It took the Emperor a moment to compose her thoughts. “I recognize your claim of diplomatic immunity for your hoversteed. It is a member of the Royal Commonwealth, and therefore safe from any hostile action, including memory wipes, while present at my jubilee. As for my own thoughts, well, I am considering changing my mind.”
A source of tension which had filled me all day drained away. “I’m glad to hear that. But you brought me here simply to say you won’t have Tilly killed like an animal?”
“Captain Boylan, you are unfamiliar with Imperial customs, so you will not understand the significance of what we have just done, but amongst demons, this ceremony is one of most sincere respect. I want you to know I respect you so that you might believe me when I make my apology,” Astrid said.
I rubbed my lip as I considered this. “What have you to apologize for if you still believe Tilly to be a danger?”
“My behavior was offensive, regardless of my beliefs. My belittlement of your views was intolerable. Were you and I both Imperial nobles, you would be well within your rights to demand a duel. I do not admit my beliefs are wrong, only that my expression of them was inappropriate.”
I could tell that even this tepid apology took quite a lot from her, but I was torn. I wanted to applaud her unbending from her iron stance, but I needed her to admit she was wrong about Tilly.
“I appreciate your apology,” I finally said, “but I don’t know if I can accept. Tilly and I… We’ve been through a lot together, more than anybody I know who’s still alive. She’s always looked out for me. It’s not her fault she’s so forceful. She was born in a war zone. Her first lessons were under fire, and everything she’s learned afterwards, she’s learned serving as a machine of battle. She can’t trust anyone because eventhe soldiers with us turned on each other when the food ran out. I’m the only one who stayed loyal to her, so she’s always stayed loyal to me.”
“I understand,” Astrid replied. “That’s why I’m willing to give your hoversteed a chance. If it was anyone but you, anyone at all, I’d have that, that machine melted into slag, but… I trust you.” She reached over and took my hand with the same clumsy motion she had used when she wanted to say something important back at the Academy. “I trust you more than anyone in the galaxy.”
I didn’t know what to say, so I said nothing, and Astrid slowly withdrew her hand. “Besides, it’s only one AI, and my engineers have reviewed remote scans and assessed that it’s not a threat. It can’t spread through the neural net, and it can’t replicate itself.”
I reached out and retook her hand. “Thank you.”
Astrid’s voice caught in her throat, but she managed to say, “What for?”
I managed a smile. “For trusting me.”
I’m not certain who initiated the kiss, but we were up out of our chairs, pressing against one another, our mouths occupied in a far more pleasurable activity than conversation. Astrid undid my buttons and sword belt and pulled off my dress tunic, letting them drop to the floor. I undid the knot at the small of her back and began frantically pulling at the many sashes which made up the top of her gown, shimmying the whole thing down around her ankles. She stepped out of the puddle of silk, and I kicked off my boots while she pulled my shirt up over my head. I tripped, stumbling into her and sending both of us sprawling on the bed, where she pulled me to her once more.
Our diplomatic entanglement was about to get even more enthralling when, outside the polarized window, I saw a flashin the moonlight, a gleam which activated all my decade-old battle-honed instincts. I had just enough time to glance sideways, to see the demon mounted on a black hoversteed taking aim, before I pulled Astrid off the bed and behind me. She giggled, not having noticed the danger, but how could she know?
She’d never been ambushed by a rotary repeating lancer.
HEARTBURN
MOST PYROMAGNETIC LANCERSare single-shot breech-loading carbines. They have a range of approximately one hundred and twenty yards and can fire almost fifteen shots a minute. This design is dictated by the limitations of the magnetic magma cartridge. When fired, powerful shaped explosives inside the cartridge’s duranium shell liquefy the magnetic alloy core. Overcharged electromagnets shape the blob of ferrous magma, spinning off a tiny spur to contact the disruptor generator and pressing the rest into the barrel, where the bolt is squeezed into an incredibly fine stream and accelerated to mind-boggling velocities. If the molten stream contacts a shield before losing integrity, the disruptor will discharge and hopefully overload the shield, sending the hypersonic bolt of superheated alloy into the soft target beyond. If the bolt separates from the continuous line back to the disruptor charge, the magma will splash harmlessly off the target’s shield. Then the empty shell is ejected, and complicated cooling systems vent heat from the barrel in slightly over two seconds.
Multiple barrels can cool separately to increase the rate of fire, and longer barrels focus finer bolts for increased range. However, barrels are heavy, lined with magnetic accelerator coils and liquid cooling systems, so any weapon light enough for a soldier to reasonably use must trade range for rate of fire. Most armies prefer the simplicity of a single-shot carbine.
The Empire had a different approach. Their demons arranged ten short barrels in a radial pan with a large drum magazine feeding shells into the rotating disk of barrels, and mounted the entire assembly on a stock and foregrip, creating a rotary repeating lancer capable of firing nearly three hundred rounds a minute. It was too heavy for an unaugmented human, but not for a large demon. Its range was barely thirty meters, similar to a decent lancer pistol, but that was enough for the melee-focused demons. They loved to charge in, rake a formation with a drum of magma shells, then draw their great battle-axes and wade into the fray.
I’d seen it many times on the battlefield. It was why I was ready when the demon outside the window opened fire.
White-hot lancer bolts shattered the crystal window and tore into the room. The bed burst into flames, followed by the walls and the rest of the furniture. The heat of the beams streaking overhead, effortlessly piercing through the meager cover behind which Astrid and I cowered, was immense. My skin blistered under the assault, but the inexperienced demon fired high.
There was a pause in the assassin’s attack. Astrid popped up to take a look, and I pulled her back down. “He’s reloading,” she shouted.
“Get me a lancer,” I yelled back. Astrid reached her hand out towards the ruin of a dresser, and a silvery object streaked into her hand, smashing through the cooling threads of pyromagnetic alloy. I briefly reflected that Astrid mustbe more cybered than I’d imagined to have a beck-and-call installed in her hand. She tossed the lancer, augmented with a bulky hovermotor under its barrel, to me. Two barrels, two shots, versus the assassin’s next thirty-round drum. Uneven odds, to say the least.
I leapt, flying across the empty space between the burning bed and the divider to the next room. Searing lancer bolts followed, tracing out the arc of my flight, but too slow. I landed behind cover, rolled onto my belly, and leveled the pistol. The demon’s rapid fire flashed an angle back to the muzzle of his weapon as he blasted through the wall, blindly trying to hit me through the inadequate concealment. I aimed low, hoped, and fired.
With my first shot, the demon stopped shooting. I emptied the second barrel, but simultaneously a heavier high-pitched clash sounded on the other side of the wall. Neither the assassin’s repeater nor my borrowed pistol had the power to make such a sound. I leaned out of cover to see the demon spin out of sight, its hoversteed burning in midair. I couldn’t believe that I’d hit it.
Astrid came charging from the bedchamber holding a hefty three-barrel lancer carbine. “Thanks for the distraction. I got him in the engine block.” She pressed a handful of shells into my hand, and I broke the pistol open, pushing two fresh rounds into the breech as the empty casings fell smoking on the floor.
“Who the Fall was that?” I asked.
“I’m more interested to know who turned off the palace shields,” Astrid growled. I stopped. She was right. The palace umbrella shields could stop a planetary bombardment. You’d need a Fall device to get through them. How on old Earth could a rotary get through unless somebody on the inside had lowered them?
Who else was on the inside with them?
Astrid headed for the door to the corridor. “Wait,” I called, then fired my lancer at the door latch.
