Maybe it wasn't the Diamond Dogs. Maybe I'd laced my wine with something other than fennel seeds, but no. The four walls steadily skated across the wooden floor with a great racket. More bricks crashed to the floor. Dishes clanked in the cupboards. The poppies bounced wildly in their vase. The chaos robbed the air from my lungs and instantly sobered me.
I stretched my arms wide at either side. "Freir!"
Blue, smoky tendrils seeped along the sleeves of my sweater from my shoulders, cascading an arctic chill so strong, my teeth chattered. Before the tendrils reached my hands, they solidified into a bright light around my wrists and stormed outward in four directions toward the incoming walls. Ice cracked along the remaining bricks up to the ceiling and froze the walls' slide across the floor.
Everything stood still. My atern ticked down three more. Forty-two clicks left. I held my breath in the sudden quiet, which was punctuated by popping and settling ice.