Authors: Poul Anderson
Tothapis, who had been ageless as a mummy, all at once looked old. He sat well back in his throne, as if its cobra hood might shield him, and rustled: 'They have escaped us, then. They have done the impossible, and now they are off in Set's own boat... to Taia.'
'How can you be sure?' Nehekba asked.
She knew it was not by scrying. After his god revealed the location of the corsair ship to him, the sorcerer had been able to track her continuously from afar. But once Amnun was aboard, he had let this surveillance lapse, for it was a demanding thing to maintain. Indeed, in his haste to organize the seizure of Conan, he had neglected to ask Amnun what Bêlit's plans were; and an agent on whom he had laid spells protective against hostile magic in life, could not be summoned back from death. If he sent his remote vision scanning widely about, the chance of its lighting upon his enemies was very slight, and meanwhile time slipped away between his fingers.
'Who but Conan, were-lion Conan, could thus have killed three strong men, bare-handed, in silence, after having slain a python
fate at work. Powers from the heavens themselves. O Set, be with your servants, make us strong against the unmerciful Sun!' 'Is he indeed bound for Taia? Has he not likelier put to sea?' Tothapis' bald head wove back and forth in negation. 'Would he had tried that. The boat would soon wallow helpless on waves that annul its fires. No, he must have headed oppositely, toward his destiny.'
Nehekba gave him a look not entirely reverent. 'Then why have you not scryed upstream till your view overtook him?'
'Were you not aware? They were puissant magicians who built that craft. As long as it remains on the river whose soul it embodies, no spell can prevail against or reveal it.'
Standing in the gloom, still dishevelled from her experience, Nehekba said, venom in each word, 'Yet since it is visible to mortal eyes, tangible to mortal hands – and, yes, stealable by mortals – it must be vulnerable to ordinary force.'
Tothapis gave her a lengthy stare. Will flowed slowly back into him, to lift his head and make his shoulders less stooped. 'What do you mean?' he inquired.
'We know, within a few hours, when those criminals left Khemi,' the witch replied. 'We know how fast they can travel. Thus we may easily calculate the farthest distance they can have gone. My lord, use your skills, your command over certain beasts. Your spirit can wing at the speed of thought, to lay under command a herd of behemoths upstream. Let the great river horses swim out to meet the boat when they see it, rise from below, crush it with bulk and rushes, bear Conan's bones down into the silt of the Styx!'
Tothapis considered. 'We would lose a most valuable instrumentality,' he said.
'If Set spoke truly, and every necromantic indication we have since forgotten, then the fulfilment of that ruffian's destiny would cost us far more.'
Tothapis meditated, his gaze lost in shadows. Finally he said:' No. Huge though behemoths be, harpooners in reed boats have often slain them. Consider what those four have already wrought, and what they now have at their disposal, and the fact that their fate is again in motion, more powerfully by far than erstwhile. They would
win through. I would have spilt priceless time and energy for nothing.'
'Will you then simply wait for yon ape to prevail?' Nehekba screeched.
Tothapis studied her. 'You hate him, do you not?' the sorcerer asked.
'After what he did to me, aye, revenge will be more precious than rubies.' The witch checked her passion. 'Brute I called him,. I was right about that, my lord, and wrong in what I just proposed. Raw strength and reckless courage, those make his dominion. We must light him on a different ground.'
Her laugh shivered forth. 'Why, my lord, he has stunned us till we were bumbling along as brainless as him. Let us use our wits. You did earlier, when you dispatched Ramwas and a homunculus to Luxur. Never has investment shown higher profit than yours will.'
'What mean you?' Tothapis demanded.
'Our enemies will make halt there,' Nehekba said eagerly. 'Falco will insist on it. See, was I not wise in getting to know him well? He will argue that Zarus must be warned, and furthermore can smuggle them directly out of Stygia. Conan ought to agree. He has no reason to suppose they are not well ahead of even the fastest carrier pigeon. But you can send an instant message to Ramwas, ordering he keep clandestine watch on the Ophirite embassy, and stand prepared to take the gang when they approach.'
Tothapis came as near showing enthusiasm as he ever did. 'By the Underworld, yes! We will do it so.' A shade of fearfulness crept back over him. 'Yet if somehow, through some damnable quirk of chance, the barbarian does elude our trap -'
'Forget not my feather skin,' Nehekba said. 'In bird guise, I will depart east within this hour. I can go faster thus than the wingboat itself, and have spells to keep me untiring aflight. It should not be long after the vessel gets to Luxur that I do, to hover aloft and observe.'
'You lack the means of communicating mind to mind,' he objected.
'What of that?' she replied. 'Do I lack intelligence to do whatever proves needful,' her fingers crooked talon-like, 'for bringing Conan
XII
The City of Kings
Luxur lay about a hundred miles south of the Styx. Once it had been the oasis lair of wild nomads. After their chieftains had conquered widely around and established the First Dynasty, its central location made it a good choice for a royal seat. With the growth of civilization, the city had engulfed the oasis. However, irrigation made agriculture possible nearby, and a ship canal was dug to connect it with the river. Trade flourished, for while the comings and goings of foreigners were regulated, they were not virtually forbidden as at Khemi. Besides visitors from every part of vast Stygia, Luxur saw Shemites, Kushites, Keshanians, and more exotic folk. Occasional vessels brought goods from far Argos or Zingara, rowing the long way upstream for the sake of prices that even made the dismal inns endurable to their crews.
The wingboat slipped up the canal by night, not to attract notice. As if to aid her wayfarers, a wind off the desert blew dust, which stung their eyes and gritted in their nostrils but obscured the moon. It died down toward morning. By then they were not far from the capital, in an area Falco remembered from excursions of limited range that the embassy staff had had permission to make. Here a gradual slope of ground to the water and below created a marsh full of reeds and wildfowl. The boat nudged into that whispery thickness until she lay well hidden against a bank.
'Let us get going,' said Conan impatiently. 'Remember, lad, if you have not heard from us after three days, do not try to be a hero on the spot. Hasten on to Taia, find Daris' father Ausar, tell him what you know, give and take what help from him you may.'
'Y – yes,' the Ophirite said unsteadily. 'But oh, do return! Mitra and Varuna guard you!' On the journey, he had not only rested and recuperated like his comrades, he had acquired worshipfulness for the mighty Cimmerian. Daris likewise often found her gaze drifting toward the leader, and herself unwontedly shy when he spoke to her. Jehanan was mostly sunk in silence, though he did his share of work and tried hard not to inflict his suffering on the rest. It had been a strange trip, through landscape sometimes barren, sometimes intensely green. No pilot of ship, barge, felucca, or canoe but sheered well off from the eldritch craft and dared not hail her. Serfs abandoned flocks, hoes, shadoofs to pelt inland at the sight. Yet those aboard were peaceful, and three of them were sometimes merry, with wine and song and tales and hopes for the future.
Now, though, action was again upon them. Falco had best stay behind, as caretaker and because he might be recognized on his way to the embassy. If all went well, his countrymen could fetch him after sundown, bringing a forged pass to get him by the night time pickets at every city gate; darkness ought to obscure his features. For this first contact, Conan wanted Daris and Jehanan along. Despite cowl and kaftan, he would be fairly conspicuous in the streets. It should lull suspicion if he was accompanied by an obvious Shemite and Taian; then people could assume they were three of mixed race in the service of a caravanner, as was common. Not all Taians were in revolt. Some, descendants of slaves or hirelings, had never seen their ancestral hills. In garb like his and Jehanan's, Daris might be a beardless youth.
They had scrubbed their faces, and Conan had shaved. Otherwise they depended on clothes to hide grime, since they dared not draw wash water from the Styx and felt it best to conserve what they had that was potable. They were not unduly gamy, having been outdoors nearly the whole time, in dry air.
Conan took Falco by the hand. 'Thank you,' he said. 'Fare you also well. But do not fret more than you can help. That which will be, will be. Our pride is to meet it boldly.'
He swung himself onto the rail and sprang ashore. His two way mates followed. On firm ground, they struck across a paddock to a dirt road. Running parallel to the canal, it pointed at towers which bulked on the southern horizon. False dawn became sunrise.
A flock of ducks beat clamorous up from the marsh. Mud hamlets dotted a terrain of crop lands, date groves, and ditches. South-west and south-east, the desert that stretched beyond it thrust ruddy wedges into its green. Air was still cool, but rapidly warming.
After a while, Conan reminded: 'Falco described well how to find Zarus' place. But we should not seem too eager or purposeful, 'f Best we loaf through the streets like newcomers off duty, sightseeing, keeping an eye out for a pleasant way to spend some of our pay. A town like this must know many such drifters each year.' 'Be not so sure how the Stygians will take to us,' Jehanan said harshly. 'Those grovellers before snakes are unlike any people anywhere else. Are they even human?'
'Oh, yes,' Daris replied. She touched his cheek in compassion. 'Some of them have misused you and yours, as some of them have misused my folk. But I have met a number of ordinary ones, and heard tell of many more – decent persons little different from you or me, simply concerned to make a living for their families paying their extortionate taxes – and what harm have these poor toilers we see coming forth ever done to anybody? The common Stygians are the first victims of their own overbearing nobles and fanatical priests.'
Conan grunted. He cared nothing for such fine distinctions. In his world view, apart from fierce immediate loyalties, the hand of every man was against every other man. At best there was truce, for practical reasons and always fragile. That did not mean that individuals could not share work, trade, enjoyment, liking, respect. He had been sorry to kill certain men in the past, though he lost no sleep afterward. Strife was the natural order of things.
Luxur grew in sight. The outer defences were yellow sandstone, formidable but not forbidding in the way that Khemi's were. Banners on cross-poles hung arrogant above battlements. Gates stood wide, and while sentinels were present, they did not check the traffic, which by now had become dense – foot, cart, litter, chariot, horse, ox, donkey, camel. Labourers in loincloths, drovers in ragged tunics, desert nomads in white and black robes, merchants in garb more colourful, courtesans in gossamer, soldiers, hawkers, strolling performers, housewives, children, foreigners, a bewildering variety of individuals surged to and fro. They crowded, jostled, chattered, quarrelled, screamed curses, yelped, importuned, haggled, intrigued, shouted, wailed, moaned, made a maelstrom of sound between high, drab walls whose balconies were festooned with garments hung out to dry. I he streets, mostly cobbled, littered and dirty as was usual in cities, were redolent of smoke, grease, dung, roast meat, oils, perfumes, drugs, humankind, beast-kind.
Conan's party entered and pushed a slow way through. A monument – on a pillar the statue of an ancient king trampled a Shemite and a Kushite underfoot – marked their turn into the Street of Weavers. Here, cross-legged in booths, sellers held out fabrics and chanted their virtues to every passer-by. It was less jammed than the main artery, and the newcomers could walk somewhat faster. According to plan, they pretended to marvel at the spectacle as they sauntered.
'Allo, allo!' cried a voice. Conan glanced behind him and saw a man in a shabby kaftan running to catch up. He carried a load of trinkets: crudely whittled toy camels in his hands, strings of bone beads hung on his arms. Drawing close, he said in Argossean, 'Welcome to Luxur. You are from Argos?'
'No,' Conan replied, annoyed.
'Ah, Zingara!' The man slipped into an accented version of the tongue of that country. 'Beautiful Zingara. You take home souvenir.'
'No,' Conan said in Stygian, 'I do not want to buy anything.'
'You speak this language!' exclaimed the vendor likewise. He smiled across his entire weathered face. The effect was somewhat diminished by his few snags of teeth. 'You are a world traveller, then. You know fine wares when you see them. Here, look at this camel. Beautiful workmanship.' He thrust one of the little models into the Cimmerian's palm. 'Only five lunars.' His reference was to a small copper coin of the realm.
'I don't want it.' Conan sought to give it back. The hawker's fingers were not there to receive.
'Four lunars,' the Stygian offered.
'No, by Crom!' Conan suppressed a desire to bring out the ax concealed beneath his robe. That would be madness.
'For four lunars, I will give you two camels,' the man said. 'Take them home to your children.'
'I tell you, no!'
'Three camels.'
'No!'
'Three camels and a necklace.'
Conan strode on. The vendor kept pace. 'You must not steal a poor man's stock in trade, sir,' he scolded in a loud singsong designed to draw attention. 'Think of my babies at home.'
'Take the damned thing,' Conan snarled, tried again to return it, and failed again.
Suddenly he noticed Jehanan and Daris were not beside him. He stopped and looked behind. The owner of a real, if rather moth-eaten camel had cornered the maiden and was insisting that she wanted a ride on it, and he would take her to all the interesting parts of town. 'Here,' he said, and made the animal kneel. He pushed her toward the saddle. 'It is easy. It is fun. You pay me only what you wish.'