Conan the Barbarian

by Michael A. Stackpole

  She’d known that idea was nonsense, but still it troubled her when a few of the other women who had heard the words of the prophecy teased her about this warrior. They fashioned him into a knight or a noble come to rescue her. That easily fit with her own scenario, which, while devoid of substance, still had the power to enchant.

  Tamara drew in a deep breath and forced herself to be calm. She was not a princess, she was a monk. Her master had seen a warrior in her future, but how far into it she did not know. And he had made her promise to go to Hyrkania if so commanded. That precluded her involvement in any civil war. The source of my blood does not matter. I am Tamara Amaliat Jorvi Karushan, a monk, and that is more than enough for me.

  Smiling at her foolishness, she began to move through her exercises. Away to the south, on the far side of the central courtyard, Fassir watched from a balcony. He acknowledged her with a nod and a quick smile. As he returned to his private thoughts, she closed her eyes and continued with her drills. She flowed from tiger through dragon and into the serpent.

  As she pivoted on her left foot, something felt out of place. The ground trembled in an odd way. Two ways, really, a low tremor and a series of staccato beats. She’d not felt its like before, at least not in that intensity or combination. She opened her eyes and glanced over the walls as the first of the riders poured into the monastery.

  The riders, encased in black armor, rode down two monks and a novitiate before drawing their swords. Fassir shouted commands, then turned and ran. Tamara immediately sprinted down the stairs and leaped from the lowest landing toward one of the riders. She caught him with both feet in the chest, spilling him from the saddle. He started to get up, but she kneed him in the face and he went back down.

  Monks with bows let fly with arrows. One flashed past Tamara’s face, thudding into a horse’s chest. The beast collapsed, vaulting the rider high into the air. He smashed into the stairs, his body bowing so his heels touched his shoulders, and slumped lifeless. Elsewhere riders fell, skewered by a handful of arrows, yet others continued fighting despite their wounds.

  More soldiers, clearly allied with the riders, burst in through the gate. Female archers filled the air with barbed projectiles. Monks curled up around shafts sped deep into their bellies. And then Kushite warriors, led by a giant in mail, brandished oval shields and stabbing spears. A few monks had managed to obtain pole arms and dueled with the invaders. Though the monks had trained for ages to be swift and deadly, the larger spearmen fought with a zeal for slaughter beyond Tamara’s comprehension. They needed a lot of killing.

  Shocked, she hesitated, and that saved her life. A misshapen man on horseback pointed his sword in her direction. “Get her with the others.” He reined away as two lightly armored men moved to grab her.

  For a moment she wilted in their grasp. As they tightened their grip, she stomped on their feet. One fist swung down, delivering a sharp blow to a groin, while the other went up, crushing a nose. As one man sank to his knees, she slammed the other face-first into the wall, then darted off toward the monastery’s interior.

  “Where is Master Fassir?” She shouted the question a half-dozen times, but never got an answer. She reached the top of the veranda stairs, looking back from where she and Fassir had spoken the day before. More troops poured into the courtyard, and more monks died, the morning’s peace forever shattered.

  The slaughter would have been complete at that point, and she would have died with the rest, save for one thing. The staccato rumbling had been the cavalry, but the lower, more consistent thunder had come from a vehicle she never could have imagined existing. The first she saw of it was the stout wooden ram crashing through the battlement above the monastery’s gate. That the falling stones crushed monk and invader alike seemed of little concern to few, and of almost none to the man who stood atop the land ship’s forecastle.

  Arms upraised, clad in black leather armor that devoured the sun’s early light, the man seemed more a god than a mortal. He peered down from the heights, surveying all the carnage. The path of a single arrow did not concern him, nor did the flight of a spear. One monk shot at him. The arrow struck the rail by his waist, but the land ship’s master gave it no notice.

  And a moment later a dozen black-fletched arrows pierced the monk’s heart in recompense for his temerity.

  For just a moment, as the last stone fell and the land ship squeezed into the gate, the battle stopped. Tamara even stopped breathing. The home she had always known, the place that had been her sanctuary, had been broken by a demigod. He was not, she knew, the warrior of Fassir’s vision, but she feared that he was the madman of Fassir’s tale.

  A hand grabbed her forearm and yanked her away from the courtyard. She spun, a hand coming up in a palm strike to the face, but Fassir blocked it easily. “Come with me, Tamara.”

  “Who was that?”

  “It’s best you don’t know. If you have his name and think on it, he can find you.”

  She blinked. “How did he find me here?”

  “You don’t have his name. I do.” Fassir dragged her deeper into the monastery grounds, toward the western gate. “We hid you and never thought he might have sought me. I should have sent you to Hyrkania sooner.”

  She stopped. “I’m not leaving. Our people are dying.”

  Fassir’s voice became edged with steel. “It is for the sake of all people that you must go, Tamara. To Hyrkania. Do not hesitate. Do not waver.”

  A company of twenty spearmen poured into the little courtyard. “We have our orders.”

  Fassir pushed Tamara toward the western gate and the coach waiting there. One monk sat ready to drive the team of four, and a half-dozen others had mounted up to ride as guards. “Go, Tamara. I prepared the coach against this. Go.”

  “I don’t want to leave you here, Master.”

  “Deprive me of my fun?”

  “Master!”

  “Do you trust me, Tamara?”

  She nodded. “With my life. With everything I—”

  “Then ask no more questions, and do as I say.”

  The intensity of his stare forced her back. She retreated from him as if half asleep. She did not want to leave, but he had given her no choice. For the sake of all people . . .

  Fassir, his hands open, entered the semicircle of warriors. “Your orders end with me.”

  Though she knew she should have run to the coach, and though the shouts of the other monks implored her to do so, she hesitated, hypnotized by her master. She had only ever known him as a demanding yet gentle teacher. In exercises, he would bring students to the point where they could seriously injure themselves, then release them and calmly explain their errors.

  With the invading spearmen he showed no restraint, and his demonstrations of their errors did not save them from pain. The first of the invaders laughed as he rushed forward, stabbing a spear at Fassir’s chest. The old man turned on a foot, letting the spear pass between body and arm. Before the attacker could recover from his lunge, Fassir had flowed forward. He jammed his left elbow into the man’s face, then plucked the spear from him. Fassir returned to his spot, spinning the spear with the ease and abandon of a boy idly twirling a stick.

  Then he cast it aside. It clattered against the courtyard’s cobblestones.

  As Tamara climbed into the waiting coach, her master beckoned the rest of the invaders forward. With a clatter of hooves and the cracking of a whip, Tamara fled the monastery and yet allowed herself to imagine that her master still fought and that all was not lost.

  CHAPTER 19

  MARIQUE STRUGGLED MIGHTILY and succeeded in resisting the temptation to stop in the center of the monastery courtyard to bask in the ebon glow of her father’s victory. She told herself that this was because she had significant work to do. Her part in his victory—in their victory—had not yet begun. She hoped he would notice how quickly she fell to her work, advancing even in the face of the monks’ continued resistance.

  She made slow her adv
ance toward the main temple, flanked by her father’s Kushite general, Ukafa. She kept her head high, and brought her right hand up higher. Each finger had been capped with a silver talon of Stygian manufacture. Too delicate to be used to flense an enemy, they had other, more subtle uses. Sunlight lanced from them as Marique thrummed the dying threads of the magick wards that had hidden the monastery. Soon all of the monks’ secrets would be open to her.

  Ukafa’s Kushite spearmen had gathered young female monks onto the temple’s top step. A few of the women had been bloodied in combat, but none seriously, as per her father’s instructions. Demanding restraint of the warriors had doubtless cost some lives, but the dull ends of spears and the flat of swords had been enough to herd the women together.

  Marique was equal parts lioness hunting and empress victorious. Of the dozen women gathered above, three were too young and two far too old to be the one she sought. She did not segregate them, however, since they appeared the most nervous. Terror is contagious. Making an example of one would inspire the others to be more compliant, and that would speed her task to completion.

  She chose one of possible candidates and approached. The woman shied from her, cringing halfway down to a grovel, but Marique caught her chin in her left hand. She raised the woman up, then tipped her head back. Her right hand came up. She stroked a talon’s needle-sharp point over pale flesh, drawing a single drop of blood.

  Marique caught the blood on the talon, then delicately deposited it on her tongue. In an instant she knew this was not the one she wanted, but she allowed herself to savor the taste. The girl did have promise, she had power, but not the right type, nor in sufficient quantity. And then there is the quality of it. Far too sweet, too light—an offering of weak tea when one sought strong brandy.

  Marique smiled. “You are not the one I seek. Go.”

  The monk stared at her in utter disbelief, then ducked her head in thanks. She darted past Marique, keeping her eyes downcast. Which is why she never saw Ukafa’s headman’s sword come around. The curved blade took the woman at the base of the skull, shearing through her neck cleanly. Her head slowly spun, her body sagged. Her severed queue writhed like a decapitated snake for a moment, then the woman’s head, eyes yet open, bounced down the stairs and rolled up against the body of another dead monk.

  The remaining monks drew back a step, but the wall of Kushite shields prevented escape.

  Marique paced before them, her silver-sheathed fingers undulating back and forth sensuously. “I look for one among you who is special. In her veins runs the blood of an ancient and venerable noble line. She is descended from the last of the Royal House of Acheron. She is here. I know this. I can smell her. I will taste her. She is among you, and if you have any compassion for your friends and companions, you will make yourself known.”

  The women glanced at one another, confusion and terror warring on their faces. One, one of the younger ones, bowed her head. “We do not know who you seek, Mistress.”

  Marique smiled and opened her hands. “There. Honesty. Was that so difficult? Your courage and honesty deserves a reward. Go.”

  The girl looked up at her. “Truly?”

  “Of course.” Marique bowed her head. “Go now.” She turned and spitted Ukafa with a glance. “Do not molest her. She is free to go.”

  The Kushite giant frowned, but did nothing as the girl raced past and down the steps.

  Of course you don’t understand. Subtlety had never been something her father’s subordinates appreciated. They had joined him because of simple things. Her father had been stronger than they, and had appealed to their personal vices. He’d promised Ukafa dominion over Stygia and the Black Kingdoms and ceded the western half of the world to the Brythnian archer, Cherin. Lucius he had tempted through gluttony and doubtless promised Remo to fashion him into a handsome man.

  Marique doubted, even if her father gained the powers of a god, that such a transformation would be possible.

  But she had learned that subtlety amplified power because it provided access in ways people did not suspect. Yes, the murder of one girl instilled fear—compounding the terror the slaughter below had already ignited. But letting the other girl go free inspired hope. In absence of hope, one might willingly die to defend a friend or a principle, but hope proved corrosive to such bonds when the life of one was to be weighed against the life of another.

  Marique looked down the line of monks and caught something in the eye of another. Of the right age and acceptable coloring, the woman brought her head up as Marique approached. Terror retreated from her face almost entirely. She threw her shoulders back and, in profile, reminded Marique of Acheronian queens she’d seen commemorated on old coins.

  “You. You are the one.”

  The woman lifted her chin, her lower lip quivering just a little.

  Marique stroked the monk’s throat, then tasted her blood. Her eyes closed as the flavor played on her tongue, for at first this one did seem right. Rich, vital, the blood carried strength. This woman had power and knew it. She had tapped into more arcane lore than her masters likely ever imagined she could. And her lineage traveled back along straight lines. She was perfect . . . almost.

  The tiniest of sour notes ruined it. Subtle, yes, and almost trivial enough to ignore. Marique’s eyes opened and studied the woman’s face again. Yes, a daughter of Acheron, distantly, and related to the royal house, but not legitimate. Born in the shadows, not to the crown.

  Marique spat in disgust. “You sought to fool me.”

  “No, Mistress. I—”

  Marique struck quickly, driving talons into the woman’s eyes. Before blood tears could roll down her cheeks, before the woman’s hands had risen halfway to her punctured eyes, the poison on the second and third talons had done its work. The woman collapsed, her flesh surrendering quickly to putrefaction, darkening in the sunlight and melting from bone.

  Marique pointed at the others with a metal-sheathed finger. “Because I was merciful, do not believe I am simple or can be deceived. You will reveal to me the one I seek, one way or another. He demands it!”

  She turned back to point to her father high above the courtyard, but he had abandoned his position. Instead he climbed the stairs behind her, his face set and grim. She turned, her skirt flaring, then sank to a knee. “Father, I—”

  “Have you found her yet, Marique? You said she was here.”

  “I am close, Father.”

  Khalar Zym grabbed her jaw roughly and tipped her face up. “Your mother waits in a cold void that abrades her soul, Marique. She waits on you. I wait on you, and you tell me close? Close? I want her here, now!” He released her roughly, shoving her away, and raised a hand to strike her.

  Marique lifted her left hand to ward off the blow, and found her right hand cocked and ready. Her father’s armor, which she had helped him don, was not without flaw. A sword might not find purchase, but a talon? At his mercy though she was, she picked out three gaps where she could strike and he would flow down the stairs as did the last monk.

  And she would have struck had he hit her, but his hand never fell. From the west, a knot of men appeared, wrestling an old, bloodstained monk to the top of the stairs. They cast him to the ground. Their leader, head bowed, went to a knee. “Master, this one sought to prevent pursuit of a wagon that escaped through the west gate. Remo has taken men and ridden after it.”

  Marique rose and withdrew a step. Though she had never seen the old monk before, she recognized his stink. His essence had been entwined with that of the one she sought from the very first. He reeks of her even now. She started forward, her right hand extended, but her father waved her off.

  Khalar Zym crouched beside the old man. “Our paths cross again. I had thought you much younger, and hopefully wiser.”

  The old monk looked up, bleeding from a split lip, one of his eyes swollen almost closed. “You pursue a course of madness, Khalar Zym. A course of evil.”

  “Evil? You speak to me of evil?”
Marique’s father straightened up. “You have a convenient memory, Fassir. You know what evils have been visited upon me.”

  The monk’s eyes hardened. “We live here in peace. We do not make war. We do not cause suffering. This is a sanctuary. We value life.”

  “Ha!” Her father thrust a fist into the air, then brought his hand down, pointing at the women arrayed behind Marique. “You value life. Have you told your disciples how you value it? Have you told them what happened in the forests of Ophir?”

  The monk shook his head.

  “I thought not.” Her father snorted with disgust. “They should know, Fassir, they should know the truth of things, the full truth of them.”

  Khalar Zym began pacing, his face tightened with fury but his eyes focused distantly. He began to spin for the monks a story—yet telling it more to himself. Marique had heard it many times, told many ways, with her father in moods that ranged from the depths of despair to the heights of triumph. He spun it as a great tragedy—the defining moment of his life. It was the reason he was born and the reason he continued to live.

  And yet in every telling, he forgets that I was there.

  Marique recalled clearly the baying of hounds and the tramp of heavy hooves as horsemen chased them through the forests. They had left her father’s domain, just the three of them, on a mission Maliva had devised. Through her reading of Acheronian tomes, she had come to believe that deep in the forests of Ophir lay a cavern, and within it a Well of Light. Were one to bathe in it, immortality would be bestowed.

  Maliva had been too obvious in her pursuit of forbidden knowledge. Her efforts exposed her to enemies who happily fed her information.They invented the Well of Light to trap her, and Marique recalled well the day her mother had joyously discovered clues to its location in documents which Marique had been translating. Maliva had contributed to her own capture through her avarice—and it was only because the taint of Acheronian magick had not clung to Khalar Zym or Marique that they been allowed to live.