Conan: The Road of Kings

by Wagner, Karl Edward

  He put it down as another of the incomprehensible rituals that preoccupied civilized folk.

  And through such rituals was the provisional government of Zingara established. Mordermi was to be king. As leaders of the major factions of the White Rose, the triumvirate of Avvinti, Santiddio, and Carico would head the revolutionary committee. Callidios, whose political acumen had proven to be no less brilliant than his command of sorcerous arts, would serve as prime minister. Conan, whose bravery and prowess in battle had made him a popular hero, would become general of the Zingaran Revolutionary Army.

  “From common mercenary to general of the king’s army in a matter of months is some promotion,” Conan observed at Mordermi’s coronation.

  “Well yes, it is quick work, isn’t it?” Mordermi laughed, motioning to a servant to bring them more wine. “But no more so than rising from prince of thieves to king of Zingara!”

  He laughed some more at his own wit. “Besides,” Mordermi went on, more serious now. “I need a friend I can trust as my. general. You’re young, Conan, but you’ve seen more fighting than most veterans—certainly you know more of battles than any of my band of rogues or Santiddio’s circle of high-minded fops. And I dare not entrust my army to any of Korst’s old officers, or to any of Avvinti’s friends among the great lords. You’re my friend, Conan—and the only friend I know I can trust.”

  “If that is so, then heed my counsel,” Conan said earnestly. “Get rid of Callidios.”

  “Cimmerians aren’t ones to sway from an idea, I can see. I need Callidios. It will take weeks to regroup the army. Until then, we’d be easy prey for any of the great lords with a private army and any scab of royal blood, if we didn’t have the Final Guard as a weapon in our defense. Callidios knows the secret of their command. I don’t.”

  “Give me time to build this Zingaran Revolutionary Army into something more than one of Santiddio’s slogans,” Conan promised, “and you’ll have no need for any army of stone devils.”

  “Come to me then with your counsel,” Mordermi suggested.

  “What? Are you two the only sober ones here?” Santiddio lurched toward them, steadying himself not too well on his sister’s shoulder. “A plague on your new crown, Mordermi, if it’s kept you sober at your own coronation.”

  “Conan and I are discussing the new army. Show more respect when you address the king and his general.”

  Santiddio made a belch that did credit to so thin a man. “Avvinti thinks it would be politic for you to share some of your presence with Baron Manovra and Count Perizi, who have come to the coronation of their new king.”

  “Of course.” Mordermi bowed to Sandokazi. “Your arm, milady? You’ll dazzle their shrewd brains with your beauty, and I’ll get them to promise to any alliance.”

  Conan watched the three of them walk across the crowded ballroom, thinking back on their first meeting. Mordermi made a truly majestic figure in his court attire and golden crown. Santiddio still looked like a drunken student, decked out in his best suit of clothes. Sandokazi was radiant in a shoulderless gown of stiff brocade, swelling in many petticoats from the tightly corsetted waist. Conan, glancing down at his own none-too-fresh garments, wondered whether the king’s general was expected to dress formally for the coronation.

  Rimanendo’s palace—Mordermi’s now—had been made presentable to some extent following the night of looting short days before. At some point it must have occurred to Mordertni that be and his men were plundering his own future palace. The people of Kordava had hailed Mordermi as their new king amidst loud cheers and wild celebration—the outlaw leader had always been a hero to them, and as the leader of the victorious rebels he was liberator as well as dashing rogue.

  “Let the people proclaim me their king,” Mordermi said. “That will be coronation enough.”

  Avvinti, reminding him that Zingara’s gentry must recognize him as their king also, pointed out that form must be observed.

  So it was. In the half-demolished palace that he had taken through force, Mordermi was crowned king of Zingara, according to the hallowed rituals of the aristocratic realm. As if to compensate, Mordermi invited all of Kordava to his coronation. The courtyard where a short time before bodies and wreckage covered the flagstones once again seethed with a riotous mob, although these had come to revel and it was wine that flowed so freely on this day.

  Conan drained his goblet, wondering that he did not share in their spirit of headlong gaiety. His friends had won a tremendous victory, he had been rewarded with high position. When he wandered south to seek his fortune among the civilized nations, this day would have then seemed to him a mad dream.

  Korst’s dying face would not stay out of his thoughts. His final words mocked him now. Had Korst only voiced his bitterness over his fate, or in death was the man fey? Conan had seen this occur with men and women of his own race when death was near.

  Conan spat, glared at the richly dressed worthies who crowded the ballroom. Outside, clamoring in the courtyard and spilling their drunken revel into the surrounding streets, these were his sort of people. With them he could get drunk and forget the mockery in a dying man’s eyes. He’d find a merry wench who was forward with her favors, and if there were those who wanted to sing or to brawl, he was ready join in with either.

  Conan stalked from the ballroom in distaste. Crom! The crown was not yet warm on Mordermi’s brow, and already the place was turning into a royal court!

  XIV

  CONAN TAKES THE FIELD

  The weeks that followed were ones of tremendous activity for Conan. Time and again the Cimmerian cursed himself for accepting this task. While this high position was indeed a great honor, Conan quickly learned that generals had more duties to perform than merely to fight battles, and that his prowess as a warrior was only one of the qualifications necessary in his new role. Conan was disgruntled to find himself reviewing troops when he might otherwise have been dicing with other off-duty footsoldiers in the barracks, puzzling over lists and reports late at night when he should be drinking and wenching in Kordava’s taverns, or trying patiently to sort out the protests and arguments of his officers when his first impulse was to crack a few skulls.

  But Mordermi was depending on him to see it through, so Conan gritted his teeth and got the job done.

  While Conan would not admit it, the presence of the Final Guard made his task possible. In the first weeks of Mordermi’s reign, while Conan struggled to weld together a new army from the aftermath of the rebels’ victory, it was doubtful that the fledgling Zingaran Revolutionary Army could have defended Kordava from any major assault. Certain of the great lords with their private armies murmured that it was intolerable to permit the throne of Zingara to be usurped by a common outlaw, while the kings of the other Hyborian nations pondered the fact that an expeditionary force might well place their puppet upon the throne of strife-torn Zingara.

  But the reports of the violent overthrow of King Rimanendo’s reign did not stint on lurid details of the carnage wrought by the Final Guard. Kordava was defended by an army of indestructible stone warriors. It was never wise to attack openly any ruler who was served by the powers of dark sorcery; the prudent course was to wait until some hidden weakness could be found. And while the jackals crouched and waited, Mordermi moved swiftly to establish his rule.

  Conan’s dilemma was an unusual one for a victorious faction: the victors had no army. The rebel force had been a coalition of Mordermi’s outlaw band and the White Rose—neither of these an army by any stretch of the word—whose ranks had been filled by armed citizens during the course of the battle. The battle in the Pit had cost the lives of many of the rebels from the original core of fighters, and those who came forward now to join the victorious revolutionaries were for the most part lacking in military training or combat experience.

  “Their only worth is as bodies to fill the ranks,” Conan fumed. “An enemy might mistake them for soldiers and strike at them instead of someone who knows w
hich end of his helmet to poke his head through. They might be good in a street brawl, but I could no more lead them into the field than I can forge a sword by sticking nails together with spit.”

  “Well, what do you need?” Mordermi asked.

  “I need real soldiers. Declare an amnesty for all of the Royal Zingaran Army who’ll swear allegiance to you. I know most of the mercenary commanders. They scattered during the massacre, but I can bring them back with a promise of amnesty and enough gold.”

  “Gold is no problem. Can we count on their loyalty?”

  “The mercenaries will sell their swords to any ruler who can pay. As for the Royal Army, most of those who were loyal to Rimanendo died with Korst in the final battle. If Rimanendo had been well loved or had left an heir it might be different, but as things stand they’ll take amnesty and be glad for a chance to throw their lot in with the new regime.”

  “It might be wise to accept the offer of some of Avvinti’s friends who have volunteered officers and companies from their personal armies to bolster our forces.”

  “I thought you didn’t trust Avvinti,” Conan reminded him.

  “I don’t,” Mordermi said blandly. “But I don’t trust Carico either, with his crackbrained politics—and I’ve noticed that far too many of his followers have rushed to enlist in my army.”

  Conan decided he had far too many other problems on his hands to concern himself with his friends’ obsession with such bickering and hair-splitting. His task was to build the Zingaran Revolutionary Army into something that might conceivably have need of a general. And in this the Cimmerian was successful. The amnesty brought a great many recruits out of hiding; Mordermi’s gold lured a great many more. Conan managed to assemble a corps of officers with the experience and ability to take charge of the bulk of the organizational drudgery, eventually learned to delegate responsibility—a difficult adjustment for the Cimmerian, who was a loner, and consequently reluctant to entrust others with key matters.

  Gold, as Mordermi had stated, was no problem to the new reign. The plunder of Rimanendo’s court had made the spoils of their raid on the late king’s pleasure palace seem no more than the handful of brass coins in a beggar’s bowl. And this in turn dwindled to insignificance beside the loot of Kalenius’ tomb.

  Since summoning forth the Final Guard, Callidios was not often to be seen. Whether the Stygian renegade was delving ever deeper into the paths he followed, or merely staying lost in the fumes of the yellow lotus, Conan wasn’t certain. He suspected the latter, hoped such was the case to be sure—lotus dreamers were not long for this world. It was a greater concern to the Cimmerian that Callidios and Mordermi were wont to remain closeted for long periods of time. Conan hoped Mordermi was using his wits to learn the secret of the Styeian’s control of the Final Guard.

  Out of one such tete-a-tete came the decision to despoil the tomb of King Kalenius. It was this even more than the summoning of the Final Guard to rout Korst’s forces that impressed upon Conan Callidios’ total mastery of the inhuman warriors. Callidios commanded the Final Guard to loot the tomb they had so long stood guard over.

  Once the enormity of the plan was overlooked, the logic seemed obvious. Who better suited to loot a treasure vault than those who guarded it? Better still, these tomb-looters were impervious to the depths that covered the ancient barrow, nor could collapsed passages and unknown dangers within the king’s eternal palace pose a threat to the Final Guard. It was an act of betrayal that outraged all honor—a betrayal of the dead king and a worse betrayal of the guardians who had endured living death for untold centuries to keep this tomb inviolate.

  As Mordermi pointed out, the gold wasn’t doing Kalenius any good. Conan was too much of a pragmatist to disagree, but the barbarian’s lust for rich plunder notwithstanding, this was a treasure Conan wasn’t sure might better remain hidden.

  It was a macabre spectacle. Into the sea marched the Final Guard, and out of the depths they returned —bearing sealed chests and coffers of solid gold. In the millennia that had passed since King Kalenius had built his eternal palace, a great portion of his tomb’s costly furnishings and treasure stores had decayed into dust and that dust dissolved into the sea. But if the exotic furs and exquisite carpets, the tapestries and paintings and carvings of rare woods, the opulent furniture and tables laden with choice viands were no more than smears of slime impinged upon the tiles of lapis lazuli—precious gems and costly metals had endured. Across the gulf of time that had decayed iron and bronze and rotted silver into blackened cinder, yellow gold and the eternally frozen starlight of diamonds, emeralds, rubies and a score of other rare gemstones were dragged from drowned darkness of the forgotten barrow and borne- into the sunlight of a new age.

  The procession was a drugged nightmare. Obsidian demons climbing out of the sea, bearing golden caskets whose contents represented the price of an empire. Only an army as dreadful as the Final Guard could have protected such a treasure from the avarice and greed of ages of seekers. The wealth they now laid before Mordermi would make his the richest court in all the Hyborian kingdoms.

  Callidios had given Mordermi power; now he gave him wealth. Conan wondered what bargain the two of them had struck, and whether Callidios might have a third gift to bestow.

  He took comfort from the fact that Callidios would no longer have a hold on Mordermi, once the Zingaran Revolutionary Army was strong enough to take the field. The Final Guard would not be needed then. Callidios, if he hadn’t already wandered into his lotus dreams and lost his way back, could be dealt with in a final manner—and Mordermi’s reign would be free of the taint of sorcery. To hasten this day, Conan redoubled his efforts with the new army.

  Their situation remained a stalemate beyond the walls of Kordava. The Final Guard preserved the city from any attack, but throughout the whole of Zingara Mordermi’s rule was by no means secure. The powerful lords with their fortresses and personal armies might recognize Mordermi’s claim to the throne or not, as they pleased. While the Final Guard was a force no human army could face in battle, Mordermi could not very well send his demon warriors marching off across Zingara to deal with those who defied his reign. While he might destroy their holdings, his enemies were certain to flee the advance of the stone warriors—and if he reduced the strength of the Final Guard by scattering them all across the countryside, Kordava would be open to a sudden attack.

  Thus Mordermi needed his new army, and needed it quickly—before the outlying provinces decided there was no need to obey the commands of a usurper in distant Kordava. The threat of the Final Guard won for Mordermi some support beyond Kordava; the rich bribes he could offer purchased still more. But in the end, it would take an army in the field to consolidate his reign.

  The threat to his rule was not long in materializing. Emboldened by Mordermi’s refusal to commit the Final Guard beyond Kordava, Count Dicendo, who ruled extensive holdings on Zineara’s distant eastern border, declared his lands to be an independent state. To support his claim, troops from neighboring Argos crossed the Khorotas River, in return for territorial concessions which Count Dicendo, having no authority to concede, made most generously from the lands of his rival. Baron Lucabos.

  “We’ll have to strike quickly and decisively, of course,” Mordermi informed Conan of the situation. “Otherwise every landowner in Zingara will be declaring independence for his fishpond and barleyfields.”

  “The army is ready to fight,” Conan told him with more confidence than he felt. “We’ll be on our march at dawn.”

  “Good,” Mordermi nodded. “I wish you a swift victory. Deal without mercy with these rebels. If we make an example of them, there are others who won’t be so tempted to defy my authority. There’s rumor that a conspiracy is brewing to the north, centering on some fool who claims to be Rimanendo’s bastard. That would defy nature’s law. Mitra, there’s treason taking root in every corner of my kingdom!”

  “You can depend on me,” Conan said.

  “I
know that, Conan!” Mordermi seized his hand. “Mitra! If I had a hundred men like you to serve me!”

  The Zingaran Revolutionary Army marched from Kordava the following dawn. The new army’s general, on his first campaign, turned in his saddle, saw the black silhouettes of the Final Guard outlined against the graying skies. His scowl was troubled, but his concern was not for his new command.

  XV

  THE SCYTHE

  The season had changed from summer to autumn before Conan returned to Kordava. It had been pleasant to see the turn of the year from summer’s dry heat to the autumn’s cool explosion of color. His stay in the Pit had been a season of changeless twilight. Conan decided he had seen enough of Kordava. Now that he had secured Mordermi’s power throughout Zingara, he would bid his friends here a farewell, convert Mordermi’s gratitude into a good horse and bag of gold, ride northward toward Cimmeria. This being a general of the king’s army was not the sort of life that he wished to follow to the end of his days. He was sick of fighting another man’s battles.

  In the mountains of Zingara’s eastern marches, Conan’s new army had waged a stubborn campaign over difficult terrain, before Count Dicendo’s stronghold was taken and the rebellious count hanged outside the breached walls. By that time Baron Lucabos, whose lands Dicendo had granted to Argos in return for military support, was under siege and strident in his requests for aid from his new liege lord. Conan drove the Argosseans back across the Khorotas River, proceeded after them, then was ordered back. Zingara’s invasion of Argos would be an act of war, Mordermi’s emissaries explained to him; the presence of Argossean soldiers on Zingaran soil did not have official sanction, and doubtless those responsible for the incident would be disciplined by their own king.

  More to the point, a serious plot had gathered force in the north, as Mordermi had feared. A Poitanian adventurer named Capellas claimed to be the bastard son of Rimanendo and an Aquilonian noble-woman with whom the Zingaran king had dallied during a stay in Poitain. Capellas produced several passably forged documents to prove his claim, and since it was undeniably true that King Rimanendo had at one time passed through Poitain, royalists rejoiced to discover that a true heir to the throne of Zingara had been found. With a strong following of those of Rimanendo’s court who had fled to exile in Aquilonia, Capellas crossed the Alimane River into Zingara—joined there by certain of the northern lords who had no especial loyalty to a usurper in Kordava when a pretender here at hand promised generous rewards for their support.