'I shall go through first, child,' said the huge man. His fingers flexed upon his hilt. Despite the heat of the day, he wore long sleeves of velvet and gauntlets of beautiful, butter-coloured leather. He had to duck low to clear the heavy lintel of the door, and he performed the action like a swordsman. He did not bend from the waist, presenting the back of his neck as a gift to any ill-wisher inside. Instead he flexed his knees deeply and went through upright, straightening to his full height the instant he was inside. His eyes swept the room and he relaxed the slightest bit, signalling for the others to come in.
The large room they were in was on two levels. Just inside
he door a bar stretched along the right-hand wall the length of the upper level. On the left a stair led to an upper story. The upper level was perhaps six paces long, then a set of four room-width steps descended to the lower level, which contained many tables and chairs. Set into the far wall were four round windows through which sunlight streamed. Through the windows they could see the sparkling waters of the bay.
There were no more than a dozen men and women in the place, for the hour was yet early. The man behind the bar surveyed his three new customers. At the sight of their expensive clothing and other trappings he sprang from behind the bar, wiping his hands upon his apron and bowing for all he was worth.
'My masters, my lady, how may I serve you?'
'We look for a man. He is a Cimmerian. We have heard that he is to be found here.' The big man spoke in clipped tones, as if he knew the value of his words and was loath to waste them.
'Oh,' the barkeep said, disappointed. 'You mean Conan. He sits over at that table by the window.''
'Excellent,' said the woman. 'Be so good as to bring a pitcher of your best wine to that table, and four cups.'
'At once, my lady.' The man scurried back behind his bar.
Conan had watched as the three came in. They were unusual figures to see in a place like the Albatross, and he made a quick evaluation of them. From the cut and material of their clothes, they were Aquilonians. The small man looked intense and excitable, but Conan had a feeling he would be handier with that short basket-hilt than most men would think. The big man was impressive. His fine clothes were not the gauds of a dandy but the rich garments of a nobleman. He was clearly 'a member of the military aristocracy, and his physical address and the condition of his sword proclaimed that he took the military part very seriously. The woman was a puzzle. Her clothing and company were both Aquilonian, but he had seen her extraordinary colouration only among the Hyperboreans. He saw the barkeep
gesture toward him and the three came toward his table. Perhaps his luck was about to change.
The three halted by his table. 'Are you Conan of Cimmeria?' asked the big man.
'I am,' said Conan, neither rising nor offering a seat. It was too early in the proceedings.
'I am Ulfilo, Margrave of Petva in Aquilonia. This lady is Malia, the wife of my brother.'
'And I am Springald,' said the smaller man, 'scholar and teacher of Tanasul.''
'We wish to speak with you about engaging your services for a journey we must embark upon,' said Ulfilo. The barkeep appeared with the pitcher and cups. He arranged them upon the table, filling each cup, and left, bowing. Now Conan rose and gestured to the other seats.
'Since you are buying the wine, I will be more than happy to listen to your proposal.' The four sat and sipped at their wine.
'This is better wine than I've had these last few days,' Conan said, understating the situation. 'You have my full attention.'
'Since reaching this port,' Ulfilo began, 'we have inquired concerning seafaring men who have experience of the Black Coast. We were told that you are such a man.'
'I am,' Conan averred. 'But there are many others in this port. Ships sail from here every season to trade among the black lands of the south.'
'Yes,' said Springald, 'down to Kush, and even a bit farther south than that. But we need to go considerably farther. We must go many leagues south of the Zarkheba River.''
'We heard rumours,' Malia said, 'that you used to sail in those waters.'
Conan paused. 'I did,' he said, 'but that was a number of years ago.'
'K is unlikely that the waters or the coastline have changed in the interim,' said Springald. 'But it is said that very few travel so far south.'
'One seeking high profit must go where there are few rivals,' Conan said non-committally. The truth was that few except pirates sailed those waters.
'How far south have you gone?' Malia asked.
'Far enough that the rivers and the lands have no names that you would ever have heard. Far enough that a white skin is a thing of marvel.' Abruptly, he laughed heartily.
'Why do you laugh, Conan?' asked Ulfilo mildly.
'Something just struck me,' the Cimmerian answered. 'The folk of those lands thought was white.' He thumped the triangle of massive chest exposed by the unlaced opening of his leather tunic. It was as deeply tanned and windburned as his scarred face. 'And I burn as dark as a Pict in those waters. What would they think of this lady?'
'They may get that opportunity,' she said quietly.
Conan turned serious. 'What is your proposal? Those are bad waters and worse coasts for people who have never roamed the hot lands.'
Malia studied the man before her. She saw a man who might have been twenty-five years old, or as easily thirty-five. He was big and powerful and exuded the relaxed ferocity of a predator at rest. His tunic was plain, of supple black leather. In deference to the warm climate he was barelegged. Arms and legs alike were knotted with muscle and scarred with many old wounds. His only ornaments were a pair of heavy bronze bracelets. The sword at his belt was long and severely plain, its crossguard and pommel of unornamented steel. An equally plain dirk balanced it on the opposite side. The purse that hung next to the dirk was very flat. He looked competent and formidable, perhaps even a match for her huge and somewhat overprotective brother-in-law.
'We must find a man,' said Ulfilo. 'He is my younger brother, Malia's husband. He left Petva, our ancestral home, two years ago. The last communication we had from him was sent from Khemi, in Stygia. From there he went south.'
Conan took a long drink of his wine. 'South of Khemi lies the entirety of the Black Coast. To simply sail south from Khemi in hopes of finding him would be folly. I suggest you wait at home. If he returns all is well. If not, you must give him up for dead.'
'You do not understand,' Malia said. 'My husband sent the letter from Khemi after a long journey to the south. He returned north and stayed at Khemi only long enough to outfit another expedition, then he sailed south again.'
'If he did that,' Conan said, 'then he is a man well fitted to thrive in those fierce lands. Why do you not leave him to his activities?' Conan assumed that the man must have become a pirate. If so, the last thing he would want would be to see his family tracking him down. Many a younger son had left home to sail the shark's road. With a few successful voyages he could return home to set himself up as a country squire, spread a few stories about fabulously profitable trading trips to exotic lands, and settle down to a life of utmost respectability after an exciting career of robbery and murder.
'No, we must find him,' Malia said. 'His letter was most emphatic. He wants us to outfit a ship and find some brave men and sail after him.'
'Are you interested in helping us?' Ulfilo broke in.
'That depends upon a number of things,' Conan said. 'First, my pay.'
'A thousand gold marks of Aquilonia,' said Ulfilo without hesitation. 'Payable upon our successful return.'
Conan shook his head. 'If you would hire me to help find your brother, I would want to be paid as soon as he is found. I would wish to return immediately, no matter what your plans might be.'
'That is fair,' Ulfilo said. 'Very well, a thousand marks when we find my brother alive.'
Again Conan shook his black locks. 'No. My toil and danger are the same whether he is alive or not. If
he is dead, I want to be paid when we find the place where he died.'
Ulfilo glowered but Malia answered: 'Agreed.'
I lien that part is settled,' Conan said. 'Now, where did my brother sail? And what was he looking for, so far south?'
Now it was Ulfilo's turn to shake his head. 'Suffice it that he had his reasons.'
I can accept that,' Conan said. 'But I must know where on propose to look for him.'
'You are accounted a bold man hereabout,' the woman said. 'Aye,' Conan answered, 'but no man calls me a fool. And I am loath to travel blind, you may be assured that you will never get a skipper to risk his ship, or sailors to man it, without some idea of where they are bound. Even high pay will not sweep men into an unknown sea.'
They paused for a while, brooding. Springald looked to Ulfilo. Finally, the man nodded. Malia repeated the gesture. The scholar turned to Conan.
'Cimmerian, what do you know of a place called the Coast of Bones?'
Conan sat back, frowning. 'An ill-favoured place, avoided by even the fiercest of the pirates. It lies six day's sail south the Zarkheba.'
'And have you been there?' Springald asked.
'I have,' Conan said, 'though not by choice. My ship was blown thither in a storm and we had to lay up for a fortnight making repairs. It was not such an adventure as any man would care to repeat.'
'And did you see the jagged white rocks that line the shore?' Springald said.
'How could I not? It is they that make navigation so hazardous. From out at sea they look like the bones of a beached animal, and it is from them that the coast gets its name.'
'And the green-stained river that empties its sluggish flow into the sea on that coast? Saw you that?'' Springald asked eagerly.
'Aye, it's hard to miss. The only source of fresh water in those parts, and even then it's only fresh by comparison with the sea. We had to strain the green muck out of it six times
through fine cloth before it was fit to drink, and even then it could be deadly.' Conan gave him a suspicious look. 'How come you to know of that coast? Oh, this mysterious brother must have written of it in his letter.''
'Nay,' said the scholar, 'that stretch of coast is little known to men of this day, but it is documented abundantly in the writings of the ancient kingdom of Acheron. Why, in the Voyages of Ahmes the Explorer alone, the great navigator details fully ten voyages to that coast and others nearby, and the Annals of the Pilot's Guild of Python lists twenty-seven—'
'Peace, Springald,' Malia chided. She smiled at Conan. 'He can go on for hours like this. Suffice it that we are not ignorant of the land, although we have never been there.'
'But these are the accounts of many centuries past,' Ulfilo said. 'What sort of folk inhabit that stretch of coast in this age?'
'That is the worst part,' Conan said. 'They are a tribe said to be cannibals. I never saw them eat anyone, but they dragged off both living men and dead. We never saw them again, but we heard the sounds the living men made as the demons tortured them night after night. Even if they are not cannibals, I can tell you that they don't like strangers.'
'Pardon me, Conan,' said Springald, 'but might it be that they just did not like the kind of stranger you were? Perhaps they had had unpleasant experiences with men resembling you and your shipmates.'
Conan glared, then grinned crookedly. 'You mean was I a pirate? Aye, it's true. It was long enough ago that no one wants to see me swing for it now. I was younger and less law-abiding then. And I'll admit that some of my shipmates may have been a bit rougher than necessary when they went into the forest foraging.'
'Then,' Springald said, 'is it not possible that they might be less hostile to men who come as peaceful traders?'
'It's possible,' Conan said. 'But only if you were in a strong party, heavily armed. All the tribes of the coast are predatory,
raiding each other and preying on shipwrecked mariners. They need to trade for what they must have and cannot get by raiding, hut they are very lacking self-restraint.' 'What does that mean?' Malia asked. 'I mean they may attack traders to take what they want even knowing that it means no more traders will venture to their land for a long time. They have little sense of the future.'
'I know many men who behave that way,' said Ulfilo sardonically. 'In the civilised lands we call them kings and nobles.'
'True enough,' said Conan. 'At heart most of us are savages, did we but know it. The difference is that most of us have learned a little restraint but civilised men of power and coastal blacks never have.'
'What are these people called?' Springald asked. 'They call themselves the Borana,' Conan answered. 'Ah! There are a people of southern Kush who name themselves the Palana, and in northern Kush are a mountain people known as Fathada. These two peoples speak a closely related tongue, which is a variant of Classical Kushite. Might these Borana be a southern drift of the same people?''
Conan regarded the little man with dawning respect. 'That may very well be. I only heard them scream and chant defiance, but the words sounded Kushite to me, and some of my Kushite shipmates said that they might be able to understand the words, if they were spoken slowly and less angrily.' 'Did you travel inland?' Ulfilo asked. 'Not from the Coast of Bones. On other parts of the Black Coast, yes.'
Malia leaned forward. 'What is it like inland?' Conan gazed out the window, as if drawing a picture from past years and faraway lands. 'Men speak of the Black Kingdoms as if it were a single land, but it is not. One man sees a little patch of territory inland from a single landing place and thinks he has seen all of the black lands, but that is foolish. What most people hear about are the great, squalling jungles with their swarming beasts and their pestilences, their fierce predators and fiercer men. But that is just the coast. The black lands are not all jungle, but only a small part. Go inland along some of the rivers, especially the Zarkheba, and you can be in the jungle for weeks, some of it so thick you have to hack your way through with bush knives. Other places, a half-day's trek can put you in the mountains where the tiny hunters make their home. In another, two days' journey can put you on a high plateau where trees are sparse and the land is covered with fine grass and the wild game is abundant. In places I've seen herds of huge antelope so vast that all the scribes of Aquilonia could not number them all.'
'Did you ever hear of a two-peaked mountain called the Horns of Shushtu?' Malia asked.
Conan snapped back to his present surroundings. 'Never. What is it?'
She shrugged her shapely shoulders. 'Just a landmark mentioned in my husband's letter.'
Ulfilo glared at her briefly, then turned to Conan. 'What of it, Cimmerian? Will you be our guide?'
Conan pondered a while. This was a fool's errand if ever he had encountered one. And he had encountered many. The man they sought was probably dead. The coast they wanted to reach was the most hostile Conan had ever visited. On the other hand, the men seemed competent, the woman was beautiful, and most of all, he had no other prospects. An offer he would have laughed at months before had a certain attraction now. He was bored, and if nothing else, this certainly promised adventure. If they should against all odds be successful, a thousand gold marks would keep him for a long time, perhaps until the wars picked up again. And there was the lure of the Black Coast. Once again he gazed out the window, as if peering past the horizon to the huge, unknown land beyond. So much of it lay there, perhaps as much as all the Western and Eastern lands together, most of it never seen by men of his hue. There were wonders there of a sort undreamed of by scholars like Springald. Horrors, too, and
in great abundance. And always hardship and fighting, but those were the commonplaces of Conan's life.
'Aye, I'm with you,' he said at last. They relaxed and smiled :it one another as if all was now settled.
'We haven't been here long,' Malia said. 'Is there a suitable ship in harbour?'
'No,' said Conan. 'Not now, and not for the last few weeks. No ordinary merchant craft will do. We need a fighting man's cra
ft and a brave crew and a canny skipper. There are none such in port just now.'
Their faces fell. 'Then we are in for a long wait?' Malia said.
'Not necessarily,' Conan said.
'Don't speak in riddles, man,' Ulfilo growled. 'Either such a ship is in port, or it isn't. Which is it?'
Conan grinned. 'There is none such just yet, but there will be in a minute or two. Ah! She drops anchor!'
'What do you mean?' Ulfilo asked, rising from his seat and stepping to the window through which the Cimmerian gazed.
Conan pointed through the port-like window to where the newcomer now lay a few hundred feet offshore. 'There is a likely craft.' The other two crowded at the window to see.
'It seems small,' said Malia, her confidence slipping.
'Come,' said Conan, rising. 'We'll go speak to her skipper. And on the way I'll tell you a few things about seafaring in the dangerous waters.' The four walked out of the Albatross.
II
The Shipmaster
That,' Conan said, pointing to the craft that lay at rest a hundred paces from the pier on which they stood, 'is a Zingaran hull, built in Kordava. It is made for the coastal trade of that land, and is designed to be swift, for near Kordava lie the Barachan Isles, which are rich in pirates. For that reason, these hulls are much favoured by the Barachans, the better to catch their prey. You see the rake of the two masts?''
'Rake?' Malia asked.
''Rake' refers to the slight backward angle of the masts,' Springald supplied. 'It is esteemed among seafarers for improving the handling qualities of the vessel.'
'Exactly,' Conan said patiently. 'No ship is built with that rake to the masts. It will always be the skipper who tries out different rakes, and different mast heights, and different sail plans to test his ship's speed and sailing qualities. I can tell by this rake that the skipper is concerned with getting the best speed out of his ship, just before you three came into the Albatross, I saw this ship round the cape and lower its yards. The sails are lateen-style, and very large for the size of the ship. Only an excellent seaman with a well-trained crew can manage such a rig. Else, the risk of capsizing the vessel is too great.'
The Conan Chronology Page 513
