"My father was a roof-maker who died in a fall from a roof,” the older boy announced. "My mother weaves baskets, too, and I cut river reeds for her—but someday I will be a warrior-priest of the One True Goddess!" He displayed a somewhat longer flint knife; returning it then to a pouch on his belt as if sheathing a noble sword, he stood with a proud, erect bearing. "Someday I may even be as famous a temple warrior as Zaius the Champion.”
The Cimmerian laughed. "Your warrior-priests are a well-dressed and well-drilled lot. I would guess their fighting techniques are a bit stiff, though, hampered by more taboos than their diet.”
"A dozen of them can wipe out any hundred ragged desert nomads, you can be sure of that!" the boy answered hotly.
Conan gazed back at the youth, taking no issue with him. "And can the son of a roof-maker or a basket-weaver gain entry to their noble brotherhood?”
"Indeed I can,” the lad argued belligerently. "Entry to the priesthood is based strictly on skill in temple school... and on spirit, and success in games and drills,” he finished, as if reciting a lesson.
"Good, then,” the Cimmerian nodded. "Maybe there is some hope for them after all. What is your name, lad?”
"I am Ezrel,” the elder youth declared. Indicating his companions, he said, "Jabed, Felidamon, and..." he indicated the child Conan had first captured, who how hovered at the rear of the group, "... Inos.”
Conan nodded, saying nothing. He had an inkling that young Felidamon was a girl-child, though she and Jabed were equally bony and wore long, soiled djellaba shirts that made it impossible to tell.
“Are you a fighter?” Jabed asked. "What kind of weapon is that?”
"This,” Conan said, taking up the blade from beside him, "is a good, stout Ilbarsi knife, taken in... trade from hill tribesmen south of the Vilayet. You can see here, the blade gets thicker toward the end—that makes up for its shortness in... chopping firewood. A fine tool, this— it will serve for cutting brush, digging holes, various kinds of skinning and butchery—even as a spit for roasting, and yet it will take an edge keen enough to shave with. A man should keep one by his side at all times...” Leaning forward with the blade, he thrust it into the glowing bed of the fire. “You never know what you may catch with it!"
Withdrawing the knife from the coals and blowing off cinders, he showed them that he had speared something oblong and steaming, wrapped in singed leaves—some foodstuff that had been baking under the hot ashes. "Sweet ground-tubers, you see! Here are swamp radishes, too, and leeks.”
Digging in the fire he produced more delicacies. Some of these the children were induced to sample after they had cooled. But it took a heart as bold as Ezrel’s to lead the way in tasting the fish stew.
"Phoo, it is hot and peppery,” he complained. This did not keep him from accepting a sizeable serving on a plate of tree bark that Conan provided. The others followed suit; even timid Inos joined in cracking the segmented shells of the crayfish and sucking out their tender flesh. The children ate greedily, leaving Conan to consume but a modest portion of the stew and finish off their leavings, mainly swamp-leeks.
"You must have travelled far,” Felidamon ventured in her piping young voice. "Have you been to cities greater than Qjara?”
"Oh, aye, I have been to Aghrapur, Belverus, Tarantia... many such overlarge hives of men. The nearest one is Shadizar, where I may go when the northward passes open, if a caravan happens through.”
"Shadizar the Wicked, they call it,” Jabed mused. "But they will not speak of it in temple school. Why is that, Conan?”
"Oh, it is a place of great wealth and great misery, all in one. Penniless men and women beg and starve in the streets at the feet of rich, resplendent fops.”
"How can that be?” Felidamon marvelled. "Don’t the priests make them share what they have?"
Conan laughed. "No, the priests are the richest and worst of them. And Shadizar is a slave market—the slaves there live under cruel masters, but many free folk are even worse off than the slaves! Most of the able, honest men there are thieves—there is even a Thieves' Guild in Shadizar. Fancy that!"
"People in our city say that a lone foreigner like you must be a thief." Ezrel’s look was fearless as usual, his words pointed. "Is that why you want to go to Shadizar?”
Conan guffawed. "Well, in truth, supposing that I was a thief, the pickings would be choicest in Shadizar, with its greedy merchants, lotus-crazed aristocrats, and rich, lordly wizards." He gathered up leavings of the meal and tossed them into the fire. “There is much better thieving in such a place than any little camel-bath like Qjara has to offer!”
"You would not want to be a thief in Qjara, in any case,” Ezrel said. "The temple warriors would cut you up into cat meat.” To Conan’s scowl, he added, "But if you promise not to steal, you could come live within the city walls, and not have to sleep on a bed of boughs.” He pointed at the shaded warren under a dense bush where Conan’s rumpled blanket lay.
The Cimmerian shook his shaggy head. “No, boy, I do not think your elders would want me prowling your city—not beyond the caravan quarter, anyway. And I do not feel like slaying a dozen men to prove the point just now. I will continue to lodge without the city walls.”
“But Conan,” Felidamon chimed in, "you could settle down in Qjara and learn to ply a useful trade. Camel-breeding, perhaps, or—” she glanced down at the dying fire and the remnants of the meal, "—cookery, at one of the caravansaries!”
"You mean, make food for travellers and accept money in return... and do only that, and nothing else?” Conan regarded her narrowly, knitting his brow in puzzlement. "But what would happen when I grew tired of cooking, as I surely would? I am not a slave, to toil endlessly at another's whim!” He shook his black mane vigorously, dismissing the matter. "And if I would not bow and grovel before your goddess Saditha, why, there would be trouble, too! No, 'tis better that I leave your town to its pious peace.” He glanced at the shadows near the stream’s edge. "But say, it grows late. Wash off your trenchers in the stream before you go.” Ezrel, noting the declining angle of the sun in the western sky, had already risen.
"Yet you will go to Shadizar.” Inos, the small fugitive, spoke up unexpectedly. "Which do you like better, Conan—Shadizar or Qjara?”
“For the sort of man I am, Shadizar is the best place.” Conan gazed at the little boy with the merest shade of regret in his blue eyes. "But before you go, listen—value what you have, lad!” He clapped a hand on the child's shoulder before hustling him along. “Never desert Qjara for Shadizar the Wicked, and pray that no slave-catcher ever drags you there.”
II
Valley of Fire
Exalted Priest Khumanos trod the desert waste in fear. To an onlooker his mental state would not, perhaps, have shown—but this dusky southerner knew that heat alone would hardly have reduced his young limbs to slack, reluctant obedience. The heavy film of sweat across his shoulder blades, beneath his hooded cotton tunic, was not due to sun; nor was the taut dryness in his throat born of the scorching furnace-breaths of the arid canyons he traversed. As Khumanos trudged onward, the harshness of the land around him went unnoticed. It was a mere faint, heat-shimmering reflection of the mortal dread and anguish that laid waste his own faltering heart.
In the palsied grip of his fear, Khumanos guessed that if anyone could instruct him, or at least point the way, Solon could. Old beyond years, wise beyond knowing, the holy hermit had dwelt in the desert since the time of Khumanos's fathers and before. Not a god, certainly, but not quite mortal either... in past times, heads of the Sarkad temple had been known to consult the sage for advice. He was respected as an oracle, a pure wellspring of the parched fanaticism that lay at the heart of true, godly zeal.
Khumanos paused in a rare knife-edge of shade, to rest against the as-yet unheated, northwest-facing wall of a deep, dry wadi. Sparingly he sipped from his lukewarm and already flaccid waterskin. He knew not if he was on the proper path to find Solon—nor if there was
such a path, nor even if Solon still lived. But tradition told him that if he placed himself in this part of the barren lands, and followed the central gully towards its source in the nameless hills, he would come to the wise old one's dwelling place.
He thought he must be on the track—for the hermit was said to live in a valley of fire, and the terrain Khumanos was entering certainly looked as if it was carved out of frozen fire. Red sandstone cliffs and ridges rose on either hand, their shapes twisting and convoluting into spires worn ragged as writhing flames. The fiery yellow sand of the dry wash alternated with banks of uneven red cobbles; these, as he tried to cross them, scorched the sides of his sandalled feet like the coals of an open hearth. The few shreds of vegetation, huddled in gully-bottoms or trailing down from narrow crevices in the walls, looked dry and dark, scorched to cinders by the slow, inexorable holocaust.
Ahead of him the gully came to an abrupt end, with no sign of a human presence. He searched the blank walls, hollowed and red-crusted like the insides of a pottery kiln; finally he saw where the way led.
In some primeval flood or avalanche the narrow stone channel of the wadi had been choked with boulders and debris; now, if Khumanos wished to follow the dead stream further, it would mean a hazardous climb up the steep, irregular face of the dam, to a height of a half dozen man-lengths. Not enough of a fall to kill him, perhaps—but enough to leave him broken and helpless, without a chance of survival in this lonely, hostile waste.
Here, then, was the challenge, the test of faith. Compared to the plague of dread that besieged his soul, Khumanos almost exulted at this minor, measurable danger. Slinging his water bag around behind him, he strode forward and made a running leap to the top of the first massive boulder. He placed his sandalled foot on the next, laid his palms on the hot, rough stone edges, and began to climb.
Later, near the top of the precipice, where a large stone had choked the fissure and created a shallow overhang, Khumanos knew that he must die. His fingertips felt raw, his breath came in shallow gasps, and the hot stone—to which he clung as tightly as a babe to its mother—scorched and abraded his chest and chin. The small, protruding rock he had intended to use as a foothold, after twisting loose under his sandal, had skittered away to smash far below. There was no hope of climbing back down—for with his eyes to the cliff wall he was unable to see the precarious, sloping footholds below. Now he knew he must either fall or cling here until the ruthless heat left him dry and brittle as a desiccated insect for the desert gusts to waft away.
Only one small hope remained. It lay above him in the narrow, glaring arc of stone his desperate eyes could scan: from a jumble of debris atop the protruding boulder which he so embraced and cherished, a single twig projected. White, dry and finger-thin, it appeared to have no strength left in it; all that could be said was that it was in reach. In all likelihood, if he shifted his anxious grip and snatched at the twig to sustain his balance, it would start an avalanche that would bear him over backward to his death... but just possibly not.
Again, a test of faith... with destruction this time only a hands-breadth away. After more hesitation and a long muttered prayer to Votantha, Exalted Priest Khumanos grasped the twig.
It may not have been a twig after all, but a dried root. There may even have been a tough thread of life left in it... because it held his faltering weight. A small shower of dirt and gravel bounded down past Khumanos, some of it pelting his eyes and mouth, but he did his best to disregard that. Trusting gradually more weight to his hand grip, he began to inch himself up the curving rock on his elbows and belly. Then, with a heave, he got his knees under him. Creeping breathlessly up the boulder, he came to the top of the dam.
Beyond it lay a level space of dry, silty sand. Further ahead he could see that the canyon continued to branch and twist, cutting more deeply into the crimson flanks of the hills—but here, close at hand, lay something of intense interest.
Partway up a dusty-red mound that projected out into the gully was the shadowy circle of a cave mouth. From it, as from recent digging, darker red earth trailed down, flecked with pale bits of bone and debris. And at the top of the refuse pile before the cave, sitting cross-legged in the sun, was a dishevelled man in a dirty white tunic.
Surely this was Solon. Khumanos, feeling doubly blessed by the discovery and by his own survival thus far, fell to his knees in the sand. He spent some time muttering devout prayers of thanksgiving to Votantha. When he looked up again, the figure before the cave was standing, making impatient gestures to one side. The rags of his costume trailed loosely as he waved. Khumanos gathered that he was pointing to a sparse path which ran around the edge of the midden, leading up to where he stood.
Hurrying to obey, Khumanos went in the direction the wise man had indicated. He soon found himself sliding in red shale and leaping from rock to rock, for the trail was ill-made and little-used. As he neared the top of the slide it became more of a garbage heap, littered with gourd-stems and cactus-pear husks, skins and bones of snakes and toads, and other dried offal. Also evident in the heap were larger, heavier bones, some with strange and disturbing shapes. By that route, the priest climbed toward a shelf which lay halfway up to the base of a sandstone monolith that towered and twisted against the blazing blue sky like a pink tornado of flame.
At the cave-shelf Khumanos, coming face to face with its occupant, paused in sudden uncertainty. At close range the old man was a grotesque sight—bent, withered, and filthy in his ragged smock, his claw-like nails untended, his hands and feet knobby with calluses and crusted with grime. His face was a grinning, near-toothless knot of seams and wrinkles; his head was almost bald, with the merest fringe of wispy-white hair in back. Scalp and forehead had suffered grievous overexposure to the sun; they were red and peeling in some places, blotchy in others. Yet his movements had a lightness and spryness that denied any thought of infirmity; the sunburnt, scrawny frame harboured an ageless vitality.
"Elder One,” Khumanos ventured, “I come in search of a seer who dwells in the desert—”
“I am Solon,” the old man replied, volubly nodding and grinning. "I have watched your approach since midday... I could have shown you a safe path around the dry fall," he added genially, "but I make it a point never to aid supplicants. It is well that you survived the climb—it proves you are strong in your faith in Votantha.”
The old man spoke volubly and lovingly, as if starved for human company. “Long it has been since a high priest found his way here from the city to homage me. What tribute have you brought?”
"Sublime One, most favoured of Votantha!” Dropping to his knees, the Exalted Priest pressed his forehead to the gritty earth at the hermit’s feet before sitting upright. In response to the old man’s impatient gestures, he reached into his tunic and produced a parcel wrapped in gold-threaded cloth. "I offer you rare delicacies—spiced dates, candied breast of songbirds, soft green figs and honeyed sesame loaf.” Before he even finished speaking, the old man had snatched the packet out of his grasp and retreated with it into the shadows of the cave. Khumanos, half-rising to his feet, crept after him as far as the low, rough archway. But Solon crouched just inside the rim of shade, and did not invite him any further. The priest knelt patiently outside, in the sun’s harsh glare.
"Sublime One, I wish I could say that my faith was strong,” he continued, "but I am prey to sinful fears—”
" ’Tis good, then, that you have come to the desert.” Solon’s words were enunciated around greedy mouthfuls of food, which he stuffed into his toothless maw with grimed, crack-nailed fingers.
"Know you," the sage went on after swallowing, "this barren land is a spawning ground of all that is mystic and holy! A pilgrim comes here to face harsh, naked reality... only to find that reality wears more cloaks and masks than a troupe of Corinthian mummers. The eastern desert is the country of mirages, hallucinations, star falls and fever-dreams. Foodstuffs are scarce, and most of those to be found here—the roots, mushrooms, and ca
ctus blooms—poison the brain and open the eyes to frightful inward visions.” Solon gnawed and swallowed more as he spoke, which made the sounds of his speech wolf-like and difficult to understand.
“And yet,” he went on, “the true mystic knows that there are no more powerful narcotics for calling forth demons and spirit visions than pain, fatigue, and starvation. And Votantha Himself knows, this place has a plentiful supply of all three! Here in the desert, the emptiness itself sounds as a mustering call to the demons that lurk in the inner recesses of a man’s soul.” Having crammed down all the dainty food without offering any to his guest, Solon now wiped his lips on the parcel's cloth-of-gold wrapping. "Here in the lost barrens, the bones and innards of the earth are laid bare, showing the true and savage nature of the beast. Come, follow.” With this command he waved a hand and, crouching low, gestured Khumanos back into the shadows of his cave.
The Exalted Priest, his eyes still dazzled by sun, had difficulty making his way inside. Promptly on entering, and then several times again in swift succession, he struck his head on objects jutting down sharply from the already-low ceiling of the tunnel. As his vision ceased swimming from the blows and began to adapt to the dimness, he could see that the protuberances were pale in colour: giant bones, as hard and massive as stone, embedded in the softer sandstone walls—which seemed to have been dug away around them to enlarge the place and reveal their shape.
As Solon led the way deeper, the cave opened up somewhat, allowing Khumanos to stand nearly upright. Odd pieces and cross sections of skeletons stuck out of the walls on all sides, representing snakelike fish, lizard-like birds, and other creatures Khumanos had never seen or heard tell of. The place had an eerie, nightmarish aspect, particularly in the bloody dimness of reflected sun which glowed off the apron of red soil outside the cave's mouth. Gradually, by degrees, the high priest was able to perceive more of the details around him—such as, that the hermit had knotted the greasy cloth-of-gold under his chin. He now wore it as a shawl or bandage around his scabrous old head, while he commended the wonders of the cave to his visitor’s view.
Conan the Outcast Page 2
