Conan the Marauder (22 page)

"I do not," Conan replied. "I have served in a dozen armies, in every rank from spear man to general. I have commanded fleets of raiding ships on the Western Sea and the Vilayet. I have fought in every kingdom west of Khitai. And I have slain far more than two horse-archers who were not handy with swords."

' 'And what is so mighty a warrior doing out here on

the steppe with naught but a single horse?" the young man asked sarcastically.

"Until recently I was an officer in the horde of Bartatua, the Hyrkanian. A misunderstanding arose and I had to flee. Just now—"

"Bartatua!" Manzur exclaimed. "You have been serving with our enemies! No enemy of Sogaria's may live in my presence!" The youth sprang to the ground and whipped out his blade.

"I no longer—" But before he could finish his sentence, the lad was advancing on him. Muttering an oath, Conan ripped forth his own blade. All he needed, he thought, was a fight with a vainglorious young fool. He had no doubt over who would win, but even the greatest of swordsmen might be wounded by an ardent amateur, and a minor wound could prove serious in this isolated place.

With a distracting stamp of his foot, Manzur feinted a cut to Conan's knee, only to flip his point up and drive a full body lunge toward the Cimmerian's throat. Conan recognized the move; it was a lunge taught by Zingaran sword-masters., modified for the curved blade of the east. He batted it aside and clouted the youth beside the head with his open palm. Boy and helmet went flying.

"First lesson—"Conan said—"never extend a lunge that far in a real fight. It takes too long to recover when you miss. Your leading knee was so far forward that I could have shattered it with my pommel."

"I shall remember," Manzur said, flushing crimson as he picked himself up from the ground. "Now, defend yourself!" He launched a flurry of blows, bewildering in their complexity, and for a few moments Conan found his hands full in dealing with them. He had to admit that the boy was swift and skilful.

But Conan was swifter and more skilful. He was, in fact, dazzlingly swift, and he had the advantages of tremendous strength and many years of experience. At almost any time during the fight he could have killed the lad easily, but he found himself reluctant to do anything as drastic. He was not certain why, but perhaps it was because Manzur reminded him of a much younger Conan, who had been just as conceited and unworldly.

Manzur, tiring fast, essayed a cut to Conan's leading knee, a blow to sever tendons and bring his enemy crashing to the ground to be finished off at leisure. But Conan had other ideas. As the keen blade licked toward his knee, the Cimmerian drew his leg back and the blade passed through empty air. Manzur was left lean-lag far forward and off balance, and Conan brought his pommel down sharply upon the lad's unhelmeted scalp.

The Sogarian dropped like an ox at slaughtering time. He was blinded by pain and dizzy from the force of the blow, and he could feel blood streaming down his face. As he lay moaning upon the ground, Conan carefully relieved him of sword and dagger. Leaving the lad to recover by himself, Conan went to the horse Manzur had been riding. It was placidly munching the tough, wiry grass and paid him no heed as he examined its burdens. A sloshing skin bag drew his immediate attention, and he sampled its contents. It was the yellow wine of Sogaria, mixed with an equal amount of water, a wonderfully refreshing drink to a man who had been breathing dust for most of a night.

"Have you anything to eat?" Conan asked. "I am starving."

"There is a little parched grain and dried fruit in the left saddlebag," Manzur said. He was sitting up now, rubbing his scalp. It had stopped bleeding, but a lump of heroic dimensions was forming there. He winced at the touch. "Where did you learn to fight so superbly?"

Conan ate a handful of the dried provisions, washed down with the watered wine. "Well, I suppose it is better than starving," he pronounced. He walked over to where Manzur still sat and suffered. "Here," said the Cimmerian, proffering the wineskin. "This will make you feel better."

Manzur took a pull at the wineskin. "It does make the world seem a better place at that. Where are you bound, foreigner?"

"To the west, through Turan and beyond. That is where I was headed when I was captured and ended up in Bartatua's army. Since the Kagan now wants my hide with which to decorate his tent, the time has come for me to continue my interrupted journey."

Manzur drank more of the wine. "I left my city," he said, "hoping to find my love, Princess Ishkala. Many days ago she was taken from the palace by the Turanian sorcerer, Khondemir. Along with an escort of Red Eagles a thousand strong, they trekked into the north-western steppe upon some mysterious errand for the prince. I feel in my bones, though, that the wizard's plot is something baleful. I go to find my Ishkala and bring her back safe to Sogaria."

Khondemir. The name seemed familiar to Conan. Then he remembered the message he had translated for Bartatua. It had stated that King Yezdigerd urgently sought this mage who had been involved in treason, or in an insurrection of some sort. And hadn't he heard the name mentioned again on the night he had eavesdropped on the prince's councillors as they sat about the pool in the palace of Sogaria? Conan did not like to deal with wizards, but this had possibilities. "Are you still on their trail?"

"Nay," said Manzur sadly. "In the dust storm I lost the broad trail I had been following. The signs left by a

mounted force of a thousand are plain even to a town-raised scholar. But the storm obliterated most of the signs, and I am no hunter to detect the passing of beasts k a bent blade of grass."

"I will ride a way with you," Conan said. "I have been a scout and tracker, and I have hunted all my life. I will know it if we cross the path of a thousand horsemen, even after a storm."

"Splendid!" said Manzur. "And will you also help me retrieve Ishkala?"

Conan thought for a while. "Perhaps. I will know better after I have had a look at the situation."

"Her father will reward you greatly," Manzur said, ignoring that it was the prince himself who had authorized Ishkala's journey with the mage.

"I have no intention of going to Sogaria," Conan said, "for any manner of reward. In the first place, I was but recently leading raids into Sogarian territory. I have encountered few kings who did not value a fort more highly than they valued a daughter. Second, your prince is likely to take a dim view of any who thwart whatever mission the wizard has undertaken."

"Then why are you willing to help?" Manzur asked.

"I have heard somewhat of this man, Khondemir. He has earned the enmity of King Yezdigerd by indulging in a bit of insurrection. It may be that if I take him or at least his head back to Turan, I might make peace between Yezdigerd and myself."

"For a man lacking even a skin of wine or a bag of food," Manzur observed, "you seem to have travelled in exalted circles. Few men have kings as diverse as Bartatua and Yezdigerd thirsting for their blood."

"I wish those two were the only ones," Conan said ruefully. "But we waste time here. Are you ready to ride?"

"I think so," said Manzur, rubbing his head again. "But I do not think I will wear my helmet for some time. By all means, let us go. My heart will be desolate until I am reunited with my Ishkala."

"My stomach will be desolate until we are united with some game," Conan said.

"How will we locate the column?" Manzur asked.

"First we must find a stream," Conan told him. "A thousand horses drink a great deal of water, and streams are few on these plains. Where we find water, there we will find the cavalry."

It was full morning as they rode away. The Cimmerian kept his eyes on the ground. The steppe seemed empty, but Conan knew that it teemed with life. Because of the lack of natural cover, the steppe animals were smaller than those of the woodland, or especially swift, or otherwise adept at flight. Many were nocturnal so as to escape the keen eyes of predators. But all needed water, and Conan knew that when he saw many game tracks converging, water could not be far away.

At a signal from Conan, the two men halted. The mounts were restive and' did not want to stop. Their nostrils flared, and they strained westward against the taut reins.

"Stay here for a while," Conan said, his voice barely above a whisper. Slowly he drew his strung bow from its case behind his right leg.

"What is it?" Manzur asked. "Enemies?"

"Better than that," Conan said. "Dinner." He pointed to a slight rise of ground three hundred paces away.

Manzur squinted in the direction indicated and saw nothing. Then he caught a hint of movement just above the crest of the rise. It looked as though someone were waving a small stick back and forth.

"What is it?" he asked. "An animal?" His mouth began to water.

"Some breed of antelope, I'll warrant," Conan said. "There will be more than one, and they are drinking at a stream over there. That is why our mounts are eager to run. They smell the water. I have been smelling it myself for the last two miles." He selected an arrow with a broad hunting head and fitted it to the string. "Wait here."

Silently he kicked his horse to a swift gallop. The beast bolted readily, the smell of water making it nearly frantic. This close to water the grass was thick, and the horse's hooves made little sound. As he surged over the crest of the rise, Conan saw perhaps twenty small fork-horned antelope drinking from a little stream. The animals stood in startled paralysis for a split second before they went flying in all directions.

In huge, graceful leaps the antelope fled, their criss-crossing, diverging paths bewildering to the eye. The Cimmerian, though, had picked his target in the moment when the animals had been frozen in surprise. It was a small, fat buck, and Conan drew his bow as the beast slanted off to his right. He released the string at the moment the antelope began its fifth leap. Animal and arrow intersected and the creature went down with the shaft buried deep behind its shoulder. It kicked for a moment, then was still.

Conan replaced the bow. He patted his now-quiet horse between the ears. "That was a difficult cast," he told the indifferent mount. "Guyak would have been proud of me."

When Manzur rode up a few minutes later, Conan was busily butchering the antelope. "There is plenty of brush growing here by the water," he told the young man. "Gather us some dry wood and we shall feast."

An hour later the two sat by a smoking fire as ribs and forequarters sizzled over the low flames. Manzur's

stomach rumbled as he sniffed the savoury aromas, but he could not suppress a twinge of guilt.

"It seems improper somehow," he said, "that we should be sitting here indulging ourselves while we have yet to find the trail of the Red Eagles."

"We would do little good riding our horses to death and starving ourselves," Conan pointed out. "There is forage and water in plenty, and we can fortify ourselves with this meat. Besides, we've found the column. It passed by here a few days ago. The signs are all around. They have been following this stream."

Manzur gazed about in the dimming light. He could see nothing by way of signs. "Truly?" Instantly he cheered up. "Then soon our task will be accomplished."

"Do not be so confident," Conan warned. "Snatching your ladylove from the midst of a thousand fighting men may prove no easy task. Not to mention the wizard, who may have other plans for her."

"No matter," Manzur said. "You and I are heroes, so what may we not accomplish?"

Conan lifted a skewer from the fire and began attacking a rack of ribs. "I cannot share your sanguine complacency, but perhaps I shall feel better with a full stomach."

Manzur slipped a hand beneath his tunic under his armour and withdrew a sheaf of parchments. "What you need is inspiration, Conan. Let me read to you some of my heroic verses."

"Verses?" Conan echoed apprehensively. The songs and poems of his own people he knew by heart, but he had heard few poems of the civilized lands that were to his barbaric taste. Manzur began to read.

The next morning they rode along the tracks made by the Red Eagles. About midday Conan called a halt,

dismounted and examined the ground closely, puzzlement writ large upon his features.

"What is it?" Manzur asked.

"They were joined here by another band of horsemen, about equal in number."

"More Sogarians?"Manzur hazarded. "Or do you think they were attacked by the Hyrkanians?"

"Neither," Conan said. "The horses were shod in the Turanian manner. Some wore the reinforcing bar used by the Turanian cavalry. It was not an attack, but a peaceful merging of the two bands." He remounted and the two rode on for a little way. The Cimmerian pointed to the ground, where Manzur could make out little save a chaotic jumble of hoof prints.

"See," Conan said. "The two bands remain separate but ride along a parallel course divided by a half-score of paces. It may simply mean military discipline, but it could also indicate mutual distrust."

"I cannot imagine why Sogarian cavalry would be meeting with Turanian forces in the midst of this wilderness," said Manzur, shaking his head.

"There is much here we do not know," Conan said. "It behoves us to proceed with caution. And these men are not Yezdigerd's cavalry, although some of the mounts are cavalry-shod. Turanian cavalry ride by squadrons in double column, with forward guard and flank security out at all times. These rogues are straggling along in a ragged file any way it suits them, and they have posted no security forces. The cavalrymen among them may well be deserters."

The two men could make better time than the two thousand, and soon the signs of passage were far fresher. The land began to roll gently and they moved into an area that would have seemed flat in most parts of the world but was hilly for the steppes.

"I like not the feel of this place," Conan said. Manzur looked about. All seemed much as before, for the slight rise and fall of the terrain. "Wherefore?"

"The grasses and shrubs do not look right," the Cimmerian said, "and the sky is not the right colour, somehow. It smells of sorcery to me."