The Conquering Dark: Crown Read Online Free Page A

weapon.
    Malcolm looked above him at the stone arches coated in flame. Penny wasn’t visible through the smoke and fire. He hoped she had gotten out and was angling for a better position to blow this elemental bastard to kingdom come.
    The wave of fire that had swept around Malcolm ceased. All magic users, whether magicians like Simon had once been or elementals like the Irishman, used aether. Ferghus had used it wastefully, spending far too much of it in a single attack. Malcolm now had precious seconds to take him out before the aether recharged. He braved the terrible heat, feeling it soak into his face. He spun toward the choir and emptied his pistols. They roared in a rhythmic song, as the self-ratcheting gears aligned the quad barrels one after the other. The Irishman couldn’t form another heat shield so he dropped to the ground as bullets peppered stone memorials behind him. Malcolm holstered his guns and rushed forward, leaping onto the Irishman. His fists pummeled the man’s head, hoping to keep him disoriented.
    â€œCome on, you bloody Paddy,” Malcolm shouted into his opponent’s face. “Or don’t you have the bollocks to take me on?”
    Ferghus’s temper consumed him as quick as his flames. He surged up and they fell against the ornate choir screen, rolling under the organ loft. Malcolm felt Ferghus’s fingers starting to burn as they dug into his face. The fire elemental’s power was coming back. Malcolm fumbled for one of his spent pistols and slammed the thick barrel against Ferghus’s head. The man reeled and his grip weakened. Malcolm kicked out from under the elemental as flames started to coat the man’s face and hands in a blazing drape. Malcolm’s trousers caught fire, but he had no time to put them out. He ran toward a column to get behind it. Heat surged at his back and he knew he wasn’t going to make it in time.
    A boom sounded from the top of the choir and a shell exploded where Ferghus stood. It rocked the church. The organ loft shimmied, then settled. Dust fell through the shafts of colored light. Penny lowered her smoking blunderbuss. Soot covered her triumphant face. She pushed ash-coated goggles above her eyes to see the damage she had wrought. She let out a low whistle of amazement.
    â€œJesus Christ, woman!” shouted Malcolm, extracting himself from beneath an iron candlestick that had shaken loose from a column.
    â€œWould you rather be roasted, you ill-tempered Scotsman?” she shot back.
    Malcolm glared at her and ran toward the collapsed archway where Ferghus had hopefully fallen, but the man was not there.
    From her high perch, Penny saw the Irishman running toward King Edward’s chair. “There!” She pointed and reloaded her stovepipe cannon.
    Ferghus vaulted up to the ancient chair, which lay on its side. The thought of Penny’s blowing to dust the ancient Scottish relic, the Stone of Scone that lay beneath the chair, propelled Malcolm toward the Irishman. They collided and tumbled over the chair to crash at the feet of Simon and the Baroness, who were still locked in struggle.
    Simon was clearly weakening, his movement slowing, his sword point lower. He grew vulnerable to the Baroness’s untiring machine power. A gauntleted hand grabbed the wires connecting one of the right forearms to the biceps and yanked. Her arm bent awkwardly in a shower of sparks, eliciting a scream from her. She grabbed Simon’s shoulder and jerked him forward into her knee. Simon gasped for breath as his unprotected abdomen took the blow. He fell backward over Malcolm.
    The Scotsman heard Simon say an ancient word in desperation. No aether came to bear and frustration washed over the powerless magician. Simon cursed in English and dropped his sword to the stone floor. He lunged up awkwardly at the Baroness, just ducking a blow from the mechanical arm with its spinning blades, which seemed to have repaired themselves.