He watched and heard and felt the other ships around him. Their movement through the phlogiston was like wind rushing between his fingers. Boulders hurtled by catapults felt to him like gentle rain, and the missiles that rushed past him were less than a light breeze. The ships that exploded, or were destroyed by spells, were nothing more than gusts of heat upon his face.
So many races were represented: Shou, elves, illithids, neogi, humans, giff, halflings, dwarves, ores and scro, beholders, minotaurs
… He felt them all, from B'Laath'a, the cunning neogi that had tortured Cwelanas, to the asteroid of dwarves who had allied themselves with the halflings. They were ready to die, either in defense of themselves or their friends, or in a futile attempt to take the Spelljammer. The Cloakmaster realized that, to them, it just did not matter. It was the beginning of a war that had been long in coming, and the unhumans would not stop until they overran the universe with their war machines and humanity was enslaved or extinguished.
— How many more must die? Teldin asked.
— Only those whose deaths are decreed by destiny, and by their own twisted desires.
— How many?
The Spelljammer paused. -Most.
— Must we…?
— It has been ordained. The cycle must begin anew. What was, will be again.
The Cloakmaster watched as the universe around him seemed to run black with death, like the rats that had attacked him in the Tower of Thought.
A tradesman and a nautiloid seemed to join as the nautiloid swung close enough to scrape the tradesman's side in a shearing attack that ripped off its starboard wings and shaved its mainmast into a mere splinter. Then the tradesman's deck became crowded with its halfling crew, shooting flaming arrows through the conjoined air envelopes to ignite inside the nautiloid's chambered hull. Black smoke joined the phlogiston in its endless swirl. Small explosions broke out as the arrows ignited the flow, sending Shockwaves across the small ships' decks.
Off to port, an illithid dreadnought turned and aimed its weapons at the Spelljammer. Ten ballistae fired from the Spelljammer's port batteries, then ten more from starboard. Then the dreadnought was torn by seven unyielding missiles. The ship spun crazily above the Spelljammer, looking more like a pin cushion than a fearsome illithid vessel.
To the Cloakmaster, it was as though someone had flung open the gates of the Abyss to let the fiendish lords run free.
— Don't they realize that the captain has come? Don't they realize that the ship cannot be theirs?
— Some know, some don't, but it no longer matters. They fight because it is their way. Their song is one of conquest. Our song is one of peace.
And the Spelljammer sang.
Finally, in his soul, he understood the Spelljammer's high, sweet song. It was soft in his ears, flooding his entire being with soothing tranquility. Around the Broken Sphere, none could hear the Spelljammer's song, but battles became less intense, and hatred and anger were momentarily dispelled.
The Cloakmaster was here because his path was true. Death had always been his enemy. Even in the War of the Lance, he I had hated himself for the atrocities he had witnessed across f the battlefields, and for what he had had to do. Yes, he had killed in self-defense. He had killed in defense of others. He had killed for an ideal that he would have died for, a purpose that had been far more important than a lone groundling named Moore.
And his purpose with the Spelljammer, he knew, was even greater.
He hesitated, had deliberately put it off, but his destiny could wait no longer, and his fight for life was the only thing that could save the universe from becoming enslaved by the unhumans.
This universe must survive, he thought. He knew that it was his duty to survive this war at the Broken Sphere, no matter how strong the enemy. Survive-that was all the Spelljammer had to do. Fight, defend, destroy, if necessary, but… survive. That was all.
Until the time was right.
Teldin knew the Spelljammer could survive only so long.. and that there would be no escape from its final destiny.
— Life, he sang, and his own song merged with that of the Spelljammer.
— Life, they sang.
The great spaakiil, whose legacy had been forgotten by all who lived, turned its tail to the Broken Sphere and swam toward the war.
The Spelljammer's change of course was noticed immediately. Some ships disengaged their enemies to veer away and wait to see what the Spelljammer was up to. Others ignored the great ship and pressed harder with their attacks against the smaller ships in an effort to defeat their enemies first.
Their concerns were unimportant. Their movements around the Spelljammer were nothing to the Cloakmaster, who looked upon the massed fleets as insignificant in the larger scheme of things.
Then the Spelljammer was in the thick of battle. Missiles shot from its towers to rend great holes in the ships fleeing before it. The Spelljammer tore through the mass of ships effortlessly, a juggernaut against the puny warships.
Three lampreys had engaged a single battle dolphin, firing upon it in a concentrated attack with their ballistae. The shadow of the Spelljammer fell across them like the specter of death, and the ships were torn asunder as the great ship plowed through them as if they were gnats. The battle dolphin was torn in half as the neogi tower caught it under the lower hull. Then the two halves of the dolphin separated, one to tumble across the starboard wing and into the endless flow, the other to spin out of control and collide with one of the fleeing lampreys. The remaining lampreys fell apart like sticks when the turning Spelljammer caught them from behind and shattered their hulls against the edge of its port wing.
The great battle began anew, and the Spelljammer longer stayed out of the fight. In a wide, sweeping arc that cut through the enemy fleets, the Spelljammer'was deliberate and careful, staying steadily on its planned course with its main objective always in clear focus. Wasp battled mosquito; nautiloid fought deathglory-the Spelljammer tore through them all without hesitation, raining missiles and boulders, arrows and bolts, upon its outclassed enemies.
Teldin winced within the Spelljammer's being. A eye tyrant ship had rammed the Spelljammer horn below, carving a great gouge in the chitinous hull that had withstood brushes with comets and the deep cold of Icespace. He could feel the beholder crew disgorging through the ship's hollow boarding ram, and he dropped the Spelljammer so that its underbelly scraped the top and starboard side of a dwarven citadel. The stone ship left a long scrape along the Spelljammer's belly, but the rock cracked and shattered the tyrant out of the Spelljammer's hull, to send it floating helplessly in the great ship's wake. The citadel went spinning like a top, and the dwarves inside were hurled against the outer walls from the ship's centrifugal force.
Single ships attacked the Spelljammer fruitlessly and were quickly dealt with by the crews manning the ship's complement of ninety ballistae and sixty catapults. The Armory doors were wide, open on the main deck, and the population was taking supplies and building extra weapons for all the towers, both human and Unhuman. Ammunition was plentiful and was shared by all the communities.
Then the Cloakmaster felt the ships around the Spelljammer separating in some semblance of organization. There were two squadrons of ships closing in: four hammerships, arranged in a classic diamond attack formation, and the six deathspiders, hexagonally flanking the command mindspider.