"Let fear break your will, and your will drags down our power with it.
Wield what we have given you without fear, and it will do what must be done. We cannot keep our promises to a man who lets fear rule him."
That was as close as any man had come to calling Syzambry a coward since he had been old enough to know that he could have blood for such an insult. He let it pass, for he did not doubt that the wizards spoke the truth and that all of his schemes would fail if his courage faltered.
So the count willed himself to shut the piping out of his mind even if he could not close his ears to the distant, silvery voice. He would not let it surround him, enwrap him like swaddling clothes on a baby, echo within his skull until all awareness of anything but the pipes fled”
Between one moment and the next, Count Syzambry knew that he had won the first victory. The pipes now seemed a long, wailing lamentation for the dead and the dying, for the doomed who knew not their fate. They did not master the count's thoughts.
Instead, the power flowing from the pipes turned against the Pougoi magic unleashed against the palace. The furrow had almost reached the outer wall of the palace when the earth itself heaved up into another wall. Stones poured down from the new wall and into the furrow.
The furrow vomited smoke, so thick that it seemed almost solid. The stones flew out as fast as they fell in, and so violently that some of them nearly struck Syzambry's men. Horses reared, their panicky squeals lost in the din of the tormented earth, and even men began to turn pale faces toward one another.
Syzambry once more found himself battling fear that threatened to eat not merely his magic, but his very wits from within.
Furrow and earthen wall now seemed to fling themselves at each other like maddened monsters. Stones flew high over the ranks of Syzambry's men, dropping among the Guards' huts.
One smashed a hut to rubble, and the count thought he heard the cries of men trapped within. He would have prayed that the stones bury the rest of the Palace Guard, except that praying to god, or even to demon, seemed unwise in the presence of the star-magic.
Syzambry forced himself to look beyond the duel of magic, trying to pierce the palace's veil of dust. In places, the night breeze had torn the veil, and there the count saw what made his heart leap.
The palace was crumbling before his eyes. It could hardly have been crumbling faster had it borne the full weight of the sky-magic. Walls sagged, roofs gaped, whole chambers opened themselves to the sky in the moment before they crumbled into rubble. More dust streamed up, renewing the veil until the count's eyes could no longer penetrate it.
They had no need. There must be defenders ready within the palace. But those defenders would have to fear peril not merely at their flanks and rear, but from the sky above and the earth below. They would be in no condition to make a determined fight.
The wizards had said that the count's will was all that mattered, not where he stood. What better way to steel his will and that of his men than to lead the way into the palace?
Count Syzambry flung the reins of his mount to the horse-holder and scrambled from the saddle. The earth rocked under his feet like the deck of a boat in a flood-swollen river, but he would not let himself fall.
Instead, he drew his sword with both hands, tossed it, caught it by the blade, then raised the point toward the palace.
"The gods themselves cast down Eloikas and all his men! Follow me!"
For a heart-stopping moment, Syzambry heard nothing save the roar of the embattled earth. Then, behind him, blades rasped from their scabbards and the war cries rose.
"Steel Hand! Steel Hand! Forward, the Steel Hand!"
In the palace of King Eloikas, chaos reigned. Chaos past description of belief, even for seasoned warriors such as Conan and Raihna.
Not that either of them gave a thought to describing what was happening about them. Their thoughts were wholly aimed at keeping their men from being caught under the falling rubble.
Then they heard the war cries, louder even than the rumble and crash of stone and the roar of the tormented earth. Out of the thundering darkness, out of the blood-tinted clouds of dust, Count Syzambry's men swarmed to the attack.
If they had begun in any sort of order, they had little or none by the time they came within sword's length of Conan. Their order had not survived scrambling over the upheaved ridge of earth. From the screams heard even over the war cries, it seemed that some of the men would not survive either.
Conan wished that the palace's unknown ally were not using sorcery nearly as dreadful as Count Syzambry's. Defending a place by casting it down upon its defenders was to Conan neither honorable nor wise.
At least the sight could leave the men under Conan and Raihna no doubt that any chance of safety, let alone victory, lay to the fore. To the rear lay only a palace sinking into ruins even as they watched. To the fore lay a human foe, and above that foe, the open sky.
"Eloikas!" Conan roared, his voice rising over the battle din. He hurled himself forward. As a lode-stone draws iron, so the Cimmerian drew after him the men who saw him. Raihna was not far behind Conan, and she did as well with those who saw her.
Count Syzambry's men were scattered, unsure of their footing, and, in places, actually outnumbered. They had better armor and weapons, and more skill, but at first these were not enough.
Nothing save massed archery or overwhelming numbers would have been enough against the Cimmerian. His broadsword hummed through the air, clanged against armor and other blades, and tore flesh and bone with slaughterhouse sounds. When the fighting grew too tangled or opponents too close for proper sword work, it was the turn of his dagger or massive fist.
Together, the Cimmerian's weapons stretched half a dozen foes helpless on the ground before any of the men following him reached an enemy.
When they did, it was with hearts raised by the sight of Conan's work, against foes equally cast down.
The count's men were actually withdrawing when their lord scrambled over the ridge and saw what seemed to be rout and ruin. He heard war cries giving way to shouts of warning, even to stark terror.
He saw the Cimmerian storming forward like an elemental force of nature.
He shouted an order, and the top of the ridge sprouted his archers.
They cocked or drew, and arrows and bolts sleeted down into the ranks of the palace's defenders. Now the warnings and screams were not only from the count's men. Beneath his dust-caked beard, he smiled.
Conan had hoped that in the dust and confusion, the count's archers would be holding back for fear of hitting comrades. They were doing this, to be sure, but they were also bringing down too many of the Guards. The Guards would be spent and broken before "friendly" archery wasted the count's ranks.
The Cimmerian judged as best he could the distance to the count. If a man could just cross the broken ground and scale the slope to bring the count down”
Arrows thudded into the earth and tinged off chunks of rubble by way of a warning. The archers had picked the Cimmerian out of the ranks of his men. If he tried to grapple the count, he would be an arrow-sprouting corpse long before he covered half the distance.
Conan withdrew, more slowly than he had advanced in spite of the arrow hail. It was against his nature to retreat at all, ten times over to start a panic among his men.
The Guards' archers went to work as their comrades retreated. Caught standing in the open, with only luck and armor between themselves and steel-tipped shafts, many of the count's archers quickly lay sprawled on their high ground. The rest hastily sought the protection of the reverse slope, and not all of the count's curses and entreaties could bring them back.
Thus Conan and Raihna, and more than half of their men, returned to such safety as the palace still provided. In the swirling din of the fight, Conan had not noticed that the duel of earth-magic seemed to have ended. But as he helped Raihna bandage an arrow gash in one of her arms, he realized that the earth was both still and silent. Al
so, the palace was no longer raining stones and tiles!
"What now?" Raihna asked, gritting her teeth as Conan tightened the bandage to hold the lips of the wound together. "We've barely won a skirmish, let alone a battle."
"I'll wager that's more than Syzambry expected," the Cimmerian grunted.
He would have given half the hoard of the Border realm, if he'd possessed it, for some wine to rinse dust and grit from his mouth.
"If the lads in the barracks have held their ground, they're in the count's rear," Conan went on. "Curse it! I'd deal with a sorcerer myself, if he could just take a message to
Raihna put a hand on the Cimmerian's arm and pointed. One of Decius's under-captains was picking his way cautiously through the rubble. He kept looking up to see what was about to tumble on him, and each time he looked up, he stumbled on something that had already tumbled down.
At last Raihna took pity on him, scurried down the hall, and led him the rest of the way. Behind what had once been the wall of a sculpture gallery, the three leaders took counsel.
"Decius wishes you to bring your men back to join his so that we may retreat as one the messenger began. He said no more before a Cimmerian roar interrupted him.
"Has Decius turned”lost his wits, or sent a coward as his messenger?"
Conan thundered the question loud enough to raise echoes and bring down loose pebbles from half-ruined walls.
Raihna gripped his arm again, and this time she put her other hand over his mouth. "Conan, for the love of the gods! You want to tell Decius, not the count!"
The messenger had turned pale at the Cimmerian's look, and he still had a corpse's hue as he continued.
"Captain Conan, the lord captain-general did not ask. He commanded."
"I don't care if Mitra and Erlik together are commanding it," Conan snarled. "We've a good part of the Guard out there, and the gods only know how they're faring. If they could break out into Syzambry's rear
"King Eloikas cannot move as fast as one might wish," the under-captain said doggedly. "He must leave the palace now, to escape the men Count Syzambry is bringing against our rear."
Perhaps it was just his blood being roused, or the fact of the sorcery so close at hand. Conan still thought that the man knew something he was not saying about Eloikas's reasons for this hasty departure.
"I wasn't asking the king to lead our charge himself," Conan said.
"Only to remember men sworn to him, and to make one last try for victory. We can still bring down the count. If we can't do that, we can hurt his men and slow their pursuit."
"Perhaps The messenger seemed torn between fear of Decius and the king and fear of Conan. Or was it knowledge that the Cimmerian's counsel held wisdom?
"Raihna," Conan said. "Gather a half score of archers and hold them ready. I'm going to climb as high as I can to see how the men in the barracks fare. If they've fallen or fled, we'll do as Decius wishes."
The messenger opened his mouth to argue, then saw Raihna's hand rest lightly on her sword hilt. His mouth shut again, with an audible click.
Conan saw on Raihna's face a wish that he send someone else. He also saw the knowledge that nothing she said would lead anywhere, save perhaps to a quarrel in their last moments of life. Conan would not readily ask a man under him to go where he would not, still less when the man was barely fledged as a soldier.
Conan dropped his bearskin and slung on a quiver and bow. He kicked off his boots, to bring toes as well as fingers to his climb. Then, as the archers gathered, he picked his stretch of wall.
As Raihna raised her hand, he stepped to the base of the structure. The hand came down, arrows hissed into the night, and Conan began to climb.
Chapter 10
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Count Syzambry was no man to admit failure, let alone defeat. He could alter his plans if they went too plainly awry.
The way in through the front of the palace would need more men than he had in hand. He must not only beat down the king's men, including that black-haired giant who seemed to be worth half a company by himself. He must also face losing men to falling walls, traps, ambushes, and the gods only knew what else as he made his way through the palace.
If he held the defenders he faced, the men he had to the rear of the palace would close the trap. Even holding where he was promised stout fighting, but not beyond what he could ask of his men.
Syzambry's decision had come swiftly. His orders were swifter still..
"Bring half the men from the Guards barracks into line. Move the rest so they stand between our rear and the Guards. Then every man prepare to advance."
Some thought him mad, or at least foolhardy. He could see it in their eyes. But they remained silent, so he need not fear losing any fighting man by summary execution for disobeying orders.
Weakening the watch on the Guards' barracks might let their survivors escape. Every servant of the king who lived through this night would be one more to hunt down later. The Pougoi warriors had refused to march with him against the palace, but they would not scruple at hunting down royal soldiers. If they did, the Star Brothers would remain them of the need to feed the beast.
Conan was perched as securely as the wall allowed before Raihna's archers had time to shoot three times. As the third flight of arrows whistled toward the enemy, he saw that Syzambry's archers were not shooting back.
Indeed, it seemed that the count's men had abandoned the fight, though not the field. Conan strained even his excellent night sight, trying to make out what might be happening beyond that magic-spawned earthen bank.
The dust was still settling, but the magical light was altogether gone and the moonlight turned fitful and dim. Conan would not have light at the price of another duel of sorcery, but he misliked planning his battle like a blind man groping in a rat-infested cellar.
The Cimmerian realized that what his eyes could not provide, his ears might. Cautiously he stood upright, unslung the bow, and nocked an arrow. Drawing back to the ear, he sent the shaft whistling toward the Guards' barracks.
Five arrows drew enough noise to tell Conan that the count still had men watching the barracks. The Guards must yet be there, or perhaps had left so cunningly that the count's men had not heard them.
The count was also moving men toward Conan's right. Had fresh men joined him, or was he drawing men from before the barracks, or both? In either case, the count's men would not likely be thinking of attacking, but of keeping up with their comrades.
Now would be a good time to surprise them, and surprise could be half of victory.
Conan waved Raihna and the under-captain who'd brought Decius's message over to where they could hear the faintest of whispers. They listened to him in silence, although doubt showed on the man's face even in the darkness.
"What of Syzambry coming behind us, between us and Decius?" he asked when Conan was done.
Conan decided that he had thought worse of the man than he deserved.
"You should return to Decius and warn
The under-captain shook his head. "One of your men can take the message as well. I will not run from this fight. Also, I know where we are to meet Decius and the royal party, if we both win free of the palace."
Conan was certain now that he had doubted the man's courage without cause. "Very well, then. But if you want to test your steel against the count's, then tell me and Raihna of the meeting place. Then you can go to the gods leaving everything behind you fine and tidy!"
The under-captain grinned as Conan tossed down his bow and quiver, then followed them in a panther-like leap.
Count Syzambry cursed the unknown archer, but did so silently. More silently than his men had endured the arrows plunging among them, at any rate. Two men had died screaming, and the unhurt were more than a trifle shaken.
Useless to tell them that the dead were unlucky, victims of a man who could no more see his hand in front of his face than they could. Too much sorcery wielded by friend and foe alike had uns
ettled his men.
Nothing but a hard, close fight with honest steel against opponents of flesh and blood would bring them back to their manhood”
A whisper crept along the ranks of the count's men, to reach the count where he crouched behind the crest of the earthen bank.
"The king's men are moving. They know we are coming. They are setting a trap. If we advance, it will be to our death."
Count Syzambry replied with a whispered threat of horrible punishment for cowards.
Silence fell on his ranks. The count turned his eyes to the front. The palace lay before him, a maze of shadows that might conceal anything and certainly hid a determined foe. His men would need torches to shed light as they fought their way into the palace.
The maze of shadows seemed to be even more tangled now. Indeed, some of the shadows were” moving?
"Steel Hand! Cry!" The count kept his voice from screeching like a woman's. But he had to take a deep breath before he could shout again.
"Up! Up and on guard! They're coming out!"
The enemy's giving the alarm did not slow Conan. Nor did recognizing Count Syzambry's voice. The Cimmerian had time for a brief thought that the count must be almost within reach if his words came so clear.
Then chaos erupted again.
Half of Conan's men were not as battle-seasoned as the Cimmerian. Some stood gaping, others cried out, a few began to run. Altogether, they brought the advance to a noisy halt.
At the same time, fire arrows began to plummet onto the Guards' huts.
The uppermost layers of the thatch were as dry as tinder and took fire as readily as straw. In moments, flames were creeping across the roofs of half the huts that had survived the shaking of the earth.
Somewhere among the count's men was a captain who wanted light at all costs. He was gaining it, but the cost included revealing his own men to Conan and the archers at his command.
These archers needed no orders to begin shooting at the men who menaced their comrades. They shot, in fact, with such zeal and so little aim that they were as great a menace to friend as to foe.
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