Then the stairs were before him. He took them three at a time. In the vast-domed temple chamber, massive columns shivered and the towering statue swayed. Without slowing, Conan ran past the tall bronze doors and into the night.
Outside, the circle of torches remained, swaying as the ground heaved in swells like the sea, but the soldiers were fled. Trees a hundred and fifty feet high cracked like whips.
Conan ran into the forest until a root caught his foot and sent him sprawling with his burdens. He could not rise again, only cling as the earth shook and rippled in waves, but at last he looked back.
Bolts of lightning burst toward the sky from the temple, hurling great blocks of stone into the air, casting a blue illumination over the frenzied forest. And dome by dome, columned terrace by columned terrace, the huge temple fell, collapsing inward, ever sinking as it leaped like a thing alive. Lightning flashes revealed the ruin no higher then the flailing trees surrounding it, then half their height, then only a mound of rubble.
Abruptly there was no more lightning. The ground gave one final tortured heave and was still.
Conan rose unsteadily to his feet. He could no longer see even the mound. In truth he did not believe it was any longer there. "Swallowed by the earth," he said softly, "and the entrance sealed once more."
His arms filled suddenly with naked, weeping women, but his mind was on other matters. Horses. Whether or not the demons had been buried with the tomb, he did not intend to remain long enough to find out.
Epilogue
Conan rode through the dawn with his jaw set grimly, wondering if perhaps he could not find just a few Vendhyan soldiers who would try to contest his passage or perhaps question the Vendhyan cavalry saddle on his horse. It would be better than the icy daggers of silence being hurled against his back by Vyndra and Chin Kou. Of necessity he gripped the reins of their horses in one hand; the fool women would not have left the forest otherwise.
"You must find us garments," Vyndra said suddenly. "I will not be seen like this."
"It is not seemly," Chin Kou added.
Conan sighed. It was not the first time they had made the demand, though they had no idea as to where he might obtain the clothes. The past hour of silence had come from his retort that they had already been seen by half the populace of Gwandiakan. He twisted in the saddle to look back at them. The two women still wore the veils, if nothing else. He had asked why, since they obviously hated the small squares of silk, but they had babbled incomprehensively at him about not being recognized, and both had gone into such a frenzy that someone might be watching, for all it had been pitch dark in the middle of the forest at the time, that he did not mention it again. They stared at him now with dark, furious eyes peeping over the top of their veils, yet each sat straight in her saddle, seemingly unaware of the nudity of which she complained.
"We are almost to the old well," he told them. "Kuie Hsi should be there with garb for you both."
"The well!" Vyndra exclaimed, suddenly trying to hide behind the high pommel of her saddle. "Oh, no!"
"There might be people!" Chin Kou moaned as she, too, contorted. Before they could slip from the saddles and hide-they had done that once already-Conan kicked his horse to a gallop, pulling theirs along behind, heedless of their wails of protest.
The wall of the old well remained, surrounded by trees much smaller than those of the forest. The well itself had long collapsed. A portion of a stone wall still stood nearby, perhaps once part of a caravansary.
There were people there as well. Conan grinned as he ran his eye over them. Hordo and Enam tossing dice. Hasan and Shamil seated with their backs against the wall. Kang Hou sipping from a tiny cup held delicately in his fingers, while Kuie Hsi crouched by a fire where a kettle steamed. The men looked the worse for wear, sprouting bandages and poultices, but they sprang to their feet with glad shouts at his appearance.
Kuie Hsi did not shout but rather came running with bundles in her arms. The other two women, Conan saw, had slid from the saddles and were hiding behind their horses. He dismounted, leaving them to their flurry of silks, and went to meet the men.
"I thought you were dead for certain this time," the one-eyed man muttered gruffly.
"Not I," Conan laughed, "nor any of the rest of us it seems. Our luck has not been so bad after all." The smiles faded from their faces, producing a frown on his. "What has happened?"
"A great deal," Kang Hou replied. "My niece brought much news with her.
For one thing, King Bhandarkar is dead at the hands of the Katari.
Fortunately Prince Jharim Kar managed to rally nobles to Bhandarkar's young son, Bhunda Chand, who has been crowned as the new king, thus restoring order. On the unfortunate side, you, my chengli friend, have been condemned to death by Royal Edict, signed by Bhunda Chand, for complicit, in the assassination of his father."
Conan could only shake his head in amazement. "How did this madness come about?"
The Khitan merchant explained. "One of Jharim Kar's first moves after the coronation-and that was a hasty affair, it seems-was to ride for Gwandiakan with the young King and all the cavalry he could muster.
Supposedly he found evidence that Karim Singh was a leader of the plot, and thus must be arrested and executed before he could become a rallying point for disaffection. It is rumored, however, that the Prince blames the wazam for an incident involving one of his wives.
Whatever the truth, Bhunda Chand's column met the caravan on which we and the wazam traveled. And one Alyna, a servant of the Lady Vyndra, gave testimony that her mistress and a pale-skinned barbarian called Patil had plotted with Karim Singh and spoken in her presence of slaying Bhandarkar."
A shriek of fury announced that Vyndra had just had the same information from Kuie Hsi. The Vendhyan noblewoman stormed from behind the horses, clutching half-donned silken robes that fluttered after her. "I will strip her hide! That sow will speak the truth, or I will wear out switches on her!"
"I fear it is too late for any such action on your part," Kang Hou said. "Alyna-perhaps I should say the Lady Alyna-has already been confirmed in your titles and estates. The Royal Edict concerning you not only strips you of those possessions but gifts her with your life and person."
Vyndra's mouth worked silently for a moment, then she rounded on Conan.
"You are the cause of this! It is all your fault! What are you going to do about it?"
"I am to blame?" Conan growled. "I enslaved Alyna?" Vyndra's eyes almost started from her head in fury and he sighed. "Very well. I will take you to Turan with me."
"Turan!" she cried, throwing up her hands. "It is a pigsty, unfit for a civilized woman! It-" Suddenly it dawned on her that her gesture had bared her to the waist. Shrieking, she snatched the still-sliding silk and dashed for the shelter of the horses.
"A woman whose temper equals her great beauty," Kang Hou said, and whose deviousness and vindictiveness exceed both."
Conan waved the words aside. "What of Gwandiakan? Will it be safe to hide there for a day or two while we recuperate?"
"That will not be possible," Kuie Hsi said, joining them. "The people of Gwandiakan took the earthquake as a sign from the gods, especially when they discovered that carts had been assembled to take the children from the city to an unknown destination. A wall of the fortress had collapsed. The people stormed the fortress, freeing the imprisoned children. Soldiers who tried to stop them were torn limb from limb.
Jharim Kar has promised justice in the matter, but in the meanwhile his soldiers patrol the streets heavily. I cannot believe any Western foreigner would long escape their notice."
"I am glad for the children," Conan said, "for all it had nothing to do with me, but this means we must ride for the mountains from here. And the sooner the better, I think. What of you, Kang Hou? Are you, too, proscribed?"
"I am but a humble merchant," the Khitan replied, "and so, no doubt, beneath Alyna's notice. To my good fortune. As for your journey over the mountains, I fear
that not all who came with you will return to Turan. You will pardon me." Bowing, he left before Conan could ask what he meant, but Hasan took his place.
"I must speak with you," the young Turanian said. "Alone." Still frowning after Kang Hou, Conan let himself be drawn off from the others. Hasan pressed a folded square of parchment into the Cimmerian's hand. "When you return to Sultanapur, Conan, take that to the House of Perfumed Doves and say it is for Lord Khalid."
"So you are the one who will not return to Turan," Conan said, turning over the square of parchment in his hands. "And what message is it you send to Yildiz's spy master?"
"You know of him?"
"More is known on the streets of Sultanapur than the lords of Turan would believe. But you have not answered my question."
The Turanian drew a deep breath. "I was sent to discover if a connection exists between the Vendhyans and the death of the High Admiral. Not one question have I asked concerning that, yet I know already this land is so full of intrigues within intrigues that no clear answer can ever be found. I say as much in the letter. As well I say that I can find no evidence connecting the 'fishermen' of Sultanapur with the matter, and that the rumors of a northland giant in the pay of Vendhyans is just that. A rumor. Lord Khalid will recognize my hand, and so know it for a true report. It is unsealed. You may read it if you wish."
Conan stuffed the parchment into his belt pouch. There would be time for reading-and for deciding whether to visit the House of Perfumed Doves-later. "Why are you remaining?" he asked. "Chin Kou."
"Yes. Kang Hou has no objections to a foreigner marrying into his family." Hasan snorted a laugh. "After years of avoiding it, it seems I will become a spice merchant after all."
"Be careful," Conan cautioned. "I wish you well, but I do not believe the Khitans are much less devious than the Vendhyans."
Leaving the young Turanian, Conan went in search of Kang Hou. The merchant was seated on the wall of the caved-in well. "Soon you will be fleeing Vendhya," the Khitan said as Conan approached. "What of your plans to sack the land with an army at your back?"
"Someday perhaps. But Vendhya is a strange land, mayhap too devious for a simple northlander like me. It makes my thoughts whirl in peculiar fashions."
Kang Hou arched a thin eyebrow. "How so, man who calls himself Patil?"
"Just fragments, spinning. Odd memories. Valash, sitting in the Golden Crescent on the morning the High Admiral died. A very hard man, Valash.
He would never have let two such beauties as your nieces leave his ship except to a slaver's block. Unless someone frightened him into it perhaps. But then, you are a very hard man for a poor merchant, are you not, Kang Hou? And your niece, Kuie Hsi, is an extremely able woman.
The way in which she passed for a Vendhyan woman to seek information in Gwandiakan. And knowing Naipal was among those who rode to the Forests of Ghelai, though I have heard his face was known but to a handful.
Were you aware that a Vendhyan woman was delivered to the High Admiral as a gift on the morning he died? She vanished soon after his death, I understand. But I have never understood why the Vendhyans would sign a treaty with Turan and kill the High Admiral within a day of it. Kandar seemed truly shocked at the news, and Karim Singh as well. Strange, would you not say, Kang Hou?"
All through the rambling discourse the Khitan had listened with an expression of polite interest. Now he smiled, tucking his hands into his broad sleeves. "You weave a very fanciful tale for one who calls himself a simple northlander."
Returning the smile, Conan put his hand on his dagger. "Will you wager you are faster than I?" he asked softly.
For an instant Kang Hou wavered visibly. Then, slowly, he brought his hands into the open. Empty. "I am but a peaceful merchant," he said as though nothing had happened. "If you would care to listen, perhaps I can weave a tale as fanciful as yours. Having, of course, as little to do with reality."
"I will listen," Conan said cautiously, but he did not move his hand from the dagger hilt.
"I am from Cho-Hien," the Khitan began, "a small city-state on the borders of Vendhya. The lifeblood of Cho-Hien is trade, and its armies are small. It survives by balancing its larger, stronger neighbors one against another. Largest, strongest and most avaricious of Cho-Hien's neighbors is Vendhya. Perhaps the land rots from within, as you say, but the ruling caste, the Kshatriyas, are tierce men with eyes for conquest. If those eyes turn to the north, they will fall first on Cho-Hien. Therefore Cho-Hien must keep the Kshatriyas' gaze to the east, or to the west. A treaty with Turan, for instance, might mean that Kshatriyan ambitions would look not toward the Vilayet but toward Khitai. My tale, I fear, has no more point than yours but perhaps you found it entertaining."
"Entertaining," Conan agreed. "But a question occurs to me. Does Chin Kou share Kuie Hsi's talents? That is," he added with a smile, "if Kuie Hsi had any talents out of the ordinary."
"Chin Kou's sole talent is that she remembers and can repeat every word that she hears or reads. Beyond that she is merely a loving niece who comforts an aging man's bones. Though now it seems she will comfort another."
"That brings another question. Does Hasan know of this?"
"Of my fanciful tale? No." A broad grin split the Khitan's face. "But he knew what I was, as I knew what he was, before ever we reached the Himelias. He will make a fine addition to my family. For a foreigner.
Now I will ask a question," he added, the grin fading. "What do you intend concerning my fanciful tale?"
"A tale spun by a northlander and another spun by a Khitan merchant,"
Conan said musingly. "Who in Turan would believe if I told them? And if they did, they would find ten other reasons for war, or near to war.
For there to be true peace between Turan and Vendhya, the Vilayet will have to expand to swallow Secunderam, perhaps enough to separate the two lands for all time. Besides, true peace and true war alike are bad for smugglers."
"You are not so simple as you claim, northlander."
"Vendhya is still a strange land," Conan replied with a laugh. "And one I must be leaving. Fare you well, Kang Hou of Cho-Hien."
The Khitan rose and bowed, though he was careful to keep his hands away from his sleeves. "Fare you well ... Conan of Cimmeria."
Conan laughed all the way to the horses. "Hordo," he roared, "do we ride, or have you grown so old you have put down roots? Enam, to horse!
And you, Shamil. Do you ride with us, or remain here like Hasan?"
"I have had my fill of travel and adventure," Shamil replied earnestly.
"I return to Sultanapur to become a fisherman. For fish!"
Vyndra pushed her way past the men scrambling into saddles and confronted Conan. "What of me?" she demanded.
"You do not wish to go to Turan," Conan told her, "and you cannot remain in Vendhya. Except as Alyna's ... guest. Perhaps Kang Hou will take you to Cho-Hien."
"Cho-Hien! Better Turan than that!"
"Since you have asked so nicely, if you keep me warm on the cold nights in the mountains, I will find a place for you dancing in a tavern in Sultanapur."
Her cheeks colored, but she held out her arms for him to lift her to her saddle. As he did, though, she pressed herself against him briefly and whispered, "I would much rather dance for you alone."
Conan handed her her reins and turned away, hiding a smile as he vaulted to his own saddle. There would be problems with this woman yet, but amusing ones he thought.
"What of the antidote?" Hordo asked. "And Ghurran?"
"I saw him," Conan replied. "You might say he saved all of us with what he told me." Ignoring the one-eyed man's questioning look, he went on.
"But are we to sit here until the Vendhyans put all our heads on pikes?
Come! There's a wench called Tasha waiting for me in Sultanapur." And with a grin for Vyndra's angry squawl, he booted his horse to a gallop, toward the mountains towering to the north.
Conan the Unconquered
Prologue
/> Storm winds howling off the midnight-shrouded Vilayet Sea clawed at the granite-walled compound of the Cult of Doom. The compound gave the appearance of a small city, though there were no people on its streets at that hour. More than the storm and the lateness kept them fast in their beds, praying for sleep, though but a bare handful of them could have put a finger to the real reason, and those that could did not allow themselves to think on it. The gods uplift, and the gods destroy. But no one ever believes the gods will touch them.
The man who was now called Jhandar did not know if gods involved themselves in the affairs of mortals, or indeed if gods existed, but he did know there were Powers beneath the sky. There were indeed Powers, and one of those he had learned to use, even to control after a fashion. Gods he would leave to those asleep in the compound, those who called him their Great Lord.
Now he sat cross-legged in saffron robes before such a Power. The chamber was plain, its pearly marble walls smooth, its two arched entrances unadorned. Simple round columns held the dome that rose above the shallow pool, but ten paces across, that was the room's central feature. There was no ornamentation, for friezes or sculptures or ornate working of stone could not compete with that pool, and the Power within.
Water, it might seem at first glance, but it was not. It was sharply azure and flecked with argent phosphorescence. Jhandar meditated, basking in the radiance of Power, and the pool glowed silver-blue, brighter and brighter until the chamber seemed lit with a thousand lamps. The surface of the pool bubbled and roiled, and mists rose, solidifying. But only so far. The mists formed a dome, as if a mirror image of the pool below, delineating the limits that contained the Power, both above and below. Within ultimate disorder was bound, Chaos itself confined. Once Jhandar had seen such a pool loosed from its bonds, and fervently did he wish never to see such again. But that would not happen here. Not now. Not ever.
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