlessly into the wall with another roar.

The gunman kicked Forthill in the face and the old priest fell back with a grunt of pain. Molly threw herself at him in pure rage, knocking him flat again, and began pounding her fists into him with elemental brutality and no technique whatsoever. The gunman threw an elbow that got her in the neck and knocked her back, then rose, his eyes searching the floor, until he spotted his weapon. He started for it.

I killed the light from the amulet. He tripped and fell in the sudden darkness. I heard him scuffling with the dazed Forthill.

Then there was a single bright flash of light that showed me the gunman arching up in pain. Then it was gone and there was the sound of something large falling to the floor. Several people were breathing heavily.

I got my fingers onto my amulet again and brought forth light into the room.

Forthill sat against one wall, holding his jaw, looking pale. Molly was in a crouch, one hand lifted as if she’d been about to do something with her magical talents, the way she should have at the first sound of the shots, if she’d been thinking clearly. The gunman lay on his side, and began to stir again.

Butters wheezed, “Clear,” and touched both ends of the naked wires in his hands to the gunman’s chest.

The wires ran back to the emergency defib unit. When they’d been melted off the paddles, it had left several strands of pure copper naked on the ends of both of them. The current did what current does, and the gunman bucked in agony for a second and sagged into immobility again.

“Jerk,” Butters wheezed. He put a hand on the small of his back and said, “Ow. Ow, ow, ow, OW!”

“Butters!” Molly croaked, and hugged him.

“Urgckh,” Butters said. “Ow.” But he didn’t look displeased at the hug.

“Grasshopper, don’t strain him until we know how bad it is,” I said. “Dammit.” I started fumbling with the straps, getting them clear of my upper body so I could sit up and work on my legs. “Forthill? Are you all right?”

Father Forthill said something unintelligible and let out a groan of pain. Then he heaved himself to his feet and started helping me with the buckles. His jaw was purple and swollen on one side. He’d taken one hell of a hit and stayed conscious. Tough old guy, even though he looked so mild.

I got off the backboard, onto my feet, and picked up the gun.

“I’m all right,” Butters said. “I think.” His eyes went wide and he suddenly seemed to panic. “Oh, God, make sure I’m all right!” He started clawing at his shirt. “That maniac freaking shot me!”

He got the scrubs top off and turned around to show Molly his back. He was wearing an undershirt.

And on top of that, he was wearing a Kevlar vest. It was a light, underclothing garment, suitable only for protection against handguns—but the gunman had walked in with a nine- millimeter. He’d put both shots onto the centerline of Butters’s lower back, and the vest had done its job. The rounds were still there, flattened and stuck in the ballistic weave.

“I’m hit, aren’t I?” Butters stuttered. “I’m in shock. I can’t feel it because I’m in shock. Right? Was it in the liver? Is the blood black? Call