“Is Malak here?” Conan asked the innkeeper quietly.
“Top of the stairs,” Manetes replied. “Third door on the right.” He wiped thin hands on a dirty apron and cast his eyes suspiciously behind the Cimmerian as if looking for pursuit. “Is there trouble in this?”
“Not for you,” Conan told him, and headed for the stairs. He had no worries concerning the gaunt-faced man’s discretion. There was the matter of saving Manetes’ daughter from the clutches of two Iranistanis who had intended her for sale in Aghrapur. Manetes would keep silent if there were hot irons at his feet.
On the second floor Conan slapped open the indicated door, and jerked back as a slashing dagger barely missed his throat. “ ’Tis me, you fool!” he growled.
Grinning nervously, Malak sheathed his blade and backed into the room. Conan slammed the door behind him as he entered.
“Sorry,” the wiry thief laughed shakily. “It’s just … well … Mitra’s Mercies, Conan, Taramis herself out there hunting us, and that fire—that was sorcery, was it not?—and I did not know what had happened to you, and … How did you get free? I’d almost forgotten the fight at the Inn of the Three Crowns, and meeting here after. Do we leave the city now? Did they dig up the gems? We’ll go there first thing and dig them up ourselves. Those stones will keep us—”
“Calm yourself,” Conan said. “We are not leaving Shadizar. At least, not yet. I have a commission from Taramis.”
“What kind of commission?” Malak asked warily. “And how much gold is she offering?”
“What she wants, I don’t know yet. As for price … Taramis claims she can bring Valeria back.”
The smaller man’s breath hissed in through clenched teeth. His dark eyes darted as if looking for a way out. “Sorcery,” he managed at last. “I knew that fire was sorcery. But do you think she has that much power? And even if she does, can you trust her?”
“I must take the chance, for Valeria. I owe …” He shook his head. Malak was a friend, but he would not understand. “You have no such reason, so I will give you my half of Abulates’ gems if you will help me.”
Malak brightened immediately. “You did not not have to make this offer, Cimmerian. We are companions, eh? Still, I will accept it, just so everything is fair. That is, so long as I don’t have to enter Taramis’ palace. She put three of my cousins in her dungeon a few years gone, and two of them died there.”
“She doesn’t know you from Hannuman’s goose-girl, Malak. Still, I will not ask it of you, and you can be sure Taramis won’t. On the plain all she wanted of you was that you leave.”
“That just shows how little she knows of talent,” the small thief huffed. “If she wants a thief, who is better than me? What am I saying? I’ll burn incense in Mitra’s temple to give thanks that she chose you rather than me. What do you want me to do?”
“I will go to Taramis’ palace. You watch it carefully. I do not know where I may have to go, and I may not have time to seek you out first if I must leave the city. Also, find out where Akiro is.”
“Another sorcerer?” Malak exclaimed.
A sorcerer, indeed, was Akiro. A short, plump man with yellow skin like the men of far Khitai, though he had never named any land as his place of birth, he had aided Conan once before with his powers. The Cimmerian did not trust him, entirely—he did not truly trust any wizard—but Akiro had liked Valeria. Perhaps that would weigh in the balance.
“I may have need of him in this, Malak, to watch Taramis’ sorceries, to make sure Valeria is not returned with some bond-spell on her.”
“I will find him, Cimmerian. Do you have time for a drink to luck, or must you return to Taramis’ palace immediately?”
“I must go there for the first time,” Conan laughed. “I left her company without farewells, and her guards scour the streets for me. But I hope to reach the palace without killing any of them.”
Malak shook his head. “You will be lucky if she is not angry enough to have a pike decorated with your head.”
“She may be angry enough, but she will not do it. She sought not just any thief, Malak, but me. She knew my name, and she rode onto the plain to find me. Whatever she intends, Conan of Cimmeria is necessary to it.”
IV
To the city that surrounded it, the palace of Taramis presented the look of a fortress, though not, of course, so much a one as the Royal Palace. That would have been a good way to be shortened a head, drunkard though Tiridates might be. Taramis’ crenellated granite walls stood four times the height of a tall man, being thus two paces shorter than those of the King. Square towers stood at the four corners of the walls, and two more flanked the tall, iron-bound gates.
Those gates stood open as Conan approached, guarded by two warriors in nasaled helms and black breastplates, with long-bladed spears slanted smartly. Other pairs stood, as rigid as the stone they guarded, atop the towers, and more along the walls. The big Cimmerian’s lip curled in contempt for such guards. Like statues, they were, and as much use. On a moonlit night a blind thief could find his way between them without being seen.
The sun now dropped toward the western horizon, and the guards at the massive gates were near the end of their watch, bored and with their minds filled with the food and wine and serving girls that awaited them in their barracks. Conan was within three paces before they realized that he truly meant to enter rather than merely pass by. In their experience, men such as he did not enter the palace of the Princess Royal unless on their way to her dungeons. Their spears dropped as one, long points presented to his chest.
“Be off with you,” one of them growled.
“I am here to see Taramis,” Conan announced.
Their eyes ran over the sweat-caked dust that covered him, and sneers painted their faces. He who had spoken before opened his mouth. “You were told to—”
Suddenly Bombatta was there, flinging a guard to either side as if he barely noticed they had been in his way. The guards slammed against the thick, iron-bound planks of the open gates and collapsed groggily. Bombatta stood where they had been, glaring at Conan, his hand opening and closing on his sword hilt.
“You dare come here after—?” The massive scar-faced warrior drew a shuddering breath. His black eyes were on a level with Conan’s. “Where in Zandru’s Nine Hells did you get to?”
“The camels frightened my horse,” Conan said carelessly. “Besides, I needed a tankard or two of wine to clear the dust from my throat after the ride back to Shadizar.”
Bombatta ground his teeth. “Come with me,” he snapped, spinning to reenter the palace. The guards, just now rising to their feet, stayed carefully out of his way, but he shouted, “Togra! Replace those buffoons at the gate!” as soon as he was inside the walls.
Conan followed, but he was no lackey to hurry after the other, as he must were he to catch up. Instead he took his own pace, ignoring Bombatta’s darkening face as he had to slow his own steps or leave the Cimmerian behind.
A broad, flagstoned way led from the gate to the palace proper through an elaborate garden where marble fountains splashed and shimmered with watery mists and alabaster spires rose to treble the height of the outer wall. Here tall trees cast a pool of gentle shade. There open spaces were filled with flowering shrubs and plants brought from as far as Vendhya and Zingara. Formal walks laced through it all, and merely within Conan’s sight half a score gardeners, their short tunics and bare legs marking them slave, labored to increase its beauty.
A portico of tall fluted columns surrounded the palace itself, and within was a profusion of courtyards floored with polished marble and overlooked by balconies piercing niveous walls that gleamed even in the fading light. Tapestries of wondrous workmanship draped the corridors, and fine carpets from Vendhya were strewn in profusion. Slaves scurried to light golden lamps against the coming night.
Ever inward Bombatta led, until Conan wondered if he were being taken through the entire palace. Then he entered a courtyard and stopped, neither n
oticing nor caring that the other man had stopped as well. Pedestals stood about the court, on each a symbol carved in alabaster or porphyry or obsidian. Some he recognized from the charts of astrologers. Others he was glad he did not know; his gaze did not linger on those. Among the pedestals stood knots of men in robes of saffron and black, embroidered with arcane signs in varying degrees of complexity. Others, in robes of gold, held to themselves apart. All their eyes swung to him as he stepped into the court, eager eyes, eyes that weighed and measured and evaluated.
“The man Conan,” Bombatta said, and the Cimmerian realized he addressed not the watching men, but Taramis, on a balcony overlooking them all.
The voluptuous noblewoman still wore her travel-stained garments, and her face was filled with arrogant fury. Her eyes locked with Conan’s. She seemed to be waiting for him to look away, and when he did not, her head jerked irritably. “Have him washed,” she commanded, “and brought to me.” Without another word she left the balcony, even her back eloquent of rage.
Her anger was no greater than Conan’s own, however. “Have me washed!” he growled. “I am no horse!” To his surprise, Bombatta’s scarred face reflected his ire.
“The baths are this way, thief!” The ebon-armored man all but snarled the words, and strode off, not looking to see if Conan followed.
The Cimmerian hesitated only a moment, though. He would welcome the chance to sluice away the dust; it was only the means of its offering—if it could be called an offer—that rankled.
The room to which Conan was led had walls mosaicked in images of blue skies and river rushes, and in its center was a large, white-tiled pool. Beyond the pool was a low couch and a small table bearing vials of oils. It was the bath-attendants who brought a smile to his face, though. Four girls flashed dark-eyed glances at him and hid giggles behind their hands. Their hair was uniformly black and pinned in identical coils tight about their heads, but short tunics of white linen fit snugly over curves that ranged from slender to generous.
“You will be sent for, thief,” Bombatta said.
Conan’s smile faded. “Your tone begins to grate at me,” he said coolly.
“If you were not needed …”
“Do not let that stay your hand. I shall still be here … after.”
Bombatta’s hand twitched toward his sword; then, the scars on his face livid, he stalked from the chamber.
The four girls had fallen silent during the exchange. Now they huddled together, staring at Conan with frightened eyes.
“I will not bite you,” Conan told them gently.
Hesitantly they moved to him, simultaneously beginning to tug at his garments and chatter.
“I thought you were going to fight him, my lord.”
“Bombatta is a fierce warrior, my lord. A dangerous man.”
“Of course, my lord, you are as tall as he. I thought no man could be as tall as Bombatta.”
“But Bombatta is bigger. Not that I doubt your strength, my lord.”
“Hold,” Conan laughed, fending them off. “One at a time. Firstly, I am no lord. Secondly, I can wash myself. And thirdly, how are you called?”
“I am Aniya, my lord,” the slenderest of them answered. “These are Taphis, Anouk and Lyella. And to wash you is what we are for, my lord.”
Conan ran an appreciative eye over her lithe curves. “I can think of better things,” he murmured. To his surprise Aniya blushed deeply.
“It—it is forbidden, my lord,” she stammered. “We are sealed to the Sleeping God.” Gasps came from the other three, and Aniya’s face paled as quickly as it had colored.
“The Sleeping God?” Conan said. “What god is that?”
“Please, my lord,” Aniya moaned, “it must not be spoken of. Please. If you reveal what I have said, I … I will be punished.”
“I will hold my silence,” Conan promised. But for all he said, they would speak no further word that did not concern his bathing.
He held still for being soaped and rinsed, then soaped and rinsed again. They dried him with soft toweling, then massaged fragrant oils into his skin. Not the most fragrant, to be sure. He managed to avoid those, though he still thought he smelled as perfumed as a noble fop by the time they were done. They were dressing him in robes of white silk when a bald and wizened man entered.
“I am Jarvaneus,” the old man said, bowing slightly, “Chief Steward to the Princess Taramis.” His tone indicated he considered that position infinitely higher than that of a thief. “If you are finished, I will take you to—” He coughed as Conan took up his sword belt. “There is no need for that here.”
Conan fastened the belt and settled the broadsword and dagger into place. He had little liking of being unarmed in any circumstances, and the more he learned the less he wanted to be so in Taramis’ palace. “Take me to Taramis,” he said.
Jarvaneus choked. “I will take you to the Princess Taramis.”
The Cimmerian waved him to lead on.
Surprise upon surprise, Conan thought when the old man left him. It was no audience chamber he had been taken to. Golden lamps gave light against the deepening night. A huge, round bed veiled with sheer, white silk took up one end of the great room. The marble-tiled floor was strewn with rugs from Vendhya and Iranistan, and in its center stood a low table of polished brass on which rested a crystal flagon of wine and two goblets of beaten gold. Taramis, swathed in black silk robes from neck to toe, reclined on cushions piled beside the table.
They were not alone in the room. In each corner stood a black-armored warrior, unhelmeted and with his sword slung across his back so that the hilt stuck above his right shoulder. Straight ahead these men stared, not moving a muscle, not seeming to breathe or to blink.
“My bodyguards,” Taramis said, gesturing to the four. “The best of Bombatta’s warriors, almost as good as he himself. But do not let them worry you. They attack only at my command. Wine?”
She rose smoothly and bent to fill the goblets. Conan’s breath caught in his throat. The black silk had tightened across her rounded buttocks as she bent. In its multitude of folds, the garment was opaque, but in a single layer it was as mist. And Taramis wore naught beneath it but sleek skin. As she came toward him with the wine, he found he could not take his eyes from the slight sway of her heavy breasts.
“I said, if you wish food, I will have something brought for you.” The noblewoman’s voice was thick with amusement.
Conan started, colored, then colored deeper when he realized what he had done. “No. No, I want nothing to eat.” Furious with himself, he took a goblet. What was he about, he wondered, staring like a boy who had never seen a woman before. If he could not keep his wits better than that, he had as well give it over. He cleared his throat. “There is a commission you want me to carry out. I cannot do it until I know what it is.”
“You want this Valeria returned to you?” She moved closer, till her breasts brushed against his chest. Even through his tunic they seemed to burn like two hot coals.
“I want her alive again.” He stepped to the cushions—casually, he hoped—and lay back. Taramis came to stand over him; he looked up, and had to pull his eyes away from the tantalizing line of thigh and belly and breast. He did not see the small smile that flashed across her lips.
“Hold hard in your mind to what you want, thief, and do as I command.”
“You still have not told me what I must do.” He had to suppress a sigh of relief when she moved away from him and began to pace.
“I have a niece, the Lady Jehnna,” Taramis said slowly. “She has lived her life in seclusion. Her parents, my brother and his wife, died when she was little more than an infant. The shock was too much for her. The child is … delicate, her mind fragile. But now she must go on a journey, and you must accompany her.”
Conan choked on a mouthful of wine. “I must accompany her?” he said when he had his breath back. “I am not accustomed to being a companion to noblewomen. I mean, it is not the sort of thing I d
o.”
“You mean you are a thief,” Taramis said, and smiled when he shifted uncomfortably. “I have not turned you over to the City Guard yet, Conan. Why should I now? It is a thief I need, for Jehnna must steal a key, a key only she can touch, and also the treasure that key will open the way to for her. Who better to aid her in that than the best thief in Zamora?”
The big youth felt as though his head was spinning. Carefully he set the goblet on the table. The last thing he needed then was wine. “I am to take this child, this Lady Jehnna, on a journey, and help her steal an ensorceled key and a treasure,” he said wonderingly. “If you say this is the service you require in return for Valeria, I will do it, though I cannot see why she does not travel with a retinue of servants and a hundred of your guards instead of with one thief.”
“Because the Scrolls of Skelos say she must journey without such.” Taramis stopped, biting at her lower lip.
“These scrolls,” he began, but the silk-draped woman waved a quick hand in dismissal.
“Prophecies,” she said hastily. “They tell what must be done, and how. Put them from your mind. They are in an ancient tongue known only to … scholars.” She eyed him consideringly, then went on. “There is some vagueness about numbers, but only two companions are mentioned specifically. I have decided to risk sending no more than that. The two will be yourself and Bombatta.”
Conan grunted, abandoning the scrolls for more immediate concerns. Bombatta to ride with him? Well, he would deal with the man when and if he had to. “Where is this key to be found?”
“The Lady Jehnna will show you.”
“It will be best if I have a map,” he told her, “and a plan of the place where the key is kept. The treasure, too. And what manner of treasure is it? Will we need pack animals to carry it?”
“The Lady Jehnna will know it when she sees it, my fine thief. And she can hold it in her hands, which no one else can do. That is all you need to know. As for a map, there is none, can be none, outside of Jehnna’s head. At her birth spells were cast to attune her to this key. She will sense the key as you journey, and know how to reach it. When the key is her hand, she will become attuned to the treasure in the same way.”
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