by Roland Green
"So who are you fighting?"
"Some stout fellow named Aondo. They say he's larger than I am—"
"They've matched you with an ape?"
"The ape would be the loser," Conan said. That again hinted of past battles against uncommon foes, but Valeria took no heart from it. What she wanted was assurance that she would not be at the mercy of the Ichiribu if Conan lost—and that assurance, she realized, was not to be forthcoming.
She took more comfort from an undoubted truth— that Aondo was not likely to best the Cimmerian in a fair battle. Was there anything she could do or leave undone to keep the fight fair?
Precious little, she realized, and some of the comfort washed away with the rain on her skin. Silently she cursed her folly in fleeing south when she had left the fort. The next time she had to flee from unwanted embraces, she would look where she was going and try not to end in a land where she knew neither law, tongue, nor custom… and was at the mercy of another's knowledge of all of them!
Ryku had not recognized the First Speaker among the circle of eight who had sought to conjure the Living Wind into the globe. Yet now the First Speaker showed signs of vast weariness in the way he slumped on his gilded stool. His eyes were cast on the lion's skin on the floor, but they seemed as vacant as if he had at last become truly blind.
—Or had seen what even those who were called God-Men were not meant to see.
As custom demanded of a Silent Brother, Ryku was prostrate before the First Speaker. He lay thus until the chill of the stone floor began to creep through his limbs toward his heart. It had to be only his fancy, but the stone seemed colder than ever before. It was as if the Living Wind had leeched the warmth of the earth from all about it.
It was as well that his face was to the floor when that thought passed through his mind.
"Arise, Ryku."
Ryku could not scramble to his feet quickly enough. The chill stone had stiffened his limbs, but he contrived to rise without loss of either balance or dignity.
"I have summoned you here because the Speakers to the Living Wind have need of you."
"This is an honor I have not dared hope—"
The First Speaker held up a hand. Ryku saw that the hand was thinner and paler than it had been the last time he had seen the man. It also seemed to tremble slightly.
"Spare me your modesty. You are not unknown to Chabano, Paramount Chief of the Kwanyi." It was not a question.
Ryku judged that this moment held opportunity as well as danger. He also judged that he should hold his tongue.
"Have you promised him anything in the name of the Speakers?" This time it was a question that demanded an answer.
"I have not." Which was entirely true, Ryku not being a fool.
"Will he believe you if you promise now?"
Ryku's confusion was not altogether feigned. "What am I to promise? Chabano is no fool, as I am sure you do not need telling, First Speaker."
"Indeed, I do not need to be told what I already know. You may promise him, in my name, some part of what he has asked for but not been granted."
"What must he give us?"
"You are bold, bargaining with me."
"I speak thus only to remind you of Chabano's ways, Master. He is as bold as a leopard slipping into a cattle pen to pluck the newborn calf from its mother's teat. He is as hungry, also, and as fierce when balked of what he seeks."
"If I thought that Chabano commanded spirits, I would say he has made himself your master. A praise-speaker could not have done better."
Ryku was silent. If the old man would spend both their time speaking in riddles—
"But if Chabano commanded spirits, he would have done for himself much of what he has asked of us in years past. So I do not doubt that you speak the truth as you believe it to be."
"No man can speak otherwise, Master."
The look the First Speaker gave him reminded Ryku that Chabano was not the only man who could quell disobedience or strike terror into the disloyal without raising his voice. He was tempted to prostrate himself again.
The First Speaker crossed his hands over a bronze medallion resting on his belly. "You may go to Cha-bano, Silent Brother Ryku. You may promise him aid from us, and ask that he tell us who has come among the Ichiribu."
"The conquerors of Xuchotl, perhaps?"
The First Speaker's look said that was something best not spoken aloud. Ryku tried to look humble.
"We have… ways… of learning this," the First Speaker went on. "Yet those who are masters of magic would know if we used these ways. They would know our powers, and that they might be in peril from us. Eyes that see and ears that hear without magic give no warning, and Chabano commands those."
Ryku now fought to look not merely humble, but surprised and admiring. In truth, he could admire one part of the First Speaker's pose. A more cunning way of pretending that nothing had happened to the seeing globe was hard to imagine.
Best I not take the First Speaker too lightly, even in this moment of triumph.
"Indeed, Chabano has often spoken of how no bird lays an egg without his knowing sooner or later," Ryku said. "I think he boasts, but he surely knows the use of spies and has them among the Ichiribu."
"Then go you and bid him use them for us," the First Speaker said. "Go, and if you return with the knowledge we seek, you may be raised to the rank of Speaker."
A new Speaker was chosen from the Silent Brothers only when an old Speaker died, and as yet there had been no word put out of such a death. Nor would there be, Ryku suspected, at least not until it became necessary to explain why Silent Brother Ryku was being honored.
It would be necessary, he swore. He would not fail, now that he had been offered as a free gift the opportunity for which he would have shed blood, and not only that of other men!
Ryku prostrated himself again until given leave to rise, then swiftly departed the First Speaker's chamber.
Chnggg!
Conan's spear sank deep into the stump that was his target in the spear-throwing contest. Sank so deep, the Cimmerian judged, that it struck a knot and rebounded. The shaft quivered so fiercely that it jerked the iron head from the wood. The spear dropped to the ground, kicking up dust.
Conan turned to Aondo and raised a hand in salute. The Ichiribu warrior had won the spear-casting contest, although by the slenderest of margins. Had it not been for that last cursed knot—
From behind Conan, Valeria strode to his side. She now wore an Ichiribu waistcloth and the wreath showing her to be his vowed woman, as well as the leather bindings on her feet. Much travel, then sunny days upon the island of the Ichiribu had darkened her northern fairness, but not otherwise marred her looks.
"What now, Conan?"
"Today, nothing more. Tomorrow, the canoe, the fish-hunting, and then at night, the drum-dance."
A shadow passed across Valeria's face. "Conan, I am as deft with a canoe paddle as any of these folk. More so than you, I think."
"Likely enough. But it's not life or death if I lose anything save the drum-dance. Aondo won the wrestling—"
"Because you let him win, to muddle his wits with false hopes."
"Woman!" the Cimmerian said, looming over her in mock fury. "Do I have no secrets from you?"
"No," Valeria replied with an impudent smile that made her look almost girlish. "After as much time as I've passed with you, I'd be a fool if it were otherwise."
"You're no fool, that's as certain as anything can be," Conan said. Then a disquieting thought made him frown. "Unless you've offered to paddle the canoe in my place?"
"And if I have?"
"Answer me. Have you offered to take my place in the canoe?"
"Yes."
"Crom! If only they had the wits to refuse—"
"They accepted."
Conan wanted to pick up Valeria and shake some sense into her, knew that he would shake their friendship to pieces if he did, and contented himself with a volley of oaths. It set all the bi
rds calling, and not a few children wailing. Women, even warriors drew back from the Cimmerian, leaving him alone with Valeria, well out of anybody else's hearing.
"Did Emwaya suggest this?" he growled.
"This what?"
He struggled for fair words. "This… taking my place."
"No. She has ben not unfriendly, but we've not been among these folk long enough for me to give that kind of ear to one of them. Especially to a wizard's daughter."
"You've not lost all your wits, at least."
"What mean you by that, Cimmerian?" Valeria's voice held an edge,
"If they are letting you take my place in one of the contests, it means they regard you as a warrior."
"So?"
"A warrior of rank."
"Better still."
The Cimmerian lost the struggle to keep an edge from his own voice. "A warrior sworn to me as a blood-brother. Such may take another's place in the contest. That is the law."
"I knew—"
"Woman!" the Cimmerian bellowed. "Did you know that if you do that, you are judged along with me? That your fate marches in step with mine? If I lose the drum-dance, you die with me!"
Conan had expected anything but that Valeria would throw her arms around him, then pull his head down with a firm grip on his hair, and kiss him soundly.
"All the gods be praised! I did not know I could so easily avoid sitting and waiting to be thrown to some warrior like a bone to a dog!"
Conan decided that Valeria was actually saying what he had heard, and that neither of them had gone mad. He much doubted that if the drum-dance went against him, there would now be any tame submission to death. Valeria was not so made.
But that submission had never had any purpose, save keeping her alive. If it was her free choice to fling herself into a last battle at his side, then so be it—and the worse for the Ichiribu if they took the verdict of the drum-dance seriously!
NINE
Valeria still did not understand much of the Ichiribu tongue. She could read faces well enough, though, and she read in all around her the common thought that she was mad.
For the tenth time since she had sat down in the canoe, she raised her paddle, letting it find its own balance in her long-fingered hands. The morning sun gilded the drops of water that fell from the paddle blade into the lake.
This morning, Lake of Death seemed a monstrously false name for such fine water. The surface sparkled, emerald-tinted with flashes of azure, and rippled softly under the light breeze. Sun flashed from the rose- and snow-hued wings of whole flocks of birds beating their way high above the island of the Ichiribu toward the distant shore.
She put the paddle down and, again for the tenth time, gently rocked the canoe to test its balance. It was as fine and light a dugout as she had ever known, both the inside and the bottom scraped and oiled until they were as smooth as the back of her hand. Smoother, likely enough, with all that she had done since fleeing that captain's embraces.
Conan was not far wrong. She might have wasted years in that dismal border settlement, until time had taken the strength and grace from her and the Red Brotherhood would no longer have her back.
Or she might have died from a fever, from a fall from horseback, or by the arrow or blade of some bandit unworthy to scrub the bilges of a Red Brotherhood ship. Died, without ever feeling a deck under her feet, seeing a sail swell with the wind, hearing the chant of rowers as they took a ship out of harbor—
She blinked and thrust the past from her. For now, she could live only from one moment to the next, from one stroke of the paddle to the next. Otherwise, Conan would have a mark against him, those with doubts of the pale-skinned strangers would rejoice, and she would have thrown her life into the scales for nothing.
From twenty paces to starboard, Aondo bared misshapen teeth in a mocking grin. Then he raised his paddle and thrust it back and forth in an unmistakable gesture.
Valeria replied in kind, biting her thumb, then pretending to throw it overboard and spitting after it. Aondo's grin wavered, then vanished as the onlookers onshore laughed. Valeria even heard one or two besides Conan shout her name as if it were a war cry.
Fifty paces to port, the two older warriors judging the race sat in the sterns of their canoes. Each of the judges' canoes had four paddlers, although one of the boats was hardly larger than the stout craft Aondo was paddling alone.
Aondo, Valeria decided, was once more determined to strut and crow like a cock on a dunghill, and much good might it do him! She had chosen a canoe that she was sure she could handle over the whole length of the race. It did not matter where else Aondo might be ahead as long as she led him past the finishing mark!
Onshore, the drums began. The Ichiribu drums were the "talking" kind, able to send complex messages, but today they had no such task. They were to spur her and Aondo on to greater efforts—and their steady, deep rumble was already reaching down into her belly, filling her as if with strong wine.
Valeria tossed her head, her hair brushed her shoulders, and the two judges raised their tridents. When those tridents came down—
Spray jetted into rainbows as the judges flung their tridents. The rainbows had not faded when Valeria's paddle plunged into the water, driving her canoe forward.
She paddled as she had learned to, head up so that her arms had free play and all the muscles of her upper body could feed the arms. Aondo, she saw, was hunched over, as if that would urge his canoe faster through the water. His strokes were not as smooth as hers, but his stout thews made them formidable.
There was not a spear's length between the two canoes as they passed the first mark. Valeria already felt sweat streaming down her face and body, and her headband growing sodden. She thanked Mitra that she had worn only the briefest of loinguards, apart from binding her hands with leather against blisters.
The race spanned six marks, about a league or a trifle more in Valeria's judgment. She had fallen farther behind than she liked by the second mark, and by then, her hair was as sodden as her headband.
She was not gaining by the third mark—halfway along—but neither had she lost any more ground. Aondo also was dripping sweat, and his canoe seemed to be lower in the water than it had been. Was the water splashed from his vigorous strokes finding its way aboard?
The judges' canoes were keeping up well, but Valeria did not expect much of the judges. She was many things that were strange to the Ichiribu, and honor might not outweigh ignorance when it came to deciding her fate. She would do as she had done before—wager all on her own skill and strength and leave the rest to the gods.
Dip, thrust, lift, twist slightly to the other side, dip, thrust, lift, twist again. Her thigh and belly muscles joined her arms and shoulders in shrieking protests. Dip, thrust, lift, twist a little harder this time to shake sweat from her eyes, which had begun to burn as if they were filled with hot wax.
Aondo's canoe had been steering an uncertain course for some time now. His thrusts seemed almost frantic, but they had lost none of their power. His canoe was no longer settling. Had he somehow managed to bail it out when Valeria's eyes were elsewhere? Or had it been only her wishful fancy that it was low in the water?
It was no fancy that his steering was growing still more erratic. Valeria stared at the Ichiribu warrior. In a moment when he thought himself unobserved, she caught him staring back at her. The malice in that stare chilled her blood and seemed to turn the sweat upon her into ice. If he had any voice in her fate, she would be begging for death long before death took her.
Her sweat-dimmed eyes made out something else, too. Aondo was steering a course that was gradually taking him across her bow. Before they reached the next mark, she would have to either back water or strike him—and if she struck him, she would forfeit the race.
Rage did not blunt Valeria's wits. She had to surprise her opponent. Aondo was as strong as an ox, but not much quicker of thought. She wondered who had counseled him to this treachery, doubted she would learn, bu
t knew one thing: the man was not in Aondo's canoe.
Valeria subtly altered the force and angle of her strokes so that her canoe began to drift quite as subtly to starboard. She felt a surge of strength as she saw Aondo actually slow his pace, and she knew that her deception was working. He thought she was exhausting her strength and would have no reply to his scheme.
As they approached the fourth mark, the canoes were barely a sword's length apart. Aondo was halfway across Valeria's bow now, paddling only hard enough to keep the distance. A few missed strokes and he would be lying across her path like a log.
But it was Valeria who missed a stroke, by intent, but making it seem the error of one at the end of her strength. She lost ground, but only by a few paces— then her paddle churned the water, and she shot under Aondo's stern.
Aondo screamed something that Valeria doubted was praise and stabbed wildly at the lake with his paddle. It struck the water on the wrong side, and he had completed his stroke before he realized this.
His canoe swerved sharply, until it had almost reversed its course.
Valeria was clear by then, past Aondo and into open water. She did not care if he spent the rest of the day spinning around in circles, or jumped overboard to be eaten by the lionfish and crocodiles. She only cared that the fourth mark was passing her to port, and now it was time to spend her strength freely. She would not allow herself even a moment's doubt that she still had that strength.
Her paddle seemed to dive now, then leap over the canoe to dive on the other side. Each thrust seemed to raise the canoe as well as thrust it forward. Water gurgled at the stern, spray made rainbows at the bow, and Valeria knew she was kneeling in a hand-breadth of water in the bottom of the craft.
She would not allow herself a moment to look back at Aondo, either. She was already giving the race everything that was in her. Aondo could no longer make any difference. The world shrank ever more swiftly to the endless rhythms of her paddle strokes, the water churning past, the fifth mark vanishing astern, the sixth and last now in sight—