Hammer and Crucible by Cameron Cooper (easy books to read txt) 📗

cup on the cupboard where the flask sat. “If you will indulge me for a moment, there is something I want to show you. May I move over to the desk and turn on the emitter?”

I had come here searching for answers. The more he talked, the more answers I would get. I could ask questions to guide him to where I wanted the conversation to go, as long as I encouraged him to talk in the first place. I nodded.

Ramaker smiled at the woman. Elizabeth with the unpronounceable last name. She was studying me and Juliyana with deep interest, possibly deconstructing our psyches and deciding we were crazy for what we were attempting to do.

I could have told her that.

Ramaker reached over the desk and tapped the emitter. It had been pre-set with a default view. “My daughter doesn’t like standing on the top tower. She suffers vertigo. So I let her sit here to watch the parade. It is just as good aview as the tower affords.” The screen assembled and focused. “Perhaps better, for the resolution is perfect.”

A starfield. At the bottom edge of the screen, the very tips of domes. The city, then. And hanging above it, the Eugorian Gate. The starfield was perfectly visible through the center and looked like the genuine thing.

“You didn’t think your little ship could hide forever behind the gate, did you?” Ramaker asked.

My guts turned cold. I held my face stiff and said nothing.

Ramaker wasn’t looking for confirmation, though. He pointed to glittering pinpricks of light between the city and the gate. “The imperial fleet. You’ll notice they’re not where they were when you first emerged from the gate.”

I had noticed. The angle was different from the view we’d had of the fleet as we drifted around behind them, but it didn’t matter, for I could see from this angle that the ships were heading for the gate itself. They weren’t all arrowing directly for it, either. There was a good number of ships moving even faster, splitting off from the body of the fleet and racing ahead.

A pincer movement. The ships would range on either side of the gate like a pair of hands ready to capture the thing between them.

The Lythion.

“While you and Juliyana were finding your way here, I sent a message to your colleague, Major Dalton,” Ramaker added. “Actually, my fleet commander sent the message, but it conveyed my sentiments.”

I wondered how a direct message from the Emperor had gone down with Dalton. He’d thought himself invisible and overlooked for forty years.

Ramaker didn’t need my encouragement to keep talking. He smiled. “The message was very simple. All sins forgiven. Dalton is free to go about his life, unmolested or pursued by any Imperial authority.”

“In exchange for what?” Juliyana demanded, beating me to the question by a fraction of a second.

He pointed to the time readout at the top of the screen. “In seven minutes, Dalton must drop that silly camouflage he’s erected over the gate and show himself to the fleet.”

“Or they shoot him out of existence,” I finished.

“Precisely. You have lost none of your sense of strategy, Colonel.” Ramaker was very pleased.

I had to clamp my teeth together to stop myself from giving anything away. Ramaker had referred only to Dalton. It was possible he did not understand the nature of the Lythion, and the rare advantage it gave us. He certainly did not know about the array’s self-awareness and the power that it gave us.

If Dalton was smart, he would have Lyth and Noam dive the ship into the gate and disappear. It would leave us on our own, but that hardly mattered.

Only, with a sinking sensation, I remembered that Dalton was beloved by those under his command because he never left anyone behind. He looked out for his men. He would not dive into the gate to get away from the fleet no matter how sensible and logical it might be—not even to come back to find us later.

Besides, the Emperor had waved in front of Dalton the one thing he desired: His life back.

I thought of the stupid garden Dalton had spoken about. How alluring was that fantasy?

I couldn’t stand here waiting to find out. I was fast reaching the point Juliyana had long by-passed. I wanted to throw up.

Instead, I tried to wrest back control of the conversation. We could still have the answers we wanted, Juliyana and I. Noam was recording these moments via the lens build into the top button of my uniform. Even if we didn’t make it out of here—which was looking more and more likely—Noam could use the evidence we dug out of Ramaker.

So I said, “There is something I think you should know about, Majesty. There is one other person on the ship—a unique individual. If your ships should fire upon the Lythion, you would deeply regret it.”

Ramaker tilted his head. “Ah…and now we come to it. You speak of the array, I presume. Did it find a way to reach out to you and pretend to be a friend? Some trick of that monster of a ship you’re using? Wedekind was delusional in the end, but still brilliantly creative. The array would have found the toys on board irresistible.”

I couldn’t help it. My breath pushed out in a rush that confirmed to the Emperor and his pet psychoanalyst that they had just turned over my trump card.

“You know about the array?” Juliyana blurted.

“Shut up!” I snapped at her.

Ramaker gave a soft laugh. “Shall we dispense with the side-stepping, Colonel? You have been brought here today under false pretenses. I’m sure the array is listening in as we speak in some way, yes?”

I couldn’t bring myself to say yes. I already felt naked. Confirming his guess would strip off another layer.

“Did you not once stop and ask yourself why the array didn’t just reach out to me and ask me to not switch the data stream away from the gates?” Ramaker added.

“Sweet stars…!” Juliyana whispered.