Fantasy Masterworks 01 (71 page)

Amalric gazed at Conan unspeaking. The man was tall and broad as Tilutan had been, without the dead man’s surplus flesh. He could have broken the Ghanata’s neck with his naked hands. ‘They decided to carry me to their city instead of killing me out of hand,’ Conan went on. ‘They thought a man like me should be a long time in dying by torture, and so give them sport. Well, they bound me on a horse without a saddle, and we went to Tombalku.

‘There were two kings of Tombalku. They took me before them - one a lean, brown-skinned devil named Zehbeh, the other a big, hulking black who dozed on his ivory-tusk throne. They spoke a dialect I could understand a little, it being much like that of the western Mandingo who dwell on the coast. Zehbeh asked one of his priests what should be done with me, and the priest cast dice made of sheep bone, and said I should be flayed alive before the altar of Jhil. Everyone cheered and that woke the other king.

‘I spat at the priest and cursed him roundly, and the kings as well, telling them that if I were to be skinned, by Crom, I wanted a good belly-full of wine before they began. Then I damned them for thieves and cowards and sons of harlots.

‘At this the black king roused and sat up to stare at me. Then he rose and shouted: “Amra!” and I knew him - Sakumbe, a Suba from the Black Coast, a fat adventurer I had known well in the days when I was a corsair along the coast. He trafficked in ivory, gold dust and slaves, and would cheat the devil out of his eye-teeth. Well, he knew me and descended from his throne and embraced me for joy - the fat, smelly devil - and took my cords off with his own hands. Then he announced that I was Amra, the Lion, his friend, and that no harm should come to me. Then followed much discussion because Zehbeh and his priest, Daura, wanted my life. But Sakumbe yelled for his witch-finder, Askia, and he came, all feathers and bells and snake-skins - a wizard of the Black Coast, and a son of the devil if there ever was one.

‘Askia pranced and made incantations, and announced that Sakumbe was the chosen of Ajujo, the Dark One, and all the black people of Tombalku shouted, and Zehbeh backed down.

‘The blacks in Tombalku are the real power. Several centuries ago, the Aphaki, a Shemitish race, pushed into the southern desert and established the kingdom of Tombalku. They mixed with the desert blacks and the result was a brown, straight-haired race. They are the dominant caste in Tombalku, but they are in the minority, and Sakumbe is the real ruler of Tombalku. The Aphaki worship Jhil, but the blacks worship Ajujo the Dark One, and his kin. Askia came to Tombalku with Sakumbe and revived the worship of Ajujo, which was crumbling because of the Aphaki priests. Askia made black magic which defeated the wizardry of the Aphaki, and the blacks hailed him as a prophet sent by the dark gods. Sakumbe and Askia wax as Zehbeh and Daura wane.

‘Well, as I am Sakumbe’s friend, and Askia spoke for me, the blacks received me with great applause. Sakumbe had Kordofo, the general of the horsemen, poisoned, and gave me his place, which delighted the blacks and exasperated the Aphaki.

‘You will like Tombalku! It was made for men like us to loot! There are half a dozen powerful factions plotting and intriguing against each other - there are continual brawls in the taverns and streets, secret murders, mutilations and executions. And there are women, gold, wine - all that a mercenary wants! By Crom, Amalric, you could not have come at a better time! I am high in favor and power! Why, what’s the matter? You do not seem as enthusiastic as I remember you having once been in such matters.’

‘I crave your pardon, Conan,’ apologized Amalric. ‘I do not lack interest, but weariness and want of sleep overcomes me.’

But it was not of gold, women and intrigue that the Aquilonian was thinking, but of the girl who slumbered on his lap. There was no joy in the thought of taking her into such a welter of intrigue and blood as Conan had described. A subtle change had come over Amalric, almost without his knowledge.

Into the west, unknown of man, Ships have sailed since the world began. Read, if you dare, what Shelos wrote, With dead bands fumbling his silken coat; And follow the ships through the windblown wrack-- Follow the ships that come not back.

Sancha, once of Kordava, yawned daintily, stretched her supple limbs luxuriously, and composed herself more comfortably on the ermine-fringed silk spread on the carack’s poop-deck. That the crew watched her with burning interest from waist and forecastle she was lazily aware, just as she was also aware that her short silk kirtle veiled little of her voluptuous contours from their eager eyes. Wherefore she smiled insolently and prepared to snatch a few more winks before the sun, which was just thrusting his golden disk above the ocean, should dazzle her eyes.

But at that instant a sound reached her ears unlike the creaking of timbers, thrum of cordage and lap of waves. She sat up, her gaze fixed on the rail, over which, to her amazement, a dripping figure clambered. Her dark eyes opened wide, her red lips parted in an O of surprize. The intruder was a stranger to her. Water ran in rivulets from his great shoulders and down his heavy arms. His single garment - a pair of bright crimson silk breeks - was soaking wet, as was his broad gold-buckled girdle and the sheathed sword it supported. As he stood at the rail, the rising sun etched him like a great bronze statue. He ran his fingers through his streaming black mane, and his blue eyes lit as they rested on the girl.

‘Who are you?’ she demanded. ‘Whence did you come?’ He made a gesture toward the sea that took in a whole quarter of the compass, while his eyes did not leave her supple figure.

‘Are you a merman, that you rise up out of the sea?’ she asked, confused by the candor of his gaze, though she was accustomed to admiration.

Before he could reply, a quick step sounded on the boards, and the master of the carack was glaring at the stranger, fingers twitching at sword-hilt.

‘Who the devil are you, sirrah?’ this one demanded in no friendly tone.

‘I am Conan,’ the other answered imperturbably. Sancha pricked up her ears anew; she had never heard Zingaran spoken with such an accent as the stranger spoke it.

‘And how did you get aboard my ship?’ The voice grated with suspicion.

‘I swam.’

‘Swam!’ exclaimed the master angrily. ‘Dog, would you jest with me? We are far beyond sight of land. Whence do you come?’

Conan pointed with a muscular brown arm toward the east, banded in dazzling gold by the lifting sun.

‘I came from the Islands.’

‘Oh!’ The other regarded him with increased interest. Black brows drew down over scowling eyes, and the thin lip lifted unpleasantly.

‘So you are one of diose dogs of the Barachans.’

A faint smile touched Conan’s lips.

‘And do you know who I am?’ his questioner demanded.

‘This ship is the Wastrel; so you must be Zaporavo.’

‘Aye!’ It touched the captain’s grim vanity that the man should know him. He was a tall man, tall as Conan, diough of leaner build. Framed in his steel morion his face was dark, saturnine and hawk-like, wherefore men called him the Hawk. His armor and garments were rich and ornate, after the fashion of a Zingaran grandee. His hand was never far from his sword-hilt.

There was little favor in the gaze he bent on Conan. Little love was lost between Zingaran renegades and the outlaws whc infested the Baracha Islands off the southern coast of Zinea These men were mosdy sailors from Argos, with a sprinkling of other nationalities. They raided the shipping, and harried the Zingaran coast towns, just as the Zingaran buccaneers did but these dignified their profession by calling themselves Freebooters, while they dubbed the Barachans pirates. They were neither the first nor the last to gild the name of diief.

Some of these dioughts passed through Zaporavo’s mind as he toyed with his sword-hilt and scowled at his uninvited guest. Conan gave no hint of what his own dioughts might be. He stood with folded arms as placidly as if upon his own deck; his lips smiled and his eyes were untroubled.

‘What are you doing here?’ the Freebooter demanded abrupdy.

‘I found it necessary to leave the rendezvous at Tortage before moonrise last night,’ answered Conan. ‘I departed in a leaky boat, and rowed and bailed all night. Just at dawn I saw your topsails, and left the miserable tub to sink, while I made better speed in the water.’

‘There are sharks in these waters,’ growled Zaporavo, and was vaguely irritated by the answering shrug of the mighty shoulders. A glance toward the waist showed a screen of eager faces staring upward. A word would send them leaping up on the poop in a storm of swords that would overwhelm even such a fighting-man as the stranger looked to be.

‘Why should I burden myself with every nameless vagabond that the sea casts up?’ snarled Zaporavo, his look and manner more insulting dian his words.

‘A ship can always use another good sailor,’ answered the other widiout resentment. Zaporavo scowled, knowing the trudi of that assertion. He hesitated, and doing so, lost his ship, his command, his girl, and his life. But of course he could not see into the future, and to him Conan was only another wastrel, cast up, as he put it, by the sea. He did not like the man; yet the fellow had given him no provocation. His manner was not insolent, diough rather more confident than Zaporavo liked to see.

‘You’ll work for your keep,’ snarled the Hawk. ‘Get off the poop. And remember, the only law here is my will.’

The smile seemed to broaden on Conan’s thin lips. Without hesitation but without haste he turned and descended into the waist. He did not look again at Sancha, who, during the brief conversation, had watched eagerly, all eyes and ears.

As he came into the waist the crew thronged about him -Zingarans, all of them, half naked, their gaudy silk garments splashed with tar, jewels glinting in earrings and dagger-hilts. They were eager for the time-honored sport of baiting the stranger. Here he would be tested, and his future status in the crew decided. Up on the poop Zaporavo had apparendy already forgotten the stranger’s existence, but Sancha watched, tense with interest. She had become familiar with such scenes, and knew the baiting would be brutal and probably bloody.

But her familiarity with such matters was scanty compared to that of Conan. He smiled faintly as he came into the waist and saw the menacing figures pressing truculently about him. He paused and eyed the ring inscrutably, his composure unshaken. There was a certain code about these things. If he had attacked the captain, the whole crew would have been at his throat, but they would give him a fair chance against the one selected to push the brawl.

The man chosen for this duty thrust himself forward - a wiry brute, with a crimson sash knotted about his head like a turban. His lean chin jutted out, his scarred face was evil beyond belief. Every glance, each swaggering movement was an affront. His way of beginning the baiting was as primitive, raw and crude as himself.

‘Baracha, eh?’ he sneered. ‘That’s where they raise dogs for men. We of the Fellowship spit on ‘em - like this!’ \ He spat in Conan’s face and snatched at his own sword.

The Barachan’s movement was too quick for the eye to follow. His sledge-like fist crunched with a terrible impact against his tormentor’s jaw, and the Zingaran catapulted through the air and fell in a crumpled heap by the rail.

Conan turned towards the others. But for a slumbering glitter in his eyes, his bearing was unchanged. But the baiting was over as suddenly as it had begun. The seamen lifted their companion; his broken jaw hung slack, his head lolled unnaturally.

‘By Mitra, his neck’s broken!’ swore a black-bearded sea-rogue.

‘You Freebooters are a weak-boned race,’ laughed the pirate. ‘On the Barachas we take no account of such taps as that. Will you play at sword-strokes, now, any of you? No? Then all’s well, and we’re friends, eh?’

There were plenty of tongues to assure him that he spoke truth. Brawny arms swung the dead man over the rail, and a dozen fins cut the water as he sank. Conan laughed and spread his mighty arms as a great cat might stretch itself, and his gaze sought the deck above. Sancha leaned over the rail, red lips parted, dark eyes aglow with interest. The sun behind her outlined her lithe figure through the light kittle which its glow made transparent. Then across her fell Zaporavo’s scowling shadow and a heavy hand fell possessively on her slim shoulder. There were menace and meaning in the glare he bent on the man in the waist; Conan grinned back, as if at a jest none knew but himself.

Zaporavo made the mistake so many autocrats make; alone in somber grandeur on the poop, he underestimated the man below him. He had his opportunity to kill Conan, and he let it pass, engrossed in his own gloomy ruminations. He did not find it easy to think any of the dogs beneath his feet constituted a menace to him. He had stood in the high places so long, and had ground so many foes underfoot, that he unconsciously assumed himself to be above the machinations of inferior rivals. Conan, indeed, gave him no provocation. He mixed with the crew, lived and made merry as they did. He proved himself a skilled sailor, and by far the strongest man any of them had seen. He did the work of three men, and was always first to spring to any heavy or dangerous task. His mates began to rely upon him. He did not quarrel with them, and they were careful not to quarrel with him. He gambled with them, putting up his girdle and sheath for a stake, won their money and weapons, and gave them back with a laugh. The crew instinctively looked toward him as the leader of the forecastle. He vouchsafed no information as to what had caused him to flee the Barachas, but the knowledge that he was capable of a deed bloody enough to have exiled him from that wild band increased the respect felt toward him by the fierce Freebooters. Toward Zaporavo and the mates he was imperturbably courteous, never insolent or servile.

The dullest was struck by the contrast between the harsh, taciturn, gloomy commander, and the pirate whose laugh was gusty and ready, who roared ribald songs in a dozen languages, guzzled ale like a toper, and - apparently - had no thought for the morrow.