"Some more of Kordofo"s kin," muttered the Cimmerian in the darkness.
"They"ve been sharpening their spears for me ever since Sak.u.mbe got rid of Kordofo."
"What do we do now?" asked Amalric.
Conan turned his head up to the narrow, starlit strip of sky above them. "I think we can climb up to the roofs," he said.
"How?"
"The way I used to climb a cleft in the rocks, when I was a youth in Cimmeria. Here, hold this sticker for me."
Conan handed Amalric a javelin, and Amalric realized that the Cimmerian had taken it from the man he had slain. The weapon had a narrow head a full yard in length, of soft iron sharpened to a finely serrated edge.
Below the hand grip, a slender iron shank balanced the weight of the head.
Conan grunted softly, braced his back against one wall and his feet against the other, and inched his way up. Soon he became a black silhouette against the stars, and then disappeared. A call came softly down: "Hand up that spear, and come on up."
Amalric handed up the javelin and, in his turn, inched his way up. The roofs were made of wooden beams, on which was laid down a thick layer of palm fronds and, over that, a layer of clay. Sometimes the clay gave a little as they walked on it, and the crackle of the fronds underneath could be heard.
Following Conan, Amalric crossed several roofs, leaping over the chasms between them. At length, they came to a building of good size, almost on the edge of the plaza.
"I must get Lissa out of here!" said Amalric, desperately anxious.
"One thing at a time," growled Conan. "We want to know what is happening."
The confusion in the plaza had somewhat died down. Officers were getting their men into orderly formations once more. On the dais with the two thrones, across the square, stood Aslria in his wizard"s regalia, speaking. Although Amalric could not hear all his words, the wizard was evidently telling the Tombalkans what a great and wise leader he would be to them.
A sound off to Amalric"s left drew the Aquilonian"s attention. At first a murmur, like the crowd noises in the square, it swelled to a roar. A man dashed into the square and shouted to Askia:
The Aphaki attack the east wall!"
Then all was chaos again. The war drams thundered. Askia screamed orders right and left. A regiment of black spearmen began to file out of the square towards the disturbance. Conan said:
"We"d better get out of Tombalku. Whichever side wins, they"ll have our hides. Sak.u.mbe was right; these people will never obey a whiteskin. Go to your house and get your girl ready. Rub your faces and arms with soot from the hearth; that way you"ll be less conspicuous in the dark.
Crab whatever money you have. I"ll meet you there with horses. If we hurry, we can get out the west gate before they close it or Zehbeh attacks it Before I go, though, I have one little task."
Conan stared across the serried ranks of the black warriors at Askia, still shouting and orating on the dais. He hefted the javelin.
"A long cast, but I think I can do it," he muttered.
The Cimmerian walked deliberately back to the other side of the roof, then made a short ran forward, towards the side facing the square. Just before he reached the edge of the roof, with a mighty whirl of arms and twist of torso, he hurled the weapon. The missile vanished from Amalric"s sight into the darkness above. For three heartbeats he wondered whither it had gone.
Askia suddenly screamed and staggered about, the long shaft protruding from his chest and lashing back and forth with the wizard"s convulsive movements. As the witch-man collapsed on the dais, Conan snarled:
"Let"s go!"
Amalric ran, leaping from roof to roof. To the east, the din of battle rose in a medley of war cries, drumbeats, trumpet calls, screams, and clatter of weapons.
It was not yet midnight when Amalric, Lissa, and Conan reined in their horses on a sandy ridge a mile to the west of Tombalku. They looked back toward the city, now illumined by the lurid glare of a conflagration. Fires had sprung up here and there during the battle, when the Aphaki had swarmed over the eastern wall and fought the black spearmen in the streets. Although the latter were much more numerous, their lack of leaders put them at a disadvantage that all their barbaric valor might not be able to overcome. The Aphaki pressed further and further into the city, while the fires merged into a holocaust.
From the ridge, the hideous clamor of battle and ma.s.sacre came as a murmur. Conan grunted:
"So much for Tombalku! Whoever wins, we shall have to seek our fortunes elsewhere. I"m for the coast of Kush, where I have friends-and also enemies-and where I can pick up a ship for Argos. What of you?"
"I had not thought," said Amalric.
"That"s a shapely filly you have there," said Conan with a grin. The light of the rising moon gleamed on his strong white teeth, shining against his soot-blackened skin. "You can"t drag her over the whole wide world."
Amalric felt himself bristle at the Cimmerian"s tone. He drew closer to Lissa and slid an arm around her waist, meanwhile dropping his free hand toward his sword hilt. Conan"s grin broadened.
"Fear not," he said. "I have never been so hard up for women that I"ve had to steal those of my friends. If you two come with me, you can beat your way back to Aquilonia."
"I cannot return to Aquilonia," said Amalric,
"Why not?"
"My father was slain in a broil with Count Terentius, who is in favor with King Vilerus. So all my father"s kin had to flee the land, lest Terentius" agents hunt us down."
"Oh, had you not heard?" said Conan. "Vilerus died within a six-month; his nephew, Numedides, is now king. All the old king"s hangers-on, they say, have been dismissed, and the exiles recalled. I got it from a Shemite trader. If I were you, I"d scurry home. The new king should find a worthy post for you. Take your little Lissa along and make her a countess or something. As for me, I"m for Kush and the blue sea."
Amalric glanced back toward the red blaze that had been Tombalku.
"Conan," he said, "why did Askia destroy Sak.u.mbe instead of us, with whom he had a more immediate quarrel?"
Conan shrugged his huge shoulders. "Perhaps he had fingernail parings and the like from Sak.u.mbe but not from us. So he worked what spells he could I have never understood wizardly minds."
"And why did you take the time to kill Askia?"
Conan stared. "Are you joking, Amalric? Me, leave a slain comrade unavenged? Sak.u.mbe, d.a.m.n his sweaty black hide, was a friend of mine.
Even if he got fat and lazy in his late years, he was a better man than most of the white men I have known." The Cimmerian sighed gustily and shook his head, as a lion shakes his mane. "Well, he"s dead, and we"re alive. If we want to go on being alive, we had better move on before Zehbeh sends a patrol out to hunt for us. Let"s go!"
The three horses plodded down the western slope of the sandy ridge and broke into a brisk trot to westward.
The Pool of the Black One -------------------------.
Conan makes his way across the southern gra.s.slands of the black kingdoms. Here he is known of old, and Amra the Lion has no difficulty in making his way to the coast, which he had ravaged in his days with Belit But Belit is now only a memory on the Black Coast. The ship that eventually heaves in sight off the head-land where Conan sits whetting his sword is manned by pirates of the Baracka Isles, off the coast of Zingara. They, too, have heard of Conan and welcome his sword and experience. He is in his middle thirties when he joins the Barachan pirates, with whom he remains for a considerable time. To Conan, however, accustomed as he is to the tightly organized armies of the Hyborian kings, the organization of the Barachan bands appears so loose that there is small opportunity to rise to leadership and its rewards.
Slipping out of an unusually tight spot in the pirate rendezvous at Tortage, he finds that the alternative to a slit throat lies in an attempt to swim the Western Ocean. This he does with complete confidence and perfect aplomb.
Into the west, unknown of man, Ships have sailed since the world began.
Read, if you dare, what Skelos wrote, With dead hands fumbling his silken coat; And follow the ships through the wind-blown wrack- Follow the ships that come not back.
Chapter One.
Sancha, once of Kordava, yawned daintily, stretched her supple limbs luxuriously, and composed herself more comfortably on the ermine-fringed silk spread on the carack"s p.o.o.p-deck. That the crew watched her with burning interest from waist and forecastle she was lazily aware, just as she was also aware that her short silk kirtle veiled little of her voluptuous contours from their eager eyes.
Wherefore she smiled insolently and prepared to s.n.a.t.c.h a few more winks before the sun, which was just thrusting his golden disk above the ocean, should dazzle her eyes.
But at that instant a sound reached her ears unlike the creaking of timbers, thrum of cordage, and lap of waves. She sat up, her gaze fixed on the rail, over which, to her amazement, a dripping figure clambered.