Void Emissary: The Book of the Void Part 1

by Lon Varnadore

  Thanks for picking up Void Emissary, the first in the series of The Saga of the Void. If you want to keep up to date on when the next book is coming out, hop on over to lonvarnadoreauthor.com and sign up for my newsletter. The site also has a blog where I talk about writing, gaming and other stuff. And, it has links to my other works. Give them a try while you wait for Saga of the Void Part Two.

  Void Emissary

  by

  Lon Varnadore

  Dedicated to the many friends and family

  who put up with my insanity to get this book out.

  CHAPTER ONE

  The Eye of Jove blazed bright, causing Pieter Strahd to close his eyes even with the smoked goggles on as he came out of the æther tunnel into the Jove system. He reached out for the Void as a reflex. The Void was there at his touch, it calmed and reassured him. The tunnel was created by the ætherscrew on the prow of his ship, which churned through the eldritch substance that surrounded all the planets of the Imperium. He took hold of the controls of his small æthercraft by using the Void, since it was easier than using his hands, and it was safer with his eyes closed. Pieter opened his eyes when he entered the atmosphere of Europa as the last vestiges of the æther’s yellows, greens, and blues thrown out from the ætherscrew drifted away. The blue and green planet looked inviting from this distance. If only it truly was, he thought.

  It was a sleek craft, enough for a drive core and small cockpit. Two bulbs on either side of the triangular craft acted as ballast and were Pieter’s steamjacks in their resting form. He opened up the speaking tube for the two steamjacks.

  Both of them replied, “Orders, sir?” Their voices flat with a slight metallic hiss.

  “Nothing yet. I don’t think you will need to leave the ship.”

  “Sir, we have been tasked with— “

  “I know what the Master said, but I’ll be—”

  “Sorry sir, you are stuck with us,” Seven said.

  Pieter gave a mental shrug and realized there was no convincing them to stay with the ship. They are programmed to protect for a reason. No one wanted to admit it, but he was still a member of House Strahd, and the two automatons would be at his elbow unless they could keep him in sight. As if this mission isn’t already difficult. He hoped that their presence wouldn’t jeopardize what he had come here to do.

  While he moved to the outer gate of the Skyquay, he reached out with the Void to touch a series of switches on the control panel, which caused various panels on the outer hull to flash in signals of red and green, telling those on the ground that he was expected and needed a place to land his craft, and also that he was an Emissary of the Void. It never took long to respond to a Void Emissary ship. They were the peace keepers of the Twelve Worlds; they were those who healed and traveled from one end of the Worlds to the other to carry news. They were the ones who had the Cerebri Caste. And then there were those like Pieter. He was trained as a partial Healer, a Seer, and Cerebri. His hand touched the thin witchwood sword at his side.

  Lights at the outer gate caused him to shake himself of his thoughts. The outer gate wasn’t truly a gate, merely a large hovering platform which was used to help direct the massive dreadnoughts, smaller sloops, galleons, and even his small personal æthercraft towards the Skyquay. A series of rapidly flashing lights in greens and blues signaled him to dock. He was able to translate the flashes before Seven or Nine could. They told him to dock at Berth Level Two, seventy-five F.

  Pieter pushed the controls forward towards the berth, taking control with his hands. He didn’t like to rely on the power of the Void more than he had to. It was tempting to do so, and that was the seductive power of it. The Void was to be used for the betterment of human and near-human kind.

  The polished gray wood thrummed with its strange partial life when Pieter touched it. He felt the saber calling out to be wielded. Pieter smiled. Not yet, not yet. The sword was there to help, and many times it had helped by staying on his hip as a reminder to those around him he was one of the Emissaries, although at times, it had been used as a more destructive tool.

  The craft was allowed to land in the northern sector of the Skyquay. Pieter allowed Nine to fire the small anchor line toward the docking post. The translucent line sailed through the air, past the post at a slight angle. The line jerked around as Nine stopped letting it play out, which caused the line to start to spin around the post again and again, until Pieter’s small craft was attached to the portion of the Skyquay.

  When he pulled open the hatch, the wetness and brine of the Yvenette Sea struck him hard. It had been some time since he had landed and been on Europa, and he had forgotten the smell. The brine was mixed with the smell of Thal, the main city of the planet. A mélange of garbage, spices, sewage, and humans drifted up from the surface.

  He looked up for a brief moment to see the Eye of Jove in the sky. Scientists said that it was “tidally locked” with Europa. Pieter understood some of what that meant, yet he didn't understand why they didn’t just say, “It would always be in the same position.”

  “Emissary Strahd,” Seven said, rolling out from under the craft and standing to his full seven-foot height. “Your mind is wandering. Shouldn’t it be on the task—”

  Pieter gave Seven a harsh cutting motion with his right hand. “Not here,” he hissed. The Skyquay was sparsely populated, yet he didn’t want to take any chances. Only a handful of Thallites wondered around, their scales and gills giving away their ancestry. A few humans moved boxes, or directed large steamjacks to move them. He pulled his cloak up, the black hood and coat standard uniform for the Emissaries. He knew that his sword was there, without him even needing to reach out and touch it; the thrum in the back of his mind was enough to tell him it was there. It still comforted him to pat a hand on the cross guard. A slight purr added to the thrum made Pieter smile.

  He started to march across the quay with his hands behind his back and eyes set ahead. No one would stop him or ask his business here. He soon found himself and his two steamjacks in a small ferry that led down to the surface. Seven and Nine waited, looking around and speaking in their own garbled tongue. Pieter’s thoughts went to the party and the mission. He then reached into his cloak pocket and produced a cravat. It was a white with a hint of a blue saber on it, the closest he could come to showing his house colors.

  “Master Strahd, that is rather pathetic attire for such a gala,” Seven said.

  “I am an Emissary of the Void, Seven. Decorum has its place, but so does my mission,” Pieter said.

  “You will use the party as cover for your mission,” the voice of his Master, Saheed, came to him as he waited to arrive on the surface.

  “Is it necessary to kill him?” Pieter had asked.

  “You don’t usually ask such a thing. Is there a problem, Apprentice?” Saheed had asked.

  “It is the meeting of the Five Families and their vassal families. The Thalis family has something to announce. It feels like caution should be—”

  “The target must be killed before the party is over. Or doom will come to the Imperium.”

  “By the Will of the Void,” Pieter said.

  “By the Will of the Void.”

  The Eye of Jove’s light cut through the æther with ease when the Osprey left the æther envelope. Kyp looked up at it, seeing a few of the other planets of the Eye of Jove system, Io and Ganymede on the other side of the Eye of Jove. Their destination was Europa, the blue and green marble below them. “I love coming into Europa’s port,” Kyp said to his fellow lineman, Guy.

  Guy looked up from his duties a moment, “Toss your line and stop lollygagging.” His green-scaled face bent bac
k to his own line.

  “The Osprey is close enough with Gwen sailing.” Kyp risked a look back to see the gangly-thin milk-pale Ioan’s hands grip the spokes of the great wheel. Then watched as those hands grabbed one of the half-dozen levers of the side-sails and engine to throttle back and slow the ship as it broke through the æther into the sphere of Europa’s atmo. Kyp, without looking, reached down and grabbed his ætherline and tossed it out. The pale line shimmered in a brilliant rainbow of colors as it flew outwards through the last vestiges of the æther before he tugged the line to stop, allowing the line to catch the last remnants of æther before he started pulling the line.

  “How do you do that?” Guy asked, twisting his lips in a sneer.

  “Lucky, I guess,” Kyp said with a smirk. He looked up at Guy’s weathered face. He was a foot taller than the youth, as were most of the crew. Yet, Kyp was the youngest at fourteen and small for his age.

  “Get ready for—”

  Before Guy could finish, Kyp was pulling at the rope of the jib sail, sail cloth unfurling to catch the air currents that would lead them to the large Skyquay of Europa. The last bits of æther burned off and the atmo-sails took over, allowing the drive core to settle. Kyp knew it was coming, yet the sudden drop made him feel like his stomach had gone to his throat.

  Kyp leaned over the edge of the rail and watched the Skyquay come closer and closer. To call the thing a quay was an understatement. It was a huge collection of timbers, metal, æthercloth, and ætherline that floated above the city of Thal’s piers and quays. It jutted out at every angle and elevation for over three hundred yards in a rough wooden sphere. The Osprey was lining up with its usual berth in the third tier from the bottom. Not the best position, yet with the cargo and money promised by Fagin, Guy had assured the linesman that this was the last trip where they would be docking as low as they were.

  Gwen lined the Osprey up perfectly with the particular berth of the Skyquay. Kyp heard the cutting of power to the engines at the right moment, allowing the ship to coast next to the pier. The ship touched the end of the pier with barely a thump. Kyp and the other linesmen tossed the anchor lines to the men on the pier, who caught them and tied the ship up. Kyp turned to follow the rest of his team to their berths. The prow of the ship held them and some of the other sailors, though they had already grabbed their belongings and left. The linesmen were always the last to leave, since they were the ones to tie up the ship.

  Kyp was one of the last ones off the ship, since the entire crew surged forward towards the gangplank.

  “Before you go, skyrats,” the voice of Fagin shouted from the main deck. “I have something to say.”

  Kyp and the rest of the crew groaned. They wanted to get off the ship and hit the Skyquay taverns. Their pay was right at the top of the gang plank, the purser waiting with his ledger and portable table. Kyp saw the purser adjust his half-moon glasses and run a hand over the thick calculator device attached to the desk, the hand crank to operate it held in his hand. He didn't seem put off at all by Fagin’s announcement. The Europan was of the Thal caste and his mouth tendrils quivered in the stirring air. Kyp knew the purser enjoyed time away from the crew when possible. He’s probably the one who set the captain up to give this speech, Kyp thought with a groan.

  Fagin walked out of the cabin, his green captain’s jacket a bit dusty, as he rarely wore the thing, usually wearing the leather of an aeronaut. He leaned down over the edge of the main railing and looked at his crew on the wider sub deck. “You are about to have shore leave for the first time in six months. Might I suggest, keeping a little bit of the pay and staying out of the brothels and alehouses?” This got the laugh that Fagin intended. “Or perhaps…” He smiled as the crew leaned forward.

  Even Kyp, who had an idea what the captain was going to say, leaned forward. He didn’t know how, yet he saw the words the captain was going to say before he said them. “You could invest in the ship and we’d stay afloat longer this time,” Kyp whispered to himself.

  “You could invest in the ship and we would stay afloat longer than we did this time,” Fagin said with a smirk.

  There was a grumble from the crew. The captain looked at the crew and shook his head. “None of you want to help the Osprey? Hasn’t she—”

  “Captain, how much are you putting in of your share?”

  Fagin looked at the one who spoke up. It was Gherland the boatswain. Kyp hated the boatswain, yet the rest of the crew hated Gherland more. All of them moved a step away from the boatswain when he spoke up. His one real eye looked around, and his mechanical one spun around, trying to give off a frightening appearance. The boatswain was from Ganymede, and the scaly face helped. At least that is what Kyp always assumed. And as soon as he thought that, he felt that he was wrong. There was something about Gherland. He wasn’t trying to be fearsome. He was trying to protect himself. From what, Kyp had no idea.

  Kyp shook his head, trying to understand where these thoughts were coming from. He ignored these thoughts and started to pay attention to what the captain said.

  “I will be putting in a portion of my share to the ship. Of course.”

  Gherland smiled. “And, what kind of portion be that?” I’ve got ya captain, Gherland’s thought echoed in Kyp’s head.

  Kyp pushed a fist to his eyes. Stop it, Kyp thought, you can’t hear thoughts. Only your imagination. The pain helped push out the stray thoughts. Only my imagination.

  The captain looked around. He didn’t seem pleased that Gherland had spoken up. The captain set a hand on the wooden railing. Kyp saw a small movement and Fagin’s sharp chimera claws slid out. He had been born for battle, yet after some incident, the chimera had come to be a merchant captain, though his wicked-sharp canines glinted from time to time. Only once had the captain used them in anger, swiping the railing he touched now and carving deep grooves into it. It looked to Kyp like there would be another set when instead, Fagin coughed and looked at his men. “I’ll be honest; it is not that much. About five percent.”

  There was a general roar from the crew.

  “However… I would put in ten if every one of you put in at least three percent to the ship.”

  The was a murmur and buzz of discussion. No one discussed things with Kyp; they didn’t like to talk to the only human in the crew. Well, fully blooded human. Everyone else was only part human, born off-world and each had something that made them a bit special, even Fagin with his cat-eyes, teeth, and claws.

  “Aye,” about half the crew shouted when Fagin asked again.

  “Good, see the purser when you collect your pay. He will divvy it up proper, and the ship will be outfitted for the next voyage.”

  Kyp hustled down as best he could, but the crew were waiting for the purser to do his duty. And since most of the crew were now trying to divide their shares, Kyp sighed and turned to sit on the railing near the bow of the ship.

  Below him was a thousand-foot fall towards Thal proper. Tiny lights that looks like motes of fireflies moved in lazy patterns that turned frantic for seconds before going back to the lazy swoops and swinging. He tried not to yawn, yet it happened.

  “What’s wrong, Kyp?” Duro asked from behind the youth.

  Kyp let out a small yelp and started to fall forward. One of Duro’s tentacled arms lashed out and wrapped around the youth. “Easy there,” Duro said. “Have a helluva time having to explain that to the captain.”

  “You mean that, Duro?” Kyp asked, looking at the one friend of his that wasn’t a linesman.

  Duro looked back at the railing. He was Europan too, but unlike the purser, he was Squall Caste, yet many called him squid boy. His right arm was a mass of tentacles. Kyp wasn’t sure if there were three or five. His face was a deep red at the moment, though it changed depending on his mood. The gills on the right side of his neck flared for a moment. Though Duro’s eyes were his strangest feature, with black square pupils in yellow irises. “Of course-- where else are we going to find an urchin who knows
how the crew operates? It would take a year to break in a new one.” Duro smirked.

  “Thanks Duro,” Kyp said while rolling his eyes.

  Duro gave Kyp a big smile. He then reached out and touched Kyp’s right shoulder with his right arm again. The hand wasn’t a hand, more a long sinuous tentacle that ended in smaller branches of tentacle. He gripped lightly, even though Kyp knew the claws inside those small holes could rip the flesh off any fish or bird and do it instantly.

  “What’s eatin’ ya’, boy?”

  “Nothing, just…”

  Duro’s tentacle touched Kyp’s forehead. “Intuition again?”

  “Yeah,” Kyp said.

  “Mmmmm,” Duro touched his chin. Or at least where the chin should have been. “You might need to take this up with the Brothers.”

  “Why would I seek them out?”

  Kyp knew Duro spoke of the Emissaries of the Void, the strange black-clad folk who were rumored to run the Imperium of the Twelve Worlds. The Squall had called them The Brotherhood, then added, “It’s another name for the Emissaries.”

  Kyp shook his head. “They’ll lock me up, and I’ll never sail again, Duro. Do you know how much I have wanted to be out in the worlds? To see the great æther and see other worlds?”

  “Yes,” Duro said. “I am very aware.” He gave Kyp a small smile. “Yet if you have a gift…”

  “How is it a gift? I hear voices,” Kyp hissed, pitching his voice low so only Duro could hear. He didn’t want the rest of his fellow crewmates to know he could do such things. He’d never be allowed back aboard.

  “Some would consider your presence on the Osprey a gift.”

  Kyp pulled back a little. “I know it is, thanks to you Duro. I know that without your help, I’d never have gotten a position on this boat.”

  “Ship, young Master Sark,” the purser said coming upon the two, looking at the two of them over his thin-rimmed glasses. “You weren’t with the rest of the crew. Are you going to be drawing pay?”