Spacerogue by Robert Silverberg
A tall wanderer named Barr Herndon arrives in the capital city of the planet Borlaam after a year away. At a public auction, he spends nearly a thousand stellors to purchase a shape-shifting alien creature called a proteus, only to immediately order it to walk to the harbor wall and shoot it dead. His motive, though concealed from onlookers, is merciful: he knows the creature suffers unbearable agony with every transformation and wishes to end its torment. He claims publicly that the act was mere caprice, a demonstration of his cold indifference to conventional morality. This performance attracts the attention of a wizened little man named Bollar Benjin, who operates an illegal starstone smuggling ring along with a disgraced nobleman named Heitman Oversk, two rough enforcers named Dorgel and Razumod, and a woman named Marya. Starstones are hypnotic gems mined on a distant jungle world called Vyapore; prolonged exposure to them reduces any viewer to a mindless, drooling addict. The ring buys them cheaply, ships them across space at great personal risk, and sells them to the wealthy elite of Borlaam at enormous profit. Herndon is tested by being handed a starstone without warning. He manages to wrench his gaze away and hurl it across the room, proving his exceptional strength of will. Benjin offers him employment: a fixed salary, a full voice in organizational decisions, and a share of the profits, in exchange for overseeing the dangerous courier route between Vyapore and Borlaam. The condition is that all members of the ring must submit to a surgical procedure implanting a neuronic mesh in their bodies, allowing whoever holds the master control device to inflict devastating pain, enforce obedience, and kill if necessary. Reluctantly, Herndon accepts, calculating that the organization provides him a ladder toward his true objective. His real purpose on Borlaam is vengeance. A year earlier, soldiers loyal to the planet's absolute ruler, the Seigneur Krellig, had raided his home village in the region of Zonnigog, killing his parents, enslaving his brother, and murdering his sister. Herndon escaped, paid surgeons on another world to give him an entirely different face so he would not be recognized, and returned in the guise of a rootless mercenary. He is determined to find a way to reach Krellig, who is protected behind fortress walls and surrounded by courtiers, and kill him. Herndon's first assignment takes him aboard a luxury liner as a second steward in the retinue of Lord Moaris, a powerful nobleman who is the Seigneur's closest confidant. During the voyage Herndon seduces Lady Moaris, a young and unhappy woman trapped in a cold, possessive marriage. She is captivated by his harsh and magnetic presence, and he, while genuinely moved by her loneliness, uses her deliberately as a means of ascending toward the court. He continues to Vyapore, a sweltering jungle world barely touched by civilization, where he meets the ring's local courier, a shifty alien named Mardlin. He investigates and confirms that Mardlin has been systematically stealing starstones, replacing functional gems with worthless imitations, and pocketing the difference. Confronting Mardlin directly, Herndon uses the neuronic control device to torture him into confessing and returning the stolen funds, then kills him. He also forces the local stone supplier, a man named Brennt, to adopt more honest accounting practices under threat of similar treatment. Returning to Borlaam, Herndon resumes his position in Moaris Keep and rekindles his relationship with the Lady Moaris. Through her influence over her husband, he eventually secures an invitation to present himself at the court of the Seigneur himself. Before this can happen, Benjin reveals a development that horrifies Herndon: while he was away, the ring concluded a secret agreement with Krellig. In exchange for immunity from prosecution and a monopoly on the starstone trade, the ring has surrendered a share of its profits and, crucially, transferred its members' oaths of personal fealty to the Seigneur. Herndon now finds himself legally and morally bound in loyalty to the very man he came to destroy. He resolves the internal crisis by visiting the surgeons on Meld a second time and paying most of his remaining fortune to have a weapon implanted inside his own body: a device that inverts the neuronic mesh, allowing him to discharge lethal bolts of bioelectric force through his fingertips, drawing power from the intensity of his own hatred. He intends to use it once and once only. The invitation to court arrives. At the grand palace, during a formal reception, Lord Moaris stages a public spectacle of domestic punishment: Lady Moaris is found suspended naked in a cage at the center of the ballroom, being tortured with a heat-gun while the assembled court watches as entertainment. Moaris announces she has been unfaithful and that the Seigneur has granted him permission to humiliate and slowly burn her to death in public. Herndon intervenes. Unable to save her life by any other means without triggering a general massacre before he can reach Krellig, he uses his implanted weapon to kill her instantly, sparing her from prolonged agony. He then reveals his true identity to the assembled court: he is the son of the First Earl of Zonnigog, whose family Krellig destroyed. He is also, by obligation, a sworn vassal of the Seigneur, an oath he now publicly revokes. He acknowledges that breaking a sworn oath demands his own death as well. He kills Moaris, then Krellig, then sweeps the assembled courtiers with bolts of force. Finally, having exhausted his reasons for living, he turns his weapon on the great stone pillars supporting the ceiling of the throneroom and blasts them apart, waiting calmly as the roof collapses and buries him beneath the ruins of the palace.
By Robert Silverberg · First published 1958 · Genre: Science Fiction, Adventure, Space Opera · 6 chapters · 17,013 words
First lines
_The proteus could change its shape / to anything at all -- and Herndon / discovered it made a perfect red herring! _
They were selling a proteus in the public auctionplace at Borlaam, when the stranger wandered by. The stranger's name was Barr Herndon, and he was a tall man, with a proud, lonely face. It was not the face he had been born with, though his own had been equally proud, equally lonely.
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Spacerogue is listed on Textopian as a novella by Robert Silverberg, dated 1958 CE.
This source record anchors work identity, reading entry points, and catalog context for checking claims about the work.
- Work type: Novella
- Author: Robert Silverberg
- Date: 1958 CE
- Language: English
- Genres: Science Fiction, Adventure, Space Opera, Hard Science Fiction, Pulp Fiction
- Length: 17,013 words
- Structure: 6 chapters, 477 paragraphs
- Reading fit: Fairly Easy (7th Grade)
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- Work identity for Spacerogue by Robert Silverberg
- Canonical title URL and first readable passage URL
- Genre and topic classification from the Textopian catalog
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Genres
- Science Fiction — The novel is fundamentally a science fiction work featuring space travel, futuristic technology, and interstellar settings that are central to the plot and world-building.
- Adventure — The narrative centers on a protagonist undertaking dangerous journeys and facing various challenges across space, embodying classic adventure story elements.
- Space Opera — The work features expansive space settings, interplanetary conflicts, and grandiose themes typical of the space opera subgenre.
- Hard Science Fiction — Silverberg incorporates scientific concepts and technological details with a focus on logical consistency within the fictional universe.
Tags
science fiction · space adventure · space opera · interstellar travel · alien worlds · future society · galactic civilization · exploration · adventure · action · suspense · cosmic mystery