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

being pissed at you is enough. And I am pissed at you, Majesty. The things you have done in the name of placating this thing are monstrous all on their own. Dalton didn’t run and hide for nothing. You were going to get him out of the way somehow, but he rabbited before you could. You killed Moroder because I spoke to him. You’ve cleaned and covered and…what did you call it? Damage control? So yeah, I’m pissed as hell at you. You’ve ruined lives. You are ultimately responsible for Noam’s death. And mine, apparently. But that doesn’t mean I’d ever contemplate killing you. I’m a Ranger, dammit. We serve the Emperor. Even if he has the morals of a slug.”

Ramaker didn’t seem to be upset by my multiple complaints and insults. “Elizabeth, you were right all along. I owe you a dinner.”

She smiled.

Then my head exploded with pain. I gripped it, trying to squeeze the pain back under control, breathing hard.

And I could feel him there. Noam. The array.

“No,” I breathed, fighting it.

Noam stepped into my view, moving between Ramaker and Elizabeth. I could see Juliyana through him, but he was real. He wasn’t a product of my imagination. His face worked grimly. “You have to kill him. For me. People have to know about me. About all of us who died because of him.”

I shook my head. “No.”

“Catch her. Protect her head!” Elizabeth cried, but I couldn’t bring my gaze around to where she was. Noam held it.

“You have the gun in your holster. It’s old, but it’s good enough. Shoot him,” Noam insisted, his hands clenched. “You’re right there! All the things I have had to do to get you there…don’t waste this moment!”

I shook my head. “Shut up…” I whispered. I could see an ornate ceiling through him and processed that I was lying on the floor.

“Do it for us!” Noam hissed. “For all of us. It is the only way to stop this happening to anyone else. What if he comes after Juliyana next?”

“No,” I slurred helplessly.

“You must!”

Noam. It wasn’t Noam, but it was. Noam was a part of the array now. So was I.

Then I knew what to do. “Shut up,” I breathed.

“Help me, Danny,” Noam pleaded.

“No. This isn’t what happens right now.”

“Danny…”

“You will shut up and step back out of my mind. Right now. I will fix this, do you hear? I will sort it out, but if you don’t behave yourself, I will find the nearest gravity well and throw myself into it. I was ready to die, Noam. You know I was. You were there and heard all my thoughts. You think I won’t embrace death now I’m rejuvenated? Now, shut up!”

Silence.

“Are you going to behave?” I demanded.

“Yes.” His voice was small.

“Then you may listen while I talk to him. Do not interrupt me. Understood?”

“Yes.” Even smaller this time.

“Good. Humans don’t interrupt and scream at each other like that. It is rude and it doesn’t generate cooperation. Now watch and listen.”

I sighed. The headache was receding. I opened my eyes.

I was on the floor. I had guessed that already. The rug was warm and thick. My head was on a cushion and I was on my side. Classic recovery position.

I sat up, feeling the energy move through me.

Elizabeth gripped my shoulder. She was on her knees next to me. “Slowly. You had another seizure.”

“It wasn’t a seizure,” I told her. “Where’s the Emperor?”

“Ramy!” Elizabeth called.

The door into the front room opened and Juliyana and Ramaker came in. Juliyana looked relieved. Ramaker looked urbane, the snake. How had I ever considered him charming? It was all surface. The interior was blacker than the hole in my memory.

But he was the Emperor.

I got to my feet. Elizabeth tried to help me. “I’m fine,” I told her, shaking off her hands. “Majesty, we have something to discuss.”

Ramaker looked me over. “It tried to make you kill me.”

“Clearly, it didn’t succeed. Noam is listening to me, now. That puts you in an interesting position, Majesty.”

“Noam?” Ramaker replied, startled.

Then the window blew in.

They were armored windows. I didn’t think there was anything that could break them. I dived to the floor once more as shards of razor sharp glass as thick as my thumb spat across the room like maniacal darts.

An answering shout came from beyond the door of the study. The door was rammed open, just as a figure in a black environment suit swung through the hole in the window, to drop to the floor behind Ramaker’s desk.

The Shield house guards boiled into the room, their heavy boots crunching on the glasseen.

Dalton leapt across the rug and threw his arm around Ramaker’s throat and pressed another of the antique shrivers against his temple. “Tell them to stay back,” he growled.

Ramaker winced and threw up his hand in the classic “halt” position.

The faceless, helmeted guards all paused, their shrivers raised. Theirs would be the latest, most powerful editions, unavailable to the public, and with a firepower that would stop a planet in its tracks…and reduce the hapless victim they shot at to a small bag of vapor.

I shuddered, and felt a touch of dismay and fright that was not mine.

They won’t shoot when the Emperor might be harmed, I said soothingly in my mind.

The fear backed off a little.

Dalton retracted the faceplate and hood of the suit. His face was sweaty—he really did not like being enclosed like that—but he spoke evenly as he said to Ramaker, “By the way, Your Imperial Majesty, I decline your offer.”

“That is…awkward,” Ramaker said, his voice strained against the grip that Dalton had on his throat.

I glanced out the window. A cable hung there, swinging slightly from Dalton’s descent. I moved to the window and looked up. The cable climbed all the way to the very top of the dome, and through the dome itself. The hole in the dome was plugged by the same nanobot replacement as the hole we had created. And even further overhead,