‘There is a problem with my edict?’

‘It would be safer to secure the resonator site and use its powers to subjugate the humans, than attempt to fight a full-scale war with them, Bountiful Font of the Dynasty’s Wisdom, Marshal of the Skies,’ said the royal warden. ‘Drawn out conflict could prove costly.’

‘Not as costly as wearing out the patience of my cousin,’ Simut replied. ‘The expenditure of resources will be worth the expediting of our goal.’

‘What would you have me do?’ asked Ah-hotep. ‘My ship is still repairing itself, but I can–’

‘Nothing,’ Simut told her. ‘I want nothing of you, plasmancer. Speed is the vital component of this plan. King Szarekh values the completion of the task to schedule more than the continued existence of the system inhabitants. Zozar and his skorpekhs will lead the first attack.’

‘You would unleash the Destroyers first, my lord?’ Ah-hotep’s spinal tail whipped in agitation. ‘I thought them a resource of last resort.’

‘You thought wrongly.’ Simut motioned to Phetos with a regal nod, accompanied by the databurst of the command protocols that would unlock the Destroyer-quarantined tombs. ‘They are a weapon. One that I have been too reluctant to use, which has cost me standing in the eyes of the king. I have perhaps confused mercy with prudence and the project has been placed in jeopardy. A mistake I will not make again – for the humans or my servants.’

The jolt of forced translocation shuddered through Ah-hotep as she materialised on the twilit command deck of her ship. Simut’s casual use of his matter transporters was possibly his least edifying trait. It was symptomatic of his entire outlook that he treated his fellow nobles as nothing more than chattel to be shunted around as he desired. The overlord seemed particularly prone to using it as a form of chastisement against the plasmancer, with full knowledge of how humiliating it was to be thrown across the void at will.

Systems were minimal but recovering after her desperate protocol override. As promised, Simut had restored canoptek services and the rudimentary command protocols. Other systems, including weapons and the stasis chamber activation core, had been triple-locked against cortical incursion. The overlord was taking no chances that Ah-hotep might access her own military potential.

The energy surveyors were her primary concern. She needed to know what was happening in the system and fleet. Ah-hotep had no doubt that the necrons would meet with swift success behind the onslaught of the Destroyers, but at what cost? Every time they were forced to ­resurrect a warrior, every canoptek contact and cryptothrall engagement risked the Destroyer malaise spreading into a new part of the system – a system to which her own protocols were now adjoined thanks to Simut’s overbearing presence.

Drifting back and forth across her dimly lit mastaba, Ah-hotep directed the canoptek swarms and higher beings to focus their attention on the sensor suite.