The back of the golem’s head melted, a face forming.
I jerked back. Not fast enough, as ropes of mud shot up from the umbrella to wrap around my arm up to my elbow.
Oh, that wasn’t good.
The other witch cackled. “Bet you wish you’d sold me the diet coke and candy bars now.”
The gas station. That’s why she seemed familiar. She’d looked a lot better then, nothing like this pale, sickly creature in front of me, lips cracked and dry and the skin under her eyes sunken and dark.
I didn’t waste time arguing with her as I tugged harder. My arm didn’t budge.
The mud crawled higher, reaching my bicep. I didn’t dare touch it with my other hand, too afraid the mud would latch onto that hand as well and I’d be stuck defenseless, both hands trapped.
There was a thump as the enemy witch slumped to the ground, Liam standing over her with an amused look on his face as he watched me struggle.
I waited, expecting the golems to fold in on themselves. When the mud inched higher, I let out a sound of frustration.
“Are you just going to stand there?” I asked.
He tilted his head and smiled. It wasn’t a particularly nice smile, more like one a wolf gives its struggling prey. “Yes.”
I growled at him as the mud crept higher. It was almost at my shoulder now.
Liam’s smile turned seductive. “Say please.”
“What?”
“Say ‘please Mr. Jackass, save me from my pride.” His eyes twinkled at me.
He was having fun. I was so glad.
I turned back to the golem and gave another vicious tug. There was no way I was begging him for a rescue like some damsel in distress. This damsel was perfectly capable of saving herself. She just needed to calm down and figure out how.
I forced myself to take stock of the situation, to ignore the mud creeping past my shoulder and analyze what I saw.
By this point, Miriam had given up on destroying the golems. She’d locked herself in a bubble of magic that shone with the ferocity of a star.
A faint flicker of magic in the center of the golem called my attention. These were simple constructs. Break the magic it housed and the rest should fall.
That was the theory anyway.
Instead of fighting the onslaught of the mud, I gave into it, plunging both hands deeper. I took a last deep breath, noting distantly that Liam had jolted forward. I was too occupied with my battle to care.
I reached with everything in me for that tiny spark, throwing both my physical and metaphysical self at it. I strained until it was nearly within my grasp, crushing it with my mind and extinguishing its small light even as my physical hands reached the lodestone at its center and yanked it out.
The golem crumbled into dirt. One by one the rest of the golems followed it.
“Guess I didn’t need your help after all,” I told Liam.
He gave me a slow clap.
Miriam’s protective shields slowly dissolved. She looked around at the disaster of her back room with displeasure.
I propped one muddy arm on my hip. “So, Miriam, who’s trying to kill you?”
“I told you she was holding something back,” Liam murmured, coming to stand at my side.
I ignored him. We didn’t know that for sure. Someone had tried to kill us and we were still no more knowledgeable than we were last night.
