Conan the Great

by Leonard Carpenter

  “I see. All of you? That was wise.” Armiro finished tugging his boots on unassisted, arose, and unhooked his gold-embroidered tunic of rank from the nearby wardrobe. “Assemble my officers.”

  Moments later, the high command of the Kothian Army stood in a neat, attentive circle on the finely woven Aghrapur carpet laid outside the tent. As they waited, the prince himself parted the draperies in the entryway. As he stepped forth, warm morning sun bathed his square, youthful face and gold-berobed figure.

  “Vassals, attend my words,” Armiro told the assembled ministers and generals. “I have had a holy vision.”

  Queen Zenobia, wife of the world’s mightiest conqueror, sat alone in her chamber savouring grief’s bitter dregs. She who controlled more wealth than any other woman in the world, whose empire was enlarged daily by the swiftest marches of armies at its remotest ends, distilled the bitter wine of sorrow from her own salt tears. Gentle Zenobia, mother of a loving son, governess of a land prosperous and unscathed by recent wars, sat alone knotting her patient skeins of anger, interweaving strands of spite, renunciation, and murder.

  The brightness of her lodging belied the gloom of her spirit. The broad, vaulted chamber was rich with furniture, tapestries, and bedclothes bartered, or wrested at sword point, from exotic comers of the world. The room shone brilliant with a brave expense of tallow candles blazing in candelabra set all around. Zenobia’s beauty, even in grief, had no cause to hide from the light. The tears that fell from her eyes twinkled like precious, fleeting gems in the candle glow.

  Her wrath and sorrow were not primarily against Conan, her husband. Him she could not hope to know or control. Men were puzzling elemental forces, like water or molten red stone flowing down to their own level: transparently simple at times, and laughably predictable. But their boyish immaturity had a way of linking with the boyishness of other males to cause remarkable upheavals that could transform the world-like the great explosions said to occur when the sea flowed into volcanoes along the Zingaran coast.

  No, Conan was both above and beneath blame for his actions. He would never hesitate an instant to place his life, and his kingdom, at stake in defence of the curious code he equated with manhood. Though a king, he was moved by inner turbulent forces he himself understood least of all. Zenobia could more easily blame others— power-seekers who sought to divert Conan’s relentless energy and, like herself, share in the result. Such others, women mostly, she could identify as threats; these she could hate.

  This Amlunia, for instance—a cheap baggage, eager to vend her body and play up to a warrior’s fantasies of what a woman’s nature and cravings should be. The rumours and spy reports, lurid as they sounded, could not conceal her true nature from Zenobia—the little slut knew exactly what she was doing! Her infamous cruelty and wantonness made it hard even to imagine an adequate punishment for her perfidy: powdered glass in her kohl and rouge, perhaps, or a handsome, seductive young assassin with a blade where his love-hilt ought to be.

  Indeed, if Zenobia had her truest wish, she would go confront the bitch and pluck out her hair with bare hands, and her eyes as well. Yet the queen entertained no serious thought of riding forth from the capital, abandoning her duties of governance, and dashing to the frontier to rescue her husband from his indiscretions. She would never dare such an extreme—would she?

  As to the other snares in her path, and in Conan’s— the woman Yasmela was a mystery, even though Zenobia had heard Conan speak of her in his frank, tactless way. A queen, she held unknown power from her place in Conan’s past; likely she sought to use it all now, to make him help her recover her lost or faltering throne. And yet, she did not seem to have sought Conan out; rather, the opposite. Characteristically, Zenobia’s husband had thrown aside everything, and jeopardized his wife’s standing and safety, to aid another woman in distress.

  In all, the Khorajan queen’s influence was less vexing than that of Conan’s closest companion, the insidious dwarf. Though not female, he had a scheming woman’s indirectness of purpose—the eunuch-like skill of wielding his power from a position of seeming weakness. Here, Zenobia felt, lay the real source of the threat to her husband. And Delvyn was male, at least nominally. So Conan’s ministers might be willing to move against him, rather than showing him the same blind loyalty and protection they gave the king in his amorous strayings.

  Yet how could she reveal her hurt—the painful rift in her heart that threatened to widen and deepen until it tore apart a whole empire? So far she had almost managed to keep it inside her, for the sake of her son and his future, for the welfare of the kingdom, and for Conan’s safety. After all, the harsh perils he faced in his daily campaigning were perhaps the sorest point of her fear; though hurt and humiliated, she would not wish to endanger him further with marital discord or political intrigue. At least not yet. Consequently, she had borne it all—the fears, the rumours, the tears and the dark, puzzling dreams—proudly and silently, except in the lonely refuge of her sleeping chamber. She had prayed to Mitra and other gods, so far in vain. She might know better how to proceed, if only she could confide in someone; the burden was hardest to bear when one lacked guidance, even a word.

  And yet, past experience told her it might all end at any moment. Conan could return unannounced, to regale and romance her grandly and put to rest her fears of abandonment. He thought of her still, from time to time, as proven by the loot and gifts he sent back from abroad in his impulsive generosity—most notably, the rich feather bed that now bulked enormous against the broad wall of the chamber. Its satin bolsters and blankets made a show in the candlelight that was far too garish to be considered an invitation to sleep; its fine ebony frame and posts, with erotic human forms carved flowingly into the polished wood, served only as a pang and a reproach to the lonely queen. She hesitated to brave such a bed alone.

  Arising, dabbing at her eyes with a damp lace handkerchief, for what she knew would not be the last time that evening, she reached across her writing-table. From it she took up a long, spoon-shaped gold snuffer, and began making the rounds of the room. She preferred not to summon a servant for such chores; stopping at each candelabrum, she snuffed out all but the tallest central candle, leaving the room at last with a dim, diffuse light spreading from its comers.

  She had just begun removing her clothing, beginning with her long white shawl, when a knock sounded. Not at the room’s main door, but at the rear one that communicated with the other bed chambers, the privy, and the postern gate. It was not unknown for her to have visitors at this hour—a spy, most likely, sent through by the guard captain in obedience to her standing order. Draping her shawl across a chair, she walked to the door and unlatched it.

  The figure loomed gaunt and thin. It was concealed entirely in the folds of a long black cloak, which hung loosely at the sleeves and trailed along the ground. Its cowl opened narrowly on a dark void, within which no face was clearly visible. Even so, the visitor seemed strangely familiar to Zenobia—perhaps from her dreams. She blinked, mindful of her prayers to the gods of Hyborea.

  “You come, then,” she found herself asking, “to bring me some wisdom or solace, amid all the turmoil that frets the world?” Stepping back, she opened the door wider. “Very well, stranger, enter!”

  XVI

  Hero of the Realm

  Corps Marshall Egilrude guided his horse along the forested ridge. The high parts of the ridge were rocky and treeless, the tallest and most exposed trees having been burnt or splintered by lightning storms that evidently struck this wild land with devastating frequency. In consequence of this, the marshal soon came to a place where a view opened out on more forested ridges—rank upon rank of them, extending to the jagged wall of the Karpash Mountains in the blue southerly haze.

  With a further clattering of loose stones beneath rough-shod hooves, Egilrude’s two adjutants reined up beside him. Neither said a word, but one of them pointed. The marshal followed the thrust of his calloused, coarse-nailed finger. On one
of the ridges rising close under the mountains’ piny flank stood the outline of a stone tower. The square battlement looked worn and dinted, whether by combat or by the force of hurled lightnings, it was hard to say. But the movement of sentries, metal-glinting in the sun, could be seen on its top.

  “Not a strong keep,” was Egilrude’s comment. “But why garrison a watchtower in this wild region?” He turned and gazed at the visored, sun-dark face of one of his subordinates. “Is there a village nearby?”

  “We do not know yet, Sire. Scouts have been dispatched to give us an appreciation of the defences, but their return is doubtful. Even if our host has not already been sighted, it will be hard to approach such an outpost unseen.”

  “Exactly,” the marshal said, “so we must advance in strength and press what surprise we may yet enjoy. Having pushed so far into Corinthia, and bloodied a good many noses doing it, ’twould be unsoldierly to turn back without gaining this bit of intelligence.” Reining his steed around, Egilrude led the others diagonally back down the ridge toward the valley trail.

  Even without sentry posts, the ruggedness of the craggy hill country made it risky ground for invaders. But the marshal was counting on the remoteness and sparse population of the district to render it helpless against the considerable force he commanded.

  He had sworn to distinguish himself in leading this mission, his first truly independent one. His rank, after all, had been specially decreed by the conqueror himself, King Conan of Aquilonia, and soon to be Lord of All the World. It was the king’s way of singling him out—a gesture of special favour, and a test. Such a chance was too precious to let pass lightly. All his days he had looked on Conan as a hero; and ever since seeing him enter a banquet hall teeming with his enemies, single-handed, to emerge unscathed and ruler of a vast new kingdom, Egilrude had viewed the doughty Cimmerian with an awe that bordered upon worship. The power and enlightenment such a godlike warrior might bestow on him were impossible to imagine; perhaps someday, with a touch of his hand or of his gleaming sword, he might bestow on Egilrude, too, the gift of godhood.

  Such thoughts were visionary, perhaps, foolishly at odds with the sweaty, dusty realities of soldierhood that daily filled his nostrils and smudged his face. But the strange, spectral dreams he had had in his tent of late, though sombre and foreboding, seemed somehow to convey this kernel of mystic promise. It felt right to him, just a part of the reckless euphoria that drove this campaign of world conquest onward, and he sensed that the others he rode with shared the same dream.

  In any event, his lot was cast; years ago, when faced with a choice of whether to march with the legions or stay and toil in the flat grainlands of Bossonia under the stem hand of his father, he had chosen his life path. He had resolved to do his best, and it was not like an Aquilonian officer to turn aside from his goal.

  Egilrude rejoined the centre of the legion which had, by his order, continued its south-eastward march. The trail was narrow but the valley bottom was flat; so, by galloping through reaches of meadow and stream bank, it was not hard to bypass most of the column. Once back at the head of the force, he and his adjutants exchanged their winded steeds for unburdened spares.

  So the morning progressed, without any return or mirror signal by the far-ranging scouts. The midday stop was made; mess carts stoked with charcoal fires fed the companies hot stew by shifts in a stream-side camp, dispatching companies as fast as new ones marched up. At every crest in the trail, Egilrude scanned the hills ahead for the square outline of the watchtower, knowing it would not be long before the column came in view of it.

  What he did encounter, he did not expect: a long line of foreign troops, Corinthian and Brythunian by their banners, threading down a mountainous cross-trail to cut the route of his march.

  The force had not had time, the marshal judged, to deploy in ambush or defence; but they were armed and ready, with light cavalry lancers well-suited to the mountainous terrain riding in the fore. Egilrude drew up his lead phalanx of mounted archers at the stream ford just below the trail junction. He directed the following infantry to continue forward and fill in on either side of the flat, steep-walled valley. Better, he reasoned, to keep the rearmost, slowest elements of the army moving, and make ready to fight in a solid, compact front. At the same time, he issued orders to be relayed by semaphore to his outriders along the nearby ridges.

  Before many minutes had passed, the lead contingent of Corinthian cavalry and officers faced Egilrude’s command party on the opposite bank of the stream. Grounding their bannered lances in a circle to signify a parley, the leaders left them behind and rode to the water’s edge. Egilrude gestured his two adjutants and a pair of cavalry officers forward; they sat in their saddles on the near bank, awaiting the foreigners’ words.

  The Corinthian leader chose the language of once proud Nemedia as a common tongue. “Interlopers, we renounce your presence on Corinthian soil! We order you to depart our sovereign territory at once. I bring with me a decree of our governing council.” The gold-crested horseman appeared to be of a rank equivalent to legion captain. He now waved high a scroll, red-tasselled, of regal-looking authority. “It states that all Aquilonian and tributary forces are to withdraw behind western borders in a space of two days, on pain of battle.”

  “So you say.” Egilrude, sitting unruffled in his saddle, used the same gruff Nemedian dialect to reply. He spoke loudly to be heard over the gurgling of the stream. “No one in our party can read High Corinthian, so the text of your scroll must- remain a matter of speculation.” He tossed off the implied insult without sarcasm or undue emotion. “But I would remind you that Aquilonians first entered your land in pursuit of stateless rebels and brigands, to subdue them as a favour both to Nemedia and Corinthia. Our high command now seeks permission to pass through your country on the way to more southerly engagements, not to make war on your masters.”

  “Of late you passed through Nemedia, and the country now lies in ruins. We would be fools to tolerate such unmannerly guests.” The gold-crested officer laughed bitterly, making low comments in Corinthian to his fellows. “If we truly sought your ruin,” he continued, “we would let your army proceed southward to face the storms and vampires of the Karpash Mountains. But our orders will not permit it. Therefore you must turn back.”

  Egilrude sat immovable in his saddle. “Your orders, such as they are, have no sway over us. Therefore I suggest that you withdraw from the path of our march.”

  The Corinthian officer reddened. “I warn you, sir, you risk open war between our lands!” He raised the scroll over his head once again. “This decree is also signed by a special emissary of the King of Brythunia, whose military forces have been committed to Corinthia's aid in clearing our western border.” He gestured to one of his confederates, who wore Brythunian-style fur trappings and a northern spiked helm; the outlander nodded sternly. “Failure to obey will be taken as a hostile act against both countries.”

  “Nonsense, we have no quarrel with Brythunia!” Egilrude shook his helmeted head with an air of dismissal. Then he shot a frank, shrewd look at the other commander. “But I warn you, since your force seems to be of no great size: my battalions are spread throughout these valleys, advancing by several parallel routes. If you would oppose me, look to your flanks.”

  The Corinthian shot an uneasy glance to his second officer and began muttering rapidly in his native tongue. As he did so, Egilrude tipped down the visor of his helmet, letting it fall with a sharp clang. This was a signal to his companions; as one, the horsemen spurred into the stream, drawing broadswords and maces to set upon their enemies.

  Water sprayed and curtained silver in the tree-dappled light as the Aquilonians crossed the ford. Then arose a furious clanging as the two groups crossed arms. The Corinthian party knew better than to try and wheel away from their attackers; yet they lacked forward motion, and so found it hard to control their steeds. One of them, the Brythunian, slipped from his saddle into the stream, there to stain the
water with a red plume issuing from a rent in his fur tunic. Egilrude hacked at the gilded Corinthian leader’s offhand arm with stunning force. The marshal watched the tasselled scroll go flying from his grip into the stream, where he decided it was well lost.

  The enemy officers crowded back and were soon enveloped by protecting lancers. Meanwhile, mounted forces charged from the Aquilonian side to join the fight. Arrows clipped the foliage overhead, and troopers joined battle all up and down the stream, for its summer level was low enough to wade or gallop across in most places. The two armies pressed together, and the din of weapons filled the narrow valley.

  Within the hour Egilrude’s side had carved out a victory—a local one, at least. The Corinthian force had not been given time to deploy fully in the valley bottom; the Aquilonian thrust pushed their lead party back, and cut them off from the trail by which the balance of their force was approaching. Having divided his foe, Egilrude pursued them relentlessly; he had not lied when he said that his own force was spread among three valleys. Now he relayed signals to his outriders to ensure that the Corinthian reinforcements were harried from two sides at least.

  His central detachment hounded the heels of the Corinthian officers and cavalry tirelessly, advancing in a series of swift, concerted charges. These always succeeded in breaking up the resistance and forcing the enemy back to the next stand of forest or rocky scrub. Egilrude lost men to arrow flights and lance skirmishes; but as he advanced, it was plain that more Corinthians than Aquilonians were left moaning and bleeding among the clumps of meadow grass and the knotted roots of balsams.

  Egilrude, following the famous example of his emperor, led the cavalry charges himself and took an active part in the fighting. Within the span of a hard-won quarter league his breath came in gasps, his arm and shoulder felt achingly sore and strengthless, and foamy sweat oozed from beneath the saddle blanket of his winded steed. Even so, he found in himself the will to fight on. And when finally he trapped the enemy commander in a tangled windfall of splintered trees, he felt exultation fiercer than he had ever known.