He drained his cup and nodded. “I am listening.”
She clapped her hands and the slave girl came in again with two full goblets. She collected the empty ones and bowed her way out. When she was gone, Omia began.
“Know, O stranger,” she said, in what Conan judged to be a ritual storytelling formula, “that Janagar of the Opal Gates reigned for five thousand years as the queen of the world, the center of an empire that is no longer even a name among the legends of the barbaric men of this age. When the last golden tile was laid atop the dome of Janagar’s last great temple, Python was but a crude sprawl of thatch-roofed stone huts, built by primitive snake worshipers who knew not the secrets of writing or more of sorcery than the petty marvels of unwashed shamans and mountebanks.”
“That was long ago, indeed,” Conan said.
“Longer than your savage mind can comprehend,” she assured him. “But even in the days of glory, Janagar was already so ancient that its early history was fragmentary, for even the greatest civilization begins with primitive villagers, and writings scratched on wood, painted on leather, inked on parchment, perish with time. This much we know: Like all great city-states, Janagar’s early power was based upon the might of the sword. The armies of Janagar crushed all opposition before them, laid lesser peoples under our yoke and seized their wealth for our own.
“With military might came fabulous wealth, and the people of Janagar learned that wealth was power, and a finer power than that of the sword, for with wealth, they could hire others to bear swords, leaving the lords of Janagar to pursue worthier endeavors.”
To the Cimmerian, this meant the very beginning of degeneracy, but he wisely maintained his silence.
“For many, many centuries, the lords of Janagar savored the joys of vast power combined with vast wealth. Every whim was theirs to satisfy. From me farthest corners of the world were brought me most exotic curiosities for the collections of the great The most beautiful daughters and sons of all nations came to Janagar as slaves. They were decked in silks and jewels, and they served the tables of Janagar with the most delectable viands, the rarest delicacies, of all the world.”
Conan was about to observe that mushrooms must have been a terrible comedown from such a diet, but he held his tongue.
“But in time,” she went on, “even the delights of unlimited wealth must pall. For it occurred to the lords of Janagar that these were the mere treasures of the material world, and that other delights lay beyond this one―transcendent beauties and ecstasies to be seized by those with the knowledge to gain access and the courage to lay hold of them.” She sipped her wine, her eyes dreamy behind the holes in her mask.
“Mankind was young then,” she said, almost whispering the words. “He knew little beyond the use of stone and metal. Even the lords of Janagar had scant knowledge of the spirit world at first. But if mankind was young, others were not”
“What mean you?” he asked, his scalp prickling.
“I mean that man was not the only thinking creature in those days. There were others: beings far more ancient, their wisdom to that of man’s like that of an old sage to the knowledge of a child. These beings were far gone in senescence, their empires long since crumbled, but still they existed in the obscure corners of the world.
“In the last great age of the priest-kings, the order went out to scour the world and seek out the remnants of these prehuman races, that we might glean from them their secrets. Centuries were consumed in these expeditions alone. Caravans set out, ships sailed forth, all charged with this task.
Generals led great treks, accompanied by hordes of armies. Merchants set forth with bags of wealth to offer bribes. Even lone adventurers like yourself went a-wandering, with no more than a sword at (heir belt and a gleam of reward in their eyes.
“And me strange, eldritch creatures were found.” Her eyes and voice were haunted with the race-memory of the time. “A few of them could almost be mistaken for humans, except for minor but upsetting differences. More were manlike only in general shape. Others bore no human semblance -whatever. All had much to teach.”
“Knowledge such as they had is best left untouched by men,” said Conan.
“The great ones of Janagar were never as lesser men,” she said contemptuously. “Do not presume to judge us by your primitive, barbaric standards. From the strange creatures we reaped riches of knowledge undreamed of. The sorcerers of Janagar, in their fumbling experiments, wold have taken aeons of trial and error to gain the knowledge we reaped from the uncanny races in a few short centuries.
Wizards who had been able to cast their consciousness only a few short leagues learned to visit distant stars in their trances. From communing with the inhuman beings of this world, they came to speak with intelligences from other planes and other worlds.”
“A man of wisdom travels on his own feet,” Conan grumbled, “or on the feet of beasts.”
“Don’t be tedious,” she said. “Even that great, hulking frame and those powerful muscles could bore me if your thoughts persist in being so narrow. Do you want to hear this?”
“Forgive me,” he said. “I am listening.” If she thought him stupid, so much the better.
“That is more like it. Know then, that in the life of every civilization, there are times of growth and times of stagnation. If a time of stagnation goes on too long, rot sets in and the civilization falls. With each new, rejuvenating source of energy, the culture grows and stretches itself and tests its limits before sinking into self-satisfaction. So it always was with Janagar. As a young, barbaric race, we were drunk with the power of steel and bronze and the shedding of enemy blood. Then we expanded further with the power of gold and other wealth, the intoxication of acquisitiveness. Finally, we grasped the ultimate power of sorcery, and we worked our will upon the world of mankind, and even into other planes.
“But even with us, there were limits. As a young race, we learned the limits of armed might In our middle age, we found that there were some things unobtainable even with the greatest wealth. In our final stage, we found that as humans, there were limits to the sorcerous powers we could wield.”
” ‘As humans,’ you say?”
“Aye. So you are listening, after all. It was true. We knew that we shared the world with thinking creatures that were not human. In the worlds beyond, there were races infinitely ancient and infinitely powerful It chafed our pride that we could not be their equals. The human brain was not organized to wield their powers. The human body could not live long enough to perfectly master many arts customary to other races. It was decided that the masters of Janagar had to somehow absorb the substance of the nonhuman races.”
With a numbing chill, Conan remembered the artistic motif he had seen everywhere in the city, above and below: entwined chains of human and demonic forms coupling in obscene combinations.
“And so it was done,” she went on. “In Janagar, men and women mated with beings in no wise ever intended to mingle their blood with that of mortal humans. It grew into a ritual and the core of our religion for the last thousand years of the city, and the progeny that sprang from this practice was strange beyond belief. Unholy combinations of human and alien sat upon the thrones of Janagar, and took part in councils that would strike any living human of today mad with horror.”
“That I can well believe,” Conan said.
“The price was terrible, but the mages of Janagar would pay any price, endure any sacrifice, for great knowledge. And great knowledge was theirs. The deepest secrets of matter and spirit were theirs to know and to exploit. Any knowledge they wished was theirs for desiring it, AH the creatures of this world became slaves to them. Even some of the beings of other worlds and planes bowed down to them.”
“But not all?” Conan asked.
“No,” she admitted. “Not all.” For the first time, hesitation crept into her voice. “There were beings in the higher planes, beings of such mind-blasting might that the half-human mages of Janagar called them
only the Powers. At first, they seemed unbelievably great, but unnoticing of humans, like the accursed sun. Whatever their doings, they had no interest in man, whether hi this world or another.”
“These Powers,” Conan said uneasily. “Were they gods?”
“Who knows what a god may be?” she said, waving a hand dismissively. “As often as not, ‘god’ is only a word men attach to that which they do not understand, but fear. To me savage, animals and rivers, storms and lightning, are all gods. Some think fire is a god. Many have worshiped the accursed sun as a god. Often the god is manlike, usually no more than a magnified ancestor whose name is the oldest his descendants remember. Those wizards of old had long since ceased believing in gods. But they believed in the Powers.”
By this time, their cups were empty again. She clapped her hands. “This is a long tale, and it must not be hurried. Let us have some refreshment.” No sooner were the words gone from her lips than the slave girl came in with more wine, accompanied this time by another, who bore a tray of viands and set it before them. Bowing, the women withdrew.
“Join me,” Omia said, waving a hand over the tray, Conan helped himself. He ignored the mushrooms in their various preparations and sauces. The tray also bore dried dates, raisins and figs, as well as other preserved fruits. He downed some honeyed figs and helped them along with a draught of wine. He knew that all of the fruits were typical products of Stygia. He took a handful of dates and held them before her.
These never grew here beneath the ground,” he said.
“So they did not,” she agreed. “But we do not speak here of commonplaces such as food. Now we speak of higher tilings.” Clearly, she did not wish to reveal the source of these tilings.
He feigned indifference. ‘In truth, preserved fruits are a lowly subject compared to the rise and fall of empire. I but mentioned it because I far prefer these to your unending mushrooms.”
At this she smiled. “Our mastery of the cultivation of fungi extends to far more than mere mushrooms, although I would not expect you to know the difference. Long ago, we learned to grow things that have no need of the accursed sun, and our table is rich and varied, had you but the palate to discern its excellence.”
“Stronger fare is the rule above the ground,” he said. “I’ve no complaint about your wine, though.”
He waved his third goblet with a slightly unsteady hand, feigning tipsiness. He had a strong head and could have drunk the golden wine at this rate for hours before giving way to genuine drunkenness.
“Perhaps you had best avail yourself of it less lavishly,” she murmured. “I might have little use for you later if you overindulge.”
He laughed loudly. “This? Why, I can drink like a camel! Have no fear of that. It takes more than a bit of drink to unman Conan of Cimmeria!” He laughed again, hoping that his windy boast further convinced her that he was an ignorant buffoon. It was more than clear to him that her attraction to him lay
not in his brain power.
“I rejoice to hear that,” she said, “and you shall learn the reason anon. Now, where were we?”
He ate slices of melon preserved in a gingery syrup, longing for some real meat. “The Powers,” he reminded her.
“Oh, yes. I continue: With their blending of human and inhuman and the many subtle shades thereof, the mages of Janagar became masters of certain arts previously unattainable to mere humans. As they exercised these arts and accomplished greater and yet greater feats, the dread notice of the Powers at last was turned upon them. Some unseen, unknown line had been crossed, and the Powers were alerted.
At first, the great sorcerers sought to deal with these intelligences as they had with all others, to learn from them and to exploit the knowledge.
“It was not to be. The attention of the Powers meant their unremitting wrath. One after another, the wizards who contacted them were blasted from existence by spells so terrible that the very fabric of the world vibrated every time one of the great sorcerers was struck down. In your travels, have you not heard many tales of ancient catastrophes that took place in time long past?”
“That I have,” he said. “Great earth-shakings and worldwide floods and terrible volcanic eruptions for a part of every myth cycle I have heard.”
“And do these ancient myths not always have a tale of a war between gods, or between gods and giants, or gods and men?”
“Aye,” he said. “In my native Cimmeria, we have an old tale of a great fight between our god, Crom, and Ymir of the Aesir a battle that shook the earth. Everyone else has such a legend.” Without asking her leave, he refilled his goblet from the dew-beaded pitcher that stood upon the diminished platter of food.
“All these tales date from that epochal combat between the Powers and the wizards of Janagar. It went on for centuries, and it altered the structure of the entire world.”
“If the Powers were so great,” Conan said, “how can it be that the fight was so lengthy? Surely these god-things could easily crush mere wizards, however powerful they might be by mortal standards.”
“A shrewd question. But you must remember that the wizards of Janagar were not truly human by this time. Their mastery of the higher arts was very near that of the Powers. It was in raw force that they were most inferior. But also these battles raged upon other worlds and other planes. For long, long years, the wizards of Janagar fought to keep the very location of our world secret from the Powers, whose driving aim was ever to destroy the very home world of their rivals. This, it was learned, they had done many, many times before.”
“Your wizards trifled with things best left alone,” he said.
She shrugged her shapely shoulders elegantly. “It is not in the nature of a truly great people to shrink from challenges, whatever the odds and however great the consequences.”
“But they risked the whole world!” he said.
“What of that? Failure meant the destruction of Janagar and all its people. Should that dread consequence come to pass, what could it matter that all the inferior races were exterminated as well? If your house bums, do you weep for the rats and roaches that perish in the blaze?”
“You have a point,” he conceded. It was not the first time Conan had encountered such an attitude.
Many a king had declared that upon his own demise, it booted nothing whether fire or flood consumed the earth.
“In time,” she went on, “the greatest mages were no more, and all the higher planes were lost to us.
In the end, all our efforts devolved to a frantic attempt to stave off defeat and save our world and empire.
Of course the most powerful spells were invoked to preserve Janagar itself. Others protected the greater cities of the empire. The spells centered upon the temples, where the most awesome and terrible rites were carried out, day and night.”
“What sort of spells could protect them from such beings?” Conan asked, fascinated in spite of himself by this tale of the death-throes of an empire.
“The final spell, resorted to after all else was exhausted, was the Great Spell of Unchanging. Once it was in place, the city thus protected would remain as it was, inviolate and without alteration. More to the point, it would become invisible to the Powers, and without the focal point of these places of great wizardry, they could not enter this world to destroy and consume.”
“So that explains the city above,” Conan said. “But if the Powers never found this world, how was the land destroyed and the fertile fields of Janagar turned to sandy desert?”
“That was not done by the Powers. The sheer force required to maintain the spells sapped the very life-force of the land, sucking the fertility from it like water into a sponge. Once Janagar lay near a great river, and from it we drew water by the most wonderful system of canals ever known. The river dwindled between its banks and finally disappeared.”
“Why did not Janagar perish then?” he asked, already knowing the answer. “When a city’s water is no more, the city dies. I have seen it happen, w
hen a besieged city’s aqueducts are cut and it has no wells. When the cisterns are exhausted, death is certain.”
“Surely even you have guessed,” she said, smiling. “We dug until we found our river again. It had abandoned the land above, but it still flowed through a great system of caverns beneath the ground. The high priests of Janagar declared that Ike am. was accursed, that if we were not to perish, we must dig, hewing a new Janagar from the bowels of the earth.
“But to maintain the Great Spell of Unchanging, the city above the ground must be kept exactly as it was upon the day that the spell went into effect. To that end, every night after the accursed sun has gone down, teams of expert artificers go up through the great temple and out into the city to repair such trifling damage as the passage of time has inflicted. Since the winds and sands of the desert do not intrude, and since it never rains, this damage is slight.”
“What became of the other cities?” Conan asked.
“They lacked the perfect will of Janagar. Some persisted for centuries, but they failed to maintain their cities unchanging, and the spell was thereby sapped. One by one, we lost contact with them and by then, doubtless the Powers were otherwise distracted, for they made no attempt to enter our world through the ruins.”
Conan remembered the great ruined temple where he had seen the twins communing with the ancient. It must have been a remnant of one of those cities of the empire of Janagar. Now only the ruins of a single building remained, and all that was left of its Great Spell of Unchanging was a rectangular patch of grass that no animal would graze upon.
“And you have lived here beneath the ground ever since?” Conan asked. “You have eschewed the sun and clean, open air?”
“That is so,” she said, rolling onto her belly and cradling her chin upon crossed forearms. “It has suited us well, but it is a way of life not without … consequences. That is how you and your companions happen to interest us.”
The Conan Compendium Page 516
