Since it was just the two of them, Dred obeyed. She much preferred the bone-reader when he wasn’t pretending to be crazy. Though sometimes episodes did genuinely overtake him, they weren’t as frequent as he let on. She didn’t begrudge him the fiction, though, as it kept other inmates from bothering him. Even in Perdition, there was a superstitious dread of harming a madman.
A day after their return, he was installing a turret at the east checkpoint. There was no ammo chamber built into the floor, so it had to be reloaded manually. All the men would need to be trained in that, but before it was necessary, they had to get the thing working. Wills had been trying for an hour before she came along, and he was in quite a testy mood, as it was rare for him to require this much effort to get something affixed to his liking.
“I need something to solder this in place,” he muttered.
“Could your bot help?” She recalled the thin maintenance laser.
“Genius. Hold this, I’ll be right back.”
Dred nearly toppled backward as he released the full weight of the gun into her hands. Somehow she steadied it and kept it from toppling. That could’ve been disastrous. Especially if it hit the firing mechanism on the way down. Biting back a curse, she glanced over her shoulder to see one of the guards moving to help her. Idiots.
He didn’t ask if she was all right, just took part of the weight for her. “These are motion-activated, right?”
“Yes, you won’t need to fire it.”
The convict grinned, showing rotten teeth. “Pity.”
She donned her iciest look. “I’ve got it. Step back.”
It didn’t do to permit too much familiarity. Sometimes it was lonely, but better this way; she couldn’t have the men remembering she had been Artan’s preferred bedmate before she’d killed him. It might give them ideas about their place in Queensland. Tam had worked too hard to build her legend for her to screw with it now.
Fortunately, he obeyed, as how she would’ve forced the issue with her arms full of turret, she had no idea. Dred laid it down on its side, away from the firing mechanism and turned to look for Wills, who was on his way back with R-17. The work went faster with the bot’s help, and two hours later, the first turret was installed.
“Why didn’t you have 17 with you?” Given that the droid had accompanied Wills everywhere since they found the thing, she was surprised he hadn’t been using it.
“Ike was finishing some upgrades.”
“Like what?” she asked, as they headed back to the hall.
Wills glanced around as if to make sure there were no eavesdroppers, then whispered, “He’s programmed it for self-defense.”
“That’s phenomenal news.” It was a relief to know some drunken idiot wouldn’t break R-17 in a fit of rage without realizing how critical the droid was. But she couldn’t circulate the truth, or somebody would steal it. Even in Queensland—the least hellish of Perdition’s territories—she couldn’t alter the fundamental nature of the citizenry. “Great work.”
“Ike did most of it. He’s not much for general repairs, but he knows a lot about bots.” The bone-reader offered a shrewd look, running a hand through his wild hair. “He’s building something, by the way. I want to get back and see if I can help.”
“Report,” she demanded.
This was how Artan lost control. He lost touch, stopped paying attention to the details and thought only of his own pleasure. You need to keep your finger on the pulse.
“He’s got spare parts, the scrap from the Peacemaker. I think he’s trying to build a defense bot, like they have in Abaddon.”
“It would relieve my mind if we had it up and running before we march.”
“Me, too,” Wills said soberly.
Dred remembered that he’d voted against trusting Silence. It bothered her that her two oldest advisors both thought it was a bad idea to commit to the assault. But what’re my choices? Wait for Priest and Grigor to join up and come to Queensland? Death’s Handmaiden seemed the lesser of the evils in this situation, not that she felt delighted with that conclusion.
Sometimes you just have to roll the dice.
“I’ll want a reading before we move out,” she said then. “But not today. Find Ike. Keep me posted.”
“Yes, my queen.”
Great, now Tam has Wills saying that, too. Only he didn’t offer the same ironic edge as the spymaster, who knew full well that she wouldn’t be sitting on the scrap-metal throne without his intel and machinations. All I did was kill a man I hated. Tam did the rest.
She lifted a hand in parting, then went to see Tam. He’d filled her in about how he’d crushed a budding rebellion, using Calypso to quietly spread the word that Dred’s people knew about the meeting . . . and that anyone who attended would be executed. Not surprisingly, there was nobody at the appointed coordinates at 2300 hours.
After he thwarted Lecass, Tam had left last night to scout Entropy to see if they showed signs of honoring their commitment. Dred needed to talk to him to see what he’d discovered, so she checked the hall first. She found him breaking his fast alone and joined him. As Dred hadn’t eaten, she grabbed a bowl of mush, tasteless but filling.
“Do you have any idea why Einar didn’t come to bed last night?” she asked.
The spymaster nodded. “He was drinking with the new fish. Think he’s still passed out.”
Dred didn’t ask where Jael was; she refused to be curious. But with Einar on a bender and Tam out spying, she’d slept alone for the first time since Artan died. It was . . . strange. She hadn’t gotten much rest, keeping an eye on the door in case someone took the opportunity to attempt assassination. From what Tam had told her, Lecass was looking for a way to get the job done. She suspected his patience would run out soon.
“What did you learn?”
Tam frowned. “Not as much as I wished. The angle was bad, and the lighting was worse. Silence doesn’t speak, even when she believes nobody else is around.”
“So you observed a signed exchange?”
“Exactly. And my vantage wasn’t ideal; her throne room is set up to prevent surveillance.”
“Don’t keep me in suspense,” she prompted.
“It was bits and pieces except this. ‘We’re nearly ready.’ In context, I think it was a question for the Speaker.”
“That, coupled with her adherence to her own code, gives me hope,” she said softly.