Word and Steel (Epic LitRPG Adventure - Book 9) (Fayroll) Read online

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  Book Nine

  Word and Steel

  Andrey Vasilyev.

  Copyright © 2017 LitHunters Ltd. (http://lithunters.com)

  All rights reserved.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this ebook with another person, please purchase another copy for each person you share it with. If you’re reading this ebook and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then you should purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Contents:

  Chapter One

  On wishes and responsibilities.

  Chapter Two

  On unexpected discoveries and decisions.

  Chapter Three

  On the lesser of two evils.

  Chapter Four

  On how falling downward can sometimes take you upward.

  Chapter Five

  In which there are some deep conversations.

  Chapter Six

  On how going back home can mean many different things.

  Chapter Seven

  In which everyone is very friendly.

  Chapter Eight

  In which we find that looking for a new place to live can be quite dangerous.

  Chapter Nine

  On how sometimes things get turned upside down.

  Chapter Ten

  In which some things work out, and others don’t.

  Chapter Eleven

  On the inscrutability of the turns life sometimes takes.

  Chapter Twelve

  In which the hero has a choice.

  Chapter Thirteen

  In which all the little things get taken care of.

  Chapter Fourteen

  In which everyone pushes toward their own ends.

  Chapter Fifteen

  In which the hero starts by pushing back and finishes by giving in.

  Chapter Sixteen

  In which everyone takes their place.

  Chapter Seventeen

  The last one, in which the hero has a chance to catch his breath.

  Book Recommendations:

  Chapter One

  On wishes and responsibilities.

  A powerful shudder ran down Vika’s body to the point that she had to grab my sleeve for support. The elevator wasn’t the problem; it was the contrast she was going through. First, we’d had the dash through the cold and dark (plus all the nerves), and suddenly, it was warm and light. She’d had plenty to drink, too… Anyone would have found themselves weak in the knees in her shoes.

  I put an arm around her shoulders, while Zimin gave her a quick lecture.

  “Vika, your feminine side has you trying to protect a certain someone, but I can assure you that this is a major mistake on the part of our security service.”

  Azov frowned, the truth biting hard, but the elevator mercifully stopped before the conversation could continue.

  “Ilya, no offense,” Zimin said to him softly. “You have a million-and-one things to think about besides our young friend. Still, take care of him for us, would you?”

  “If he listens to me and stops pulling his tricks, he’ll be fine,” Azov replied.

  We stepped out of the elevator into a softly carpeted hallway.

  “This is so nice,” Vika blinked sleepily. “It’s the living quarters, right?”

  “Of course,” Zimin said. “Living here is the best. It’s like having your mom around—they feed you, they bring you drinks, they tuck you in at night.”

  “Tuck you in…” Vika mumbled. “I just want a shower and a bed!”

  “No matter how nice the hotel is, it’s still just a building you come and go from,” I said skeptically. “It’s not like having your own place.”

  “Nonsense,” Azov responded. “I had a friend who bought the apartment he’d been renting. So, did he buy his own apartment or someone else’s?”

  “Don’t be pedantic,” Zimin said with a wave. “You’d be better off listening to what our young lady friend here said about this guy not having a moment’s rest.”

  “Everyone’s a critic,” Azov muttered, though not angrily. “Anyway, what are we waiting for? She’s falling asleep as we stand here.”

  Vika really was going limp in my arms.

  “Onward, then.” Zimin started off down the hall. “It’s just around the corner.”

  ***

  Once there, we found a table, a chair, and what looked like a reception desk. There was a girl in a Raidion uniform giggling quietly as she read something on her phone screen.

  “Something good?” Zimin asked amiably from above her.

  “Oh, just reading about some mages, the Castle on Crow Mountain— Oh!” She squealed, slid her phone off the desk, and flashed a charming, professional smile. “Mixam!”

  “Mixam?” Maxim replied, eyebrows shooting skyward. “I think I need to have a talk with Raisya about what you’ve been up to around here.”

  “Night watch,” the maid—that was definitely her—replied playfully. “And doing a fine job of it, too.”

  “We’re letting things get out of control over here in the living quarters,” Zimin said to Azov. “Sounds like we need to make an example of someone.”

  “Can’t do that,” Azov replied apathetically. “It’s illegal.”

  “Well, we can cut their bonuses, at least. Anyway, that’s not important. My good lady, show us where this wonderful pair will be living. You should have been given orders to prepare an apartment for them.”

  The girl gave our crumpled, dirty figures, a quick glance and a look of disbelief at how “wonderful” we were flashed across her face, though she knew better than to argue with Zimin. Instead, she smiled radiantly, stood up, and came over.

  “We have a two-room apartment ready for you. Unfortunately, we didn’t have time to get one of the larger ones ready, but you’re welcome to let us know tomorrow if you’d like to upgrade.”

  Before she had even finished speaking, the girl had already trotted off down the hallway, leaving us to follow her. Vika wobbled on my shoulder; I was practically carrying her.

  “Here you are!” An electronic key card slid across a white rectangle on the wall, and a red light turned green.

  “Oh, look, Vika,” I said, pointing at the tag on the door. H&V Nikiforov. “Not bad, huh?”

  “Getting ahead of themselves,” Vika muttered before asking the maid a question with a tired smile. “Is there a washing machine around here anywhere? I got this a little dirty…”

  “Oh, that’s nothing,” the girl replied, throwing her arms out. “Don’t even worry about it. Take your clothes off, empty your pockets, stick them in the basket marked ‘For clothes’ in the bathroom, and put it outside the door. That’s it.”

  “That reminds me,” Zimin said with a snap of his fingers. “You…what’s your name, sweetie?”

  The girl’s gaze dropped. “Ludmila.”

  “So, Ludmila,” Zimin said, snapping his fingers again, “tell Raisya to bring someone from a women’s clothing store to see Vika tomorrow. I’m sure she knows someone like that. Vika’s wardrobe will be unavailable for the time being, and she needs something to wear—shoes, stockings, dresses, and everything else that makes life bearable. Can you do that?”

  “Certainly.” Ludmila pulled a notepad out of her apron pocket, quickly jotted something down, and looked at me. “Do you need someone from a men’s clothing store?”

  I wasn’t sure about that. I needed my coat washed, certainly, and I could do w
ith a dousing myself, but a designer like the kind she was talking about…

  “No need,” Zimin said. “It’s easier for us. A wash and some ironing… Harriton won’t be going anywhere for the near future, anyway—he’ll be living here. We have the same height and build, so I’ll stop by tomorrow with one of my suits—a brand new one, even. I bought it in Copenhagen and haven’t touched it since.”

  “Thank you, of course,” I replied with tight lips, “but what do you mean by not going anywhere? Nowhere at all?”

  “Boys, let’s figure all that out tomorrow,” Vika groaned. “I’m about to collapse.”

  “You’re right about that,” Zimin replied. “Except that we’ll be talking everything over today, and not tomorrow. Okay, time for us all to get to bed. Except you, Ludmila—you have the night watch. Ah, we need to take care of their keys, too. Ilya?”

  “On it.”

  Vika was already asleep when I stepped out of the bathroom. She’d been first, taking less than ten of her usual thirty minutes, and then she’d thrown herself onto the enormous bed. Needless to say, she didn’t wait for me. That was a shame, too, since I still had adrenaline coursing through my veins and was looking for an outlet.

  I looked around the suite we were going to be staying in for the time being. To be fair, “suite” wasn’t the right word—it was a full-fledged apartment. There was a vestibule, two furnished rooms, a kitchen with appliances and a grocery lift, and everything was big. In fact, when I saw what the floorplan hanging in the vestibule had labeled as the “small room,” I realized that it was as big as my large room, my kitchen, and my foyer to boot—at least, if you took down all the walls.

  There wasn’t a computer, though. Vika’s phone, which I took without her permission, didn’t have a signal, either. The internet was presumably hidden or blocked.

  Crawling under the covers, I cuddled up to Vika, and she turned toward me without waking up. I gazed at her face, stern and serious even as she slept, suddenly feeling something like tenderness. Or pity? It had been quite the day for her. But she hadn’t whined, she hadn’t cursed me for what I’d brought down on her, and she’d proven that she was no coward. Not a bad girl, I found, I decided as I wrapped my arms around her. Azov is right; I need to marry her.

  A heavy knock on the door woke us up, and we found ourselves cuddled in the same position we’d been when I fell asleep. I’m getting sentimental and patient in my old age.

  “Would you open up, already?” It was Valyaev, and he was apparently sober. “Kif, damn it! Are you alive? I’m about to kick the door in!”

  “I’m so tired of him,” Vika mumbled sleepily. “You have no idea.”

  “Oh, I do,” I whispered in her ear. “Just be careful saying things like that out loud. We might have had bugs at home; we definitely have them here. So, just take it easy, dear.”

  I was about to get up and save the door from the punishing blows it was sustaining when Vika put a warm hand on my back.

  “What did you say?” she asked in a clear voice.

  “Think about what you’re saying,” I muttered, already regretting the word that had slipped out. Okay, I’m definitely going soft.

  “Not that.” She pressed up against me from behind. “What did you call me?”

  For some reason, my face lit up with a smile. “I didn’t call you anything…”

  “Coward,” she whispered in my ear. “But you said it, and that’s good enough for me. I can deal with you not saying it now that I know how you feel. Get over here.”

  “Are you out of your mind?” I asked, pointing in the direction of the door. “He’s going to—”

  “Who cares?” Vika leaped up from the bed, pattered across the floor, and yelled out the door.

  “Nikita, screw you—we’re busy!”

  The blows stopped raining down on the door, and Valyaev’s reply was puzzled and a bit envious.

  “Leave the damn thing here. I guess I can go get a cup of coffee. They’re busy…”

  Vika dove back under the covers and repeated her invitation.

  “Get over here.”

  I took her up on her invitation without a second thought, hungrier for what she was offering than I ever had been. Quite a lot had changed the previous night for both of us. You can tell that kind of thing in bed…

  ***

  “I’m hungry,” Vika said slowly. Her eyes were staring into mine, her chin on her arms and her arms crossed over my chest. “And thirsty. I need to wash my hair, too.”

  “You can figure your hair out yourself, but I don’t think the food will be a problem. Zimin told me we just need to call and order breakfast. He didn’t say what number to call, though I think we’ll figure it out. We have a grocery lift, so—”

  “…we don’t have to think about food.” Vika rolled over on her back, showed me a hand, and started counting off on her fingers. “The apartment is huge, the bed is comfortable, we don’t have to do laundry, there’s a garage right there… Nikiforov, what if we said we’re too afraid to go home? I don’t want to leave.”

  I rubbed my head and threw an appreciative glance down Vika’s naked body. She was examining her nails critically.

  “I just don’t like living somewhere that isn’t home.”

  “I don’t like it when people are out there trying to kill me,” Vika replied, looking sadly at a broken nail. “The same goes for when they’re trying to kill you. And why can’t we live the good life until New Year’s? Then, we’ll go see my parents in Kasimov.”

  Suddenly, Vika stopped, realizing that our trip was no longer a given.

  “I mean, if that’s okay,” she continued carefully. “If Ilya lets us go.”

  Someone half-scratched and half-knocked at the door.

  “This is getting old.” Vika got up from the bed, stretched her arms high overhead, and sent another course of energy running through me.

  “Vika, get dressed and head over to the kitchen. Telling Valyaev to screw himself twice today would be going too far.”

  Vika bent over me and flicked my nose. “Look at you! Indefatigable. Where is this coming from?”

  How do women know when they have the upper hand? They must read some secret signs in our soul, and then proudly stamp us. He’s mine, now, and that’s final. Incomprehensible.

  Vika opened the closet. “Unless I’m mistaken, there will be…Yup, there it is.”

  She was talking about robes. One was wrapped around her, underwear be damned, while the second came flying my way.

  “Let the loser in. Let’s get the stupid jokes and hangover fumes over with.”

  Valkyrie is right…

  ***

  Nikita walked in when Vika opened the door for him and looked at her with a measure of respect.

  “You two are crazy!” he said, shaking his head. “Yesterday, you were tearing the city apart, and today, you’re going at it so hard, I could hear you in the hallway.”

  Valyaev was red-faced, red-eyed, and stubbly-faced. The smell of alcohol mixed with the minty gum he was chewing, neither strong enough to grab the upper hand.

  “Oh, is that right?” Vika burst out. “And who was that yelling at my Kif downstairs last night?”

  “That was the vodka,” Valyaev replied honestly. “It’s a curse. I went so hard yesterday that I don’t even remember half of it. Kif, brother, was I really that hard on you?”

  “It wasn’t so bad,” I said, deciding not to push my hungover boss too hard. “But it was pretty offensive. I was definitely upset.”

  “I didn’t mean it,” Valyaev said repentantly. “Forgive me? Here, let’s drink to putting that behind us. It’s magic—it works!”

  “Over to the left,” someone at the door said. Two hefty gentlemen in overalls were carrying a neural bath into the apartment.

  “No, no, not that!” Vika grabbed her head with her hands. “Valyaev, that’s not fair. At least, let me have my man while we’re here!”

  “Can’t do that,” Valyaev r
eplied seriously. “He has work to do.”

  “Hey, that’s my capsule,” I said as I walked over and checked out the device. “It’s definitely mine. Look—that corner is dented.”

  “Who else’s would it be?” Valyaev grinned before rubbing his throat. “So, how about that drink?”

  “Enough,” Zimin said, walking in. “You had plenty yesterday. Good afternoon, Kif.”

  “Morning,” I said. “Good morning.”

  “Morning for you, maybe—it’s one in the afternoon,” Zimin replied as he handed me a garment cover. “The suit I promised you. Just in case the Old Man asks you to stop by, or something else happens, it’s good to have one around.”

  They took the cocoon into the large room, my computer following it.

  “So, you stopped by our place?” I asked.

  “Of course,” Zimin nodded. “Don’t worry, it’s all quiet. Everything’s fine in the apartment, too—your money’s where it should be, and we locked the door.”

  “It’s weird that it’s quiet. What about the police? They don’t usually miss firefights and dead bodies.”

  “They do when you pay them,” Zimin replied. “You just have to know how much to give to who. There wasn’t a firefight by your building yesterday; a few firecrackers went off accidentally.”

  “What about the car I…?” The word “shot” didn’t fit, somehow, and I finished with a vague gesture.

  Zimin sat down in a chair. “Oh, that. Some Dagestanis were shooting into the air after a wedding the way they always do, and one of their drivers smacked into a lamppost. He lost control. There was no car chase, and the guilty parties in the accident have been punished.”

  “Well done,” I said.

  “What’s your password?” one of the repairmen walked over and asked. “We need to check the interface.”

  “I’m not telling you,” I replied. “Let me enter it myself.”

  ***

  Back in the room, I found that Vika had joined the group. One hand held a porcelain cup full of coffee; the other waved around vigorously.

  “I can’t leave the office alone,” she said to the Raidion officers. “I just can’t. Those bad guys out there only need me when I’m with my husband, too—I doubt they care about me alone.”