By then Conan had decided to take himself off out of hearing of the lovers' first quarrel. He hoped they would make peace soon; he did not need them at daggers drawn with each other while carrying out the ruse.
But why in the name of all the gods had Bethina taken him, if she'd had her eye on Farad all along as much as he had on her? It was not in Conan to regret a delightful tumble with a fine young woman, but blood-feuds had begun over less.
Fortunately, the Afghuli was a proven warrior and old enough to be a wiser head to Bethina, as well as in fettle to remind her that she was a woman any time she wished it. She could have chosen worse. She would have chosen worse, had she set herself wholly on the Cimmerian.
And it still made precious little sense, unless one accepted the truth that the ways of women were hardly more predictable than those of the gods. At least women were human, and few priests claimed to understand them, but otherwise the difference sometimes seemed too small for a man's discerning.
Muhbaras was at sword practice when the messenger arrived.
He listened to the man, while turning his gaze from the darkening slopes of the mountain to the gate of the valley. The men posted there had reported that since early morning the Maidens would not talk to them, and seemed pale and drawn, as with a fever. One man said that he had heard inhuman cries from beyond the gate, and maintained this in the face of the scoffing of his comrades.
Muhbaras wished that he had no duties toward his men, or at least none that would keep him from the Lady's side. Then he put the wish away. He was no sorcerer, and however well wielded, few swords availed much against magic gone awry. Also, the Lady had her pride, and would not thank him for seeing her weak.
Moreover, if the messenger spoke the truth, Muhbaras was needed more than ever in the outer world, Muhbaras and all his men.
"If I took you a half-glass's ride down the path, you'd see where they're making the cairn," the messenger concluded. "They've their chief all laid out proper, with his grave goods and sword, and enough stones ready to pile on him to keep out lions let alone wolves. Most likely they'll lay him down at dawn, and build the cairn during the day. That's the way of the tribes, leastways the ones I know."
The messenger was a seasoned veteran, one of the handful remaining, and had likely forgotten more about the people of these mountains than Muhbaras had known when he came to them. He would trust the man for anything he had seen with his own eyes, and they had seen a good deal.
"Very well," Muhbaras said. "You shall have a proper reward for this work, and soon."
"Tonight, Captain, or I might not be living to spend it."
Muhbaras wondered if the soldier had heard the tales of fear within the valley. He did not dare ask.
Then the man grinned. "No, it's just that I reckon you're about taking us down to clean those tribesfolk off our mountain. Chancy work in the dark, even if they've lost their chief. There's a Maiden I've wanted to gift a mite, for her kindness to me, and surely you wouldn't be quarreling with a man's doing that, would you?"
Muhbaras laughed and drew two silver coins from his purse. "I would not, and here's your reward. Save something for the fighting, though."
"Aye, Captain, I'll do that, and you take your own advice too."
Left alone, Muhbaras considered various schemes, but knew time was short. He decided that nothing would serve better than a straightforward night attack with every man he could spare. That would have to be everyone, as he had too few seasoned warriors among the bandits and unfledged recruits to divide his forces.
That also meant putting the pay chests and other valuables in a safe place. The only man who could be spared for that was Ermik, which was rather like trusting a mouse to the care of a serpent. But the serpent might not be hungry. The oncoming raiders surely would be.
Then he wrote three short letters. One was for his superiors in Khoraja. It accepted all blame, if such there was, and absolved his men. Then he wrote one for the Maidens, which he left unsealed. Even Ermik should be able to read his message that the Maidens should be doubly watchful tonight and for some nights to come, with human foes closer to the valley than for some years.
His last letter, he sealed as tightly as he could.
It was not a letter that schoolchildren would be made to recite in future years. It was not a letter that anyone except the woman who read it would long remember. It was merely the letter of a man to the woman he loves, before he goes out to battle, hoping to return in triumph but asking her to remember him if his luck is out.
However, in all the years that such letters had been written, there could not have been many written by a warrior to a sorceress.
In her innermost chamber, where not even her serving Maidens were admitted, the Lady awoke and threw off her blankets. She had come to find it easier to add blankets to her bed, rather than use her magic to keep the chamber warm at all times.
She had not abandoned sleeping unclothed, however, as her mirror showed her. For a moment she wished the mirror were Muhbaras's eyes”the desire she read in them was so beautiful to see, so unlike what she had expected from men for so long, that it aroused her almost as much as his caresses.
Then she drew on a chamber robe, rinsed the sleep from her mouth, and sat down at her scrying table. She had not sat there for some days, although the wards she had placed on it earlier should have been sufficient to warn her of anything amiss. Not that there ever had been, except in the days when she thought ruling the Maidens like a tyrant would help her cause, but still¦
Her hands tingled the moment they touched the table, and a dozen shades of blueness swirled in the glass, until it was like peering down into a bottomless well of luminous water. At the very bottom, she sensed the Mist she had brought into being and fed for so long.
Until recent days, that is. She knew what Muhbaras thought of those sacrifices, even when they were of useless mouths and made cleanly, without pain. She could not help but know, after lying in his arms so many times.
She also could not help what had gone before, but she could keep it from happening again. There had to be a way of constraining the Mist, so that it would at least be harmless. Meanwhile, it had not been strong enough to feed by itself the last time she offered life essences to it. A moon or two of fasting would do the Mist no harm.
Now her questing spell touched the Mist”before she had expected, indeed. She strengthened the touch”and it was as if the Mist pushed back, as Muhbaras sometimes did when they mock-wrestled to a love-fall¦
But this was not a friendly push. It was like a man swatting at a fly, with great strength. More strength than the Mist should have. As much strength as it would have had, if it had been fed regularly all these past days while she loved Muhbaras.
The Lady withdrew the questing spell and rose from the table. Something was amiss, and she intended to seek answers (at least at first) without casting any more spells.
-
Sixteen -
The Mist did not distinguish between friend and enemy. Those were distinctions too subtle for it.
But it could tell what lived from what did not live. It could also tell what life it could feed on, and what life it could not.
In the time since it first fed of its own will, it had also learned to tell those who helped it to feed from those who would hinder it. It saw the second kind, not as enemies, but as more food.
Waiting for a night attack by a formidable foe, high in thin cold mountain air, after a long day of marching and fighting and with a wounded wrist throbbing none too gently, is no man's idea of pleasure.
Not even the most hardened of Cimmerian warriors.
Not even Conan's.
However, he had not expected this quest to bring much pleasure. If he and his Afghulis left Turan with a whole skin and some of their jewels, that would be enough.
Oh, and to be sure, it would be as well if this Lady of the Mists and her magical menaces were also put down. But Conan was beginning to wonder if the Lady was
only a tale.
Here they were in her mountains, and according to Omyela (speaking through Bethina), so close to the valley that a child could have walked the distance in half a morning. All they had seen were humans, and not the most formidable sort of humans either. Even Omyela could not say for certain that the Lady's magic was still potent”although Conan knew that some kinds of spells were shields against detection. Dangerous ones, more often than not, commanded by potent sorcerers”and the Lady was one, if she was anything at all, Conan stretched cramped muscles.
He lay on his bier, playing the "dead chief by night as he had by day.
Just after the light vanished, he'd slipped off the bier to relieve himself and snatch bean-bread and sausage from his pack, while Farad took his place. Then it was back to playing his own corpse, while a string of "mourners" marched around the bier, making the din demanded by custom.
Conan only hoped that they didn't keep the sentries from hearing the noise of the approaching attack.
A lull in the mourning, and then soft footsteps approaching. He had heard them before, and recognized Bethina's pace. Before she had been with Farad, but now she was alone.
The footsteps halted. Conan heard soft breathing, smelled warm woman (not recently bathed, but then who among them had for some days?), then felt tears fall on his face.
"Ha, lass," he whispered. "I'm not dead yet."
"I know. I would weep for you, though, if you were."
"Even though you're going to wed Farad?"
"Even so."
"Well, then, be sure that he tells you about his three wives and seventeen children back in Afghulistan. He
Conan felt a cold sharp point at his throat. "Conan, you are jesting, are you not?"
It took some effort to command his voice. "Yes. Farad has no wife, and not much in Afghulistan to draw him back. What he says, you can believe."
"I am grateful." Suddenly the point was withdrawn and warm arms fell around his neck. "I am also frightened. When will they come?"
"Easy there, Bethina. I know it's hard, waiting for an enemy you know is out there to spring on you. But we're on our own ground. They're stumbling around in the dark, wondering if they will have any warning or if they're about to fall into a trap.
"Believe me, I've done both, and we have the easier work tonight."
"I can almost believe you. I will believe you, if you hold me."
"Farad
"I told him where I was going, when he went out to the sentries. He blessed me."
"Not me?" Conan scoffed. "The ungrateful hound! I bring him from a flea-ridden hut to the embraces of
"Hssst!" Bethina said, in a very different manner. Conan put his arm around her but was silent.
Then they both heard it”a high, wailing cry that might have been an abandoned babe. But it was many times too loud and seemed to come from both the rock of the mountains and the stars in the sky at once.
Muhbaras heard the sound, too, and his first thought was that one of the raiders' sentries was blowing a whistle to give the alarm. Then it swelled until it was almost painful to hear, and he ceased to believe that it could be natural.
What he wanted to believe was that the Lady of the Mists was calling on her powers to aid him. What he feared was that magic was on the march tonight, without the Lady's leave.
He did not know to what god he could lawfully pray, for the victory of one who had delved into matters forbidden by those same gods. He also wondered if he could pray for his own victory, seeing that he was bound by the most ancient of human ties to that same delver into the forbidden.
Since Muhbaras did not know how to pray, he did not do so. Instead he devoted all his attention to keeping on his feet as he led his men down across the scree-strewn slope. A stone turning under somebody's feet could do worse than give the alarm. It could tumble a man, so that he took others off their feet until the whole raiding party slid downhill like a living avalanche, to end up helpless amid the rubble while their enemies cut their throats.
Mountains were no place for moving fast at night, and here the bandits had the advantage over their lowlander comrades. They knew ground was supposed to be rubble-strewn and slanting, and their feet found safe paths without demanding direction from their wits or senses.
Muhbaras's eyes had long since accustomed themselves to the darkness, although his night-sight was not of the keenest. He saw that he himself was running almost straight at the dead chief's bier, and that some of the men on his flanks were well ahead of him.
He could almost be grateful to the terrible cry in the night. It had to be drawing all his enemies' attention, and completely drowning out the footfalls of his men. They would strike by surprise, and that alone might give them the edge.
Muhbaras put out of his mind the thought that the magic unloosed in the night might make meaningless the difference between victor and vanquished. It was disloyal to his Lady, it might unman him, and it might even be untrue.
Conan waited until the last moment of the attackers' approach. He had plenty of warning, not only from the sentries (who gave ground before the onrush without engaging) but from the "mourners" around him.
Among them was Bethina, who was keeping her courage and her wits about her for all that she was plainly fearful of what might befall Farad out on the sentry line. She moaned and wailed quite convincingly, and in between the moans gave Conan the numbers of the enemy. When the number reached fifty and grew no higher, Conan heaved a gusty sigh.
That was odds of no more than two to one, and ensured a battle rather than a massacre. But he trusted his men; when the fight was over there should be little between them and the Valley of the Mists.
Little of human contriving, that is.
Conan moved enough to see the sentries pelting past the archers climbing on the piled stones, to give themselves clear shots over the heads of their friends into the ranks of their foes. The clatter of onrushing feet on stones was now louder than the wailing in the sky.
Then the first of the enemy burst out of the night. A lean man in ragged robes, he leapt clean over Conan's bier, to meet Bethina's dagger full in his chest.
His death-cry made all other sounds seem like a hush. Conan rolled off the other side of the bier, drawing both dagger and broadsword in a single motion as he came to his feet. Both blades found living flesh as they were drawn, and two enemies crumpled before Conan had taken three steps from the bier.
A third man stared at the Cimmerian, gibbering like a bee-stung ape.
"Your pardon for coming back from the dead, but I had work to do,"
Conan said. His broadsword licked out and the man's head lolled on his shoulders. He fell backward into the path of a fourth man, who was agile enough to leap aside but not enough so to escape the downswing of Conan's sword.
It was only a flesh wound to the man's left arm, and he wielded the tulwar in his right hand with no loss of speed or skill. Conan feinted with his dagger to draw the man into a furious slash that put him briefly off balance and in reach of the broadsword. The broadsword ended the fight, opening the man's chest, across half his ribs and down to his heart and lungs.
Conan had now slain four men in hardly more time than it would have taken to draw that many breaths. His rising from the dead had not frightened as many enemies witless as he had hoped, but it had left him well inside their ranks.
A squarely built man with a grizzled beard now came at Conan. The man had nearly the Cimmerian's reach and much of his strength, but not his speed. Conan could not use all his swiftness of foot, eye, and hand on this rough ground with enemies lurking in every direction.
So he and the bearded man went at it for a good long while for such a fight, which is to say all of a minute or two. They also fought unhindered by either friends or foes, which might have been chivalry but was more likely that the two wove about them a web of flying steel such that no prudent man dared draw close.
The bearded man drew Conan's blood twice, and the Cimmerian consider
ed that this quest was giving him more scars than usual. Then his opponent made a downward cut that was just a trifle too predictable, and Conan caught the man's blade with his dagger.
Pushing back hard, the Cimmerian locked the other's blade between them, then brought his broadsword about in a sweeping stroke.
It struck flat-bladed; Conan wanted a prisoner. Too much that they had not expected was abroad tonight, and this man had to know more than Conan did! Besides, the man was too good an opponent to kill without good cause.
The blow knocked the man's helmet awry and staggered him without stunning him. He lurched back, clearing his blade and drawing a short hill knife from his belt. Conan brought a knee up into the man's groin and slammed the hilt of his broadsword into the other's jaw.
Those two blows were almost enough. The man still thrust his knife weakly at Conan, touching the Cimmerian's scarred chest. Then he reeled and fell, his steel falling from limp hands.
Conan stepped back from his fallen opponent and looked around. The archers from the stone pile were now at work, and arrows whistled by close enough to be heard over the cry of the night. The cries when they struck living flesh were even louder; Conan counted half a dozen writhing or still forms within spear-throw.
Now to see to his prisoner, and hope that no one tried to kill him or trample on the man while he was doing that.
Conan had just gripped the man's ankles when the cry in the night doubled, then redoubled, until all the world seemed to be one terrible wailing that seemed to signal the death of gods or even of the universe itself.
In the valley, the Lady of the Mists was running for the first time in some years. She was relieved to discover that her wind and limbs were still sound enough to let her make good speed.
Or perhaps she owed her speed to being sensibly clad, with stout shoes and a tunic and trousers borrowed from one of the servants. They were not the best fit, but she was conscious as never before how keeping the chill wind from her skin and the stones of the paths from her bare feet allowed her to make better time on her journey.
Of course, it would be well to doff all her garments as usual when it came time to wield her magic. Meanwhile, though, no one would take her for the Lady of the Mists or perhaps even for a woman, as the garments were large enough to alter her shape. Even in the uncanny light the Mist was pouring out into the Valley, her staff might also look like a shepherd's crook or a bearer's walking stick.
The Conan Compendium Page 562