Into The Void

by Nigel Findley

  “Sometimes,” he replied, “but I enjoy conversation, too.”

  She chuckled throatily. “Well spoken. What kind of conversation would you enjoy now?”

  He shrugged, returning her smile. “Any that you’d care to give me.”

  “Ah —” she laughed “— the give and take of witty repartee. All right, then. Where do you hail from, Aldyn Brewer?”

  Teldin’s stomach went cold. He had a false name, but no false story to go with it. He desperately searched his memory. “From Wayspace,” he said, clutching at the name of a crystal shell that Aelfred had mentioned visiting. “From Waypoint,” he said, naming what he thought he recalled being the major world in that sphere. When she nodded, he asked, with a sinking feeling, “Do you know it?”

  She shook her head. “Know it, no,” she answered. “Know of it, yes. I’ve heard the name, but I don’t know much about it. Tell me about your life on Waypoint, Aldyn.”

  “It’s not that interesting,” Teldin mumbled uncomfortably.

  Rianna wasn’t going to be put off that easily. “Perhaps not to you,” she pointed out, “but I like learning everything I can about other worlds: the feel of the world, what it’s like to live there.” She sat up straighter in her chair and tucked her booted feet beneath her. Hugging her knees, she smiled at him again. “What did you do on Waypoint, Aldyn Brewer?” One part of Teldin’s mind – the logical part – was telling him this was crazy, dangerous. He should make some excuse and get himself out of here right now. Another part admitted that this was the last thing he wanted to do. With Rianna sitting near him, and her fragrance in his nostrils, he certainly didn’t want to leave. In any case, he found himself reasoning, he should be able to keep the topic of conversation away from anything sensitive. This would be good practice if he had to do it under other, more dangerous, circumstances.

  Thus reassured, he relaxed back into his chair. “I was a farmer,” he told her with a smile, “nothing interesting.”

  She shook her head, and her golden curls danced. “Don’t undervalue yourself,” she told him. “You left your world to seek adventure in space, didn’t you? How many people actually do that? One in a hundred thousand? One in a million? You did. I find that interesting. Tell me about your farm. Was it yours?”

  “My father’s,” Teldin answered, “but I ran it, ever since I came back from …” He paused. He’d almost said “back from the wars.” He had to be more careful. “… from military training,” he concluded quickly.

  “Your land has an army?”

  “I think all lands do,” Teldin answered honestly.

  She grinned. “Perhaps. What did you grow, Aldyn?”

  “Some of everything,” Teldin replied. He was beginning to enjoy this, despite – or maybe because of – the knowledge that he was taking a risk. “We were self-sufficient and grew enough to sell. We weren’t rich – far from it – but we were comfortable. It was a good life, a pleasant life.”

  “But too dull, else you’d never have left to come into space, right?” She nodded as if answering her own question. “Were you married?”

  “No. Never.”

  “Why not?” Rianna’s grin grew mischievous. “Were you having too much fun breaking farm maids’ hearts? Would marriage have put too great a limit on your freedom?”

  Teldin shook his head firmly. “No,” he answered again. “I just never found the tight woman. Maybe —” he had to smile at his own unaccustomed flight of rhetoric “— maybe that’s why I left home, to seek her among the stars.”

  Rianna’s eyes sparkled like emeralds. Her laugh seemed to thrill through Teldin’s body. “Would you bow her if you found her, Aldyn Brewer?” she asked.

  “Who’s to say I haven’t, Rianna Wyvernsbane?” he joked.

  The woman laughed again. “If all men of Waypoint are as silver-tongued as you, maybe the place is worth a visit, but you know, it’s interesting ….” Her voice took on a musing tone, but her gaze was steady and appraising. “I always thought that Waypoint was a desert world, and all you could farm there was dust and lizards.”

  Teldin had felt like he was drifting through a warm, comfortable dream. Now reality struck him like a bucket of cold water. Stupid, he cursed himself. He’d let himself get blinded by Rianna’s beauty and apparent friendliness, and she’d led him straight into a stupid contradiction. Damn it! She knew he was biding something. What else did she know?

  The woman’s green eyes were still on him. Well, he thought, he could at least do some damage control, “That must be the southern hemisphere you’re thinking of,” he said as casually as he could manage. “Well, it’s been a pleasure, Rianna ….” He started to climb to his feet, but Rianna reached out a hand and took his arm.

  “No, don’t,” she said quietly. “Don’t leave yet.”

  The woman’s grip on his arm was surprisingly firm. Teldin could have broken it, but not without some effort. And, even now, he had to admit he didn’t want to break it. He took his seat again.

  “I could well be mistaken about Waypoint,” Rianna told him. Her hand was still on his arm; he could feel its warmth. It was her gaze, now, that fixed him in place, rather than her grip. It held his own firmly, made it impossible for him to look away even if he’d wanted to.

  “We should change the subject,” she went on. “You’ve told me something about you, and it’s my turn now. In my business, I deal with lots of people who have secrets. I think just about everyone has secrets. You bow, I think your secrets are probably the most personal possessions you ever have, and no matter how rich you are, they’re probably the most valuable Do you see what I’m saying? I think you should treat a person’s secrets with the same respect you’d treat any other valuable item they have. You can accept some item of value as a gift, but you don’t take it. It’s the same with secrets.” She smiled. “There. I’ve just told you something that’s important to me, one of the rules I live by. Like a gift, I hope you take it in the spirit in which it was given.”

  Although the woman’s tone was light, almost joking, and her mouth was smiling, the glib expression didn’t reach her green eyes. Her gaze still held Teldin’s, and in it was an intensity that was almost uncomfortable. He couldn’t look away – not that he was sure he wanted to. Those deep, emerald eyes seemed intent on passing a message that wasn’t contained in her words. Or maybe it was, but deep below the surface. Teldin thought he understood that message, thought it was meant to reassure him, but he couldn’t accept that message at face value, not right now.

  Rianna seemed to sense his thoughts as clearly as if he’d spoken them aloud. She nodded as if in answer to a question or statement of his, then she let her eyes soften into the smile that was already playing about her lips; The intensity faded from her gaze.

  “Well,” she said – and her tone was as light as ever – “I hear Rauthaven is our port of call. I’ve been to the Resort several times. Maybe when we land I can show you around a little.”

  “I’d like that,” Teldin told her, and again he was telling the truth.

  Her smile grew warmer, if that were possible. “So would I.”

  Chapter Ten

  From space, Toril was to all practical purposes indistinguishable from Krynn. Teldin was surprised and somewhat disappointed to find this out. Both worlds were simple blue spheres streaked with irregular patterns of white clouds. From Teldin’s vantage on the forecastle, Toril appeared about as big as his clenched fist held at arm’s length. There was no way he could see anything through the cloud cover, no way to pick out the shapes of the seas and the continents that would prove that he was actually seeing a new world. Currently, Teldin thought, if he were feeling particularly paranoid, he could easily convince himself that the planet he was looking at was Krynn, and that the whole voyage had been some kind of elaborate hoax. Let’s just sail out and back and confuse the dirtkicker. Of course, he didn’t believe that, but in some ways it was an attractive concept. It would mean that what those white clouds conceale
d was home.

  Teldin shook his head. It would be good to get off the Probe, he thought. He needed to feel real ground under his feet, see a real sky overhead. Feel the wind, taste the rain, smell growing things. While he’d lived on the farm, he’d never been consciously aware of the close bond that he felt with the world around him. It was only this forced isolation he’d experienced aboard ship that had brought this fact to his notice. Why do we have to lose something to realize we have it? he wondered. He’d noted that trait in others but was surprised to find it in himself.

  The symptoms of his isolation had started subtly-vivid dreams of home, of walking through familiar woods, of hiking the hills that bordered his farm-then he’d found that his mind would sometimes wander off down strange pathways, contemplating bizarre thoughts, the one about the trip to Toril being a hoax, for example. There was never any temptation to accept these weird conceptions as real, so he didn’t fear for his sanity, but he did quickly come to realize that he wasn’t by nature cut out for long voyages in the claustrophobic atmosphere of a ship-even one as large as the hammership. How could Rianna stand it? he wondered. Her ship was much smaller than this one. All in all, it would be much better if he could get onto solid ground, find an arcane, get the cloak off, and be done with it. Maybe he could go home to Krynn. Or – he glanced over at Rianna, who leaned on the forecastle rail next to him – perhaps he’d prefer to make a new life for himself on Toril. One never knew ….

  “You look so serious.” Rianna’s warm contralto voice cut through his reflections. “A copper for your thoughts.”

  He smiled at her. “Save your money. I was just thinking how much Toril looks like … like my home. It’s a strange world, an alien world. Shouldn’t it look strange or alien?”

  Rianna gave a throaty chuckle. “It’s nor strange or alien,” she chided him, “it’s my home.” She sobered. “I do know what you mean, though. It’s … disappointing that so many worlds look alike. Of course, there are some old spacedogs who claim they can tell how the continents are laid out by looking at how they disturb the clouds, and so claim that all worlds look different to them.”

  “I can’t believe that.”

  She laughed again. “Neither can I, but I’m sure the stories are good for a few pints at dockside taverns.”

  They sank back into a comfortable silence. Over the last several days, Teldin and Rianna had spent more time together. It was nothing extreme and didn’t even seem to be purposeful on either of their parts. It was just a matter of taking opportunities that came up – and, Teldin had to admit, being more conscious of such opportunities. Whenever the two of them met, at meals or while wandering the ship when neither had the watch, they’d take the opportunity for brief chats. These talks were just enjoyable ways of whiling away some time. They’d rarely touch on anything of much significance, preferring to keep the exchanges light. It was obvious to Teldin that Rianna enjoyed his company, and he knew that their impromptu discussions were generally the brightest parts of his day. It was impossible to deny that a warm friendship was developing between them.

  Or, more correctly, between Rianna Wyvernsbane and Aldyn Brewer, Teldin thought somewhat bitterly. Since Rianna’s crippled mosquito had first been spotted, he hadn’t shown his real face, even when alone in his cabin. The Probe’s officers were very careful to refer to him only as “Aldyn,” and the way things were working out, the hammership’s crew had less and less reason to refer to him at all.

  The growing relationship – if you could call it that – didn’t go unnoticed. When it comes to such things, after all, even the largest ship is very small. The retinue of male crew members that had been following Rianna around the ship began to tail off in number. While she was still considered by far the most beautiful and alluring female aboard ship, it was generally accepted – at least according to the gossip that Teldin heard – that she’d made her choice as to the man with whom she wanted to spend her time. With anyone else, that might have led to some uncomfortable, jealousy-fueled confrontations. In Teldin’s case, however, the crew seemed unwilling to provoke an incident with the warrior-mage who now wanted to be called Aldyn. Envy and jealousy did still appear, but in the harmless forms of generally shunning Teldin and not talking to him unless absolutely necessary-which, Teldin found, was just fine with him at the moment.

  The Probe’s officers were a different case. Rianna seemed to have totally won them over-particularly Sylvie, it seemed. Teldin had frequently seen them in private tête-à-tête. Now the half-elven woman was quite likely to shoot Teldin knowing – and somehow sly-glances whenever they met. Only Julia seemed to feel anything less than total friendship for the blond woman, and that, Teldin decided, was merely jealousy. While the red-haired officer was attractive in her own way, she definitely paled in comparison with Rianna.

  Aelfred and Estriss seemed to view the whole thing with what could only be called paternal amusement – which Teldin found patronizing but was unable to complain about. The illithid had reminded him that it was still a good idea to maintain his new identity, no matter how he felt to the contrary. Aelfred’s only comment had been that “Aldyn’s” face looked great, but that he hoped the illusion was as good all over his body – this said with an expression of studious innocence.

  Teldin wanted to argue about the whole thing. He enjoyed Rianna’s company, and apparently vice versa, but that’s all it was. Not even friendship, really, just close-acquaintanceship, if there were such a word. He well knew that it’d do more harm than good to argue the point. Oh, well, what did it matter? He was enjoying himself at the moment, and he might be nearing the end of his quest, if Estriss was right about the arcane.

  Estriss. That was another interesting issue. Rianna had been aboard the Probe only a couple of days when she’d marched onto the bridge – so said Aelfred – and demanded to see the captain. She’d figured out that the captain was keeping himself hidden, she’d explained, and had concluded it was because he wasn’t human or demihuman. Was he a lizard man? she’d asked. Or maybe an illithid?

  Aelfred had been surprised, but admitted to Teldin that he’d also been quite impressed. He’d immediately arranged a meeting between Rianna and Estriss, wondering if the woman would handle matters as well when she met the “brain-sucking monster” face to face. If he’d been expecting any show of fear, he’d been disappointed. “She carried it off perfectly,” the first mate had told Teldin, “greeted Estriss politely, then started asking if ‘the honorable captain’ ever had any need for a message-runner.” The big man had chuckled deep in his throat. “I’m coming to like her a lot.”

  “Not too much, I hope,” Teldin had replied.

  *****

  Neither Teldin nor Rianna were on duty as the Probe spiralled slowly down toward the surface of Toril. There was nobody on the forecastle, so they’d taken it as their private viewpoint.

  As they’d drawn closer to the planet, and – presumably – as the Probe’s navigator picked the course that would best take them to Rauthaven, the cloud cover had thinned beneath them. Now Teldin could look down through patchy white clouds. There was water below them, water of an almost breathtakingly pure blue. Here and there was a flash as sunlight reflected off waves – at least, that’s what Rianna assured him the glints were. From this vantage point, Teldin found he had no way of judging their altitude, and hence no way of estimating the size of the body of water below them. It could just as easily be a small lake or a great ocean. He remarked on that to Rianna.

  “It’s the Great Sea,” she told him. She pointed. “See that island? That’s Nimbral, called the Sea-Haven. Rauthaven’s near the southeast tip.”

  Teldin moved closer to her so he could sight down her arm. In fact, he could pick out the island she was referring to, but why pass up on an opportunity like this? he thought. Her shoulder was warm against his chest as he lowered his head to sight down along her arm. He took a quiet breath, enjoying the subtle smell of her.

  She nudged him playfully
. “See it?”

  “Oh, there” he responded in feigned surprise. Her laugh told him she knew what he was doing, and – more importantly – that she, too, enjoyed their closeness. “So that’s where we’re going.”

  “That’s it,” she confirmed. “Of course, you won’t see the city itself until we get much lower.”

  Even though she’d lowered her arm, Teldin felt no great desire to move away from her. She leaned in a little more against his chest. After a moment’s hesitation, he slipped his arm around her waist and let his hand settle on the point of her hip. She made no movement to pull away or remove his arm. “Where were you born?” he asked, more to simply hear her voice again than from any need for the information.

  She laughed softly. “Sorry, I can’t point it out to you,” she said teasingly, “we can’t see it from here. It’s called Waterdeep, on the Sword Coast, a long way away.”

  “But you’ve been to Rauthaven.”

  “I’ve been a lot of places. My father traveled a lot, and then I followed in the family tradition.”

  “What did he do, your father?”

  She shrugged, and he felt strong muscles shift under her soft skin. “He was a merchant, I suppose you’d say,” she replied. “But, like me, he dealt more in information than hard goods. There are always people willing to pay to have their messages delivered without having to trust to wizards.”

  “You’re a wizard, too, aren’t you?” Teldin remarked. “You’ve got to be to pilot a ship, don’t you? Unless you’re a priest …”

  Rianna laughed out loud. “Oh, I’m no priest, Aldyn Brewer,” she told him. “Yes, I’m a wizard, but not much of one, just enough to fly my ship. I learned it young. It didn’t take me long to realize that the world’s full of creatures that would like nothing more than a nice, harmless messenger for even-feast. Magic’s an equalizer, and I always like to have an equalizer.” With the suddenness that Teldin had come to expect from her, she changed the subject. “You’re with this ship but not of it, at least that’s how I read it,” she said. “How come you’re going to Rauthaven?”