Conan the Liberator

by Lyon Sprague de Camp

  The barons’ caution was understandable; but uncertainty drove sharp spurs into the rebel leaders’ souls. If they must linger on the Plain of Pallos until the Poitanians sent their secret signal, would there be time to reach Culario on the appointed day? Despite the headstrong urgings of his barbaric nature, Conan counseled patience until the Poitanian signal came. But his officers remained uncertain or ofiFered divers plans.

  So the rebel leaders argued far into the night. Prospero wished to split the army into three contingents and hurl them aU at once upon the three best fords: those of Mevano, Nogara, and Tunais.

  Conan shook his head. “Procas will expect just that,” he said.

  "What then?” Prospero frowned.

  Conan spread the map and with a scarred forefinger pointed to the middle ford, Nogara. “We’ll feint here, with two or three companies only. You know tricks to convince the foe that our numbers are vaster than they truly are. We’ll set up empty tents, light extra campfires, and parade companies within view of the foe and then swing them out of sight behind a copse and around the circuit again. We’ll unlimber ballistas on the river bank to harass the crossing guards. Those screeching darts should entice Procas and his army thither in a hurry.

  “You, Prospero, shall command the diversion,” Conan added. Learning that he would miss the main battle, the young commander began to object, but Conan silenced him: ‘Trocero, you and I shall take the remaining troops, half to Mevano and the balance to Tunais, and force the two crossings. With luck, we may catch Procas in a nutcracker/’

  “Perchance you’re right,” murmured Trocero. 'With oiu' Poitanians in revolt in Procas’s rear …”

  “May the gods smile upon your plan, General,” said PubHus, mopping his brow. “If not, all is lost!”

  “Ah, gloomy one!” said Trocero. ‘War is a chancy trade, and we have no less to lose than you. Win or lose, we all must stand together.”

  “Aye, even at the foot of the gallows,” muttered PubHus.

  Behind the partition in Conan’s tent, his mistress lay couched on a bed of furs, her slender body gleaming in the feeble light of a single candle, whose wavering flame reflected strangely in her emerald eyes and in the clouded depths of the small obsidian talisman that reposed in the scented valley of her breasts. She smiled a catlike smile.

  Before dawn, Trocero was roused from his couch by the urgent hand of a sentry. The count yawned, stretched, blinked, and irritably struck the guard’s hand aside.

  “Enough!” he barked. “I am awake, lout, though it scarcely seems light enough for roll call… .”

  His face went blank and his voice died as he saw what the guard held out to him. It was a Poitanian arrow, coated from barb to feathers with dried blood.

  'How came this here?" he asked. “And when?"

  "A short time past, my lord Count, borne by a rider from the north,’' rephed the guard.

  '‘So! Summon my squires! Sound the alarm and bear the arrow forthwith to General Conanl'’ cried Trocero, heaving himself to his feet.

  The guard saluted and left. Soon two squires, knuckling sleep from their eyes, hastened in to attire the count and buckle on his armor.

  "Action at last, by Mitra, Ishtar, and Crom of the CimmeriansI'’ cried Trocero. “You there, Mnesterl Summon my captains to council! And you, boy, has Black Lady been fed and watered? See to her saddling, and quickly. Draw the girth tight! iVe no wish for a cold bath in the waters of the Alimanel”

  Before a ruby sun inflamed the forested crests of the Rabirian Mountains, the tents were struck, the sentries recalled, and the wains laden. By the time bright day had chased away the laggard morning mists, the army was on the march in three long columns, heading for Saxula Pass through the mountains and beyond it for Aquilonia and war.

  The land grew rugged and the road tortuous. On either side rose barren rondures toothed with stony outcrops. These were the foothills of the Rabirians, which scurried westward following the stately tread of the adjacent mountains.

  Hour after hour, warriors and camp servants trudged up the long slopes and down the further sides. The hot sun beat upon them as they manhandled heavy vehicles over steep rises, clustering about the wains like bees around a hive to push, heave, and pull.

  THE BLOODY ARROW

  On the downward slopes, each teamster belayed one. wheel with a length of chain, so that, unable to rotate, it served to brake the vehicle. Dust devils eddied skyward, besmudging the crystalline mountain air.

  As they crested each rise, the main range receded miragelike before them. But, when the purple shadows of late afternoon fingered the eastern slope of every hill, the mountains opened out, like curtains drawn aside. They parted to disclose Saxula Pass, a deep cleft in the central ridge, as if made by a blow from an axe in the hand of an angry god.

  As the army stiTiggled upward toward the pass, Conan commanded a contingent of his scouts to clamber up the steep sides of the opening to make sure no ambush awaited his coming. The scouts signaled that all was clear, and the army tramped on through. The footfalls of men, the rattle of equipment, the drum of hooves, and the creak of axles reverberated from the rocky cliSs on either hand.

  As the men emerged from the confines of the pass, the road wound downward, losing itself in the thick stands of cedar and pine that masked the northern slopes. In the distance, beyond the intermediate ranges, the men glimpsed the Alimane, coiling through the fiatlands like a silvery serpent warmed by the last rays of the setting sun.

  E)own the winding slope they went, with wheels lashed to hold the wagons back. As the stars throbbed in the darkening sky, they reached a fork in the road beyond the pass. Here the army halted and set up camp. Conan flung his sentinels out wide, to guard against a night attack from the foe across the river. But nothing disturbed the weary tioopers’ rest except the snarl of a prowling leopard, which fled at a sentry’s shout.

  The following morning, Trocero and his contingent departed along the right branch of the fork, headed for the ford of Tunais. Conan and Prospero, with their

  forces, continued down the left branch until, shortly before noon, they reached another fork. Here Prosper© with his small detachment bore to the right, for the central ford of Nogara. Conan, with the remaining horse and foot, continued westward to seek out the ford of Mevano.

  Section by section, squad by squad, Conan s rebels filed down the narrow roads. They camped one more night in the hills and went on. As they descended the final range of foothills, between clumps of conifers they again caught gHmpses of the broad Ahmane, which simdered Argos from Poitain. True, Argos claimed a tract of land on the northern side of the river—a tract extending to the junction of the Alimane with the Khorotas. But under Vilerus III the Aquilo-nians had overrun the area and, being the stronger, still retained possession.

  As Conan’s division reached the flatlands, the Cimmerian ordered his men to speak but Httle, and only in low voices. As far as possible, they were to quiet the jingle of their gear. The wagons halted under heavy stands of trees, and the men pitched camp out of sight of the ford of Mevano. Scouts sent ahead reported no sign of any foe, but they brought back the unwelcome news that the river was in flood, rampant with the springtime melting of the highland snows.

  Well before the dawn of a cloud-darkened day, Conan’s oflBcers routed the men from their tents. Grumbling, the soldiers bolted an uncooked breakfast and fell into formation. Conan stalked about, snarling curses and threatening those who raised their voices or dropped their weapons. To his apprehensive ears, it seemed as if the clatter could be heard for leagues above the purl of the river. A better-trained force, he thought sourly, would move on cat’s paws.

  To diminish the noise, commands were passed from captains to men by hand signals instead of by

  TBDE BLOODY ARROW

  shouts and trumpet calls; and this caused some con' fusion. One company, signaled to march, cut through the ranks of another. FisticufiFs erupted and noses bled before the officers ended the fracas
.

  A heavy overcast blanketed road and river as Conan’s troops neared the banks of the Alimane. Mounted on his black stalKon Finy, Conan drew rein and peered through the curtaining drizzle toward the further bank. Beyond his horse’s hooves, the high water, brown with sediment, gurgled past

  Conan signaled to his aide Alaricus, a promising young Aquilonian captain. Alaricus maneuvered his horse close to that of his general.

  '‘How deep, think you?" muttered Conan.

  "More than knee-deep, General,” replied Alaricus. “Perhaps chest-high. Let me put my mount into it to see.”

  'Try not to fall into a mudhole,” cautioned Conan.

  The young captain urged his bay gelding into the swirling flood. The animal balked, then waded obediently toward the northern shore. By midstream, the murky water was curling ov^r the toes of Alaricus’s boots; and when he looked back, Conan beckoned him.

  "We shall have to,chance it," growled the Cimmerian when the aide had rejoined him. “Pass the word for Dio’s light horse to make the first crossing and scout the farther woods. Then the foot shall go single file, each man grasping the belt of the man before him. Some of these clodhoppers would drown if they lost their footing whilst weighted with their gear.”

  As sunless day paled the somber sky, the company of light horse splashed into the stream. Reaching the further bank. Captain Dio waved to indicate that the woods harbored no foe.

  Conan had watched intently as the troopers’ horses sank into the swirling flume, noting the depth of the water. When it was plain that the river bed shoaled beyond midstream and that the other bank was clear,

  CONAN THE LIBERATOR

  he signaled the first company of foot to cross. Soon two companies of pikemen and one of archers breasted the flood. Each soldier gripped the man in front, while the archers held aloft their bows to keep them dry.

  Conan brought his stallion close to Alaricus, saying: 'Tell the heavy horse to ford the stream, and then start the baggage train across, with Cerco’s company of foot to haul them out of mudholes. I’m going out to midstream.”

  Fury stumbled into the river, gaskin-deep in the rushing brown water. When the charger flinched and whinnied, as if sensing unseen danger, Conan tightened his grip on the reins and forced the beast through the deepest part of the central channel.

  His keen eyes searched the jade-green foliage along the northern shore, where a riot of flowering shrubs, their colors muted by the overcast, surrounded the boles of ancient trees. The road became a dark tunnel amid the new-leaved oaks, which seemed to bear the weight of the leaden sky. Here was ample room for concealment, thought Conan somberly. The light cavalry still waited, bunched into the small clearing where the road dipped into the river, although they should have searched far into the surrounding woods before the first foot soldiers reached the northern bank. Conan gestured angrily.

  "Dio!” he roared from the midstream shallows. If any foe was present, he would long since-have observed the crossing, so Conan saw no point in keeping silence. "Spread out and beat the bushes 1 Move, damn your soul I'’

  The three companies of infantry scrambled out on the northern bank, muddy and dripping, while Dio’s horsemen broke into squads and pushed into the thickets on either side of the road. An army is at its most vulnerable when fording a stream, this Conan knew; and foreboding swelled in his barbaric heart

  He wheeled his beast about to siuvey the southern

  THE BLOODY ARROW

  shore. The heavy cavalry was already knee-deep in the stream, and the leading wains of the baggage train were struggling through the flood. A couple had bogged down in the mud of the river bottom; soldiers, heaving on the wheels, manhandled them along.

  A sudden cry ripped the heavy air. As Conan swung around, he caught a flicker of movement in the bushes at the junction of road and river. With a short bark of warning, Conan reined his steed, and an arrow meant for him flashed past his breast and, swift as a striking viper, buried itself in the neck of the young officer behind him. As the dying man slumped into the roiling water, Conan spurred his horse forward, bellowing orders. He must, he thought, command the troops in contact with the foe, whether they faced a paltry crossing guard or the full might of Procas’s army.

  Suddenly Fury reared and staggered beneath the impact of another arrow. With a shriek, the animal fell to its knees, hurhng Conan from the saddle. The Cimmerian gulped a swirl of muddy water and struggled to his feet, coughing curses. Another arrow struck his cuirass, glanced off, and tumbled into the torrent. All about him, the stagnant calm of the leaden day hung in tatters. Men howled war cries, screamed in fear and pain, and cursed the very gods above.

  Blinking water from his stinging eyes, Conan perceived a triple line of archers and crossbowmen in the blue surcoats of the Border Legion. As one man, they had leaped from the lush foliage to rake the floundering riverbound rebels with a hail of arrows.

  The screeching whistle of arrows mingled with the deeper thrum erf crossbow bolts. Although the arbalesters could not shoot their ciunbersome weapons so fast as the longbowmen, their crossbows had the greater range, and their iron bolts could pierce the stoutest armor. Man after man fell, screaming or silent, as the muddy waters closed over their heads and rolled their bodies along the scoured shoals.

  Wading shoreward, Conan searched out a trumpeter to call his milling men into battle formations. In the shallows he found one, a tow-headed Gimder-man, staring dumbly at the carnage. Growling curses, Conan splashed toward the awestruck lout; but as he sought to seize the fellow’s jerkin, the Gunderman doubled up and pitched headfirst into the water, a bolt buried in his vitals. The trumpet fell from his flaccid grip and was tumbled out of reach by the current.

  As Conan paused to catch his breath, glaring about like a cornered lion, an augmented clatter from the clearing riveted his attention. Aquilonian cavalry— armored lancers and swordsmen on sturdy mounts— thundered out of the woods and swept down upon the milHng mass of rebel light horse and infantry. The smaller horses of the rebel scouts were brushed aside; the men on foot were ridden down and trampled. In a trice the north bank was cleared of rebels. Then, with clocklike precision, Procas’s armored squadrons opened out into a troop-wide rank of horsemen, which plunged into the water to assail those rebels who struggled in the deeps.

  “To'meI” roared Conan, brandishing his sword. “Form squares!”

  But now the survivors of the debacle, who had been swept back into the river by the Aquilonian cavalry, thrashed through the water in panic flight, pushing aside or knocking over comrades who floundered northward. Through the turbulent current pounded Procas’s horse amid foimtains of spray. Behind the second line, a third line opened out, and then another and another. And from the flanks, Procas’s archers continued their barrage of missiles, to which the rebel archers, with unstrung bows, could not reply.

  ^‘General!’' cried Alaricus. Conan looked around to see the young captain breasting the water toward him. “Save yourself! They’re broken here, but you can

  THE BLOODY ARBOW

  rally the men for a stand on the southern bank. Take my horsel”

  Conan spat a curse at the fast-approaching line of armored horsemen. For an instant he hesitated, the thought of rushing among them single-handed, hewing right and left, flickering in his mind. But the idea was banished as soon as it appeared. In an earlier day, Conan might have essayed such a mad attack. Now he was a general, responsible for the lives of other men, and experience had tempered his youthful recklessness with caution. As Alaricus started to dismount, Conan seized the aide’s stirrup with his left hand, growling:

  “Stay up there, ladl Go on, head for the south bank, Crom blast itl”

  Alaricus spurred his horse, which struggled toward the Argossean shore. Conan, gripping the stirrup, accompanied him with long, half-leaping strides, amid the retreating mass of rebels, horsed and afoot, all plunging southward in confused and abject flight

  Behind them rode the Aquilonian
s, spearing and swording the laggards as they fought the flood. Already the muddy waters of the Alimane ran red below the ford of Mevano. Only the fact that the pursuers, too, were hampered by the swirling stream saved Conan’s advance units from utter annihilatiorL

  At length the fugitives reached a company of heavy cavalry that had broached the river behind the rebel infantry. The fleeing men pushed between the oncoming horses, yammering their terror. Thus beset, the frightened beasts reared and plunged until their riders, also, joined the retreat Behind them, mired in the river bottom, teamsters strove to turn their cumbersome supply wagons around or, in despair, abandoned them to leap into the water and splash back toward the southern shore. Coming upon the abandoned vehicles, the Aquilonians butchered the bellowing oxen and pressed on. Sodden corpses, rolled

  CX>NAN THE LIBERATOR

  along by the current, wedged together into grisly human log jams. Wagons were overturned; their loads of tent canvas and poles, bundles of spears, and sheaves of arrows floated downstream on the relentless flood

  Conan, shouting himself hoarse, struggled out on the south bank, where the remaining companies had awaited their turn to cross. He tried to rally them into defensive formations, but everywhere the rebel host was crumbling into formless clots of fleeing men. Throwing away pikes, shields, and helmets, they sought safety, running in all directions out of the shallows and across the flats that bordered the river. All discipline, so painfully inculcated during the preceding months, was lost in the terror of the moment

  A few knots of men stood firm as the Aquilonian cavalry reached them and fought with stubborn ferocity, but they were ridden down and slain or scattered.

  Conan found Publius in the crush and seized him by the shoulder, shouting in his ear. Unable to hear his commander above the uproar, the treasmrer shrugged helplessly, pointing. At his feet lay the body of Conan’s aide, which Publius was shielding from the rough boots of the fleeing soldiery. Alaricus’ horse had disappeared.