blocks ice

There was a sharp hissing sound, and Molly threw up her left hand, fingers spread. She spat out a word or two, and flickering sparkles of defensive energy spread from her fingertips into a flat plane.
Molly simply didn’t have a talent for defensive magic—but this was the best shield I’d ever seen the grasshopper pull off.
A hurtling white sphere hit the shield. It should have bounced off, but instead it zipped through the shield, its course barely bent. The sphere struck Molly in the left shoulder and exploded into diamond-glitter shards of ice. She let out a short, harsh grunt of pain and staggered.
“Focus,” said the calm woman’s voice. “Use the pain. Make the shield real with your will. Know that it will protect you. Again.”
Molly looked up with her teeth clenched. But instead of talking, she raised her left hand once more, and another ball of ice flew at her. This one hit the shield and went through—but its path was attenuated more significantly than the last. It flew past her, barely clipping one arm.
She gasped and sank to one knee, panting. Magic taxes the endurance of anyone who uses it—and if you use magic you aren’t particularly skilled with, you get worn down even faster.
I shivered to see Molly like that. I knew how she felt. When Justin began teaching me how to create protective shields, he threw baseballs at me at top speed. When I failed, I was hit with a fastball moving at more than eighty miles an hour. Justin said pain was an excellent motivator, and that the activity was good training.
When I had been teaching Molly how to shield, I hadn’t used anything more painful than fluffy snowballs and rotten fruit.
“That will do for now,” said the woman’s voice. “Tomorrow we will move up to knives.”


Ghost Story Chapter 21, Page 236