The ship that might be the Dragonshelf dropped almost straight down on the nasty-looking orange and black one. Nubry had known Bott could fly, but watching it from here made that really obvious. If only he hadn’t been a pirate as well! Her eyes moved to where the captioned dialogue was rolling up the screen.
DEAR ME, CAPTAIN DARLING. COULD WE NOT RECRUIT THEM AS CREW?
NO, SWEET NBASSADA. EVEN COPIES OF THAT INSANE LIBRARIAN MIGHT RUIN OUR TRIUMPH.
THEY’D INSIST ON KEEPING THE BOOKS. AND TJEY OUTNUMBER US.
This sort of thing had upset her at first. But there was no sense in getting angry. She wasn’t likely to live long enough for it to make a difference.
All that she asked was to be completely dead before she saw them destroy the books she had sworn to protect and defend. It couldn’t be long now. The cuffs were surely all that was holding her up. One foot stretched out in front of her as if she were climbing a very shallow staircase. Her hands were clasped behind her head, pressing forward just enough to hurt.
I THINK WE SHOULD JETTISON THE BOIOOKS AS WE LEAVE, TO CONFUSE THE SENSORS WHEN THEY TRACK US.
I SAY SET THEM ALIGHT AS WE DROP THEM, TO CAUSE A DIVERSION.
I DO HOPE YU LADIOES AREN’TGOING TO ARGUE. WE HAVE A LOT OF WORK TO DO AND YOUR CONTINUED FRIENDSHIP IS KEY TO OUR SUCCESS.
“Bilstim controls!”
Nubry frowned. That had been Bott’s voice; she hadn’t run across that particular expletive anywhere else. Were they fighting right under this room? Would she have heard it, even so? And why didn’t it show up on the monitor?
She rolled her eyes to the Emperor, who was using a long blue swizzle stick to stir small ichikans who struggled in a solvent which destroyed their bodies without killing them. He reached for a straw.
OH, WE COULD NEVER ALLOW PETTY QUARRELS TO INTERRUPT OUR DEVOTION TO YOU,DEAR CAPTAIN.
THERE, CAPTAIN. GIVE HER A SHOT UP THE TAILPIPE, THE WAY YOU DID
Nubry’s head jerked to one side. She’d heard him say “flowers”. She knew she’d heard him. Ignoring what felt like a million red hot needles in every muscle of her body, she turned her head, looking for some alternate source of communication.
Catching the movement, His Imperial Worship glanced at his captive and then back at the battle. “Pity your captain doesn’t realize one of his ladies is feeding us secrets.”
“Is she really?” That black spot on his earlobe: it wasn’t the only spot on his face but it was the only Kydczak earphone. She strained to hear: Bott was saying something about circles.
WE SHOULD POUR ACID ON THE BOOKS AND MAKE THEM REALLY DANGEROUS WHEN WE DROP THEM.
“Only a tiny fraction of what she tells us is any use.” The Emperor took a long drag on the straw. “But the odds were so goof I thought I should bet on one of them making it out alive.”
“Why are you wearing….”
A hand slid from his beaker to the controls. Nubry’s face was lowered to the level of her waist. Her ankles came sharply together and then spread left and right.
She felt herself moan as her feet were jerked above her head. But her brain was busy with that tiny earphone. If he was listening to the prisoners with that, all the words on the computer could be lies. Bott probably wasn’t planning to destroy the books at all. Why would he? No pirate would destroy something he could sell.
Her nose itched; ti would run if she wasn’t so dehydrated. It could simply be something else, someone else’s voice. Or the words on the monitor could be delayed, while the Emperor was listening to them in real time. And she wasn’t going to live to find out. As that long hand reached for the nastiest button on the console Nubry recited to herself the Schlatter Seed Carakog Inventory. Maybe if she realty concentrated, she could ignore the pain.
The thumb held its position just above the vital control. Imperial eyes had turned to the screen. Nubry was about to cheer at the sight of the perhaps-Dragonshelf moving around behind the wicked-looking other ship, but remembered in the nick of time that she was possibly very angry at the pirate.
The tiniest vibration in the big eggshell told her the Imperial thumb had not forgotten its duty. A second later, her face was on fire, and the familiar flaming claws were tearing flesh from her back.
The Emperor took another drink.
Hot coals forcing themselves up through her throat told her the new copy was about to arrive. She forced herself to think of something else, to concentrate as she had during long days on the Dragonshelf. Having read a number of books on mental powers, she had tried to force characters from other books to materialize, and talk to her. She wanted to ask Lilu Lemonleaves why she had never, in the course of fifteen novels from Decledy, trust her husband. She intended to discuss weather with rain deity Kilaui Dumm-Dumm, and introduce Susan Sedan to Justin Alastair. Right now, if she worked hard enough, perhaps she could materialize the reading room around herself, and be aboard the Dragonshelf, ordering a conversation between people who never got to meet.
A figure was hovering just on the edge of reality. The copy, of course: Nubry’s powers of concentration had never materialized anything even this ephemeral. She had always felt a little guilty about forcing dialogue into the mouths of other people’s characters. As her spine seemed to roll into a little ball, cracking and splintering in phantom stabs of red agony, she decided to stop feeling gulty about it.
“Move back,” she thought, staring at the spot where the copy was growing but not allowing her eyes to focus. It was the same method she used when trying to materialize Lily Lemonleaves. “Move back.”
Suddenly the copy was solid, and suddenly the trap door opened. But between the suddenlies, the copy rolled one leg over the other and moved away from the opening in the floor.
Nubry glanced at the emperor. At first she thought he was enrapt by the way the big ship of black and orange (hereditary colors of the hawk people of Wilnead) was desperately trying to elude the maybe-Dragonshelf. But no: his eyes were fixed on a smaller monitor showing the current odds, his hands flexing to change the conditions in the big white room in any way that might enhance his profit.
Looking down, she saw the poor girl trying to get up. She did not look at all well. His Imperial Worship must have twiddled his controls to make her look even worse. Surely she, herself did not look so raw, so flimsy.
The Nubry on the floor tried to get her legs under her. She had very thin legs. She opened her mouth as if she had to cough.
“Don’t cough,” the original Nubry thought. The copy swallowed.
On the big screen, the library ship rose swiftly against the bottom of the larger one, trying to smash it against the ceiling. Nubry nodded; she might have tried that.
“Catch your breath,” she thought, as the other Nubry struggled to rise. She wondered why the copy didn’t look back. It was really quite interesting. One to thing watch oneself moving on a screen; the brain could explain that away. Seeing Nubry in the flesh, leaving bloody streaks as she dragged herself along the floor, was an entirely other thing.
Yet here she was, dangling in mid-air high above the light blue tile. The copy ought to take a look, Nubry’s whole career was based on sharing interesting things.
Now look: the copy’s mouth was open and her tongue was hanging out. Where did that come from ? She never did such a thing. Did she? Well, hardly ever.
QUIT PLAYING WITH THEM, CAPTAIN SWEETNESS. JUST FINISH THEM OFF.
YOU JUST WANT ME TO PLAY WITH YOU SOME MORE.
Nubry frowned. Interesting as this was, there ought to be something useful she could do with it. That she could give instructions to the copy was an achievement, perhaps the last of her life. But what did she want it to do?
The emperor nodded as the possible Dragonshelf swooped. The other ship was way too low as it came across those tall cones.
“Go up and take those controls away from him,” Nubry thought. “Take them away.”
The copy’s head turned toward the Imperial chair, her tongue still hanging out, her torn chest heaving with deep breaths. The Emperor did not look back. The large ship pulled up too late.
“Hurry,” thought Nubry.
The copy’s shoulders bounced. Muscles tensed in her legs. The bottom of the orange and black ship was torn open.
“Boy hey!” cried the Emperor, as the copy leapt.
Both Nubrys shrieked as the copy hit the forcefield around the Imperial chair, One stopped sooner than the other. The surviving Nubry watched the copy fall to the floor, emitting smoke in a dozen places.
“My compliments,” said His Imperial Worship, as the copy fell into ash. “I’ve never had a duplicate try to take my life.”
“I never….” Nubry found her head being pulled up and back. Her hands were still behind her, but her elbows drew in.
“It must frustrate you more, but I need to inform you this shield has neither a battery to steal nor a cord to cut.”
Nubry tried to explain again that killing him was not her plan, but found herself unable to speak through a neck bent this way. Her lips rose in a smile she didn’t intend as an Imperial hand swept across a spherical control.
“You must not hurt enough.” He spun another sphere on the console. “Let’s augment the power and see if that doesn’t occupy your mind.”
The Imperial thumb hit the Start button again.
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