“Like you’d understand, even if I could explain it,” said Janissary Jane, with some of her old force in her voice. “I don’t need to know how weapons work. I’m a mercenary, not a mechanic. But I’m told it’s a largely conceptual weapon. What we’ve got here is a hyperspatial key, activating the real weapon, which is hidden away in some other dimensional fold, just waiting to be unleashed. When pressed, the button on the box gives the weapon the target coordinates and . . . Boom! There you have it. Or rather, there you suddenly don’t. One less universe to trouble the gaze of God. The Deplorable End, for everyone and everything.”

“But, basically, it’s just an untested prototype,” I said carefully. “So there is a small but nonetheless definite chance that it might not, actually, work? As such?”

“It’s a last resort,” Janissary Jane said tiredly. “When you’ve tried absolutely everything, and the Hungry Gods are coming through to eat all there is that lives . . . then the Deplorable End is your last chance for revenge. A way to take the bastards down with you, and to make sure no other universes will have to face the horrors we did.”

Her eyes fluttered closed as exhaustion finally took her. I gingerly took the gleaming metal box from her hand and had her taken away to the infirmary to get some rest. By the time she woke up, I hoped, it would all be over, one way or another. Though, if things went really bad, it might be a mercy if she never woke up . . .

I held the end of the world on my palm. It hardly weighed a thing. The Armourer peered closely at it, but didn’t attempt to touch it.

“I wonder who made it?” he said, almost wistfully.

“Armourer!” said the Matriarch, and the sharp authority in her voice snapped his head around immediately. He moved quickly over to join her and she fixed him with a cold, implacable stare. “Armourer, I hereby authorise you to open the Armageddon Codex. We have need of the forbidden weapons. Bring out Sunwrack, the Time Hammer, the Juggernaut Jumpsuit, and Winter’s Sorrow, and ready them for use.”

“No!” I said immediately, and my voice cracked so sharply across the Matriarch’s that everyone in the War Room stopped what they were doing to look at both of us. I went over to join the Armourer and the Matriarch, carefully not hurrying. I stared directly into Martha’s cold eyes, not flinching one little bit. “Not yet, Grandmother. We can’t use any of the forbidden weapons against the Invaders until they’re actually in our reality, and a clash of such powerful forces would almost certainly tear our world apart. With no guarantee the weapons would destroy the Hungry Gods anyway. We save the Armageddon Codex for when all our plans have failed. And I’m not out of plans yet.”