Squatting in the center of the village were half a dozen solid-looking structures, built of irregular chunks of stone and plugged with mud and pebbles. Kailash pointed to the largest of them. A Brythunian standard, out of place in such wretched surroundings, rose proudly from the building's shabby roof. Several horses were tethered to a wooden rail by the front door.
The inn had no windows, and only a heavy, pitch-smeared tarp over its irregularly shaped doorway. Conan had been in seedier dives than this, but he had to admit that even the filthy, ill-kept Pommel outshone this wretched-looking hellhole.
The three men dismounted and approached the rail. Conan and Kailash secured their horses to it and lifted the bags off, flinging them over their shoulders. Madesus was walking slowly, rubbing his bruised backside. Conan and Kailash laughed heartily at the priest's discomfort.
"If you feel sore now, wait until tomorrow," the hillman said. "You may wake before we do, but I'll wager we'll be back on our horses before you are!"
Still chuckling, Conan secured the small bag of gold to his belt. He passed two pieces of the coin to Kailash. "These are forh" he paused, sparing the priest a glance "hlodging."
The Kezankian grinned, but shook his head. "If old Malgoresh is still here, we will drink free!" He doffed his helmet and stowed it in his pack, then pulled his hood back. Without another word, he shoved the tarp aside and entered. Conan followed him.
The Cimmerian's doubts about the taproom proved ill-founded. The brightly lit room was good-sized, but overly crowded. Every bench was taken, and many people simply stood in clusters, or leaned against the rocky walls. As Conan and Kailash walked in, a few heads turned and a few conversations halted. Moments later, heads turned back and talk resumed, the regulars apparently indifferent to the two travelers after all.
"Look there!" Kailash pointed at a long, high wooden table in the back of the room. Behind the table stood a paunchy, graybearded man, dipping ale from a huge oak barrel. Many similar barrels lined the back wall. '"Tis Malgoresh, as I'd hoped!" Kailash plowed through the mass of tightly packed bodies, with Conan close behind. A few sober patrons saw the men approaching and hastily stood aside.
Only a few tavern wenches were present, in spite of Kailash's earlier comments. Many had long since seen their prime years pass, but a few caught the wandering eyes of the Cimmerian youth. He was surprised to find even a few beauties like these strutting about in this dungheap of an inn, hidden away in such a small, remote village.
"Hold a moment," Conan said to the hillman, looking behind him with concern. "Madesus did not follow us in. We should wait untilh"
"Bah! A priest in a taproom is like water on a fire. He may have given up and decided to find a room. Besides, I was only taunting him earlier, 'ere we approached the village. The wenches here have lost some of their luster. After a few tankards of ale and such fare as can be had at this hour, I'll be ready for a night's rest." As Kailash spoke, a mischievous look came to his face. "If the priest comes in, we could have a jest at his expense. When we get to yonder table, let's make eyes at a few of the barmaids. The expression on the priest's face would be worth the tongue-lashing we'd no doubt get for our trouble!"
Priest or no priest, Conan would have liked to take the plan even further, but he supposed that he may as well go along with Kailash. He pushed aside a giggling drunk who blocked their way. With a balancing act that a skilled juggler would have envied, the tall and lanky villager managed not to spill a drop of ale. After one look at Conan, he decided to vacate his place at the table.
Kailash stepped up to the high table at the back of the tavern. Behind it, the balding barkeep plunked a few huge tankards of ale down and wiped his hands on the filthy, ale-stained apron tied loosely around his ample waist.
As he turned his bearded face toward them, looks of surprise and recognition came into his eyes. "By Hanuman's hairy stones! 'Tis me old friend Kailash, or I'm a Pict!" His throat, roughened from years of shouting at tavern-goers, roared with hoarse laughter. "Welcome to the finest tavern for a hundred leagues around!"
Kailash laughed uproariously. '"Tis the only tavern for a hundred leagues around, you old warhorse!" He pointed at Malgoresh's sizable waistline. "I see that you've guzzled a few barrels' too many of your own brew. Have you swigged all of it tonight, or did you leave enough for two parched travelers?"
Malgoresh looked dubiously at Conan. "Two? Is he with you, orh"
"Speak no ill of him! His name is Conan, and he hails from the frozen lands of Cimmeria. Any sword raised against him would clash first with mine."
"A Cimmerian, by Hanuman's shaggy lingam! Strange must be the tale of his coming here, but methinks even stranger would be the tale of how you two became comrades." Malgoresh scratched his chin thoughtfully, his expression becoming somber. "What news from Pirogia?"
"The king's health is restored." Kailash leaned forward, glancing to either side and speaking in a hushed voice. "But Valtresca is deadhand Salvorus, too. The general was exposed as a traitor to the throne. In a pitched battle beneath the palace, Conan and Salvorus slew him."
Malgoresh's jaw dropped, as did the tankards he was setting down before them. Ale sloshed across the table and dripped onto the floor in foaming puddles. "A traitor!" he hissed, ignoring the spilt ale and bending forward to keep his coarse voice from reaching too many ears.
"What ill news you bear, old friend! Still, at least Eldran lives."
"Yet he is not out of danger," Kailash said grimly. "I have no time tonight to tell the full tale. If Mitra is with me, I will return to Innasfaln soon and relate it to you. 'Tis a strange tale, in which Conan has played a great part. Only Mitra knows how it will end.
Tomorrow we travel south, and I have need of news from you before we leave."
"Of course! Anything you wish to know. But how is it that Valtrescah"
"Enough, 'Gor! No more questions will I answer until my dry throat is soothed by a few draughts of your ale. Have you forgotten our thirst, or has your head gone as soft as your belly?"
Malgoresh clapped a hand to his hairless forehead, clucking to himself.
He retrieved the dropped tankards and gave them a cursory wipe with his apron. After dipping them into the ale barrel, he set them down before the two travel-weary warriors.
Still standing outside, Madesus eyed the tavern's door dubiously. He was having doubts about joining Conan and Kailash. Nevertheless, he supposed he should keep a watchful eye on them. He swallowed his misgivings and stepped inside, just as Conan and Kailash swallowed their first draughts of Innasfaln ale.
Within, the tavern was larger than Madesus had expected. However, everything else about the place was much as he had imagined. The pungent stench of unwashed bodies and stale beer intermingled with less easily identifiable odors. He believed that everyone in the village was jammed into the place. More than a dozen crudely made tables were packed with men of various age and origin. Madesus counted six barmaids, and some three-or four-score patrons. Many were laughing, or breaking into occasional off-key singing, while others hunched forward over their tables, trying to talk above the clamor.
Madesus was grateful for his travel cloak, which hid his true identity.
He supposed that the patrons in this place would have wondered what a priest was doing among them. He was not surprised to see Kailash and Conan swilling ale, like horses at a trough. As Madesus approached, they clanged their tankards together in a toast, then drank deeply of the thick, dark ale.
A buxom, blonde-haired peasant wench walked boldly toward the two men, her generous charms shifting suggestively beneath a flimsy garment of gauzy, red-dyed cotton. One of the villagers groped her firm, rounded behind as she strutted past; she giggled and swatted the man's hand away, her attention focused on the two strangers.
Outraged by this wanton display, Madesus stomped toward his companions, intent on putting a stop to any licentious designs his comrades might have for this wanton harlot. He was so engrossed that he stumbled r
ight into a short, stocky villager.
The man's stinking breath assailed Madesus's nostrils. The stench was vile enough to stop a charging bull in its tracks. The priest turned his head to one side, making a futile attempt to avoid breathing the cloud of fouled air that hung cloyingly about the man's pitted, unshaven face and unwashed tangle of hair. "I beg your pardon," he said politely to the grubby, potbellied villager.
"Huh! Wa'sh where ya goin'! Waddara, inna hurry, are ya?" The drunken cretin's slurred speech was nearly unintelligible. He punctuated the question with a deep, reverberating belch, sending a reeking wave of air into the priest's face. Madesus found it easier to determine what the man had been eating and drinking than what he was saying. However, to avoid provoking the besotted wretch any further, he simply stepped back and bowed slightly. The uncouth man staggered past, picking at his grimy ear with a dirt-encrusted finger and belching again.
By this time, Conan and Kailash had each found a voluptuous wench. The Cimmerian had thrown a brawny arm around the slender waist of a pale-skinned hussy, who ran her painted, long-nailed fingers through his mane of black hair. A dark-eyed doxy, wearing only thin cloth strips that covered very little of her smooth skin, exchanged bawdy gibes with Kailash. The warriors saw Madesus and waved, calling to him, but their voices were drowned out by the overwhelming din of the taproom.
Madesus dug into his satchel and carefully withdrew two heavy coins, golden dragons of Nemedia. Each was worth five Aquilonian gold nobles.
He palmed the thick coins and approached the two wenches, praying silently to Mitra that his idea would work.
"Ladies." He managed to smile as he spoke, realizing that the word applied only loosely to these two. "Both of you come hither, for just a moment."
The women looked questioningly at Kailash and Conan, who shrugged and nodded their approval. Madesus put his hands where his companions could not see them and lowered his head slightly, whispering to the barmaids.
"My friends are poor, having diced their wealth away on our journey. I am loath to see two beauties like yourselves waste your evening for a few paltry silver pieces. Soon these two worthies will be too drunk to appreciate your charms anyway. My fortunes have been better, and I would share my luck with you." He pressed a golden dragon upon each.
"Here, take these and retire from this place. You must share this coin with all the other barmaids. You and your friends need not waste this night on these ruffians here. Agreed?"
Wide-eyed, they stared at the golden dragons, more wealth than they would earn in a month of nights. They nodded, looking at Madesus blankly. One of them tossed her hair back and pressed against him, flirting. "Will ye not be joinin' us, even later?" The sound of her husky, seductive voice and the sight of her full, rounded breasts, straining against their gauzy confines, would have raised a man from his deathbed.
Embarrassed by this brazen behavior, Madesus pulled back a little, almost wishing that he were not a priest of Mitra. "Nay," he said, shocked that he had been thinking any impious thoughts, even for a brief instant. "Our journey has been long, and I am fit for naught but sleep this night." The women looked at each other, smiling coyly. They slipped away through the crowd and went out the door.
Madesus shook his head, silently asking Mitra for forgiveness. These warriors were a decadent influence. To think that for the cause of good, a priest of Mitra must lie and give away good gold to harlots! At times like this, he understood why so many priests took refuge in the haven of Mitra's temples.
Conan and Kailash watched the priest, first with disbelief, then with wonder as all of the women trickled out of the taproom like sand from an hourglass. Madesus walked up to them with a hint of a smile playing at the corners of his mouth. "Well?" the priest asked, his eyes twinkling.
"Crom! What did you say to them?" Conan shook his head in disappointment.
"Aye. Why did they leave?" Kailash's tone echoed the barbarian's.
"I told them that you had no coin to offer for their favors," the priest replied. "Further, we have no time for these diversions. When we have done away with the priestess, you will have plenty of time to pursue your depraved leisures. But for now, I implore you to keep about you the few wits you have. No doubt you have even forgotten to ask news of the road ahead."
Conan scowled, and Kailash fixed his gaze on the floor. Then they broke out laughing. Madesus looked at them as if they had gone mad. This brought out even louder guffaws, until the two were roaring uncontrollably before the discomfited priest.
Although he found Madesus's reaction amusing, Conan was truly disappointed. He was certain that Darinais, the golden-haired Brythunian trollop he had met, would have willingly bedded him without asking for so much as a copper farthing. He was younger and more vigorous than either Madesus or Kailash realized. A late-night romp with Darinais would have lifted his spirits. Ruefully, the Cimmerian began to wish that Madesus had not decided to come into the tavern.
Kailash drained his tankard and slammed it down on the table with a solid thump. He looked about for the barkeep, but did not see him anywhere. "Malgoresh!" His bellowing voice actually rose above the hubbub. "More ale!"
Behind the counter was the taproom's rear door. Unlike the front door, it was made of stout, iron-backed wood. Crude but sturdy hinges anchored it to a thick, vertical column of wood set into the taproom wall. The door banged open and Malgoresh stepped through, red-faced and puffing, as if he had just outraced a bloodthirsty Pict war party.
Braced on each of his immense Turanian shoulders was a barrel of ale, held in place by his burly arms.
"In a moment!" Malgoresh yelled back, setting the barrels down with a heavy thud. Beads of sweat had formed on his sharply hooked nose.
"Where in Zandru's Nine Hells did me serving wenches go? I turn me back for a span or two and they go, without so much as a 'by your leave'!"
Cursing, he haphazardly dipped tankards into ale barrels at a frenzied pace, setting them on the long, narrow table.
Patrons snatched up the tankards just as quickly as he put them down, leaving coins on the table. Without bothering to count these or to make change, the gruff Turanian barkeep scooped up the bits of copper and silver, dropping them deftly into his capacious belt purse. A continuous stream of oaths poured forth from him as he moved up and down the length of the table. When he finally caught up with the demand, he mopped his sweat-soaked face with his apron and sauntered back over to Kailash.
The hillman took a deep pull from his tankard. "Busy night," he noted, then wiped foam from his moustache.
"Aye. Too busy. I've a mind to close early. Many years have passed since we last shared a barrel of ale. What say that youhboth of youhjoin me?"
"Not tonight, my friend. The years have taught me that there are better places to pass the night than the floor of a tavern. Soon my companions and I must find rooms to retire to."
"Companions?" Malgoresh's eyes settled on Madesus. The priest's cloak covered his religious garb, but the Turanian's shrewd gaze took in a few conspicuous details: no weaponshnot even a daggerhand simple, travel-worn garments. Yet the, man had not the look of a merchant or a noble. The Turanian's instincts told him that this was some sort of sorcerer, or maybe a priest. Shaking his head, Malgoresh gave Kailash a dubious look. The Kezankian hefted his tankard and took another pull from it.
"This is Madesus, ah" the hillman paused, catching himself "her, a friend from Corinthia," he added lamely.
Madesus extended his hand to the barkeep, who took it and shook it vigorously. Madesus felt the bones in his hand grate together under the power of the Turanian's grip. He fought the urge to wring his numbed fingers when the barkeep let go. "Well met, Malgoresh," he managed. "We are grateful for your hospitality."
"Think nothing of it." The bald barkeep shrugged and turned to fill another tankard with ale. He set this down in front of the priest, who eyed it as if it were a fanged serpent, Malgoresh pretended not to notice this, but he was now convinced that Madesus wa
s not just an ordinary traveler. "Kailash and I fought side by side in more than one border campaign. Why, our last campaign together seems like only days ago. There were but twenty of us, traveling along the southern banks of the Yellow River, when we were ambushed by that slave-raiding Nemedian bastard, Nekator. His numbers were thrice our own, and half our lads were cut down before we knew what had befallen us. That was a battle, by Hanuman's woolly member! The water turned red andh"
Malgoresh's tale was rudely interrupted by the arrival of a dirt-smeared lout, whose breath stank like a slaughterhouse on a hot summer day. He swayed unsteadily against the table, shoving in between Madesus and Conan. Snuffling noisily, he broke wind loudly enough for the sound to carry over Malgoresh's voice. "Ale! Blast you, ale!" The boisterous lout slammed his empty tankard down forcefully, planting it squarely on the fingers of Conan's left hand.
Conan pulled his hand back and growled in annoyance, elbowing the besotted patron in the gut. Madesus noted with despair that it was the same buffoon who had accosted him earlier.
"Ooomph!" the sodden cretin gasped as Conan's elbow drove into his side. He staggered backward, nearly falling, but recovered his shaky balance with a superhuman effort. Snarling in drunken rage, he aimed a blow at Conan's head with his tankard. The Cimmerian easily blocked the attack with one arm, and rammed an iron-hard fist into the man's pockmarked face. Howling through his shattered jawbone, the drunkard was propelled backward from the force of the blow. Before he sank to the floor, the troublemaker pitched his tankard in Conan's direction.
Through a cruel twist of fate, the haphazardly thrown missile sailed straight toward the barbarian's face. Conan ducked to one side, putting a hand up to bat the tankard to the floor. The heavy iron vessel flew past his outstretched hand and crashed solidly into Kailash's forehead.
The hillman remained conscious long enough to wish he had left his helmet on. Dazed by the bone-crushing impact, he lurched against the table, then dropped to the floor like a felled ox.
The Conan Compendium Page 64
