The Broken Sphere Read Free

following the line of his jaw – still felt strange to his fingers.
    But it certainly goes with the clothes, he had to admit. With his light brown curls cropped in what he thought of as a “helmet cut” – short, to fit under an armored helmet – and the beard, plus the black clothes, he looked quite piratical. Teldin Moore, wildspace pirate, cutlass-for-hire. He snorted.
    Still and all, he told himself, I wear the Cloak of the First Pilot, as the elves call it. Why not dress the part? He flipped his mirror image a mocking salute.
    For a moment, he considered going out on deck for a breath of fresh air. The one-compartment cabin of his ship was small, not much larger than the sail locker he’d shared with the gnomes aboard the Probe. Sometimes he regretted his decision to set sail alone in a ship tiny enough to be crewed by one man. While he relished the privacy, and the chance to think without interruption, he frequently suspected the tradeoffs had been too great. Space was a major issue, but even more important was the fact that he couldn’t put an end to his privacy when he was done thinking his deep thoughts.
    Still and all, he reminded himself, you’ve made your bed and now you’ve got to lie in it.
    After parting with Vallus Leafbower, the bionoid Hectate, and the other members of his last crew, Teldin had looked into acquiring a private ship. At first he’d balked at the staggering prices of even the smallest spelljamming vessel. But then he’d discovered, through conversation with a minor ship broker, that money was the least of his problems. Apparently – thanks to one “Master Captain Leafbower” – Teldin had a line of credit, backed by the Imperial Fleet, sufficient to buy outright anything up to the size of a hammership, like the late Aelfred Silverhorn’s Probe, or even larger.
    A ship that size wasn’t what Teldin wanted, however. It hadn’t taken him long to spot the vessel that matched his needs perfectly. The ship broker had acted as though Teldin had taken leave of his senses when he pointed it out, but that didn’t matter. There was something about the old river trader – converted for spelljamming travel through the addition of a battered minor helm – that called to him. The ship’s background, he’d thought, was probably very much like his: spending the majority of its existence in some peaceful, bucolic – and definitely terrestrial – setting, and only lately being thrust into the confusing reality of wildspace, the Flow, and the greater universe.
    The trader was short and beamy – not more than thirty feet from prow to stern, and more than half that in width – with a single square-rigged mast. It had a single communal cabin, with a small, closed room for the helm at the stern, plus a surprisingly large cargo hold. In answer to Teldin’s question, the broker had reluctantly admitted that the ship could be handled by a single person – though at much reduced speed and maneuverability – and that had sealed the matter in the Cloakmaster’s mind.
    The deal was settled, and the next day at dawn he’d set off. With his cloak – the ultimate helm – glowing sunrise pink at his back, Teldin had listened to the water hissing from the ship’s hull as he climbed away from the harbor. A few quick experiments had confirmed that the decreases in speed and maneuverability arising from a crew of one were more than compensated for by the incredible control the cloak gave him. The ship was unarmed, but the Cloakmaster was confident he’d be able to evade all but the swiftest vessels that might come after him.
    And so he’d taken to wildspace in his own vessel – which he named the Ship of Fools, even though he now was the only fool aboard, alone and – for the first time in a long time – free.
    But I’m not really free, am I? he asked himself, stroking the smooth fabric of the cloak. Not while I’m wearing this.
    No matter how much he wanted to deny it, he