The Conan Chronology

by J. R. Karlsson

  'Then your duty is discharged and you may do as you like,' she said.

  'Well,' he growled, 'it seems simple enough. Which mountain is this cave in? Cimmeria is full of mountains, and most of them have caves.'

  'This cave you should have no trouble finding,' she assured him. 'You are familiar with a mountain called Ben Morgh?'

  Now Conan's heart sank into his worn-out sandals. 'Ben Morgh?' he said in an awed whisper.

  'Exactly. The flask must be emptied on a fire as the sun rises upon the morn of the autumnal equinox in the great cave in the east face of the mountain called Ben Morgh.' She smiled at the dismay writ large on the face of the Cimmerian. 'What ails you, Conan? You seem to fancy yourself a hero. Have you no stomach for a hard journey and a climb up a mountain?'

  'You Stygian bitch!' Conan said, ignoring Moulay's hasty grab at his

  dagger, 'Ben Morgh is the home of Crom! That cave is the home of my people's god!'

  The man who dangled outside, just above the window, heard those words with much interest. He was supported only by a thin rope, one end of which was looped about the battlement surrounding the inn's flat roof, the other end terminating in a broad leather strap buckled about the man's ankle. When speech within the room concluded, he hoisted himself back to the roof, set about detaching his tackle, and looped it about his waist.

  He was a small man, quick and deft in his movements. He sat atop a merlon as he performed his task and watched the street below. It was full dark now, but his eyes were as sensitive as a cat's; he recognised the Cimmerian, who emerged from the building and turned to walk dejectedly toward the poorer quarter of the city.

  The little man crossed over several tight-packed rooftops until he reached a house near the goldsmith's quarter. Here he descended through a trap leading from the roof garden into the house proper. In a large room he found a corpulent man sitting cross-legged on a cushion, his hands folded limply in his lap, his eyes closed.

  'Jaganath?' the small man said hesitantly. 'I have returned.' His speech was that of the highest caste of Vendhya.

  The seated man's eyes opened, and he smiled benignly. 'And did you learn anything of note, Gopal?' Quickly, the younger man described what he had heard outside the room of Hathor-Ka. The fat man's smile increased. 'The Double-goer's Spell of Tuya! The Stygian woman is indeed clever. She has saved herself an arduous journey.'

  'Why did you not utilize that spell yourself, uncle?' the younger man asked.

  Jaganath turned his gaze upon his inquisitive young kinsman with little favour. 'Because, Gopal, it requires an extraordinarily trustworthy person to make the delivery certain, and I trust nobody but myself.' He smiled benignly again. 'Not even you.'

  He contemplated the parchment laid out before him. 'Now, at least, there can be no doubt. Hathor-Ka has stumbled across the same lost text

  from the Book of Skelos as I did so many years ago. I wonder how many others are making the same journey at this very moment?'

  'Uncle,' said Gopal, 'do you not think that it is now time for you to tell me the meaning of this journey we have undertaken? It has been so many long, weary leagues from Vendhya to this barbarous place. Surely, it is not only for the sake of knowledge that we have endured such hardships.'

  'Not knowledge,' Jaganath said, 'but power.'

  'Power?' said Gopal, his eyes alight.

  'Exactly. When I was a very young man, little older than you are now, I studied in many strange lands. One day, in the library of a wise man of purple-towered Aghrapur, I found a book, a frivolous book of poetry. I was about to put it away when I noticed that the parchment lining the inside of the cover was peeling loose, and there was strange lettering on the inner surface. I cut it free carefully and returned the book to its place. This parchment before me is the very one I found that day. Can you read it?'

  Gopal craned his neck to look, but the script was utterly alien to him.

  Even though the letters meant nothing they seemed to draw and twist his thoughts down paths unwelcome even to a Vendhyan apprentice wizard.

  'No, uncle, I cannot,' he admitted.

  'And neither could I in those days; yet, even as you feel it now, I felt this was a thing of unsurpassing importance. Years later, after much study under great masters, I gained knowledge of this language and remembered the parchment I had acquired. I found that this was a fragment from a lost chapter of Skelos, written in the original tongue. It is in the form of obscure quatrains, but the burden of the message from the ninth line to the twentieth is this: A new star shall appear between the horns of the Bull. Upon the morn of that year when day and night are of equal length, after the blaze of summer, before the chill of winter, a new Master shall arise to command all the wizards of the Earth. That one shall reign without peer or rival. On the morn of that year when day and night are of equal length, as the sun rises and casts its rays into the cave of the mountain of Ben Morgh, in the land of Cimmeria, the wizard who is to be master of all others will chant the Great Summoning of the Powers. That one shall gain the ultimate power of sorcery, and shall not die until struck down by an Arrow of Indra. So prophesieth Skelos.'

  Gopal sat silent for a moment, jaw slack with awe. 'What does it mean 'an Arrow of Indra'?' he asked.

  'The Arrows of Indra are falling stars, which are seen to drop from the constellation called Indra's Chariot only once in every thousand years.

  There is a rumour that the palace of the King of Valusia was destroyed by such eight thousand years past. The Arrows of Indra were last seen to fall a mere hundred years ago. Thus he who reaches that cave on the appointed morn, and chants the Great Summoning, will rule as supreme wizard of the Earth for at least nine hundred years!' The assumed mantle of serenity fell from the Vendhyan, leaving the naked mask of power-lust.

  'The text says 'master,' ' Gopal said. 'How can the Stygian woman hope to gain this power?'

  'The ancient tongue makes no distinction between male and female,'

  Jaganath answered. 'And Hathor-Ka is among the elite of adepts who can chant the Great Summoning. No more than ten of us have mastery of that spell. Of those, how many have found this prophecy? Two I am certain of.

  If there are more than two others I shall be very much surprised.'

  'And what of this Cimmerian?' Gopal asked.

  'The road to his homeland is a long one, fraught with perils. Something may happen to him. In fact, I am sure that some ill thing will befall him.'

  The younger man nodded understanding. 'But, just suppose he should survive this something. What then?'

  'He will travel overland,' Jaganath explained patiently. 'He must go through Ophir, then through Nemedia or Aquilonia and across Gunderland or the Border Kingdom before he can reach Cimmeria. Even then it will be a long journey from the border to Ben Morgh.'

  'But, uncle,' Gopal persisted, 'what is to keep the barbarian from going to the coast and taking ship?'

  Jaganath smiled with pleasure. 'That is most perceptive, nephew. In fact, that is exactly what I intend to do. We shall travel east until we reach the Tybor River in Argos, take a barge to the port of Messantia, and thence ship north. Thus shall we travel in relative comfort to Vanaheim, where we will find men to escort us to Ben Morgh. The Cimmerian cannot

  take this easy route, for to reach Cimmeria from the sea he must cross the Pictish Wilderness or Vanaheim, and both Pict and Van are deadly enemies of the Cimmerians.'

  'Then,' Gopal said, 'if we win the race, as seems certain, you shall be the greatest sorcerer who has ever lived.' He was awed and eager at the same time.

  'I shall be as powerful as a god,' Jaganath said, 'and you shall be second only to me.'

  Conan sat brooding over his wine in a tavern, a much finer establishment than the one at which he had lodged. From a tall Aquilonian mercenary he had purchased a patched but clean tunic which would serve to keep him acceptable in better surroundings until the markets opened on the morrow. Glumly, he ignored the strains of wild music and the posturin
g of the dancers. He was not yet hungry, and he could not savor his wine. For lack of a purse or other personal furniture, the bag of gold hung from his neck on a thong, hidden in his tunic. He had paid the tavern keeper for three days lodging with one of the gold coins: a heap of copper and silver now lay on the table before him, brought by his host in change..

  'Tell your fortune, master?' Conan looked up to see an ancient, ragged Khitan standing by the table.

  Even in such a cosmopolitan caravan centre as Khorshemish, men of the distant east were a rare sight. The man's shredded tunic did not even cover his skinny shanks, and he wore a bizarre headdress of feathers and bells. Strings of bones and shells and coral and other nameless things hung around his neck. He grinned ingratiatingly at the barbarian, nodding with senile glee that made his thin goat-beard flutter. 'Tell you good fortune, very cheap.'

  'Is this what attracted you?' Conan said, gesturing toward a little pile of coins before him. He picked up the smallest—a thick, ill-stamped copper shekh from Shem—and tossed it to the ancient. 'Here. Now, be gone with you.' He turned his attention to his neglected wine.

  The mountebank caught the coin and studied it. 'You get no good fortune for this,' he said. 'For this, all you get is a quotation. Duke Li said: 'Each piece on the player's board thinks that it moves by its own sovereign

  will from one square to another.''

  'Eh?' Conan said, mystified. 'What kind of fortuneteller are you?'

  'Good one,' the old man said. 'Give me one piece silver, I tell you good fortune.'

  Reluctantly, Conan grinned. The crazy little old man was amusing, and right now he needed distraction. He hated sorcery, but he had no fear of the petty magics of mountebanks. 'Sit down,' Conan said, gesturing hospitably. 'Have some wine.'

  The ancient cackled gleefully and plunked his skinny backside onto a stool opposite Conan. He snatched a cup from another table, and dumping the lees on the straw-covered floor, filled it from the pitcher that sat before the hulking Cimmerian. 'You Northman, not so?' he asked.

  'From Cimmeria, yes. Now you're drinking my wine, so I want a favorable fortune.'

  The old one dipped his fingers into the wine and spattered drops in the cardinal directions, drawing curses from tavern patrons who were struck by droplets. He drank all but a few drops from his cup and studied the lees swirling in the bottom while he muttered incomprehensibly. Grinning, he looked up. 'Very good fortune! What you do, the gods direct. You think you decide your own actions, but in reality you do only the bidding of higher powers, like Duke Li's gaming pieces.' Once again the old man switched from foolish chatter to sensible speech.

  'You call that a fortune?' Conan said. 'I always hear that kind of nonsense from easterners. The gods don't direct me; I am my own master.'

  'Yes, yes,' said the Khitan, nodding and grinning furiously, 'but sometimes you do something a little strange, not so? Something you do not understand?'

  About to retort sharply, Conan remembered his ill-considered oath to Hathor-Ka earlier that evening. 'Yes,' he admitted at last, 'sometimes I do.'

  'See?' said the Khitan, as if that explained everything. 'Soon you go on

  long trip, not so?'

  'That takes a little gift of prophecy,' Conan grumbled. 'Of course I'm going on a journey. Nobody stays in Khorshemish if he can help it.'

  'Well, you do things now, you do things soon, they are important. They seem like little things, unimportant things, but they are part of the gods'

  plans. Nothing you can do about it, all for good anyway.' The old man poured himself another cup.

  'Crom take you,' Conan said, now bored with the mad old fool and disgusted as always with eastern fatalism.

  'Soon enough,' said the old man, laughing and nodding.

  II

  The North Gate

  In the great market of Khorshemish, as in markets everywhere, the people gathered in the morning to buy and sell, to trade the latest gossip, and to talk politics. Women waited in long lines at the central fountain with empty water jars to fill, taking the opportunity to socialize with their neighbours. In a corner of the market, the local astrologers were met to discuss the same phenomenon about which they had been heatedly arguing for months: the new star that had appeared between the horns of the Bull. No agreement was reached except that it was either significant or otherwise, and, if significant, it meant something either good or bad.

  Conan entered the market at midmorning, having just come from the clothiers' quarter. He was now dressed in a decent tunic and trousers, with leather boots. None of his garments was of excellent quality except the boots, for he knew he would be trading the clothes for cold-weather gear as he travelled northward. He strode across the market, drawing admiring looks from the women who stood by the fountain. His mind was not on women, but on weapons. Khorshemish was not noted for its metal work, but many caravan routes met here and consequently there were weapons of many nations to be found among the wares of its merchants.

  Conan examined the goods displayed before the shop of an arms merchant. He picked up each sword and hefted it, running a critical eye

  over each piece while the merchant supplied a continual commentary in praise of his stock.

  'A Turanian sword, master? Curved like the crescent moon, its hilt rich with pearls and gold. The weapon of a prince, my lord.'

  'You don't kill with the hilt,' Conan said. 'You do it with the blade.'

  'Exactly, master,' the merchant agreed. 'Do but examine this pilouar of Vendhya. The blade is inlaid with potent spells in gold and silver.'

  'I don't believe in spells,' Conan said. 'I believe in a good sword arm.

  Have you any western or northern blades? I prefer a straight, broad blade to these curved slicers.'

  'Then this is exactly the sword my lord wishes,' purred the merchant, pulling a cloth cover from a splendid straight sword with a short guard and heavy pommel of carved steel. 'From Vanaheim, master.'

  Conan's eyes blazed with pleasure. The Vanir made fine swords, at least. He picked it up and tried its balance. The high polish flashed in the morning sun. That was wrong. The Vanir preferred the pearly grey lustre of steel in the first polish, which displayed the fine grain and pattern of their intricately welded blades. They never polished a sword to mirror brightness. Suspiciously, he ran a thumbnail along one edge from hilt to point, then turned the blade over and tried the other edge. Halfway up he felt a slight unevenness in the, steel. He held the blade close to his eye, out of the direct sunlight, where the polish could not hide a flaw. There was a hairline crack running from the edge almost to the central fuller. He tossed the sword to the table in disgust. 'Worthless,' he said. 'Haven't you anything better?'

  Fuming at the barbarian's obstinacy, the shopkeeper waved him toward the shop behind him. 'There are some old blades in there, if you want to look at them.'

  Inside the shop Conan waited for a few minutes, letting his eyes adjust to the gloom, then examined a pile of swords, and daggers on a table. He found a plain, heavy dirk, single-edged and broad-spined, and stuck it in his sash. None of the swords was to his liking. He was about to pay for the dirk and leave, when he saw a big pottery jar standing in a corner with a cluster of swords protruding from it. He pulled out several, but most of

  them were ancient, notched, and rusty, their grips broken or rotted away.

  On the point of leaving to seek out another shop, he drew forth a sword that felt different from the others. In the dimness he could tell little except that the blade was broad and straight, and the grip had long since deteriorated, leaving only a stretch of thin tang between hilt and pommel.

  He took it outside for a better look. In the sunlight he saw that the blade had turned purple-black with age, but bore no trace of rust. The curiously wrought hilt and pommel were of bronze long since turned green.

  To get a feel of its balance, Conan borrowed a strip of leather from a nearby stall, wrapped the tang, and swung the brand a few times. Even with the inadequate g
rip he knew that this sword had a balance as fine as any he had ever felt. He returned the leather strip to its owner and asked the merchant what he wanted for sword and dirk.

  'A very rare old sword, sir,' the merchant said, 'no doubt possessing many hidden virtues.'

  'Well-hidden at that,' the Cimmerian said. 'You bought it from some tomb-robber for a trifle.'

  Conan's time in the eastern lands had taught him the art and entertainment of haggling. The arguement continued occasionally threatening to escalate into open violence, and idlers passing by paused to contribute views and opinions. Eventually, Conan walked away with the sword wrapped in a length of cloth and the dirk tucked into his sash, certain that he had paid a pittance for so fine a blade. The merchant was equally sure that he had unloaded a worthless item on an ignorant outlander for an outrageous price.

  In the jewelers' quarter Conan found a sword dresser sitting before his workshop, surrounded by polishing stones of varying grit, bowls of sand and other powders, and sheets of rough sharkskin. Conan handed the man his new purchase.

  'Can you clean this up and sharpen it? It needs a grip as well. Plain wood will do, or staghorn or bone.'

  The sword dresser examined the weapon minutely, and the way he handled it told Conan he had come to the right man. This one knew weapons, if not with the arm of a warrior, at least with the eye of a

  craftsman.

  'A fine weapon,' the artisan pronounced at last. 'Most unusual, but I think I can do something with it. It will look much handsomer than you'd think when it is cleaned, and it deserves an exceptional grip. I have something you will like.

  'Nothing fancy,' Conan said, 'I prefer plain wood or bone.' But the craftsman had already disappeared into his shop.

  Conan fretted, suspecting mat the man would try to sell him a handle of solid jade or crystal or other splendid, useless material.

  When the man returned, though, he was holding a thin box of fragrant sandalwood. 'I had this from a Hyrkanian trader two years ago,' he explained. 'I've been waiting to find a wormy sword.' He opened the box, revealing a sheet of thin, parchmentlike material. It was as white as new ivory, and covered with tiny irregular bumps. Intrigued, Conan ran his fingertips over the knobbly surface. His experienced hand told him that this exotic stuff, beautiful as it was, would afford a fine grip.