As the five royalists, bending low over their horses' necks, ' pounded towards the Poitanians, death rode in their grim eyes. The rebel swordsmen could not present a solid line, spread out as they were among the trees, so the Aquilonians aimed for the gaps. The leader rode at Trocero, his blade thrust outward like a lance. To right and left, the count's men, avenging furies, rushed headlong at the foe.
There was an instant of wild confusion, raked by shouts and illumined by the white light of terror in the eyes of men flogged by the fury of their desperation. Two troopers converged upon a galloping Aquilonian, whose upraised sword whirled murderously above his tousled head. One drove his steel into the soldier's sword arm; the other struck downward with all his might, tearing a long gash in the speeding horse's side. But the screaming animal pressed forward, and the man ran free.
A rebel's sword darted past a blade that sought to slash him and sheathed six inches of its point into an eagle-emblemed midriff. The lean, muscle-knotted Aquilonian leader lunged at Trocero, who parried with a clang, and the hum of steel on steel was a song of death. Then the five horses were through and away, like autumn leaves in a gale, with four of their riders. The fifth lay supine on the leaf mould of the forest floor, with a bloodstain spreading slowly across his white surcoat.
'Gremiol' shouted the count. Take your squad and pursue! Try to capture one alive!'
Trocero turned back to the trampled turf, which bore mute testimony to the furious encounter. Spying the fallen man, he said: 'Sergeant, see if that fellow lives.'
As the sergeant dismounted, another trooper said: 'Please, my lord, he spitted himself on my steel as he rode past. I know he's dead.'
'He is,' nodded the sergeant, after a quick examination.
Trocero cursed. 'We needed him for questioning!'
'Here's one of their captives,' said the sergeant, kneeling beside the nude creature, flung like a discarded garment against a fallen log. 'Me thinks it was knocked down by a lying hoof and stunned in the melee.'
Trocero bit his underlip in thought. 'It is, I do believe, a Tabled satyr, whereof the countryfolk tell fearsome old-wives'
tales.'
A look of superstitious terror crossed the sergeant's face, and he snatched back his questing hands. 'What shall I do with it, sir,' he said, rising and stepping backward.
The satyr, whose wrists were bound together by a narrow thong, opened its eyes, perceived the ring of hostile mounted men, and scrambled to its feet. Trembling, it sought to run; but the sergeant, grabbing the rope that trailed from its neck, tugged and brought it down.
When it had been subdued, Trocero addressed it:
'Creature, can you talk?'
'Aye,' the captive said in broken Aquilonian. Talk good. Talk my tongue; talk little yours. What you do to me?'
That's for our general to decide,' replied Trocero.
'You no cut throat, like other men?'
'I have no wish to cut your throat. Why think you that those others so would do?'
'Others catch us for magic sacrifice.'
The count grunted. 'I see. You need fear naught of that from us. But we must bring you back to camp. Have you a
name?'
'Me Gola,' said the satyr in his gentle voice.
'Then, Gola, you shall ride pillion behind one of my men. Do you understand?'
Tin- satyr looked downcast. 'Me fear horse.'
'You must overcome your fear,' said Trocero, giving the sergeant a signal.
'Up you go said the soldier, swinging the small form ; In ft; and, lifting the noose from Gola's neck, he bound the rope firmly about the satyr's waist and that of the trooper on whose horse the creature sat.
'You'll be quite safe,' he laughed. Swinging into his saddle, he turned the column around.
The squad sent in pursuit of the royalists arrived at the base of the Giant's Notch in time to see the fugitives disappear up the steep tunnel of the gorge. Fearing ambush, the Poitanians pressed the pursuit no further.
Later, in the command tent, Trocero reported on his mission to the assembled leaders of the rebellion. Conan surveyed the captive and said: 'That binding on your wrists seems tight, friend Gola. We need it not.'
He drew his dagger and approached the satyr, who cringed and screamed in mortal terror: 'No cut throat Man promise, no cut throat I'
'Forget your precious throat!' growled Conan, seizing the captive's wrists in one gigantic hand. 'I would not harm you.' He slashed the thong and sheathed his poinard, while Gola flexed his fingers and winced at the pain of returning circulation.
'That's better, eh?' said Conan, seating himself at the trestle table and beckoning the satyr to join him. 'Do you like wine, Gola?'
The satyr smiled and nodded; and Conan signalled to his squire.
'General!' exclaimed Publius, holding up a finger to stay the execution of the order. 'Our wine is nearly gone. A few flagons more and we're all back on beer.'
'No matter,' said Conan. Wine we shall have. The Nemedians have a saying, 'In wine is truth', and this I am about to test.'
Publius, Trocero and Prospero exchanged glances. Since lie first clapped eyes upon the satyr, Conan displayed a curious affinity for this subhuman being. It was as if he were an un-tamed creature of the wild himself, he felt instinctive sympathy for another child of nature, dragged from its native daunts by civilised men whose ways and motives must be utterly incomprehensible.
Half a wineskin later, Conan discovered that two regiments of royalist cavalry held the plateau above the Imirian Escarpment. They were encamped, not at the cliff-top where they could attack if the rebels ascended the flume of the Giant's Notch, but several bow shots - perhaps a quarter-league -lack from the edge. And for several days royalist hunting parties had clambered down the Notch to sweep the neighbouring woods for satyrs. Those they caught, they dragged alive back to their camp and penned them, still bound, in a stockade built for the purpose.
'My folk move from Notch said Gola, sadly. Had no pipes ready.'
Ignoring that strange remark, Conan asked: 'How know you that they plan to use your people's blood for magical sacrifices?'
The satyr gave Conan a sly, sidelong glance. We know. We, too, have magic. Big magician on cliffs above.'
Conan pondered, studying the small creature intently. 'Gola, if we push the bad men from the upper plain, you need no longer fear mistreatment. If you help us, we will restore your woods to you.'
'How know I what big men do? Big men kill our people.'
'Nay, we are your friends. See, you are free to go. Conan pointed to the tent flap, arms spread wide.
A glow of childlike joy suffused the satyr's face. Conan waited for the glow to fade, then said: 'Now that we've saved some of your folk from the wizard's cauldron, we may ask help from you. How can I reach you?'
Cola showed Conan a small tube made of bone that was suspended from a vine entwined about his neck. 'Go in M,,S and blow.' The satyr put the whistle to his lips and blew his cheeks.
' I hear no sound,' said Conan.
'Nay, but satyr hear. You take.'
Conan stared at the tiny whistle as it lay in his huge palm, while the others frowned, thinking the bit of bone a useless toy intended to cozen their general. Presently, Conan slipped the whistle into his pouch, saying gravely: 'I thank you, little friend.' Then calling his squires and the nearest sentry, he said: 'Escort Gola into the woods beyond the camp. Let none molest him — some of our superstitious soldiers might deem him an embodied evil spirit and take a cut at him. Farewell.'
When the satyr had departed, Conan addressed his comrades: 'Numitor lies beyond the Notch, waiting for us to climb the slope ere he signals attack! What make you of it?'
Prospero shrugged. 'Meseems he relies much on that 'big magician' - the king's sorcerer, I have no doubt.'
Trocero shook his head. 'More likely, he's fain to give us a clear path to the top. so that we can face him on equal terms. He is a well-meaning gentleman who thinks to fight a war
by rules of chivalry.'
He must know we outnumber him,' said Publius, perplexed.
'Aye,' retorted Trocero, but his troops are Aquilonia's best, whereas half our motley horde are babes playing at warfare. So he relies on dash and discipline . . .'
The arguement was long and inconclusive. As twilight deepened into night, Conan banged his goblet on the table. We cannot sit below the cliffs for long, attempting to read Numitor's mind. Tomorrow we shall scale the Giant's Notch, prepared for instant action.'
X
Satyrs' Blood
Prince Numitor paced restlessly about the royalist camp. The cooking fires were dying down, and the regiments of Royal Frontiersmen had turned in for the night. The new moon set, and in the gathering darkness the stars wheeled slowly westward like diamonds stitched upon the night-blue cloak of a dancing girl. To the west, where twilight lingered, the dodging shape of a foraging bat be-smudged the horizon, while overhead the clap of a nightjar's wings shattered the silence.
The prince passed the line of sentries and strolled towards the edge of the escarpment, where Thulandra Thuu had placed things needful for his magic. Behind him the camp vanished into forest-shadowed darkness. Ahead the precipice fell sharply away. And leftward yawned the black canyon that was called the Giant's Notch.
Although the prince's placid ears picked up no sound of movement in the gorge, something about the camp's location disturbed him; but for a time he could not put a finger on the source of his unease.
After walking several bow shots' distance, Prince Numitor sighted the dancing flames of a small fire. He hastened towards it. Thulandra Thuu, hooded and cloaked in black, like some bird of ill omen, was bending over the fire, while Hsiao, on his knees, fed the blaze with twigs. A metal tripod, from the apex of which a small brazen pot was suspended by a chain, straddled the fickle fire. To one side a large copper cauldron squatted in the grass.
As Numitor approached, the sorcerer moved away from the firelight and, fumbling in a leathern wallet, extracted a crystal phial. This he unstoppered, muttering an incantation
in an unknown tongue, and poured the contents into the heated vessel. A sudden hissing and a plume of smoke, shot through with rainbow hues, issued from the pot.
Thulandra Thuu glanced at the prince, said a brief 'Good even, my lord ' and reached again into his wallet.
'Master Thulandra!' said Numitor.
'Sir?' The sorcerer paused in his searching.
You insisted that the camp be set far from the precipice; I wonder at your reasoning. Should the rebels steal into the Giant's Notch, they would be upon us ere they were discovered. Why not move the camp here on the morrow, where our men can readily assail the foe with missiles from above?'
The eyes beneath the sorcerer's cowl were veiled in purple darkness, but the prince fancied that they glowed deep in that cavernous hollow, like the night eyes of beasts of prey. Thulandra purred: 'My lord Prince, if the demons I unleash perform their proper function, my spell would put your men in danger should they stand where we stand now. The final stage I shall commence at midnight, a scant three hours hence. Hsiao will inform you in good time.'
The magician shook more powder into the steaming pot and stirred the molten mixture with a slender silver rod. 'Now I crave your pardon, good my lord, but I must ask you to stand back whilst I construct my pentacle.'
Hsiao handed Thulandra Thuu the wooden staff, ornately carved, which served him as a walking stick when he stalked about the camp. While his servant piled fresh fuel upon the dying fire, the sorcerer paced off certain distances about the conflagration and marked the bare earth with the ferule of his staff. Muttering, he drew a circle, a dozen paces in diameter, then etched deep lines back and forth across the space enclosed. Following an arcane ritual, he inscribed a symbol in each angle of the pentacle. The prince understood neither the diagram nor the lettering thereon, but felt no desire to plumb the wizard's unholy mysteries.
Now Thulandra rose up and stood beside his fire, his back to the precipice. He intoned an utterance - a prayer or incantation - in a singsong foreign tongue. Then, facing east, he repeated his invocation, and in this wise completed one mutation. Numitor saw the stars grow dim and shapeless shadows flutter through the clear night air. He heard the sinister thunder of unseen beating wings. Thinking it better not to view more of the uncanny preparations of his cousin's favourite, he stumbled back to camp. To his captains he gave orders to rouse the men an hour before midnight to comply with the sorcerer's directions. Then he turned in.
Three hours later Hsiao spoke to a sentry, who sent another to awaken the sleeping prince. As Numitor made his way to the cliff whereon the wizard prepared his magical spell, he came upon the column of soldiers ordered by Thulandra Thuu. Each man-at-arms gripped : bound and captive satyr. A dozen of the furry forest folk whimpered and wailed as their captors brutally hustled them into line. Hsiao had built up the fire, and the brazen pot bubbled merrily, sending a cloud of varicoloured smoke into the starlit sky. Upon Thulandra's curt command, the first soldier in the line dragged his squirming captive to the copper cauldron standing upon the grass and forced the bleating creature's head down over the vessel's rim. As the darkness throbbed to the beat of an inaudible drum-or was it the beat of the awestruck soldiers' hearts?-the sorcerer deftly slashed the satyr's throat. At a signal, the man-at-arms lifted the sacrificial victim by its ankles and drained its blood into the large container. Then, in obedience to a low command, he tossed the small cadaver over the precipice.
A pause ensued while Thulandra added more powders to his sinister brew and pronounced another incantation. At length he beckoned to the next man in line, who dragged his satyr forward to be slain. The other soldiers shifted uneasy feet. One muttered:
'This takes longer than a coronation! Would he'd get on with it and let us back to bed.'
The eastern sky was paling when the last satyr died. The fire beneath the brazen pot had burned to a bed of embers. Hsiao, at his master's command, unhooked the steaming pot and poured its boiling contents into the blood-filled cauldron.
The nearest soldiers saw-or thought they saw-ghostly form rise from the latter vessel; but others perceived only great clouds of vapour. In the deceptive pre-dawn half-light, none could be sure of what he saw.
Faintly in the distance those on the cliff-top heard the sound of men in motion. Among the marching men no word was spoken, but the jingle of harness and the tramp of many feet cried defiance to the silent morning air.
Thulandra Thuu raised a voice shrill with tension: My lord! Prince Numitor! Order your men away!'
Startled out of his sleepy lethargy, the prince barked the command: 'Stand to arms! Back to camp!'
The sounds of an approaching army grew. The sorcerer raised his arms and droned an invocation. Hsiao handed him a dipper, with which he scooped up liquid from the cauldron and poured the fluid into a deep crack in the rocks. He stepped back, raised imploring arms against the lightening sky, and cried out again in unknown tongues. Then he ladled out another dipperful, and another.
Along the road from Culario, before that sandy ribbon disappeared beneath a canopy of leaves, the mage could see a pair of mounted men. They trotted towards the Giant's Notch, and as they went they studied the rock wall and the woods below it. Then a whole troop of cavalry came into view; and following them, files of infantry, swinging along with weapons balanced on their shoulders.
Thulandra Thuu hastily ladled out more liquid from the cauldron and once more raised his skinny arms to heaven.
Leading the first rank of rebel horse, Conan rose in his stirrups to peer about. His scouts had seen no royalists in the greenery along the forest road, or at the Giant's Notch, or atop the towering cliffs. The Cimmerian's eagle glance raked the summit, now tipped a rosy pink by the slanting rays of the morning sun. Conan's apprehension of hidden traps stirred in his savage soul. Prince Numitor was no genius, this he knew; but even such a one as he would make ready to defend the Notch.
One scout reported a strange discovery. At the base of the escarpment, leftward of the Giant's Notch, he had come upon a heap of satyr corpses, each with its throat ripped open. The bodies, smashed and scattered, had fallen from the heights above.
'Sorcery afoot!' muttered Trocero. 'The king's he-witch has joined with Numitor, I'll wager.'
As the two lead horsemen neared the Notch, they spurred their steeds and vanished up the road that paralleled the turgid River Bitaxa. Soon they reappeared upon a rocky ledge and signalled all was quiet. Conan scanned the summit once again. He thought he caught a hint of movement —a mere black speck that might have been a trick of light or of tired eyes. Turning, he motioned the leader of the troop, Captain Morenus, to enter the tunnel of the Notch.
Conan sat his mount beside the road, watching intently. As the horsemen trotted past, his heart swelled at the soldierly appearance they made, thanks to the driving force of his incessant drilling. His own horse, a bay gelding, seemed restless, stamping its hooves and dancing sideways. Conan stroked the creature's neck to gentle it, but the bay continued to fidget. He first thought the animal was impatient to move forward with the others of the troop; but as the horse became more agitated, a premonition took shape in Conan's mind.
After another glance at the escarpment Conan, a scowl
on his scarred face, swung off his beast and dropped with a clash of armour to the ground. Gripping his reins, he shut his eyes. His barbarian senses, keener than those of city-bred men, had not deceived him. Through the soles of his boots he felt a faint quivering in the earth. Not the vibration that a group of galloping horsemen sends through the ground, this was something slower, more deliberate, with more actual motion, as if the earth had waked to yawn and stretch.
The Conan Chronology Page 606