The two men, old and young, went around the camp and spoke in low voices to the little clumps of men. At their report the men ceased their discontented muttering and their lowering scowls changed to grins of anticipation. Whatever the odds, Northlanders would always rather right than wait.
They arose and quietly prepared for a night march and battle. Many tied cloaks or blankets about their bodies to muffle somewhat the rattle of the metal scales and to prevent the clink of weapons and shields against armor.
Starkad thought of having them blacken their metal with soot from the fires, but decided against it. They might be willing to muffle their gear for
the sake of stealth, but no Van going into what might well prove his last fight would want to make less than his finest display.
In all, Starkad was well content. If he had little chance, at least it was better than none. It was always good to be leading men into a battle. His only real grief was that they might all die and the story of this fight never be sung in the halls of Vanaheim. Songs and poems were the immortality of a hero. He whistled idly as he thumbed his ax, making sure that the edge was keen. His thoughts were interrupted by Jaganath, who had appeared soundlessly behind him.
"Are you going somewhere, Starkad?" he asked.
"Yes. We have decided to take a little stroll down the hill and have some exercise with the blackhairs. Then we will go home. You may keep your gold. I have a feeling I would have precious little use for it were I to wait for it."
"It grieves me to part company with you, but if this is your wish, of course I shall not stand in your way. However, I have something for you all which may be of help."
Starkad narrowed his eyes. "What might that be?" This foreigner was accepting his defection with strange equanimity.
"I have made up protective amulets for you all. They contain a sacred power that will protect you from the detection and the weapons of your enemies. Gopal, help me distribute these."
"This is generous of you," Starkad said as the wizard hung around his neck a tiny bag on a silken string. The younger Vendhyan was passing the amulets out among the other men.
"It is the least I can do." Jaganath smiled.
When all was ready the Vanir began their slow, quiet trudge downhill.
When they were gone, Gopal turned to Jaganath. "Uncle, are these Northmen truly as stupid as they seem?"
Jaganath smiled and nodded, setting his many chins aquiver. "Is their simplicity not sublime, nephew? They are so unsubtle that it is possible to
outwit oneself in dealing with them by feinting and dodging an obvious counterploy that never even occurs to them. Now they are properly consecrated and ready for sacrifice. There is no sacrifice more pleasing than a willing one, and no sheep ever went to the altar more willingly than these fools.
"Now, come. These men shall not slow down that mob below, and among them is the Cimmerian hired by Hathor-Ka, if my pursuers and even my cursed gold failed their task. We must not chance it with the stakes so high. I am not yet sure who brought the demons here, nor for what purpose save stirring up the countryside, but I have a plan. There is a spell known to me that shall send the demons against those men camped in the valley. Thus will the Cimmerians be eliminated as a threat while at the same time the caverns will be vacated so that I may perform these important rites in privacy and uninterrupted."
"You always plan with such elegance, uncle," said Gopal with fawning admiration.
Far below them, in the bowels of the mountain, a skinny, ragged figure sat cross-legged in a dark side tunnel. From time to time it murmured some ancient chant. Then, in the dimness, it smiled.
Fifteen
The Battle Among the Cairns
The Cimmerian camp spread across the Field of the Dead to the flanking slopes that defined its limits. The mossy stones of the cairns had been restored to their proper order, and the worst of the defilement cleared away. A true purification was not yet possible. That could be done only with the blood of the defilers.
Conan walked through the camp, smelling the smoke of the peat fires and hearing the low talk of the warriors. In other armies the young and untried men would be chattering nervously of what was to come. Those with a little experience would be boasting of their past feats. True veterans would be holding their own counsel, seeing to their fighting gear and trying to get some rest. In this, as in most things, Cimmerians were different. In the snatches of conversation as he was passing the fires, Conan heard them talking of the everyday things of their lives: of their
wives and children, of cattle and feuds and farming. It was as if they were gathered for a trading fair instead of a battle. Once again Conan knew he was an alien in his own land.
Only in the camp of the Aesir did he find the kind of congenial fellowship that he liked among fighting men. Here the yellowhaired warriors laughed and sang and passed around a huge skin of wine from the South while a few young Cimmerians stood around and gazed upon them as upon some strange animals. Conan strode into the circle of men and intercepted the wineskin as it was being passed. He upended it and poured a long stream of the yellow juice into his mouth.
"Hey, Conan, leave some for the rest of us!" Wulfhere had hair and beard so pale that it was almost white. He was a little older than Conan, but was already a famous chief among the Aesir.
He and his men were a startling contrast to the somber Cimmerians.
Like their cousins the Vanir, the Aesir delighted in gaudy display. Their armor was of polished iron or bronze, and their helmets were crested with horns or wings or fantastic animal figures, often overlaid with silver or gold. Their arms glittered with bracelets and armlets of fancifully wrought gold, and many a swordhilt blazed with jewels. With mirrors of polished silver, many of these warriors were taking advantage of the firelight to comb and braid their beards or shape their long moustaches into dashing curves. Several songs were going at once. Like the Vanir, the Aesir were merry in hall or camp, wild in battle, and sad at home among their families.
Conan took a final swallow and passed the skin on to the next man.
"Why did you not bring ale if this stuff is so precious?"
"Ale takes up too much space," Wulfhere said. "We wore out three slaves carrying this wine as it was. This had better be a good fight, Conan.
We abandoned a promising raiding party against the Hyperboreans to come here."
"You'll enjoy it," Conan promised. "There shall be Vanir to kill, along with the demons."
"That will be good," Wulfhere approved. "And these creatures have raided into Asgard as well, this last year, but we had no idea where they had disappeared to until your messenger came. Whatever befalls, there
will be many songs sung in the halls of Asgard about this fight."
A one-eyed man with gapped teeth handed the wineskin back up to Conan. "Come raiding with us when this is done," he said. "It has been long years since you took the wolfs path with us. I should like to see what tricks you have learned in your wanderings."
"That I may well do, Ulf. I make no promise, though. Tomorrow I may be dead, or you may be dead. Best to make no plans until the shield-cleaving is done."
"Now you speak like a Cimmerian," grumbled Wulfhere.
Conan grinned. "I've been with my relatives too much."
He left the camp of the Aesir and walked up the valley to the upper watchpost. Here no fire burned, lest the guard's night vision be ruined.
Chulainn stood here with another young man, who wore the Galla topknot.
"All quiet, cousin," Chulainn reported.
"It will not be for long," Conan predicted. "We've no more than an hour until first light. I am sure they will strike us before that." They stood for a while in silence, their ears, eyes, and noses trained uphill, where danger lay.
It was the Galla warrior who raised his head first, his nostrils flared.
"They come," he said. Then the other two heard the sounds of men descending, still far up the slope.
"Fools," Ch
ulainn said. "To think they could sneak past Cimmerians in our own mountains."
"Are demons among them?" asked the Galla, lifting his long shield and swinging his terrible club.
Conan shook his head. "The Vanir. Trying to escape is my guess. They'll serve to warm us up for the real fight."
"You two have already killed some of them," the Galla said. "You go rouse the others. I will stay here." His eyes blazed with eagerness to kill his enemies.
"No," Conan said, "we'll all walk back into the firelight. No sense fighting in the dark." Grumbling, the Galla obeyed.
As they stepped into the light of the first fire, Conan said simply, "Vanir coming."
Quietly, without fuss, the men picked up sword and spear and waited.
The quieting of their conversation was the only sign that they were ready for combat.
When the Vanir were fifty paces away they cast off their muffling cloaks, raised their battle cry, and rushed into the Cimmerian camp. Their only chance was to plow through the camp in a solid mass, so they came in a wedge, with Starkad at its point. The Cimmerians rushed to meet them joyfully, all their solemnity gone in the frenzy of mortal combat.
The momentum of the wedge pushed the Vanir well into the camp, but as each succeeding wave of blackhaired avengers broke against it, the wedge slowed and at last stopped. Then it was a desperate battle that broke up into a multitude of single combats. The Vanir sought desperately to hold a shield wall, while the Cimmerians, innocent of all strategic thought, rushed upon them screaming like madmen.
At the first rush of the wedge Conan was pushed back like the rest, able to strike only intermittently. Only his great strength and his superb sense of balance kept him on his feet while others fell and were pulped beneath the weight of the Vanir swine's-head array. Conan found a low rock behind him and he leaped nimbly atop it. The wedge split to pass the rock and he managed to split a skull as they passed. Then men within the wedge were stabbing at him with spears and Conan gathered his legs beneath him.
With a spring that would have awed a Zamoran tumbler, he cleared two ranks of Vanir and landed outside the wedge once again. The Aesir who were fighting there saw and cheered the feat.
Conan ran to the top of the cairn and scanned the battlefield, The Vanir were desperately holding their tight formation, but their forward impetus had been lost. They had not as yet taken many losses, and they would not as long as they held together. The Cimmerians were far more numerous, but they could not make the weight of their numbers felt against the tight knot of men behind their shield wall. Once the Vanir lost their cohesiveness, it would be over swiftly. He looked uphill, but there was no sign of reinforcements yet.
The fires had been built up, and they provided a lurid light for the ferocious goings-on among the cairns. Men cursed and sang and struck, Cimmerian swords rang on Vanir scale, Vanir ax split heads and unarmored bodies. Over all rose the unmistakable stench of blood. Conan could almost hear the satisfied mutter of Cimmerian chiefs as the blood of their enemies trickled down to them.
Conan ran down the side of the cairn and launched himself at the knot of Vanir below. Splitting a shield and the arm behind it, he finished the redbeard with his second blow. A Vanir tried to take the place of the fallen man, only to have his head crushed by a Galla club. Conan shouldered his way into the gap thus made and hewed to both sides, each blow sending a Van howling to the ground. Grimly refusing to let the Vanir advance men to close the gap, Conan worked his way farther in, widening it. Others forced their way in behind him, and the Vanir wedge began to break up.
The clamor of striking weapons and screaming men was deafening, and the ground was growing slippery. As the fighting grew more and more desperate, men became truly insane with fury. Conan saw an As throw away his shield, tear off his mailshirt, and dive headfirst into the midst of the Vanir. He was hewn to pieces within moments, but he died with his teeth buried in the throat of a Van. The Vanir howled and foamed, biting the rims of their shields and stamping, each impact of their feet raising a spray of blood from the soaked ground.
The Vanir broke into small knots, then into pairs standing back to back, finally into single warriors with no thought except to take as many enemies with them as they could.
Conan saw the chief he had seen upon leaving Crom's cave and rushed to fight him. There was no thought in any mind of sparing the remaining Vanir. Centuries of hate and vengeance forbade it, and the Vanir would have considered the offer an insult in any case. Once battle was joined, it was always fought to the bitter last in the North.
The Van chieftain grinned mirthlessly as he saw Conan. His armor was still whole, and his elaborate helm bore only a few shallow nicks. He had been busy, though, for his ax was bloody from head to butt, and his hands and arms were bloodied to the shoulders. "Come play with me, blackhair!"
he called to Conan. He shook his ax. "Come kiss the maid who has spurned so many of your kin. Perhaps she will like you better!" If Starkad was exhausted from the fight, he showed no sign of it.
"More Vanir blood for our fathers!" Conan shouted, rushing to the fight.
Starkad dodged his first blow and sent back another that Conan avoided only by a desperate dive to the ground. The follow-up ax blow rang against the ground an inch from Conan's back as he rolled. Then Conan was on his feet and his blade rang against Starkad's helm. As the chieftain staggered back Conan hewed a leg from under him. Before Starkad could fall, Conan's third blow split him from shoulder to belt.
Standing over the fallen man, Cohan spun his sword overhead in a great circle, shedding blood and scales in a wide arc.
Around him the fighting was over, and men stood panting from the terrible exertion. Canach approached Conan. "That was well done, kinsman," the chief said. "It is good for the young men to see a real warrior at his work."
"The battle was ill done, though," Conan said, glaring at the heaps of dead. "We lost too many just to kill so few Vanir, not even a hundred of them. They must have taken at least as many of us. There are ways to handle such a situation without such losses.
Canach shrugged. "That is not our way of fighting, and the Vanir are doughty fighters, not like your soft southerners. Besides"―the chief managed a faint smile―"I did not notice you holding back and pondering stratagems."
Conan grinned ruefully. "You have the right of it. In the end I am as Cimmerian as the rest. Do not let the men relax. I think there will be more fighting before the sun rises."
"Good," said Canach. "Many had no chance to wet their blades. I would not like to take them home discontent."
The sky to the east was beginning to turn gray when old Milach came to him, accompanied by Chulainn. Neither man was badly wounded, but their notched weapons proclaimed they had been in the thick of the fighting.
"I am sorry I thought you had become soft, Conan," said Milach. "I have been watching you in the fighting. You are not too far off your best speed and power even now."
"It must be the oat porridge," Conan said. "It makes a man lose the fear of death."
A glimmer up the slope caught Conan's eye. The sun was still below the horizon, but its earliest rays were shining at the very crest of Ben Morgh.
Inexorably, the light would descend the slopes of the mountain, eventually reaching Crom's cave. He had to be in the cave when that happened.
Conan went to a cairn and found the bundle of belongings he had cached there. Within a cloak was the flask given to him by Hathor-Ka. In one of the little encampments he found a fire pot, a small jar pierced with holes for bearing glowing coals in a bed of ashes. He did not want to waste time striking flint against steel when he reached the cave.
As Conan climbed the slope from the Field of the Dead, he found that others were falling in behind him. The sky was paling, and they no longer needed the light of the fires to fight by. All wanted to drive the demons from Crom's mountain home, and they would enter the caverns to do so should it prove necessary. Conan had expected the demons to strike ere no
w. Soon it would be light. Then he remembered the unnatural cloud they sometimes took with them.
There was a rising mutter when the warriors saw the gaping pit that had not been there before. This was a desecration as great as the Vanir defilement of the cairns. They were almost at the lip of the pit when all the horrors of Hell came boiling out of it. One instant, the field before the pit was empty. The next, Conan was fighting desperately for his life against something that looked like a cross between a moth and an ape.
The thing had long reddish hair and withered wings and gigantic compound eyes. Conan was more concerned with the wide-bladed glaive with which it was trying to kill him. It fought with no art he could interpret, but sliced at him with a clear intent to slay. It took him a few moments to determine its timing, then he stepped in and pulped its skull with his sword. The thing continued to flail away blindly until Conan hewed away its head, then it fell, still struggling futilely.
All around Conan was a demented battle being carried on by screaming men and things from a nightmare. The insect-creatures were dying easily, but the lizard-things were exacting a toll. Conan felt a fierce pride swelling in him. Any civilized army he had seen would have fled in terror from this unearthly force, and all their polish and discipline would have availed them naught. But this little horde of Cimmerians with their Aesir allies
rushed to do battle as if they had no other purpose on Earth.
A howling horror of tentacles and batwings bore down on Conan, and he hacked it in twain, burying his blade half its length in the soil in the process. He wrenched the sword free and sunlight glimmered on its bluish length. Conan looked up the slope and saw that the light of the morning sun was almost to the level of the cave.
He had no worry over the progress of this fight. The things died, and if they could die, the Cimmerians would kill them all. He began to climb.
Twice he was attacked by unclean creatures. Twice he shook their blood from his sword. Then he stood in the mouth of the cave.
The Conan Compendium Page 333
