Nigel Findley - The Broken Sphere

"Of course I do, Teldin," Djan said, his voice as quiet as the Cloakmaster's. "We have a saboteur on board, maybe more than one. I personally checked the rigging and the weapons before we set sail. Everything was fine then."

"One of the hadozee?" Julia asked plaintively.

Djan shook his head. "I meant, 'before we set sail from Starfall,' after the hadozee had gone ashore. The saboteur's still aboard."

Teldin was silent for a moment, digesting this news. Then, "Have you told anyone else about this?" he asked.

The half-elf shook his head again.

"Don't," Teldin said firmly. "We don't want to tip off the saboteurs that we're on to them." He gave a grim smile. "And I don't even want to think about the effect this would have on morale."

"So what do we do?" Julia asked, her voice quiet.

"What can we do?" the Cloakmaster asked bleakly. "We'll watch the crew as closely as we can…" He paused, the enormity of the situation only now dawning on him. "We'll watch them. But there are only three of us-four if we include Beth-Abz-and there are twenty of them. The saboteur could wreck just about anything on board, and we'd only spot him if we were extremely lucky. Still," he sighed, "it's the only thing we can do at the moment." He ground his teeth with-frustration. There had to be something else they could do-something active instead of reactive-but he could think of nothing.

Julia turned to Djan. "Any ideas who it might be?" she asked.

The first mate shook his head firmly. "None," he said flatly. "I don't know any of them well enough to even guess." He shrugged. "They all have good experience, they all came well recommended, they all seem trustworthy. But, offered enough money-and I assume a planet full of illithids can offer a lot of money-even the most trustworthy person might succumb to temptation."

The Cloakmaster looked at his two officers, his two closest friends. He could see anxiety written plainly in the lines of their faces, but there was something else there as well as they looked back at him. He thought it was trust, mixed with hope. They trust me to do something about this, he realized grimly. I'm the captain; I'm the gods-damned Cloak-master. It's my responsibility. I've got to do something… but what'

He stretched a painful kink out of his neck. I'll think of something, he told himself. "Well," he said aloud, "we'll do what we can on this issue." He turned to Djan with a wry smile. "Have you got any good news for me?"

"As a matter of fact, yes." Djan's face brightened a little. "Blossom tells me we've entered a phlogiston river. A fast river, one that doesn't appear on our charts… but does appear on yours." He smiled. "Maybe Nex isn't a myth after all."

The voyage continued with no further incidents-a pleasant surprise, Teldin told himself; we've had all too many incidents recently. As captain, it had been his unpleasant duty to officiate at the funeral services for the four slain members of the Boundless's crew. He'd known he'd have to say a few words before their canvas-wrapped bodies were put overboard-'consigned to space"-but at the time the words just hadn't come. Staring at the bodies-Allyn, Vernel, Manicombe and little Merrienne-his eyes had filled with tears, and his throat had tightened so much that he'd felt as if he was choking. All he'd been able to manage was a croaked, "Good-bye. And thank you." To the crew, that had seemed to be enough-a fitting tribute from a captain who so obviously cared for those who served with him. The burial crew had taken over, and the bodies had slid over the rail. For a few minutes he'd watched the pathetic bundles drift out along the squid ship's gravity plane. More deaths added to the tally, he'd told himself. But then Julia had appeared at his side to lead him away, down below to his cabin.

Julia had been there for him during the hours and days after the funeral. Never had she pressed her presence on him, but when he'd wanted someone to talk to-or someone just to silently be with him-she'd been there. The intense, confusing emotions he'd felt for her when they'd both been aboard the Probe hadn't returned. In their place he felt a growing kinship, a calm acceptance of each other's strengths and weaknesses, of needs and desires. It was friendship, but a different kind of friendship than he'd experienced before, more intense, yet also somehow more subtle. The two had been lovers aboard the Probe, and both seemed to accept that they'd be lovers again. But neither felt there was any need for haste in consummating matters.

While the captain had been coming to terms with the changes in his emotional landscape, the crew had been busy. Under the close scrutiny of Djan Alantri, they'd gone over the whole ship-supposedly checking for hidden damage the Boundless might have taken from the recent engagement, but actually looking for more signs of sabotage.

They'd found nothing, the half-elf had reported. While they'd been at it, they'd reinforced the mountings for both booms-mainmast and mizzen-since Djan had recognized that that was a weak point in the squid ship's design. They'd also patched and reinforced the bow where the pirate's catapult shot had struck. In what Teldin had considered a meaningless exercise, they'd even repainted the scores and scratches left on the ram from when it had pierced the battle dolphin's hull. Now those areas gleamed a bright blood red, a strong counterpoint to the dull, space-faded hue of the rest of the ship.

The Boundless was seventeen days out from the Heart-space sphere. A new crystal sphere loomed ahead of the squid ship, right where Teldin's copied chart had said it would be. Nex is within it, the Cloakmaster told himself. It bas to be. The ancient book had been right about everything else. And if Nex were there, were the Juna present also? He'd know soon enough.

Standing on the afterdeck, Teldin looked forward along the hull, along the slender ram, toward the crystal sphere that hung in the phlogiston like a huge pearl. In the Flow it was nearly impossible to judge the scale of anything, or its distance, with the naked eye alone. Even so, he could feel that he was close.

He looked away from the sphere as Djan joined him on the sterncastle. "Six hours from the sphere," the half-elf said with a smile, "maybe a little less. That's what the navigator says." He hesitated, and Teldin could see doubt in his friend's expression. "She also says it's very small," he went on slowly. "Unusually small. Maybe too small, I don't know. Based on our distance and its apparent size, the sphere can't be more than a single day's sail from one side to the other."

Teldin nodded slowly. "Unusual," he admitted.

Djan smiled wryly. "Very unusual," he emphasized. "If Nex is the outer planet of the system, that makes it only six hours' sail away from the sun. If it's not the outer planet…" He shrugged.

The Cloakmaster understood his point. If it's not the outer planet, Nex is even less than six hours from its primary. In contrast, Krynn was twenty-four hours' sail from the sun. Did that mean Nex would be a fire-scorched cinder? Or was its sun abnormally small, or very cold? "Well,'' he told Djan, "we'll know soon enough."

The half-elf nodded. "That we will."

*****

Unusually small or not, the crystal sphere still loomed huge before the Boundless as the ship approached. From this distance, the curvature of the mother-of-pearl outer surface was invisible, and Teldin could almost believe the squid ship was suspended, bow down, over an infinite flat plain.

Below him, within the sterncastle, Blossom was on the helm, while Dranigor readied himself to open the portal. Djan stood in his customary position by the speaking tube that communicated with the helm compartment. "Ready to open the portal," the first mate announced. Teldin simply nodded, hardly listening as the half-elf relayed the command to Dranigor. This could be it, he told himself, the end of my quest. Maybe 'the creators'-the mysterious figures the dying reigar had spoken of at the outset of all this-were on the other side of this crystal barrier.