The Conan Compendium

by Robert E. Howard

  Conan climbed up to the shelf and examined it. Above, the hill continued to rise steeply for several hundred spans before it crested. There was no apparent way to arrive upon the shelf from another angle without climbing the hill from behind, and that was unlikely on the part of any pursuers. No, the only way was via the path he had just taken, unless one had wings or was willing to travel a day or two to the other side of the hill. With any potential attacker having to come at them single file, and having to worry about sliding backward at the slightest misstep, this spot was as good as they were likely to find.

  Conan worked his way back to the trail below.

  "Night comes soon," he said. "And there is where we camp." He pointed up at the shelf.

  All were in agreement.

  "I shall see if I can snare some rabbits or other small game," Conan said. "The rest of you should climb to yon ledge. You might gather some large rocks, in case we have unwelcome visitors."

  With the others working their way upward, Conan went to see if he could provide them with some kind of supper.

  The small fire was sufficient to sear the two rabbits and three ground squirrels Conan had collected, and while it was hardly a sumptuous meal, it helped calm the rumbling in the otherwise empty bellies of the escapees. There had been several small mountain streams along the climb to cool their thirst, but the game was more than welcome.

  The meal was mostly done. Raseri walked to the edge of the cliff to relieve himself. Fosull and Vilken sat near the other end of the shelf, talking quietly. Penz demonstrated rope tricks to the Jatte twins. Tro and Sab huddled together near the hillside.

  Teyle sucked the marrow from a bone and tossed the empty shell into the fire. Conan sat next to her, chewing the last bit of gristle from his own portion of roasted rabbit.

  "I did not have time to thank you for our escape and for saving my sister's honor," the giantess said.

  "It was nothing."

  "Nay, it was." She shivered in the night air.

  "Are you cold?"

  "A little."

  Conan moved closer and put one arm as far around Teyle as it would reach. She was a giant, but she was also a woman, and she had banished the aches from his body. He could warm her, at the very least.

  As they sat close together, she said, "My father wishes for your death as much as he does for that of Dake."

  "Oh?"

  "He takes very seriously his belief that the Jatte must stay hidden forever."

  "But what of the forgetfulness potion of which he has spoken?"

  She shrugged under his encircling arm. "I have never heard of such a thing."

  Conan looked to where Raseri stood relieving himself.

  Teyle seemed to realize what she had said. "He is the shaman and knows many herbs that I do not, of course. And he has given his word."

  Her loyalty to her father was admirable, but Conan's disquiet was not made easier by her statement. He could not help but recall that Raseri would have cheerfully tortured him to death in the name of the "natural philosophy" he practiced. How much was such a man's-albeit he was a giant-honor to be trusted? Trusting Teyle had put him into a cage, after all, and although they had since gone through adventures that made Conan feel as if she could be relied upon, so such thing could be said of Raseri.

  Men who took their duty too seriously could be very dangerous, Conan had learned.

  Something disturbed the Cimmerian's light slumber. The fire had long since dwindled to cooling embers, emitting only a fitful glow and little smoke, and the flat stretch of rock had cooled under the night's breath as well. No one stirred on the shelf as far as Conan could see. He sat up.

  Low and thick clouds hid most of the stars and the moon, and the air was still.

  What had awakened him-?

  There, below on the trail, farther down the mount, a tiny speck of orange light glimmed. As he watched, he saw more such lights, and he knew them for torches in the distance. They were around several turnings of the trail, probably an hour or more away, but moving steadily.

  Conan reached over and shook Teyle awake.

  "What-? "

  "Our unwelcome guests come. Behold."

  Behind him he heard some of the others stirring, roused by his quiet speech to Teyle, or perhaps by some innate sense of danger such as had roused the Cimmerian.

  Penz moved closer. "They are either brave or stupid to travel by night in these mountains. The path is dangerous."

  Tro walked to the edge of their camp and peered into the darkness. She was back in a moment. "It is too far to see for certain. At least fifteen men on foot. More, perhaps."

  "Looks as if your trap collected a few," Penz said.

  "Would that it had taken more."

  "Now what?" Teyle asked.

  "We wait."

  "Perhaps with luck they might pass by without seeing us," Morja said.

  Her brother added his thoughts: "We could then go back the way we came and steal their horses."

  "Nay," Raseri said. "We chose this place for battle. Better we should make certain they know we are here, eh, Conan?"

  The Cimmerian had to agree. "Climbing up here in the dark is not likely, so they shall have to wait until light. Meanwhile, when they draw level with us, perhaps another rain of stone might serve us."

  There were few loose rocks on the shelf, and most of those were either too small or too large to be of use; still, there were enough fist-or headsized chunks for all of the party to have several each. Moving as quietly as they could in the dark, they gathered the stones.

  "When I give the command, throw your rocks as quickly as you can. Aim for the torches if you can see nothing else. Hold back some of the stones for use when it gets light."

  Conan himself held a rock slightly larger than his fist in his right hand, a smaller stone ready in his left. Were they lucky, they might crack a few skulls or knock three or four men off the trail. Any reduction of the attackers would help.

  They watched as the enemy climbed higher toward them. Whatever was done, Conan knew it would have to be done quickly. He and his party had little food and almost no water, and a long siege would quickly deplete both. A day or two at most, and things would have to be ended.

  One way or another.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  The torchman walking directly in front of Dake grunted and suddenly took it upon himself to pitch headfirst over the edge of the trail. He screamed as he tumbled down the hill. His torch lay guttering where it fell. What-?

  Then Dake realized that the thumps and thuds he heard were caused by things falling onto the trail or bouncing down the side of the hill from above. Hard things, such as, say, rocks.

  "They are above us!" Dake screamed. "Take cover! "

  Alas, finding cover was easier commanded than accomplished. The hill sloped upward steeply and offered only dirt and rocks. On the opposite side of the precarious trail, the slope was somewhat steeper, and a leap that way risked bouncing to the bottom, a notinconsiderable distance, and serious injury or death.

  A guard shrieked a curse behind Dake as a rock smashed into his leg, knocking it from under him. Dake saw the white of bone in the man's shattered limb gleam in the light of the remaining torches.

  Those men carrying said torches must have realized that being bearers of the light made them more visible targets, for the flaming brands were dropped or thrown away in short order, adding darkness to the confusion.

  "Idiot!" Capeya screamed, shoving a man who turned to run and slammed instead into the merchant. "I will have you flogged and quartered and-gukk! "

  Whatever further punishment the merchant intended dealing the man would never be known, for a rock easily as big as Capeya's head came down smack upon that portion of him and shattered his skull as if it were no more than an egg hammered by a man's fist.

  So much for Dake's wealthy patron.

  "Set curse you!" Dake yelled into the darkness. He jammed his hand into his belt pouch and pulled forth his Bottle of Li
ghtning. "Cover your eyes!"

  With that, Dake spoke two of the three magic words and uncorked the bottle. He hurled it straight up as hard as he could, then yelled out the final word that completed the spell.

  Having seen several of the torches fall down the hillside, Conan was pleased with his initial attack. A rock was certainly a useful weapon when utilized correctly. At this distance, it was better than a sword Amidst the screams of the wounded and panicked men below, he heard a yell that sounded familiar.

  "Cover your eyes!" came the faint cry.

  "Was that not Dake? And had not Penz and Tro and Sab said something about a blinding spell?

  Conan had barely time to turn away and shut his eyes before the impossibly bright light seared through even his closed lids. Reflected off the hill, it was still enough to turn everything white and cause spots to dance before the Cimmerian's gaze.

  As quickly as it had come, the flash of white blinked out, and when Conan looked again, he found he could see well enough even though the spots persisted.

  Others of his party were not so fortunate.

  "By the Green God, I cannot see!" Fosull called out.

  "Nor can I!" Vilken said.

  To a degree, nearly all of the others were affected; some had not heard the cry; some had, but had not understood it in time. Only the four-armed man was able to see as well as Conan, and that because he had used two of his hands to cover his eyes.

  Conan hurled another stone, as did Sab, and then they hurried to make certain that none of their comrades moved in the wrong direction and risked a fatal fall.

  "Stand still," Conan ordered. "Sab and I shall lead you away from the edge."

  Below, Dake realized that the rain of stone had ceased. After a final pair of rocks bounced down, well past his position, he realized too that his lighting must have blinded the attackers. It was only a temporary loss of vision, a matter of minutes, and likely would not allow him enough time to gather his troops and mount an attack. Even if he knew exactly where to attack, he suspected it would not be a simple matter of marching there and capturing his thralls. Not in the dark, in any event.

  Someone scrabbled over the path toward him.

  "Dake?"

  Kreg. Whatever gods favored the fool had not yet withdrawn their protection, so it seemed.

  "Is that them?" Kreg asked.

  "Unless the rabbits and squirrels of the mountains have taken up rock-throwing."

  "What are we to do?"

  "At the moment, nothing. They have ceased their attack. Morning arrives shortly. When we can see them, then we can decide what to do about them." Ah.

  Came the dawn. Dake inched his way from behind the rock that sheltered him and peered up the hill.

  There was a ledge some distance above that jutted from the face of the rise, much like the prow of a ship. Although he could not see anyone upon the ledge from this angle, Dake would wager a gold solon against a copper cent that those he sought were perched on top of that shelf.

  Going up there to collect them would be a hellish task. The small trail leading that way was narrow, strewn with loose gravel, and steep enough to provide a nasty fall if one slipped. Dake had no intention of trying to climb that while avoiding the rocks that would surely greet such an attempt.

  The situation was not to his liking. He had one trump card he could play, and its use entailed a fair amount of risk. Among his untried conjurations was one he had won in a game of dice from a down-on-his-luck magician who said he was from Zingara. This spell would, so the gambler had claimed, levitate something as heavy as an ox to whatever height one desired-yea, even all the way to the moon. Such a claim had seemed farfetched to Dake at the time, but two of the other spells he won from the unlucky wizard had worked as promised, and one of those was the binding spell that had given Dake command of his thralls.

  Even if the spell did work, there was a drawback: It would do so only once. The magic needed was fairly strong, the Zingaran wizard had said, and once it was sucked from the storehouse of sorcerous energies in the area, it would burn itself out as did a moth flying into a flame.

  Could Dake but get close enough, he could again lay his obedience spell on those rogues above; however, he had no desire to go floating upward to become a target for their rocks and spears.

  No, the spell was a good idea, but only if he could distract the escapees' attention enough so that he would not be noticed. Were they busy with other things, he could utilize the magic and take them unawares.

  Assuming, of course, that the wizard had not lied to him about this levitation.

  Once more behind the safety of his rock, Dake removed from his pouch the focus for the floating trick. It was a small bird, carved from some black and heavy wood, with the runes that would loose its power etched upon the bird's breast. Dake studied the runes. Aye, he recalled the words for which the symbols stood. If the magic was sufficiently potent to lift an ox, then it could certainly lift him and his slackwit assistant. He need only keep his quarry busy enough so that they did not notice him.

  Well. That could be done.

  Dake grinned at the thought. Before the sun reached his midpoint, it would be done!

  "What do you see?" Raseri asked.

  Conan pulled himself back from the edge of the shelf. An arrow sailed up a span or two past him, but fell back of its own weight. At this distance, to be hit by such a missile would be less damaging than an insect bite; still, they kept shooting.

  "They are mostly hidden," the Cimmerian said. "And since they can see our rocks coming down, there is no point in wasting our supply."

  The blindness suffered by the group had been temporary, as Penz had assured them it would be, and all could see as well as they had before. Even so, Conan kept them well back from the edge, so that those below could not discern how many of the escapees might be up here.

  "Do you think they will try to attack?" This was from Oren, who seemed pleased at the idea.

  "Who can say? I would not, in their position. I would wait and try to starve us out. They cannot know if we have food and water, however, and they may not have much of either themselves."

  "So we wait, eh?" That from Fosull. "I like that not."

  "Nor do I," Conan said. "But sometimes waiting is the best ploy. It allows our enemies opportunity to make a foolish mistake, and it keeps us from doing the same."

  "How long-?" began Teyle. She stopped as a wet, plopping sound interrupted her. There came another such sound, and another, and in a moment the air was filled with the cause: It was raining toads.

  Illusions they might be, but they felt real when they struck. A toad thumped onto Conan's neck, and he brushed it away. By Crom, what did Dake hope to gain with this foolishness?

  Below, the nine men who were still able to mount an attack looked at Dake as if he had gone mad.

  "You want us to climb up that steep hill against the boulders that will certainly be heaved down upon us? This is surely a stupid idea!"

  "Aye," said a second man. "They cannot stay there forever. Why not simply camp down here out of range and wait for them to come down?"

  Dake shook his head. "Nay, I am not disposed to wait. I have already begun the attack. Behold!"

  The nine men looked up to the sky above the shelf; it was dark, and raining what appeared to be dirt clods upon, the ridge. One of the clods bounced down the hill.

  "You attack them with toads?"

  "Aye, and a demon shall lead you up the hill. Observe!"

  The mage performed the conjuration, and the gigantic red demon appeared.

  The startled nine drew back, muttering to their gods.

  "If you can send that," said one man, "why would you need us?"

  Dake could not fault the man's logic, but he had no time to cater to it. "I have my reasons."

  "May be, friend, but our master is dead, and I do not recall him leaving you in command. Even with your tame demon, such an assault would be suicide!"

  How had these men su
ddenly developed such a grasp of tactics? Dake wondered. Before, they had seemed much less clever. Well. No matter. They would attack, like it or not. He had purposedly gathered them in close, so that all would be in range of his obedience spell. He had never done nine at once, but as long as they were bunched within the reach of his magic, there was no reason why the spell should not work.

  Dake spoke the words quickly, taking care not to mispronounce them.

  "Hey, what is that?" one of the men began fearfully. "What are you-?"

  He did not finish expressing his qualms. Dake instead completed his incantation, felt the geas take hold of the nine, and said, "Silence, fools!"

  A short distance away, outside of his range, Kreg called out, "The toads have stopped falling."

  "No matter." A wave of Dake's hand sent the demon lumbering up the hill. Being an illusion, it was unaffected by the steepness of the slope. The demon was a fearsome sight, to be certain, but useless, as those above knew it for what it was. No matter, though.

  "You nine go and capture yon escapees, now!"

  Against their wishes, the nine troops began their climb.

  "The red demon comes," Penz said.

  "Do we need fear it?" Fosull asked.

  "Nay, Father. It is an illusion."

  "Why, then, is Dake sending it?" Conan wondered aloud. "He knows that we know this."

  "Perhaps it is to hide those who come behind it," Penz said. "Observe."

  All of the group moved to the edge of the shelf and peered down the hill. A loose line of men clambered upward.

  "Ready your stones," Conan said.

  "This way," Dake said to Kreg. "Hurry!"

  "What are we going to do?"

  The pair moved along the trail and rounded the next turning.

  "Turn so that I may mount you, pig 'a back," Dake commanded.

  Kreg looked puzzled, but turned. Dake climbed up onto his assistant's back, the carved bird of levitation clutched in one hand. He wrapped his free arm around Kreg's chest and pressed his knees against the blond man's sides.

  "I do not understand."

  "We are going up the mountain."

  "Not if you think I can carry you."