Part 28 (2/2)

At first glance the amazed watchers seemed to be looking down upon a glittering sparkling sea of bronze and gold, where steel points twinkled like a myriad stars. With the lifting of the fog the invaders had halted as if frozen, in long serried lines, flaming in the sun.

First was a long line of chariots, drawn by the great fierce horses of Stygia, with plumes on their heads snorting and rearing as each naked driver leaned back, bracing his powerful legs, his dusky arms knotted with muscles. The fighting-men in the chariots were tall figures, their hawk-like faces set off by bronze helmets crested with a crescent supporting a golden ball.

Heavy bows were in their hands. No common archers, these, but n.o.bles of the South, bred to war and the hunt, who were accustomed to bringing down lions with their arrows.

Behind these came a motley array of wild men on half-wild horses the warriors of Kush, the first of the great black kingdoms of the gra.s.slands south of Stygia. They were s.h.i.+ning ebony, supple and lithe, riding stark naked and without saddle or bridle.

After these rolled a horde that seemed to encompa.s.s all the desert. Thousands on thousands of the war-like Sons of Shem: ranks of hors.e.m.e.n in scale-mail corselets and cylindrical helmets the a.s.shuri of Nippr, Shumir, and Eruk and their sister cities; wild white-robed hordes the nomad clans.

Now the ranks began to mill and eddy. The chariots drew off to one side while the main host came uncertainly onward. Down in the valley the knights had mounted, and now Count Thespides galloped up the slope to where Conan stood. He did not deign to dismount but spoke abruptly from the saddle.

”The lifting of the mist has confused them! Now is the time to charge! The Kus.h.i.+tes have no bows and they mask the whole advance. A charge of my knights will crush them back into the ranks of the Shemites, disrupting their formation. Follow me! We will win this battle with one stroke!”

169.

Conan shook his head. ”Were we fighting a natural foe, I would agree. But this confusion is more feigned than real, as if to draw us into a charge. I fear a trap.”

”Then you refuse to move?” cried Thespides, his face dark with pa.s.sion.

”Be reasonable,” expostulated Conan. ”We have the advantage of position ”

With a furious oath Thespides wheeled and galloped back down the valley where his knights waited impatiently.

Amalric shook his head. ”You should not have let him return, Conan. I look there!”

Conan sprang up with a curse. Thespides had swept in beside his men. They could hear his impa.s.sioned voice faintly, but his gesture toward the approaching horde was significant enough. In another instant five hundred lances dipped and the steel-clad company was thundering down the valley.

A young page came running from Yasmela's pavilion, crying to Conan in a shrill, eager voice, ”My lord, the princess asks why you do not follow and support Count Thespides?”

”Because I am not so great a fool as he,” grunted Conan, reseating himself on the boulder and beginning to gnaw a huge beef-bone.

”You grow sober with authority,” quoth Amalric. ”Such madness as that was always your particular joy.”

”Aye, when I had only my own life to consider,” answered Conan. ”Now what in h.e.l.l ”

The horde had halted. From the extreme wing rushed a chariot, the naked charioteer las.h.i.+ng the steeds like a madman; the other occupant was a tall figure whose robe floated spectrally on the wind. He held in his arms a great vessel of gold and from it poured a thin stream that sparkled in the sunlight. Across the whole front of the desert horde the chariot swept, and behind its thundering wheels was left, like the wake behind a s.h.i.+p, a long thin powdery line that glittered in the sands like the phosph.o.r.escent track of a serpent.

”That's Natohk!” swore Amalric. ”What h.e.l.lish seed is he sowing?”

The charging knights had not checked their headlong pace. Another fifty paces and they would crash into the uneven Kus.h.i.+te ranks, which stood motionless, spears lifted. Now the foremost knights had reached the thin line that glittered across the sands. They did not heed that crawling menace. But as the steel-shod hoofs of the horses struck it, it was as when steel strikes flint

170.but with more terrible result. A terrific explosion rocked the desert, which seemed to split apart along the strewn line with an awful burst of white flame.

In that instant the whole foremost line of the knights was seen enveloped in that flame, horses and steel-clad riders withering in the glare like insects in an open blaze. The next instant the rear ranks were piling up on their charred bodies. Unable to check their headlong velocity, rank after rank crashed into the ruins. With appalling suddenness the charge had turned into a shambles where armored figures died amid screaming mangled horses.

Now the illusion of confusion vanished as the horde settled into orderly lines. The wild Kus.h.i.+tes rushed into the shambles, spearing the wounded, bursting the helmets of the knights with stones and iron hammers. It was all over so quickly that the watchers on the slopes stood dazed; and again the horde moved forward, splitting to avoid the charred waste of corpses.

From the hills went up a cry: ”We fight not men but devils!”

On either ridge the hillmen wavered. One rushed toward the plateau, froth dripping from his beard.

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