The Broken Sphere

by Nigel Findley

For almost half a minute, the only sound Teldin could hear was the pounding of his own heart. Beth-Abz’s colorless eyes – unmoving, unblinking – were fixed on his. Teldin could almost sense the intensity of the man’s thoughts. Beth-Abz’s expression gave no indication when he reached his decision, but the moment was impossible to miss.

  The lines and contours of the burly warrior’s body shifted, like flowing water. His limbs withdrew into his body, and his body itself shortened and broadened. The chair he’d been sitting in scraped across the floor, pushed back from the table by his new bulk. His head, too, was reabsorbed into the bloated body, to be replaced by multiple, writhing processes that extended upward. As the outline changed, so too did the figure’s texture and color. The man’s clothes vanished as though they’d been, absorbed into his flesh through his pores. Then the skin thickened, shifted, and cracked into what looked like discrete scales. A mouth opened in the center of the swollen body, and above it lay a great, staring eye.

  The transition took only an instant. Even before it was complete, however, Julia was on her feet, a short sword seeming to sprout magically from her hand. She tried to interpose herself between Teldin and what Beth-Abz was becoming.

  The Cloakmaster grabbed her left arm, gestured her to be calm. Unwillingly she obeyed, lowering her shining blade.

  Although his heart was beating so hard he imagined the crew could hear it like a slave galley’s drum, Teldin remained seated. He struggled to keep the rush of terror he felt from showing on his face.

  Beth-Abz was a beholder, an “eye tyrant.” Teldin had seen only two, one on the Rock of Bral and one on the cluster world of Garden. The former had been dead and stuffed, mounted over the door of a tavern. The latter, though, had been alive … and lethal. The Cloakmaster remembered with a chill the destruction the beholder had caused with the magical blasts it could create. Teldin felt his muscles tensing, as though that could possibly save him when the creature lashed out with its power.

  But …

  It could have killed me at any time, Teldin realized, but it didn’t. Why would it do so now? He let himself relax a degree and observed the creature silently.

  The bulk of its body was roughly spherical, maybe five feet in diameter. Teldin guessed that that body might weigh about six hundred pounds. But, then, weight doesn’t mean much, does it? he reminded himself. The beholder was. floating in the air so that its center was about four feet off the ground. The body was covered with discrete plates of what looked like hardened skin and were colored a dark brown-green. In the center of the body, facing Teldin, was a single enormous, lidless eye the size of a dinner plate. Bloodshot white surrounded an almost colorless-“spit-colored”-iris, in the center of which was a horizontal, slit-shaped pupil. And beneath the eye was a great, loose-lipped mouth. Although the mouth was closed, the way the lips bulged clearly showed that it was full of teeth the size of small daggers. Sprouting from the top of the body were ten armored and segmented protrusions, like the legs of lobsters or spiders, almost as long as Teldin’s arm, each tipped with a single small eye no larger than a man’s fist. While the central eye was fixed, steady and unblinking, on the Cloakmaster, the ten smaller eyes moved constantly, tracking around the room, making a sickening, faint clicking as their joints flexed.

  ” Who …” Teldin’s voice cracked. Four of the small eyes pivoted to focus on him. He took a deep breath, and forced control. “Who are you?’ he demanded.

  “I am Beth-Abz,” the beholder stated. Its voice was low-pitched, slow, blurred, hard to understand. That’s how a swamp would sound if it could talk, Teldin told himself. “Beth-Abz.” the creature repeated, “of the clan Beth, of the nation Gurrazh-Ahr.” It paused. When it spoke again, its voice was less certain – tentative, almost, Teldin thought. “You saw through my disguise. How is this?”

  Teldin blinked in surprise. From what other people had told him about beholders, they weren’t given to asking questions. If something puzzled them, or confounded them, they tended to blow it apart so they wouldn’t have to worry about it anymore. He shrugged. “I have my ways,” he said vaguely. “But I’m asking the questions. What are you doing on my ship?”

  “You already know my reasons,” the beholder said slowly. “I have already told this one” – with a pair of eyestalks, Beth-Abz indicated Julia – “the details of my travels.”

  “That was the truth, then?” Teldin demanded. “You expect us to believe that?”

  The beholder’s ten eyestalks moved in unison, a strange, circular gesture. The creature’s equivalent of a shrug? Teldin wondered. “I would have no reason to tell you an untruth,” Beth-Abz pronounced simply.

  “All that you told me about crewing on various ships,” Julia cut in, “you’re trying to tell me you did all that’ You?” She gestured vaguely at the spherical shape across the table.

  “It is as I said.”

  “Why in human form?” she demanded.

  Beth-Abz chuckled – a horrible, burbling sound like swamp gas rising from the bottom of a fetid marsh. “Would humans and their kin sail with me otherwise?”

  Teldin nodded slowly. He understood the rationale; it was much the same that Estriss the mind flayer had discussed with him long ago.

  But there were still things that the Cloakmaster didn’t understand. He didn’t know much about beholders, but he had heard travelers’ tales. “What about your clan?” he asked. “What about clan Beth? Why did you leave it? Or does it still exist?”

  “Clan Beth is still in existence,” Beth-Abz admitted, “as is nation Gurrazh-Ahr.” The creature paused – uncomfortably.

  Teldin thought. “I broke with my clan,” the beholder continued slowly, “something that young such as myself do only with serious provocation.”

  Teldin leaned forward, fascinated. “What provocation?”

  “It is hard to explain, and I would not expect any to understand it.”

  “Try me,” Teldin suggested.

  Again the beholder’s eyestalks made their circular gesture. “The way of nation Gurrazh-Ahr is obedience and loyalty,” Beth-Abz explained, “to the clan, and to the hive mother – the ultimate. The existence of an individual is subordinated to the existence of the clan, and the existence of the clan to the existence of the nation. I found that … intolerable.

  “There is more to the universe than blind obedience,” the beholder continued. Its voice had taken on a new tone, one that Teldin interpreted as doubt, as struggling with a concept that came hard for the creature. “I wished to experience that ‘more.’” Again it paused. “I understood what my destiny should be within my clan and wished for another existence. I left my hive some time ago. My clan and my nation consider me a rogue, a renegade – by definition insane for placing my own needs above those of my kin. Yet …

  “It is an insanity I find I relish.” Once more it gestured with its eyestalks. “I would not expect you to understand.”

  Teldin shook his head slowly, a sad half smile on his face. On the contrary, he thought, I understand all too well … if what you’re saying is the truth. He took a different tack. “What do you know about the Spelljammer?” he asked sharply.

  “What any sentient in the universe knows,” Beth-Abz answered. “That it is the subject of myth and legend, perhaps the largest and most powerful vessel to ply the spaceways. More powerful than the largest tyrant ship, more powerful even than nation Gurrazh-Ahr’s entire fleet. Some of the false nations among those not of the true ideal covet it, I know that also.”

  Teldin wasn’t sure he grasped the nuances of what the beholder was saying, but he thought he understood enough. “And what about nation Gurrazh-Ahr?” he asked. “And clan Beth? Do they covet it?”

  “I can no longer speak for my clan or my nation,” Beth-Abz said slowly, and this time the sadness in the creature’s voice was unmistakable. “I no longer have clan or nation. I can speak only for myself, and I would as soon covet an entire crystal sphere as the Spelljammer, for the chances of obtai
ning either are nonexistent.”

  The Cloakmaster was silent, lost in thought. He watched his fingers stroking the heavy grain of the tabletop. Then he raised his gaze back to the beholder. “What would you say if I told you that I sought to captain the Spelljammer?” he asked quietly. He heard Julia’s gasp of shock, but forced himself to ignore her.

  With a chorus of clicks, all ten of Beth-Abz’s eyestalks pivoted around to focus on Teldin. “I would say your insanity is even greater than mine,” the creature said at once. “Yet I would also say that your destiny is your own, Captain, and the direction of your life is yours to choose.” It paused. “I would also say that I would relish a chance to glimpse the Spelljammer,” it finished wistfully.

  Good answer, Teldin told himself. It has the ring of truth. But can I trust this thing?

  Yet what good would distrusting Beth-Abz do? He remembered what he’d heard about beholders, that each of its smaller eyes could direct blasts of destruction, and that its central eye could emit a ray capable of suppressing all magical activity. If it wanted me dead, I’d be dead already, he thought again. If it wanted the cloak, it could kill me and take it off my body, and the entire crew of the Boundless couldn’t stop it. Or it could simply suppress the magic of the cloak and take it from my shoulders. (Now there was a thought ….)

  But Beth-Abz hadn’t done any of those things. What possible benefit could it gain from deceiving him? Teldin wondered.

  He watched the beholder silently. All of its eyes were still fixed on him, as it watched him in return.

  The creature was terrifying, its potential for destruction impossible to estimate. In form it was a monster … but, Teldin found, he wasn’t thinking of it as a monster. Maybe his time with Estriss, and his exposure to other sentient races that humans might consider monsters, had burned that atavistic, instinctive reaction out of him. Beth-Abz was a thinking, feeling creature. A potential threat, yes – but also a potential ally of great power. And – who knew? – maybe a potential friend.

  The Cloakmaster nodded as he made his decision. “Will you sail with me, Beth-Abz?” he asked. “Will you accept my authority as captain?”

  “I have already done so.” The hideous creature’s response seemed guileless.

  Teldin laid both hands flat on the table before him. “You are part of my crew, Beth-Abz,” he said quietly. From the corner of his eye he could see Julia’s look of disbelief. Yet almost at once he saw her suppress her reaction, saw her shoulders relax as she accepted his decision.

  Before him, the lines of the beholder shimmered again as it began its shift back to human form.

  “No,” Teldin said sharply. The transformation ceased; the beholder returned to its spherical form. “No,” the captain repeated, “you’ll keep your true shape. I don’t want any more deception on this ship. I’ve had enough of deception.”

  He turned to Julia. “Please spread the word about our … um … new crew member.”

  Again Julia stared at him as though he’d lost his mind. “It’s going to be a hard sell, Teldin,” was all she said.

  He shot her a reassuring smile. “Then think of the satisfaction when you succeed.”

  Chapter Five

  The privateer Shark hung against the psychedelic backdrop of the Flow, its helm warmed up for station-keeping and prepared for pursuit or flight. In front of the battle dolphin, the outer surface of Heartspace’s crystal sphere looked like an infinite wall of mother-of-pearl. From the command deck, the permanent portal into the sphere’s interior looked like a black disk limned around the edges with Saint Elmo’s fire. At this distance, the portal – actually large enough to accommodate even the biggest ship – appeared about the size of a doubloon held at arm’s length.

  Captain Berglund leaned back against the aft railing, looking forward down the length of the command deck toward the shimmering portal. He pulled from his belt pouch the folded sheets of parchment he’d been given when he was ashore on Starfall. For the dozenth time since entering the Flow, he reread his orders – he still thought of them as “orders,” even though it had been seven years since he’d deserted from military service.

  The orders were very specific. Hold station at a specific point outside the Heartspace sphere and wait for a particular vessel to exit through the portal. Intercept said vessel and cripple it. Board and put the crew to the sword … with one exception: the captain was to be spared, no matter what it took to guarantee that. Scuttle the target and head off with all haste into the Flow for a distant crystal sphere, bringing the captain as prisoner.

  Berglund stroked his beard as he thought. With the exception of sparing the captain, the orders matched his standard operating procedure. He didn’t have a problem with that part of the mission at all … particularly since the nondescript human who’d hired him agreed that Berglund could keep whatever booty he could take from the vessel.

  What did bother him was the amount of detail he’d been given about the target. He turned to the second page of the orders. Here was a complete rundown on his victim – a squid ship, he noted again. There was also a manifest detailing all the weapons the vessel carried, its projected time of arrival at the portal, plus an entire crew roster. Berglund simply wasn’t used to having this level of intelligence on a target.

  Still and all, he thought, it does make my job easier, and guarantees no surprises. You don’t refuse a gift ship just because you smell dry rot, do you?

  But where did that mystery man get all this information? Berglund wondered again. There was something about this that hinted to the pirate captain that he was getting into something much too big for him.

  Yet the payment was big, too, wasn’t it? Even if the squid ship turned out to be empty of valuables, Berglund and his crew would make more from this single operation than they’d normally make in a four-month of piracy.

  He shook his head. His battle dolphin against a squid ship was normally a much closer fight than he liked. Smaller, less maneuverable, and worse – armed vessels were much more tempting targets. Even though Berglund was a good tactician, there was always the chance of losing such a well-matched battle. Yet the mystery man had said that had been taken care of, too ….

  A final time he read the section describing how the enemy captain was to be treated. Bound hand and foot, blind-folded, and gagged – that he could understand. But kept unconscious throughout the entire return voyage, even if that meant risking his captive’s life through repeated blows to the head? There definitely was more to this mission than he knew.

  Still, he supposed, he who pays the piper calls the tune. And this piper was very well paid indeed.

  *****

  The crew’s even better than I expected, Teldin Moore thought. Although the revelation that Beth-Abz was a beholder shocked the crew members down to their very cores, their outward reactions had been calmer than the Cloakmaster would have thought possible. There’d been no hysteria, no outrage, and – Teldin’s greatest unspoken fear – no hint that anyone was considering mutiny.

  Certainly, the crew had treated the beholder with fear at first, shying away from it whenever it appeared, as though it would vaporize them at any moment. But within only a few days, their reactions had started to change. Fear had faded and quickly become respect. Crewmen still stepped well back when Beth-Abz floated across the main deck or entered the galley, but the wide eyes and grimaces of terror were gone. It hasn’t killed me so far, each crew member seemed to think, so why should it now … as long as I don’t give it a reason?

  For the first week after the revelation, nobody had talked with the beholder, probably because they just didn’t know what to say. Teldin, Julia, and Djan – who took the whole matter in stride, as if sailing with an eye tyrant were an everyday thing – had gone out of their way to be seen treating Beth-Abz no differently than the rest of the crew. They’d greeted the creature in the same way they would anyone else, and chatted idly with him whenever they happened to have similar duties.

  The e
xample hadn’t been missed by the crew. At first cautiously, and then more freely, other members of the Boundless complement had taken to striking up conversations – albeit very brief ones – with the spherical creature. Teldin had known the campaign to integrate Beth-Abz with the rest of the crew was won when he’d wandered into the saloon one graveyard watch and found the beholder trading travelers’ tales with a handful of off-duty sailors. When he’d heard them break into laughter together – the harsh, coughing sounds of the beholder’s mirth mixing with human chuckles – he’d been amazed.

  “I can’t believe it,” he’d told Djan the next morning, after describing what he’d experienced. “The credit’s all yours for picking good spacers.”

  The half-elf had shaken his head. “No,” he’d corrected Teldin, placing a hand on the captain’s shoulder, “I think the credit’s yours. They trust you, Teldin. They trust your judgment, and they want to sail with you. If a beholder in the crew’s mess is acceptable to you, then it’s acceptable to them.”

  In his familiar position on the afterdeck, Teldin shook his head. Everybody’s always so keen to trust me, he thought. Sometimes I think I’m the last person they should trust … if they want to stay alive, at least. He took a deep breath and forced the thoughts from his mind. He knew all too well that they’d be back, however.

  “Portal ahead, Captain.” Djan’s voice rang out, echoing hollowly through the speaking tube the half-elf had installed running up the mizzenmast from the helm compartment to the afterdeck. “Slowing to tactical speed.”

  Teldin stamped on the deck once – the agreed-upon signal for “message received and acknowledged.” Then he waved to Julia, who stood on the forecastle by the mainmast.

  “Crew aloft,” the copper-haired second mate called. “Rig for portal passage. Flow stations. Extinguish all flames.” On her order, four crewmen scurried up the ratlines, while twice as many more on the main deck hauled on lines to trim the rigging. Still others scoured the ship, putting out torches and braziers, so as not to ignite the volatile phlogiston once the ship passed through the portal.