The master of spies frowned over the map that Alcina had slipped into Quesado's hand and that the Zingaran now handed to him. Sternly he asked:
Why did you bring it yourself? You know you are needed with the rebel army.'
The Zingaran shrugged. 'It was impossible to send it by carrier pigeon, my lord. When I joined that gaggle of rebels, I had to leave my birds in Messantia, under care of my replacement, Fadius the Kothian.'
Vibius Latro stared coldly. 'Then, why did you not take the map to Fadius, who could have flown it hither in the accustomed manner? You could have remained in that nest of traitors to follow the winds of change. I counted on your knife at Conan's back.'
Quesado gestured helplessly. When the lady Alcina obtained this copy of the map, Master, the army was already three days' ride beyond Messantia. I could scarce request a six-day leave to go thither and return without arousing suspicion, whilst to go as a deserter would have meant searches and questions by the Argosseans. Nor could I rejoin the army once I had departed without leave. And pigeons do betimes get lost, or are slain by falcons or wildcats or
In inters. For a document of such moment, I deemed it better to carry it myself.'
Tin; chancellor grunted, pursing his lips. 'Why, then, did you not bear it straight away to General Procas?'
Quesado was now perspiring freely. His sallow brow and bestubbled cheeks glistened with moisture. Vibius Latro was no man lightly to displease.
'General P-Procas knows me not.' The spy's voice grew querulous. 'My sigil would mean naught to him. Only you, my lord, command all channels for transmission of such intelligence to the military chiefs.'
A small, thin-lipped smile flickered across the other's enigmatic features. 'Quite so,' he said, 'You have done adequately. I should have liked it better had Alcina obtained the map ere the rebels marched north from Messantia.'
'Methinks the rebel leaders had not fully chosen their mute before the night of my departure,' said Quesado. He did not know this for a fact, but it had a reasonable ring.
Vibius Latro dismissed the spy and summoned his secretary. Studying the map, he dictated a brief message to General Amulius Procas, with a copy for the king. While the secretary copied Alcina's crude sketch, Latro summoned a page and give him both copies of each document.
'Take these to the king's secretary,' the chancellor said, 'and ask that His Majesty impress his seal upon one set. Then, if there be no objection, ride with that set to Amulius Procas in Poitain. Here is a pass to the royal stables. Choose the swiftest horse, and change mounts at each post inn.'
The message came not to the king's secretary. It was, instead, delivered into the thin, dark hands of Thulandra Thuu by his Khitan servant, Hsiao. As the king's sorcerer read the message and examined the map in the light of a corpse-fat candle, he smiled coldly, nodding approval to the Khitan.
'It fell out as you predicted, Master,' said Hsiao. 'I told the page that His Majesty and his scribe were closeted with you, so he handed the scrolls to me.'
'You have done well, good Hsiao,' said Thulandra Thuu. 'Fetch me the wax; I will seal the scrolls myself. There is no need to distract His Majesty from his pleasures for a moment.'
From a locked coffer the sorcerer took a duplicate of the king’s seal ring and, folding together one copy each of map mid message, he lit a taper from one of the massive candles. Touching the sealing wax to the flame, he dripped the molten wax along the open edge of the packet. Thulandra then stamped the cooling wax with the duplicate seal ring and handed the package to the Khitan.
'Give this to Latro's courier,' he said, 'and tell him that His Majesty desires it to go post-haste to General Procas. Then draft me a letter to Count Ascalante of Thune, at present commanding the Fourth Tauranian Regiment at Palaea. I require his presence here.'
Hsiao hesitated. 'Dread lord!' he said.
Thulandra Thuu looked at his servant sharply. Well?'
'It is not unknown to this unworthy person that you and General Procas are not always in accord. Permit me to ask: Is it your wish that he shall triumph over the barbarian rebel?'
Thulandra Thuu smiled thinly. Hsiao knew that the wizard and the general were fierce rivals for the King's regard, and Hsiao was the only person in the world in whom the sorcerer was willing to confide. Thulandra murmured:
'For the time being. As long as Procas remains in the southern provinces, far from Tarantia, he cannot threaten my position here. And I must risk that he add another victory to his swollen list, since neither he nor I would welcome Conan at the gates of Tarantia.
'Procas stands betwixt the rebels and their march upon the capital. I intend that he shall crush the insurrection, aye; but in such wise that the credit shall fall to me. Then, perchance, an accident may take our heroic general from us in his moment of victory, ere he can return in triumph to Tarantia. Now be on your way.'
Hsiao bowed low and silently withdrew. Thulandra Thuu unlocked a chest of ebony and placed therein his copies of documents.
Trocero stared in puzzlement at his commander, who paced us tent like a caged tiger, angry impatience smouldering in his fierce blue eyes.
'What ails you, General Conan?' he demanded. 'I thought it was lack of a woman, but since you carried off the dancing girl, that explanation is a punctured wineskin. What troubles you?'
Conan ceased his restless pacing and came over to the held table. Glowering, he poured himself a cup of wine.
'Naught that I can set a name to,' he growled. 'But of late I grow fretful, starting at shadows.'
He broke off, eyes suddenly alert, as he stared into one corner of the tent. Then he forced a gruff laugh and threw himself back in his leather campaign chair.
'Crom, I'm as restless as a bitch in heat!' he said. 'Forsooth, I know not what is gnawing at my vitals. Sometimes, when we confer, I half believe that the very shadows listen to our words.'
'Shadows do betimes have ears,' said Trocero. 'And eyes as well.'
Conan shrugged. 'I know there be none here save you and piie, with the lass at rest, and my two squires burnishing my armour, and the sentries tramping outside the tent he muttered. 'Still and all, I sense a listening presence.'
Trocero did not scoff, and foreboding grew upon him. I le had learned to trust the Cimmerian's primitive instincts, knowing them keener by far than those of civilised men like liiuiself.
But Trocero was not without instincts of his own; and one of these bade him distrust the supple dancing girl whom Conan had borne off as his willing mistress. Something about her bothered Trocero, although he could not put his finger on the reason. Certainly she was beautiful —if anything, too beautiful to dance for thrown coppers in a Messantian pier-side tavern. Also, she was too silent and secretive for his taste.
Trocero could usually charm a woman into a babbling stream of confidences; but, when he had tried to draw Alcina out, he had no success at all. She answered his questions politely but non-committally, leaving him no wiser than before.
He shrugged, poured himself another cup, and consigned all such perturbations to the nine hells of Mitra. 'The inaction chafes you, Conan,' he said. 'Once we are on the march, with the Lion banner floating overhead, you'll feel yourself again. No more listening shadows then!'
'Aye,' grunted Conan.
What Trocero had said was true enough. Give Conan an enemy of flesh and blood, put cold steel in his hand, and he would dare the deadliest odds with a high heart. But, when he strove against impalpable foes and insubstantial shadows, the primitive superstitions of his tribal ancestors crowded into his mind.
In the rear of the tent, behind a curtain, Alcina smiled a slow, catlike smile, while her slim fingers played with curious talisman, which hung by a delicate chain about neck. There was only one match to it in all the world.
Far to the north, beyond the plains and the mountains and the River Alimane, Thulandra Thuu sat upon his wrought-iron throne. On his lap, partly unrolled, he held a scroll inscribed with astrological diagrams and symbol
s. Before him on a taboret stood an oval mirror of black volcanic glass. From one edge of this mystic mirror, a semicircular chip was missing, and it was this half-disc of obsidian, bound to the main glass by subtle linkages of psychic force, that hung between the rounded breasts of Alcina the dancing girl.
As the sorcerer studied the chart on his knee, he raised his head betimes to glance at the small water clock of gilt and crystal, which stood beside the mirror. From this rare instrument came a steady drip, drip, inaudible to all but the keenest ears.
When the silver bell within the clock chimed the hour, Thulandra Thuu released the scroll. He moved a claw-like hand before the mirror, muttering an exotic charm in an unknown tongue. Gazing into the mirror's depths, he became iic in mind and soul with his servant, the lady Alcina; for when a mystic trance linked the twain, at a moment determined by certain aspects of the heavenly bodies, the sights Alcina saw and the words she uttered were transmitted magically to the sorcerer in Tarantia.
Truly, the mage had little need of the men of Vibius Latro's corps of spies. And truly Conan's keen senses served him well: even the shadows in his tent had eyes and ears.
IV
The Bloody Arrow
Each dawn the brazen trumpets routed the men from slumber to drill for hours upon the Plain of Pallos and, with the setting sun, dismissed them to their night's repose; and still the army grew. And with the newcomers came news and gossip from Messantia. The moon had shrunk from a silver coin to a sickle of steel when the captains of the rebellion gathered in Conan's tent for supper. After washing down their coarse campaign fare with draughts of weak green beer, the leaders of the host consulted.
'Daily,' mused Trocero, 'it seems King Milo grows more restive.'
Publius nodded. 'Aye, it pleases him not to have within his borders so great an armed force, under another's leadership. Be like he fears that we shall turn upon him, as easier prey than the Aquilonian tyrant.'
Dexitheus, priest of Mitra, smiled. 'Kings are a suspicious lot at best, ever fearful for their crowns. King Milo is no different from the rest.'
'Think you he'll seek to attack us in the rear?' growled Conan.
The black-robed priest turned up a narrow hand. Who can say? Even I, trained by my holy office to read the hearts of men, dare hazard no guess as to the shrouded thoughts that lurk in King Milo's mind. But I advise that we cross the Alimane, and soon.'
'The army is prepared,' said Prospero. The men are trained and as ready to fight as ever they will be. It were well they were blooded soon, ere inaction dulls the edge of their fighting spirit.'
Conan nodded sombrely. Experience had taught him that any army, over-trained and under-used, is often splintered into quarrelling factions by those same forces of pride and militancy that its trainers have so painstakingly instilled. Or wilts, like overripe fruit.
'I agree, Prospero,' said the Cimmerian. 'But an equal jinil lies in too early a move. Surely Procas in Aquilonia has spies to tell him that we lodge in the mountains of . PI them Argos. And a general less shrewd than he would guess that we mean to cross the Alimane into Poitain, the most disaffected of all the provinces of Aquilonia. He needs lit to mount a heavy guard at every ford and keep his Border I rj.;ion mobile, ready to march to any threatened crossing.'
Trocero swept back his greying hair with confident fingers. 'All Poitain will rise to march with us; but my partisans keep silent, lest word reach the vigilant Procas in time to act.'
The others exchanged significant glances, wherein hope mid scepticism mingled. Days before, messengers had left the camp to enter Poitain in the guise of merchants, tinkers and pedlars. Their mission was to urge Count Trocero's liegemen and supporters to prepare for forays and diversions, to confuse the royalists or to draw them off in futile pursuit of raiding bands. Once these agents had carried out their mission, a signal to move would reach the rebel army —a Poitanian arrow dipped in blood. Meanwhile, waiting for I lie message stretched nerves taut.
Prospero said: 'I am less concerned about the rising of Poitain, which is as certain as aught can be in this chancy world, than I am about the promised deputation from the northern barons. If we be not at Culario by the ninth day of the vernal month, they may withdraw, since planting time will be upon them.'
Conan grunted and drained his goblet. The northern lordlings, in smouldering revolt against Numedides, had vowed to support the rebels but would not openly commit themselves to a rebellion stigmatised by failure. If the Lion banner were broken at the Alimane, or if the Poitanian revolt failed to take fire, no bond would tie these self-serving nobles to the rebel cause.
The barons' caution was understandable; but uncertainty drove sharp spurs into the rebel leaders' souls. If they must linger on the Plain of Pallos until the Poitanians sent their secret signal, would there be time to reach Culario on the appointed day? Despite the headstrong urgings of his barbaric nature, Conan counselled patience until the Poitanian signal came. But his officers remained uncertain or offered divers plans.
So the rebel leaders argued far into the night. Prospero wished to split the army into three contingents and hurl them all at once upon the three best fords: those of Mevano, Nogara and Tunais.
Conan shook his head. 'Procas will expect just that,' he said.
'What, then?' Prospero frowned.
Conan spread the map and with a scarred forefinger pointed to the middle ford, Nogara. We'll feint here, with two or three companies only. You know tricks to convince the foe that our numbers are vaster than they truly are. I We'll set up empty tents, light extra camp fires, and parade I companies within view of the foe and then swing them out I of sight behind a copse and around the circuit again. We'll unlimber a couple of ballistas on the river bank to harass I the crossing guards. Those screeching darts should entice Procas and his army thither in a hurry.
'You, Prospero, shall command the diversion,' Conan added. Learning that he would miss the main battle, the young commander began to object, but Conan silenced him: Trocero, you and I shall take the remaining troops, half to Mevano and the balance to Tunais, and force the two crossings. With luck, we may catch Procas in a nutcracker.'
'Perchance you're right,' murmured Trocero. With our Poitanians in revolt in Fracas's rear . . .'
'May the gods smile upon your plan, General,' said Publius, mopping his brow. 'If not, all is lost!'
'Ah, gloomy one!' said Trocero. War is a chancy trade, and we have no less to lose than you. Win or lose, we all must stand together.'
'Aye, even at the foot of the gallows,' muttered Publius.
Behind the partition in Conan's tent, his mistress lay couched on a bed of furs, her slender body gleaming in the the light of a single candle, whose wavering flame reflected strangely in her emerald eyes and in the clouded depths of the small obsidian talisman that reposed in the scented valley of her breasts. She smiled a cat-like smile.
Before dawn, Trocero was roused from his couch by the urgent hand of a sentry. The count yawned, stretched, blinked, and irritably struck the guard's hand aside.
'Enough!' he barked. 'I am awake, lout, though it scarcely seems light enough for roll call . . .' His face went blank and his voice died as he saw what the guard held out to him. It was a Poitanian arrow, coated from barb to feathers with dried blood.
'How came this here?' he asked. 'And when?'
'A short time past, my lord Count, borne by a rider from the north,' replied the guard.
'So! Summon my squires! Sound the alarm and bear the arrow forthwith to General Conan!' cried Trocero, heaving himself to his feet.
The guard saluted and left. Soon two squires, knuckling deep from their eyes, hastened in to attire the count and buckle on his armour.
'Action at last, by Mitra, Ishtar, and Crom of the Cimmerians!' cried Trocero. 'You there, Mnester! Summon my captains to council! And you, boy, has Black Lady been fed and watered? See to her saddling, and quickly. Draw the girth tight! I've no wish for a cold bath in the waters of the Alimane!'
Before a ruby sun inflamed the forested crests of the Rabirian Mountains, the tents were struck, the sentries recalled, and the wains laden. By the time bright day had chased away the laggard morning mists, the army was on the march in three long columns, heading for Saxula Pass through the mountains and beyond it for Aquilonia and war.
The land grew rugged and the road tortuous. On either side rose barren rondures toothed with stony outcrops. These were the foothills of the Rabirians, which scurried westward I'nl lowing the stately tread of the adjacent mountains.
Hour after hour, warriors and camp servants trudged up the long slopes and down the further sides. The hot sun beat upon them as they manhandled heavy vehicles over steep rises, clustering about the wains like bees around a hive to push, heave and pull. On the downward slopes, each teamster belayed one wheel with a length of chain, so that, unable to rotate, it served to brake the vehicle. Dust devils eddied skyward, besmudging the crystalline mountain air.
As they crested each rise, the main range receded mirage-like before them. But, when the purple shadows of late after- noon fingered the eastern slope of every hill, the mountains opened out, like curtains drawn aside. They parted to disclose Saxula Pass, a deep cleft in the central ridge, as if made by a blow from an axe in the hand of an angry god.
As the army struggled upwards towards the pass, Conan commanded a contingent of his scouts to clamber up the steep sides of the opening to make sure no ambush awaited his coming. The scouts signalled that all was clear, and the army tramped on through. The footfalls of men, the rattle of equipment, the drum of hooves and the creak of axles reverberated from the rocky cliffs on either hand.
As the men emerged from the confines of the pass, the I road wound downward, losing itself in the thick stands of cedar and pine that masked the northern slopes. In the distance, beyond the intermediate ranges, the men glimpsed the Alimane, coiling through the flatlands like a silvery serpent warmed by the last rays of the setting sun.
The Conan Chronology Page 596
