With an angry bellow, Conan dispersed the crowd around him by striking about with the flat of his blade. Then he hoisted Alaricus to his shoulder and headed southward at a jog trot The stout Pubhus ran puflBng beside him. Not far behind, the Aquilonian cavalry clambered out of the river to pursue the retreating rebels. They enveloped the line of wains drawn up along the shore, awaiting their turn to breast the flood.
Further inland, some of the teamsters managed to turn their clumsy carts and lashed their oxen into a shambling run back toward the safety of the hills.
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The road south was black with fleeing men, while hundreds of others darted oflF across the meadows to lose themselves in the sheltering woods.
Since the day was young and the Aquilonian forces fresh, Conan's division faced annihilation at the hands of their well-mounted pursuers. But here occurred a check—not a great one, but enough to give the fugitives some small advantage. The Aquilonians who had surrounded the supply wagons, instead of pushing on, pulled up to loot the vehicles, despite the shouted commands of their officers. Hearing them, Conan panted:
"PubUus! Where’s the pay chestr^
"I—^know—not," gasped the treasurer. " 'Twas in one of the last wains, so perchance it escaped the wreck. I—can—run—no further. Go on, Conan.”
'Don t be a fooll” snarled Conan. “I need a man who can reckon sums, and my yoimg mealsack here regains his wits.”
As Conan set down his burden, Alaricus evened his eyes and groaned. Conan, hastily examining him for wounds, found none. The captain, it transpired, had been stunned by a crossbow bolt, which merely grazed his head and dented his helmet. Conan hauled him to his feet.
'T ve carried you, my lad,” said the Cimmerian. "Now ‘tis your turn to help me carry our fat friend.”
Soon the three set out again for the safety of the hills, Publius staggering between the other two with an arm about the neck of each. Rain began to fall, gently at first and then ia torrents.
The winds of misfortune blew cold on Conan s head that night as he sat in a hollow of the Rabirian Mountains. The day was plainly lost, his men dispersed —^those who had survived the battle and the bloody vengeance meted out by the royalist general and his
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searching parties. In a few hours, it seemed, their very cause had foundered, sunk in the muddy, bloodstained waters of the river Alimane.
Here in a rocky hollow, hidden amid oak and pine, Conan, Publius, and five score other rebels waited out the dark and hopeless night. The refugees were a mixed lot: renegade Aquilonian knights, staunch yeomen, armed outlaws, and soldiers of fortune. Some were hurt, though few mortally, and many hearts pounded drumbeats of despair.
The legions of Amulius Procas, Conan knew, were sniffing through the hills, bent on slaughtering every survivor. The victorious Aquilonian evidently meant to smash the rebellion for all time by dealing speedy death to every rebel he could catch. Conan grudgingly gave the veteran commander credit for his plan. Had Conan been in Amulius Procas’s place, he would have followed much the same course.
Simk in silent gloom, Conan fretted over the fate of Prospero and Trocero. Prospero was to have feinted at the ford of Nogara, drawing thither the bulk of Procas's troops, so that Conan and Trocero should have only minor contingents of crossing guards to contend with. Instead, Procas’s massed warriors had erupted out of concealment when Conan’s van, waist-deep in the Alimane, was at a hopeless disadvantage. Conan wondered how Procas had so cleverly divined the rebels’ plans.
Gathered around their fugitive leader, in the lonely dark, huddled men who had been soaked by rain and river. They dared not light a fire lest it become a beacon guiding forces for their destruction. The coughs and sneezes of the fugitives toUed the knell of their J hopes. When someone cursed the weather, Conan growled:
"Thank your gods for that rain! Had the day been fair, Procas would have butchered the lot of us. No
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fire!" he barked at a soldier who tried to strike a light with flint and steel. "Would you draw Procas’s hounds upon us? How many are we? Sound oflE, but softly. Count them, Publius."
Men responded 'THereI” ‘Herel” while Publius kept track with his fingers. When the last "Herer’ had been heard, he said:
"One hundred thirteen. General, not counting ourselves.”
Conan grunted. Brightly though the lust for revenge burned in his barbarian heart, it seemed impossible that such a paltry nimiber could form the nucleus of another army. While he put up a bold front before his rebel remnant, the vulture of despondency clawed at his weary flesh.
He set out sentries, and during the night exhausted men, guided by these sentinels, stumbled into the hollow in ones and twos and threes. Toward midnight came Dexitheus, the priest of Mitra, limping along on an improvised crutch, leaning heavily on the arm of the sentry who guided him and wincing with the pain of a wrenched ankle.
Now there were nearly twice a hundred fugitives, some gravely wounded, gathered in the hollow. The Mitraist priest, despite the pain of his own injury, set to work to tend the wounded, drawing arrows from limbs and bandaging wounds for hours, until Conan brusquely commanded him to rest.
The camp was rude, its comforts primitive; and, Conan knew, the rebels had little chance of seeing another nightfall. But at least they were alive, most still bore arms, and many could put up a savage fight if Erocas should discover their hiding place. And so, at last, Conan slept
Dawn moimted a sky where clouds were breaking up and dwindling, leaving a clear blue vault. Conan
was awakened by the subdued chatter of many armed men. The newcomers were Prosper© and his diversionary detachment, five hundred strong.
^Prospero!” cried Conan, struggling to his feet to clasp his friend in a mighty embrace. Then he led the officer aside and spoke in a low voice, lest ill tidings should fiuther depress the spirits of the men. "Thank Mitral How went your day? How did you find us? What of Trocero?”
“One at a time, General,” said Prospero, catching his breath. “We foimd naught but a few crossing guards at Nogara, and they fled before us. For a whole day, we marched in circles, blew trumpets, and beat drums, but no royaUsts could we draw to the ford. Thinking this strange, I sent a galloper downstream to Tunais. He reported a hard fight there, with Trocero’s division in retreat. Then a fugitive from your command fell in with us and spoke of your disaster. So, not wdshing my small force to be caught between the millstones of two enemy divisions, I fell back into the uplands. There, other runagates told us of the direction they had seen you take. Now what of you?”
Conan clenched his teeth to stifle his self-reproach. "I played the fool this time, Prospero, and led us into Procas’s jaws. I should have waited until Dio had probed the forest ere starting my lads across. It’s well that Dio fell at the first onslaught—^had he not, I’d have made him wish he had. He and his men milled around like sheep for a snailish time ere pushing out to beat the undergrowth. But still, I was at fault to let impatience sway me. Procas had watchers in the trees, to signal the attack. Now all is lost.”
"Not so, Conan,” said Prospero. "As you are wont to say, naught is hopeless imtil the last man chews the dust or knuckles under; and in every war the gods throw boons and banes to either side. Let us fall back to the Plain of Pallos and our base camp. We may join Trocero along the way. We are now several
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hundred strong, and we shall count to thousands when we sweep up the other stragglers. A hundred gulHes in these hills must shelter groups like ours.”
Trocas far outnumbers us/' said Conan somberly, “and his well-foimd forces carry high spirits from their victories. What can a few thousand, downcast by defeat, achieve against them? Besides, he will have seized the passes through the Rabirians, or at least the main pass at Saxula.”
”Doubtless,’' said Prospero, 'T5ut Procas’s troops are scattered wide, searching for fugitives. Our himgry prid
e of lions could one by one devour his packs of bloodhounds. In sooth, we came upon one such on our way hither—a squad of light horse—and slew the lot Come, General! You of aU men are the indomitable one—^the man who never quits. Youve built a band of brigands into an army and shaken thrones ere now; you can do the same again. So be of good cheerl"
Conan took a deep breath and squared his massive shoulders. 'Toure right, by Crom! Ill mewl no longer like a starving beldame. We’ve lost one engagement, but our cause remains whilst there be two of us to stand back to back and fight for it And we have this, at least"
He reached into the shadows and drew from a crevice in the rocks the Lion banner, the symbol of the rebeUion. His standard bearer, tiiough mortally wounded, had borne it to the hollow in the hills. After the man had succumbed, Conan had rolled up the banner and thrust it out of sight. Now he unfurled it in the pale light of dawn.
"It’s little enough to salvage from the rout of an army,” he rumbled, 'T)ut thrones have been won with less." And Conan smiled a grim, determined smile.
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The smiling day revealed that Fate had not entirely forsaken the army of the rebellion. For the night had been heavily overcast, and in the gloom the weary warriors of AmuHus Procas had failed to root out many scattered pockets of survivors, like that which Conan had gathered around him. Thus, as the morning sun rolled back its blanket of clouds, bands of heartsore rebels, who had either eluded the search parties or routed those they encountered, began to filter back across the Rabirian range.
Night was nigh when Conan and his remnant approached the pass of Saxula. Conan dispatched men ahead to scout, since he was convinced he would have to fight his way through. He snorted with surprise when the scouts reported back that there was no evidence of the Border Legion anywhere near the pass. There were signs—^the ashes of campfires and other debris—^that a force of Procas’s men had camped in the pass, but they were nowhere to be seen.
”CromI What means this?'’ Conan mused, staring up at the great notch in the ridge. "Unless Procas has sent his men on, deeper into Argos/’
“I think not,” said PubHus. "That would mean open war with Milo. More Hkely, he ordered his men back across the Alimane before the coinrt at Messantia
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could hear of his incursion. Then, if King Milo protests, Procas can aver that not one Aquilonian soldier remains on Argossean soil.”
"Let’s hope you are right/’ said Conan. “Forward, menl’'
By the next midday, Conan’s band had gathered up several full companies that had fled unscathed from the ambush at Mevano. But the rebels’ greatest prize was Count Trocero himself, camped on a hilltop with two hundred horse and foot Having built a rude palisade, the Count of Poitaia was prepared to hold his Httle fort against Procas and all his iron legions. Trocero emotionally embraced Conan and Prosper©.
"Thank Mitra you live!” he cried. '’! heard that you had fallen to an arrow and that your division fled southward like wintering wildfowl.”
"You hear many things about a battle, perhaps one tenth of them true,” said Conan. He told the tale of the ambush at Mevano and asked: 'How fared you at Tunais?”
“Procas smashed us as badly as he shattered you. I beheve that he himself commanded. He laid his ambush on the south bank of the river and assailed us from both sides as we prepared to cross. I had not thought that he would dare so grossly to violate Argossean territory.”
“Amulius Procas is nobody’s fool,” said Conan, "nor does he scruple to snatch at a long chance when he must But how came you hither? Through Saxula Passr
“Nay. When we approached it, a strong force of Procas’s men were there encamped. Luckily, one of my horsemen, a smuggler by trade, knew a narrow, little-used opening through which he led us. It was a dizzy climb, but we got through with the loss of but two beasts. Now, say you that Saxula Pass is open?”
'lt was last night, at least,” said Conan. He looked around. ”Let’s go on, posthaste, back to our
base camp oh the Plain of Pallos. My men together with yours make above a thousand fighters/’
"A thousand scarce an army makes/’ grumbled Publius. " Tis but a remnant of the ten thousand who marched northward with us.”
“It’s a beginning,” said Conan, whose gloom of the night before had vanished with the Hght of day. “I can recall when our whole enterprise nimibered only five stout hearts.”
As the renmant of the rebels marched, more bands that had escaped the slaughter joined the host, and individual survivors and small groups came straggling in. Conan kept glancing back with apprehension, expecting at any moment to see Procas’s whole Border Legion pour down the Rabirian Hills in hot pmrsuit But Publius thought differently.
"Look you. General,” he said. "King Milo has not yet betrayed us or turned against us, or surely he would have come pounding at our rear whilst Procas engaged us in the van. Methinks not even the mad King of Aquilonia dare risk a full and open war with the sovereign state of Argos; the Argosseans are a hardy lot. AmuHus Procas knows his politics; he would not have so long survived in Niunedides' service had he rashly affronted neighboring kingdoms. Once we regain our base camp and shore up our barricades, we should be safe for flie moment The reserve supplies and the camp followers await us.”
Conan scowled. "Until Numedides bribes or bullies Milo into turning his hand against us.”
In a sense, Conan was right. For even at that hour, the agents of Aquilonia were closeted with King Milo and his councilmen. Chief among these agents was Quesado the Zingaran, who had reached Mes-santia with his party by a long, hard ride from Teurantia, swinging wide of the embattled armies.
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Quesado, now resplendent in black velvet with boots of fine red Kordavan leather, had changed; and the change was not to his employer’s advantage. Hearing of the spy’s exploits in the service of Vibius Latro, a delighted King Numedides had insisted on promoting Quesado to the diplomatic corps. This proved a mistake.
The Zingaran had been an excellent spy, long trained to aflFect an miassuming, inconspicuous air. Now suddenly raised in pay and prestige, he let his fa9ade of humility crumble, and the pompous pride and hauteur of a would-be Zingaran gentleman began to show through the gaps. Looking down his beak of a nose, he endeavored by thinly veiled threats to persuade King Milo and his councillors that it were wiser to court the favor of the King of Aquilonia than to support his raggle-taggle foes.
“My lord King and gentlemen,” said Quesado in a sharp, schoolmasterish voice, "surely you Imow that, if you choose to be no friend of my master, you must be coimted amongst his enemies. And the longer you permit your realm to shelter our rebellious foes, the more you will be tainted with the poison of treason against my sovereign lord, the mighty King of Aquilonia,’'
King Milo’s broad face flushed with anger, and he sat up sharply. A heavy-set man of middle years, whose luxuriant gray beard overspread his chest, Milo gave the impression of stoHd taciturnity, more like some honest peasant than the ruler of a rich and sophisticated realm. Slow to make up his mind, he could be exceedingly stubborn once he had reached his decision. Glaring at Quesado, he snapped:
“Argos is a free and sovereign state, sirrah! We have never been and, Mitra willing, never shall be subject to the King of Aquilonia. Treason means a misdeed of a subject against his overlord. Do you claim that fat Numedides is overlord of Argos?”
Quesado begaia to perspire; his bony forehead gleamed damply in the soft light that streamed in ribbons of azure, vert, and scarlet through the stained-glass windows of the council chamber.
“Such was not my intention. Your Majesty," he hastily apologized. More humbly, he pleaded: “But with all respect, sire, I must point out that my master can hardly overlook assistance given by a neighboring brother monarch to rebels against his divinely established Ruby Throne.”
"We have given them no help,” said Milo, glowering. "Your spies will have apprized you that
their remnants are encamped upon the Plain of Pallos and, lacking supplies from Messantia, are desperately scouring the coimtryside for food. Their famed Bossonian archers employ their skill in pursuing ducks and deer. You say your General Procas’s victory was decisive? What, then, has mighty Aquilonia to fear from a gaggle of fugitives, reduced by starvation to mere banditry? We are told they have but a tithe of their original strength and that desertions fiuiJier reduce their numbers day by day.”
"True, my lord King,” said Quesado, who had recovered his poise. "But, by the same token, what has cultured Argos to gain by sheltering such a band? Unable to assail their rightful ruler, they must needs maintain themselves by depredations against your own loyal subjects.”
Scowling, Milo lapsed into silence, for he had no convincing answer to Quesado’s argument. He could hardly say that he had given his word to an old friend. Count Trocero, to let the rebels use his land as a base for operations against a neighboring king. Moreover, he resented the Aquilonian envoy’s eflForts to rush him into a decision. He liked to make up his own mind in his own time, without hectoring.
Lumbering to his feet, the king curtly adjourned the session: “We will consider the requests of our
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brother monarch, Ambassador Quesado. Our gentlemen shall inform you of our decision at our pleasure. You have our leave to withdraw.”
Lips curled in a false smile, Quesado bowed his way out, but venom ate at his heart. Fortune had favored the rebellious Cimmerian this time, he thought, but the next throw of the dice might have a different outcome. For though he knew it not, Conan nursed a viper in his bosom.
The Army of the Lion was in no wise so enfeebled or reduced to famine as Milo and Quesado beHeved. Now numbering over fifteen hundred, it daily rebuilt its strength and gathered supplies. The lean horses grazed on the long grass of the plain; the women camp followers, who had been left at the base camp when the army marched northward, nursed the wounded. Much of the baggage train had been salvaged, and ragged survivors continued to limp and straggle in, to swell the thin but resolute ranks of the rebellion. The forests whispered to the footfalls of himters and rang to the axes of woodcutters, while in the camp, fletchers whittled spear and arrow shafts, and the anvils of blacksmiths clanged with the beat of hammers on point and blade.
Conan the Liberator Page 6