"Rather than save Conan, if he needs it?" Govindue asked.
The young chief was pleased to note that even some of the most heavy-eyed men nodded at those words. Some among the band had the same notions of honor as he did, which was as well. By now, they all owed their lives to Conan more than once, and Govindue was sure they would owe much more to the man who would not be called Amra before they saw the Bamula lands again.
"We do not know where he is Kubwande began again.
It was Bowenu who interrupted. "We know that where the battle is, Conan will be found. Never was there such a chief for finding the enemy, or they finding him."
This time everybody nodded, even Kubwande, although he seemed uneasy.
Govindue made ritual gestures of gratitude at Bowenu and vowed that when he had it in his gift, the man would have more than gratitude.
"Then some of us should go," Kubwande said. "I will gladly lead them."
Govindue shook his head, and he was glad to see distaste for that idea on most of the other faces. "We will not divide our strength, not in an unknown place and facing an unknown enemy. We will all gather what we wish to take from this place, and when we leave this stone hut, we will leave together. Nor will we divide ourselves on the way to find Conan, or afterward, save by chance.
"We have been together this far, and it has meant life to all of us. If now it means death, then that is as the gods will it, and we will meet the death they send like warriors of the Bamulas. In this land, too, people will cry 'Ohbe, Bamula!'"
It was the longest speech Govindue had ever made in his life, even longer than the one at his manhood ordeal. It also seemed to strike home more than he dared expect, with warriors some of whom were almost old enough to be his father.
The gods touched those whom they wished to lead, it seemed. He would have to be worthy of their trust, as well as that of the men.
Then there was no more speech, only the scrape and rattle of men preparing to strike out for war.
***
Conan moved openly through the tunnels now. Speed was everything, to take him back to his people before anything could happen to them.
Treachery by Lysenius, attack by chakans, another earthquake”anything was possible.
Anything except panic among the Bamulas. Not all of them had showed equal prowess in battle, but all of them had followed him through the world-walker and on after that. It was not in them to give way to fear.
At one point, the roof of a tunnel gaped open, a crack wide enough to swallow a boy running up into nighted depths. Conan could have sworn that the wall was also bulged out. Just as well he was moving openly through the wider tunnels. The narrow passages of the secret route he had taken to Scyra's bed might have become a trifle too narrow for a well-grown Cimmerian warrior.
Conan realized that the way he was following now led past the treasure-room. He also realized that there were smoke and dust in the air, and a foul odor he had no trouble recognizing. Chakans lay ahead.
This time he was ready. He set down the purse and map and advanced burdened only by lantern and weapons. Around the first bend, the smoke and dust swirled thicker, seeming ready to swallow every beam of light from the lantern. Around the second bend, his sandals grated on stones, and a block fallen from the roof lay half-barring the passage.
Conan crouched, listening for any sound from beyond the block. If the chakans were lying in wait, that would be the best place for them.
Only silence came, broken once by the faint, distant clatter of rock falling. The reek of the chakans seemed to be weaker now, and another odor was joining it. That one was even more familiar to Conan. It was the smell of death.
Whose death? The only way to learn was to go on. Conan drew both weapons and sidled past the block, back to the wall, his eyes seeking friend, foe, or even knowledge of what had befallen the treasure-chamber.
The chamber opened off a larger one, and when Conan entered that larger chamber, he found himself on what seemed like a battlefield. Fallen rock was strewn about, likewise gobs of half-melted metal and pieces of charred wood, all still smoking and adding to the choking miasma.
Among the other debris were several corpses. They had almost human shape, but the proportions of the limbs were subtly wrong and no human ever sported such a peaked skull. Conan also saw on those corpses that were not charred black far too much hair for any human being.
Beyond the rubble-strewn floor, the arched entrance to the treasure-chamber gaped. Smoke curled out of it, and more from the remains of the doors still dangling from either side of the arch.
Beyond the entrance, smoke and dust swirled so thickly that the light of Conan's lantern could hardly penetrate farther than into the stone itself.
He had seen enough, however. A band of chakans had come prowling this way, and with their half-bestial intelligence, had found the treasure-chamber. What they had thought it to be, the gods alone knew, but they had surely made some attempt on the doors”vigorous enough to draw the chamber's magickal defenses on them and cause a minor quake.
Or had that been entirely magickal? Lysenius had not seemed to be any master of the mechanic arts, Scyra still less. But these caves and tunnels were too extensive and well-shaped to be altogether natural; what powers had made them in the eons before Lysenius came to the Pictish Wilderness? What had those powers left behind?
Conan knew one thing that he was not going to leave behind”anything portable in the treasure-chamber. Lysenius had no good use for any pickings, and the Bamulas might need more than Scyra's gold to speed their way homeward. He would have to chance confrontation with any remaining mechanical or magickal defenses of the treasure-chamber, but he had taken greater risks with less need when he was far less skilled a thief.
Conan retrieved the purse and map and was crossing the chamber when he heard footsteps mounting the tunnel from below. These were human footsteps, and numerous, moving fast”mayhap the Bamulas, or perhaps Picts following in the wake of their shaman's creatures.
The Cimmerian slipped into the arch of the treasure-chamber's entrance and waited, then doused his lantern. Now he was all but invisible, unless one shone light almost squarely upon him.
The newcomers were carrying lanterns. Good. They would illuminate themselves well before they illuminated him. Then a quick rush, if they were Picts”
More footsteps. These were coming from the tunnel Conan had just followed. They were slower, fewer”and now the Cimmerian heard the click of claws on stone. Chakan, or whatever else they might be; the one thing they were not was human. Did Lysenius have creatures of his own conjuring at his service, to defend his stronghold?
The oncoming men seemed to hear the others almost at the same moment as Conan did. He heard their footsteps stop, then a whispered command to set the lanterns down in front of them. Relief washed through the Cimmerian. The language was Bamula, and he could have sworn the voice was Govindue's.
Three chakans now slipped into view, one of them on all fours, sniffing the floor. From Scyra's description, that had to be the one trailing the Cimmerian. The others were to guard it while it trailed and help it to strike down the prey when they came upon it.
Conan resolved to alter their plans. There seemed to be far too many of these shaman's pets roaming about tonight. He intended that by dawn, there would be far fewer.
He bent carefully, without any betraying scrape of skin on stone or rattle of gear. He picked up a small stone between thumb and forefinger, then tossed it out onto the rubble-strewn floor.
The rattle seemed as loud as a war cry in a temple. It certainly drew the chakans' attention. Whuffling uncertainly, they stopped and looked about them. They had to be able to see the Bamulas' lanterns, but could they see the men beyond?
At least one of them did. With a cry that was part-scream, part-howl, it leapt toward the lanterns. It landed among them, knocking two over.
Darkness redoubled, as did sound, with Bamula war cries, Cimmerian war cries, and the bestial howls of the chakan
s all vying with one another.
The two remaining chakans sprang to join their comrade, or so Conan judged as best he could by the scant light remaining. If that was so, then all three had their backs to him.
He leapt from his hiding place, landing amid fallen rocks and barely keeping his footing. A charred piece of wood cracked under him, but the sound was lost in the uproar and no chakan turned to face him.
That was fatal to one of the beasts almost at once. Knowing their strength, speed, and tenacity of life, Conan struck with two hands on his sword. The cord of the spine, the bone of the skull, the flesh of the chakan's neck all gave way together. The creature's high-peaked head lolled on its shoulders as its body lurched forward, bounced off its comrades, and fell to the floor. Two spears thrust from above into its back ended its last struggles, and the rank odor of its death filled the chamber.
"Don't close with them!" Conan shouted. "Form a hedge with half your spears and throw the others!" The Bamulas were no weaklings, but Conan doubted their power to come alive out of a chakan's unnatural grip.
For answer, someone threw a spear. It passed wide of both living chakans and nearly struck the Cimmerian. He snatched it up, ready to return it point-first to the fool who had thrown so wildly.
Or had it been wildly? He remembered those footprints on the bank where he fought the river-horse, and Kubwande's taste for intrigue. A "wildly thrown" spear in the darkness could give any man excuse should it slay a friend.
The next moment, the Bamulas brought down the second chakan with spears both thrown and thrust. Conan heard a warrior cry out in pain and fury, and then came the death-rattle of the chakan. The third chakan seemed bemused and astray in its wits; it crouched on the floor and whimpered until Govindue stepped forward and thrust it through the neck.
The young chief had withdrawn his spear and was bending its point back into shape when Conan approached him. They pounded each other on the shoulders, then Conan led Govindue apart and whispered:
"A spear came near to taking me instead of the chakan. Did you see who threw it?"
"Is that their name? We thought them apes. Are they more?"
Conan told him of what he had learned from Scyra. Govindue looked grave. "It is not good, to have two kinds of evil magick against us."
"Tell me what I don't already know, or hold your tongue."
"I know who threw the spear. Need I name him?"
"I have no wish to curse him. Kill him, if needs be, but not curse him."
"Then you need no name. Such as he, I think curse themselves from the day they are born."
"Likely as not." Conan raised his voice. "Ho, Bamulas! We have a treasure-room to loot. Take only what you can carry easily. We must leave here swiftly and keep up a good pace for some days."
"Why are we leaving Lysenius?" That was not Bowenu, as Conan might have expected. He did not recognize the speaker in the darkness, but someone apparently did and spoke up:
"Scobun, do you want to share quarters with these? Or serve anyone who commands them? Better to take our chances with the Picts! A cleaner death, if no more."
"Yes," Conan said. He told briefly of Lysenius's planned treachery. He spent no time explaining how he had learned, although Kubwande did ask where the crystal was.
"Where I intended it to be," Conan replied. "I judged rightly. It is woman's magick, and a good thing for us. Scyra will not make war on her father for us, but she has no love for treachery. What strengthens her works for us."
"Wise words," Govindue said. "Now¦ the treasure-room lies over there."
He pointed with his spear. "Four at a time, and each four only while I count to a hundred. Anyone greedy or stealing from his comrades will not live long enough to fear Lysenius or the Picts!"
The young chief's voice was still a trifle too high-pitched to give him a real air of command, but he had everything else a captain might need.
If luck and the gods spared him, Govindue would leave a mighty name behind him.
If, of course, he did not tonight leave his bones in Lysenius's caves.
***
The looting of the treasure-chamber went swiftly enough. Chests and bags alike had been sundered apart by the chakans and the magick defense against them. Gold and silver coins, some freshly minted Aquilonian crowns, others from realms long lost in the mists of time, jewels, massive necklaces, arms rings and ornaments, and finely decorated weapons, lay strewn wantonly about.
Conan kept a close watch on the men, partly to encourage them to pick the precious rather than the showy, and partly to prevent trickery. He had his sword drawn and even the thought of taking something from a comrade was hard to hold if one sensed those ice-blue eyes boring into the back of one's neck and seeming to read one's innermost thoughts.
The Cimmerian contented himself with a jeweled dagger, which he added to the purse of gold from Scyra.
The blade had never been of the best steel, and now showed signs of rust. The jewels might be worth a manor; the dagger itself was barely fit to cut salt meat in a starveling siege camp.
Everyone had a bulging pouch or bag when he left the treasure-chamber.
No one seemed any the slower for his burden, but the day's march would test the Bamulas far more rigorously. Conan resolved that any man who fell behind from an overabundance of loot would have to divide half of his cache among more prudent comrades. If they also were fully burdened, the man would have to leave his baubles for the Picts and the wolves.
With this decision made, Conan formed his men up and led them down past their old quarters and out into the night. Dawn found them well on their way east, and as yet unpursued.
The Bamulas rejoiced at this, and seemed to regard their escape as a certainty. Conan was silent about his own doubts. They were a long way from the border, Lysenius might have resources not yet used or be letting them go for his own purposes, and the Picts would not be long in coming.
Even if they survived all these perils, the border might be closed to them. They had raided in the Marches, and it might well be that no amount of gold would make Bossonians forgive men who had marched with the Picts.
***
"They are gone! Gone! Gone!" Lysenius thundered.
Scyra hoped that he would not try to cast any spells until his mind was less troubled. Now, if he tried to warm a bowl of herb tea, he was likely as not to set his robe on fire.
She had seen this sort of thing happen before, and it had helped speed his way out of both Aquilonia and Bossonia. In Aquilonia, men paying good gold and silver for spells unlawful even under the decadent Numedides brooked no failures or partial successes. In Bossonia, bungled spells betrayed Lysenius and his family to hard-handed neighbors who might otherwise have not learned who lived among them.
But a tiger who missed his leap three times out of four was no less dangerous to the man under the fourth leap.
"We must raise the Picts and be after the Cimmerian and his men,"
Lysenius groaned. "But what can I do to pay blood-price for the warriors who will die?"
From a brief look at the treasure-chamber, Scyra doubted that her father lacked gold for this purpose. Twenty Bamulas had wrought further havoc after the wardings slew the chakans and shattered the door, but they had by no means stripped the chamber bare.
But offering part of that gold would make the Picts wonder if there was more. Indeed, they might already have learned of it from the chakans.
Neither god nor man nor magick could stand between Picts and that much gold.
Her father would escape as a beggar, if he escaped at all, with no gold, no magick not unlawful in any land they could hope to reach, nothing but her”if her marriage to a Pictish chief was not the price of his escape. There had to be some path out of this that would neither beggar her father nor slaughter Conan and his Bamulas.
If she could save Conan (she shivered at the memory of his lusty embrace) and leave the Bamulas to their fate”
No. Conan would refuse such a soluti
on and die cursing her. His honor bound him to save those who had followed him through the world-walker and into a land that must be as strange to them as the Black Kingdoms would be to her¦ else he would die with them.
But if she could save Conan's band without ruining her father¦
She stepped back and drew from her purse the Crystal of Thraz. Her fathers eyes were fastened on the ceiling when she did so, and he seemed to be talking to some being there, or even in the solid rock beyond. It took some moments before he lowered his gaze.
He started then, and let out a roar that nearly made Scyra drop the crystal. She stepped back two more paces, as he looked ready to snatch at it.
"No, Father. It was a gift from Conan. He took it from the Bossonian caravan, then gave it to me."
"But¦ you know what these can do?"
"Am I not your daughter?"
"Do not, for once, answer a question with a question, Scyra. It is clever, but this is not the time for cleverness."
In that, Scyra thought, her father was very much mistaken. It was indeed a time for her to be clever beyond her wont, or Conan was doomed.
"Wait, Father. I know what this is. I have¦ I have tested it, in small ways. Not great ones, but the small ones have been enough to tell me that this one is bonded to women and women only."
Lysenius frowned. Scyra hoped he was not trying to remember the names of the spells that she might have used. If he interrogated her even aloud, let alone reaching into her mind, betrayal was likely and disaster not impossible.
"This is the truth?"
"By all that I know, yes."
"You cannot swear by more," Lysenius said. His broad shoulders bowed for a moment under the weight of all his years and memories.
Scyra knew how many of those memories were of failure and loss, and wanted to hug her father as she had when she was a child. It had comforted him them; would it comfort him now?
Perhaps, and she would feel even worse a traitor than she did already.
Her father might not scruple at selling her to the Picts to advance his schemes, but when she stood before him, he had not the heart to call her a liar. There remained in him more of the man he had been than she had thought.
The Conan Compendium Page 417
