Conan: The Road of Kings

by Wagner, Karl Edward

  “We’re trapped,” Mordermi cursed. “There’s no way down without a rope.”

  Conan snorted. “In Cimmeria babes learn to scale mountain precipices before they can walk on flat ground. This is a garden path. Hang on to me, if you won’t climb down yourself.”

  All but helpless, Mordermi clung to Conan and tried to support his dead weight as best he could with his crippled left arm. The cliff seemed sheer as a pane of glass, its face hidden by sea-mist that drowned even the starlight. The rocks were slick with spray from the surf below, and a slippery coating of moss and seaweed made their descent the more perilous with each foot they crawled.

  Yet Conan clambered down the escarpment with the ease of an ape climbing out of a tree, seemingly heedless of Mordermi’s clinging weight. It was an interval that Mordenni would never forget, although it could not have been much more than a minute or so before Conan dropped the remaining distance to safety on the beach below.

  “Did you decide to take a short cut?” Santiddio laughed uneasily. “We saw the rope come down, and wondered what was coming after.”

  “Half of Rimanendo’s army, if we wait long enough,” Conan growled. “Mordermi’s already caught an arrow, and there’ll be more any second.”

  “Cast off! Why are you waiting?” Mordermi yelled, his face ashen from lost blood. “Conan, I’ll not forget this.”

  “You saved me from the gallows,” Conan told him as they waded into the surf to cast off. “I always pay my debts.”

  VII

  GOLDEN LIGHT, BLUE LIGHT

  Mordermi’s face bore an unnatural pallor, but there was nothing of infirmity in his smile as he held a lustrous necklace of matched pearls to the golden candlelight.

  “Sandokazi, this is yours. Count it as having come out of my share. None of us could have danced well enough to gull those sheep into lining up so conveniently for the shearing.”

  Mordermi’s left shoulder was rebandaged, and he was still bare above the waist. They had cut the arrow out of his flesh before that dawn, after returning to the Pit without incident through one of the tunnels that connected the underground warren with the waterfront. The arrow had been deflected by bone, had lodged in the thick muscle of Mordermi’s shoulder— inflicting no grievous hurt once the bleeding was stopped. Sleep had restored much of his strength, and the prospect of the raid’s fantastic plunder further revitalized him.

  They sat at ease within Mordermi’s headquarters: Conan, breaking his fast over a rind of cheese and loaf of coarse bread; Santiddio, disheveled and sleepless from excitement; Sandokazi, smiling as she tried the pearls about her throat; Mordermi, eyes aglow as he contemplated the results of a theft that would make his name a legend within the brotherhood of thieves.

  In the center of the paneled chamber, a massive mahogany banquet table sagged under the weight of the gold and silver that was stacked upon its boards. The sheer mass of the jewelry alone represented a fortune beyond their powers to comprehend. A sidereal moraine of rings and necklaces, pendants and tiaras, earrings and brooches—it was as if all the stars in the firmament had been heaped upon the table. Beside this dazzling mound of precious stones, the sprawling mountains of gold and silver plate seemed tawdry and insignificant.

  “Do you know?” Mordermi sighed contentedly. “Dividing all of this into shares is going to be a more difficult task than was the stealing of it.”

  “But a more pleasant one, I think,” Santiddio purred.

  Conan washed down a mouthful of dark bread with a swallow of wine from a golden chalice. “You may find the task is no less dangerous. These baubles are pretty to look at, but I’d prefer a chest of coins any day. We can’t just open up a stall on market day and sell this stuff off to whoever walks by.”

  “No problem,” Mordermi assured him easily. “We’ll handle this as if it were any ordinary theft. I have the organization, after all. We’ll melt down the gold and silver plate into bullion—that can’t be traced—and dispose of the jewels through my connections in Aquilonia. Even with a cut here and a cut there, there’s enough wealth here to buy all of Zingara and hire Rimanendo to clean sponges in the public baths.”

  “It’s too much money,” Conan persisted. “That’s the danger.” He sipped his wine and declined to express himself further.

  “And half of it goes to the White Rose,” Santiddio exulted, ignoring Conan’s misgivings—the Cimmerian was ever a man of sombre mood.

  “And well earned,” Mordermi agreed. “I’ll confess now that I had my doubts as to whether. your people could carry out their end of things.”

  “I, too, have my organization,” Santiddio told him smugly.

  “That will be your organization now,” Sandokazi said sarcastically, as there came a knocking at the chamber door.

  One of Mordermi’s men—the bandit’s headquarters was like an armed camp following the raid— opened the door to admit Avvinti and Carico. Their arrival was so punctual that they could only have come early and waited without until the appointed time. Avvinti bowed with precise formality as he entered; Carico shouted a boisterous greeting and shook hands. The faces of both men registered awe at the sight of the plunder.

  The two men—Santiddio’s chief rivals for leadership of the White Rose—were not friends for all of Santiddio’s rhetoric of a common cause. Avvinti, tall and poised, physically resembled Santiddio with his aristocratic features and wellborn manner. The fourth son of a noble house and excessively educated, his likeness to Santiddio was a source of jealousy rather than a common bond.

  Conan despised him.

  Carico was of a different mold—uncouth, sweaty, coarse- featured and barrel-chested. He had the massive shoulders and sooty complexion of a blacksmith, which trade he pursued—when not breaking up the secret meetings of the White Rose by propounding some new bit of radical thought. For although without formal education, Carico was a great thinker—a quality his followers extolled. Conan, whose father had been a blacksmith, thought Carico a good drinking companion and better at arm-wrestling than speechmaking.

  Santiddio’s politics fell somewhere in between Avvinti’s doctrine of benevolent dictatorship through an intellectual elite and Carico’s classless utopia that would be achieved through an alliance of agrarian peasant and urban laborer. As such, while both factions denounced him, he drew majority support from those who were alienated by either extreme. As a consequence, it was Santiddio’s leadership that held the White Rose together.

  “Impressive, isn’t it?” remarked Santiddio, as the two newcomers continued to gape speechlessly.

  “There’s gold enough here to feed all of Zingara’s poor for a year!” Carico exclaimed.

  “Enough for the White Rose to establish the organizational power base that we must have,” Avvinti said sententiously, “if our movement is to emerge as a force to be reckoned with in Zingaran politics.”

  “We can discuss how our share of the loot is to be distributed at our next meeting,” Santiddio interrupted their nascent quarrel. “Mordermi will need time to fence all of this discreetly.”

  “How much time?” demanded Avvinti suspiciously.

  “All that depends on General Korst,” Mordermi snapped back at him. “We’ll move as quickly as we dare—only a fool would risk getting caught with loot that can be identified so readily. I’m counting on the fact that our escape by sea will lead him to concentrate his first efforts against ships lying off the harbor. But this is no ordinary theft, and Korst knows that his position hangs on placating Rimanendo’s wrath. We must use extreme caution.”

  “Why not divide up just the coins now, then?” Carico suggested. “We both have immediate expenses to satisfy, after all. I for one fully trust Mordermi to fence the rest of this treasure as fairly and as speedily as possible.”

  “I’ll go with that, of course,” Santiddio seconded. “Avvinti?”

  “We could divide the entire mass of gold and jewels right now,” Avvinti argued. “I’m sure we could dispose of our half of
the loot through the White Rose —just as efficiently and with less chance of being cheated.”

  Mordermi smiled thinly. “Cheated?” Cold light flickered behind his veiled eyes. His swordarm was uninjured, and his hand rested negligently upon his rapier hilt.

  “By middlemen,” Avvinti hastily explained.

  “How many fences do you know?” Carico wondered caustically.

  “And we will need an expert’s eye to appraise this hoard,” Santiddio sneered. “Shall we permit a Shemite jewel merchant to give us full value for each piece, or shall we just hack every ring and necklace into halves?”

  “I only want whatever is best for the White Rose,” Avvinti said coldly. “You’ll forgive me if I may have had less experience than some in matters relating to the dispersal of stolen property.”

  Conan, who had seen this sort of dispute arise too often before, remained silent. Mordermi did not miss the fact that Conan ate with only his left hand, while his right hand hung close to the hilt of his broadsword.

  Avvinti was not so obtuse as to fail to realize how matters stood. “If this is the will of the majority, then of course I must agree,” he conceded with ill grace. “Shall we get on with dividing just the money, then?”

  “Good,” Mordermi concluded. “Then we’ll count out the coins into two shares. I have scales, if you wish —or shall we just assume that our worthy masters wouldn’t stoop to give us fraudulent coinage?”

  The mood lightened in that moment of anticipation, as Sandokazi leaned across the table to drag the heavy purses of gold and silver and copper coins toward Mordermi. Faces leaned forward intently, as the bright glitter of coinage spilled a trail across the stained mahogany boards.

  They were so intent, that only Conan noticed that the candle flames suddenly burned with a blue nimbus. The Cimmerian rubbed his eyes. The yellow flames seemed to dwindle beneath a veil of blue. Conan started to speak.

  The door opened. Suddenly, silently, without announcement. Touched by the bluish glow of the candles, a stranger stood upon the threshold. Unbidden, he entered their chamber. The door swung shut of its own, bui not before Conan saw the motionless figures of Mordermi’s men standing indifferently at their posts.

  It happened so suddenly, so unexpectedly, that time seemed to hang suspended before anyone moved.

  Mordermi was the first to speak. “Who are you— and how did you get in here?”

  “My name is Callidios,” the newcomer replied in a tone of irony. “I walked in here.”

  “I’d left orders not to be disturbed,” Mordermi growled, angered over the interruption and the breach of security.

  “No one told me,” the stranger rejoined.

  “Well then, why are you here?”

  “I’ve come to make you a king.”

  Conan’s fist closed about his swordhilt, but Mordermi only laughed—as did the others after a nervous pause This calm assertion, uttered within this den of rogues and killers, Was surely a pointless jest. But Conan did not join in their laughter, for he felt the chill breath of sorcery in this, and the stranger’s accent was of Stygia.

  Callidios was not a presence to radiate menace. He was young—apparently no older than any of those here—and his figure was thin and loose-limbed beneath doublet and trunk hose that wanted mending. A loose cloak of gray stuff was slung haphazardly about his narrow shoulders, and he slouched crookedly from one hip to the other, so that he seemed about to trip over the long rapier he wore too low from his hips. He had the dusky complexion and hawk- nosed features of a high caste Stygian, but the lank straw-colored hair and gray-green eyes evidenced his mongrel bloodline. Between the limp hair and shadowed eyes was an impressive expanse of brow, although the aura of great intellect was marred by the thin lips that twitched aimlessly and the too-lustrous eyes that hinted of lotus dreams.

  “Once more, before my men come to crack a few ribs, what are you doing here?”

  “Call your men, but you’ll hear no answer,” Callidios smiled, shifting weight to his other hip. “They sleep too soundly. Perhaps they kept late hours last night.”

  “Sifino! Amosi!” Mordermi shouted. “Come and knock this damn fool loose from his teeth!”

  When there came no response, Mordermi repeated his demands, somewhat more luridly, but with no better result.

  “It is a simple spell,” Callidios shrugged. “I know at least one other. Don’t draw your swords, gentlemen! If I intended any mischief, you’d have known of it before now.”

  “Conan, kill this bloody fool if he makes one more move,” Mordermi snarled. “Santiddio, see what’s going on outside in the hallway.”

  Santiddio started to obey, then froze. There was no longer a door to the chamber. Only a blank wall where the doorway had stood.

  “A childish illusion, I’ll admit,” Callidios apologized. “It may be that the doorway is still there, I’m really not sure. But forgive my precautions. This council should not reach any beyond our small circle.”

  Callidios made no discernible movement, but suddenly the doothay had reappeared. From the hallway beyond, they could hear dim voices shouting accusations.

  “It was nothing very imaginative,” Callidios shrugged.

  “Wait, Conan!” Mordermi forestalled the Cimmerian’s murderous lunge. “Let’s hear him out. Our visitor is a man of subtle talents.”

  “He’s a Stygian sorcerer, and he’ll seem less subtle when he’s shorter by a head,” Conan spat. “Kill him now, or we’ll all live to regret it.”

  “In a moment, perhaps,” Mordermi suggested, as the others seemed to be of Conan’s mind. “But since Callidios has sought out our council, let’s allow him to explain his presence here.”

  “Easily done,” Callidios said languidly. “I’ve come to help you invest your bright new treasure.” With total insouciance, he sprawled into a chair at their table.

  “This man is mad!” Mordermi shook his head. “I think I’ve seen you before—skulking about the Pit near the waterfront, reeling from the fumes of the yellow lotus. I don’t know how you made your way in here, but, whether you’re Rimanendo’s spy or playing your own mad game, you won’t find leaving here with our secret as easy a task.”

  “Secret? Surely you didn’t think a theft of this magnitude could be kept secret? Every tongue in the Pit speaks of Mordermi’s daring raid of last night. Even the dull wits of Rimanendo’s court must know by now whose hand stripped them of their baubles - —and their pride. A pity you could not have stolen the one without the other, Mordermi. In the past, Rimanendo has done nothing about you simply because you were never worth his attention. You may be prince of thieves here in the Pit, but His Majesty and his lords steal more from the people in a week’s taxes than you and your band could steal from Rimanendo in a year’s looting. But now you’ve stolen their pride. Rimanendo can only save face when you and your men are feeding ravens on the Dancing Floor. And worse, you have made an alliance with the White Rose—goading it from sedition to insurrection. Korst will move against the Pit, and Rimanendo will give him authority to use whatever force he requires to destroy Mordermi and the White Rose.”

  “And so,” Callidios concluded. “You’ll want to invest your newfound fortune with extreme care, or you’ll soon be boasting of your wealth to the ravens.”

  “This man is a genius,” Mordermi laughed sourly. “Until this moment, we’d thought Rimanendo had wanted us to share his wealth. And in the few breaths that you have left, pray tell us how to spend our treasure.”

  “Use it to destroy Rimanendo—before he destroys you!”

  Callidios lurched out of his chair, began to pace the room in his maddeningly disjointed posturing. “You’ve stolen a fortune, but you don’t know its worth. You talk of food for the starving, fine clothes for yourselves, leaflets to disseminate your political theories, weapons for your followers. You remind me of the thieves who stole an ancient amulet from a temple of Set in my homeland. When they were captured, it was found that they had broken loose
the gems, melted down the gold—thinking themselves wealthy men, when the amulet they had thus destroyed had the power to make its holder invulnerable.”

  Amulet of Set

  “Do you know what you have here? You have the price of a kingdom! If you use this wealth intelligently, you can bring about the downfall of Rimanendo. Instead of hunted fugitives hiding in the Pit, you can be the new rulers of all Zingara and live at ease in the palaces of your former masters.”

  “As you observed,” Santiddio nodded to Mordermi, “the man is mad.”

  “Perhaps he only shares his lotus dreams with us,” Mordermi said. “But such dreams are a splendid vision.”

  “I’ll cure his madness,” rumbled Conan.

  “No, wait!” Mordermi halted him. “Let’s hear Callidios out.”

  “Consider the balance of power that holds Rimanen do’s reign together,” Callidios went on, as confidently as if they were seated in his chambers. “At the top of the pyramid is King Rimanendo, corrupt and incompetent, his only concern as ruler being that the taxes that fill the royal coffers are sufficient to support his excesses. Below the king are his lords, left to tyrannize the people of Zingara as they will, so long as nothing disturbs Rimanendo’s pleasures. Any one of the strongest houses might depose Rimanendo, but for the jealousy of their rivals—who would surely interfere with any change in the balance of power. Supporting the king and his court is the army—both the Royal. Zingaran Army and the private armies of the powerful lords. They enforce the will of their masters upon those who make up the base of the pyramid —the people of Zingara.”

  “This man,” said Santiddio, “has a wonderous obsession to tell us things we already know well.”

  “And yet you tolerate this situation,” Callidios gibed.

  “Not for very much longer!” Carico burst out, unable to contain himself further. “When the base of the pyramid moves, those at the top must fall. The White Rose shall lead the people of Zingara into a new social order in which there are neither oppressors nor oppressed.”