Part 3 (1/2)
His weapon training, by contrast, had grown routine, even interesting, since being taken over by Durwald And his horse pacing was tolerable under the lax supervision of Arga, the farrier After the perils of the first days, Conan was beginning to feelthese Nemedians, vain as they were of their petty local crotchets and custoer here at the Manse, but not without a ready escape route and solanced carefully through the arch before entering the ground-floor corridor He assumed that histo the kitchen, he did his share in helping to lay out the servants' dinner, then did rown to accept him, even to like him This was especially true of Velda, the fat, bawdy chief cook; the sly tow-headed boy, Glin; and Lokey, the half-witted kitchen hand whose forehead was still flat on one side from a mule kick received in childhood
Conan's preemptive appetite posed no threat to any of them since food was ever-plentiful in the lower reaches of the house, as it asted royally by the nobles above And in these gatherings, Ludya's familiarity helped to draw the stolid Ci the ends and gruesores and trolls
Later, when all were abed-and after a brief, restless wait in his own sleeping-closet for discretion's sake-Conan went to Ludya's side They eether, and eain Ludya confided her fondest ambitions to him
”Even in class-bound Neirl of lowly station is favored by a man of position and taken by hidoms where queens and priestesses hold sway, rank accrues only to thein spirit, can rise greatly Like the Lady Heldra” Ludya's voice was a sighing warood fortune,” heas one doesn't end as she did, with poison in her craw or a dagger in her back!”
”I serve the baron's table, Conan, and of late I have felt the young Lord Favian's eyes on e”
Conan's voice ruainst Favian He is an intemperate chap, and violent in his cups”
”Not like you in the least, is he, Conan?” Ludya teased ”But truly, nobles ed by the sah heavily on them and impel them to excess Favian merely bridles under his father's strictness, as any son would”
”Now there is a thought! If you want to rise in the world, why not catch the watery eye of the old ht to the top, marry the baron and ed to convey a cynical distaste
”Oh no, Conan! 'Tis a well-known state secret that Baldomer has no use for women” Ludya's voice shi+fted from protest back to confidentiality ”In the last Brythunian border war, just before Favian was born, he sustained two grave wounds: the one to his face and another lower down, here!” Ludya's hand erous custo of kilts by Nemedian nobles He was sorely impaired; that is why he so cherishes Favian as the last Einharson heir
”But I know you were jesting Really, Conan, how could you suggest such a thing? Me seduce the baron, indeed!” She laid a hand on her bedmate's cheek in a ood-looking as Favian” She pecked a kiss on Conan's cheek ”Why, Favian is just as beautiful as you aremaybe even handsoy with sleep and ebbed tides of pleasure, Conan raised himself from the warmth of Ludya's bed He crawled to the end of the stall and drew on his clothes quietly to avoid waking her He peered through the drapery, then went silent into the dim moonlit common-room
His destination was not the burlap and hay of his own pallet For that he would not willingly have abandoned the Nerant warmth of her body
He padded to the kitchen archway and felt his way cautiously through the roolow of banked cook fires An alht outlined the half-open door to the corridor; when Conan edged up to the opening and eased his head through, he saw the night sentry standing against the wall beside the Manse's rear entry
The guard was a veteran in full unifor steel helmet and breastplate Burdened so unco Conan knew He stepped back inside the kitchen and waited
Indeed, in a little while he heard the scuff of leather soles in the corridor They passed the kitchen, turned around and passed it again Conan chose that uard ended his circuit and turned back to face the corridor, the youth had flitted behind hih another archway
The Cih pitch-black storeroo panther and h northern woods Now he employed these talents in pursuit of a more fabled reward: the vast treasure that all castles harbored and all barons hoarded Legendry told hily, and the pro his share of it made him bear all the vexations of the place
Another hope was to find soth he needed it, than a desperate dash through the open palace gates by daylight Although he had found no hint of such a route yet, a previous night's wanderings had taken hihest roof of the Manse, to an aerie above the very hel sentries There he had breathed the heady airs of suazed out over the slate and thatch of the town roofs to the htly secured and well-patrolled was the baron's keep during the dark hours Still, there would be a way
The once-glimpsed stair, which Conan now found by touch, ascended toward an unexplored quarter of the Manse But as he started up the narrow steps, he heard the scrape of a door at the top A crease of light appeared and widened, sending forth yellow rays to pierce the dusty expanse of the storerooe behind a bale of coarse cloth
The source of the light proved to be tapers of cri silver candelabru rays descended toward Conan, he was forced to crouch low out of sight But the scuff of feet on the steps bespoke the presence of only one person, and so, as the light passed hilare illued profile: Baldolanced up to see that the door was shut Then,shadows thrown back by the swaying double flame, he followed The Cimmerian felt intense curiosity over Baldomer's presence in the castle's nether rooe for the excursion, consisting of a long, pale nightshi+rt, his leather kilt belted over it, and upon his breast a heavy, gleaer-pointed blades
The night-walker moved on steadily, as if sure of his purpose; yet Conan wondered that he see for the blank end of the vast, vaulted storerooht Was Baldo to visit a treasure-hoard secreted inside one of these dusty bales or kegs, or s of the cellar floor?
Walking straight to the back wall of the chamber, the baron set down his candelabrum on a crate at one side; then he laid his hands on a cobwebbed wooden loom across which a dusty, half-finished tapestry stretched like the sagging web of a titanic spider Leaning and straining, the nobleman shoved the heavy frame aside to reveal a breach in the wall beyond a low, dark archway barred by aany lock or bolt that Conan could see, Baldo swung open, it sent a rusty, rasping groan echoing through the dim emptiness The baron picked up his candlestick and stooped to enter the cra iht when Conan ventured forward to follow
He nearly tu inside the archway, but he caught hi his palms between the narroalls He descended swiftly and silently, anxious to overtake the last faint gli beneath
The level corridor at the bottom was a burial crypt lined with open alcoves Reflections of retreating candle-flaainst its wet, slireen-bearded with sparkling nitre Conan feared that the baronthe straight, narrow passage; fortunately, stone h for hii of Dinander's past rulers, Conan surmised Involuntary contact with the ht of the distant candle-beams, that the sides of each one were intricately carved with runes and heraldic sy sword and suit of mail, probably once the favorite battle-dress of the noble cadaver tucked away inside
Conan felt uneasy about these relics; he avoided touching them, for he possessed the priers in theold, this foul grave-trash was scarcely the treasure he sought Nevertheless, each tie ahead, he found it necessary to shelter behind the coffins and press up close against theht corridor, Conan began to wonder just where beneath the Manse or its grounds he was; the tunnel see's foundation Then he saw an end to the journey, for the will-o'-the-wisp candlestick cae, ornate sarcophagus The box lay transverse across the corridor where it abutted a wall just ahead
Halting, the baron knelt with a genuflection that was screened by his body and invisible to Conan Then he reached forward a up what looked like the rust-eaten skeleton of a great longsword With careful reverence he propped it against the wall behind the sarcophagus When it was placed thus, its hilt, star-shaped because of its crossed double hand-guard, stood up behind the marble coffin lid like a holy fetish above an altar It resembled the amulet around Baldomer's neck, Conan realized; indeed, it was probably the model after which the charm was fashi+oned
The baron took up the candelabrum and placed it in front of the hilt, so that the star was visible through the vacant center of the silver-branched utensil The flickering tapers at either side illue hilt
The light in the gloohter by virtue of Baldomer's careful placement of the sword To Conan the weapon see uncanny in the way the flames danced and shi+mmered on the ancient metal, and for a azed on was old or new, corroded or freshly polished He blinked repeatedly, squinting at the odd illusion
Baldo his kilt beneath his bare knees on the stone Meanwhile, Conan crept forward for a better view, until he was lurking behind the last sarcophagus short of the candlelit one, mere paces from the baron He peered over the coffin carefully so as not to disturb the debris atop it; some of the armor in this deeper and older part of the crypt was more intact than was the newer rusted plate Fashi+oned of heavy bronze rather than of steel, it was tarnished bright green, but still serviceable
Baldo the narrow confine His utterance was couched in archaic dialect containing obscure hints and allusions, but Conan could follow the gist of the ritualized statement
”Sacred sword of Einhar! Blade of my father's father's first father, I co the storied ti Still we remember the old days, and honor the old ways Kin of thine shall never brook the insolent eye, nor the treasonous tongue, nor the hand that htful prey of the blades of Einhar's sons!
”O Sword of ilant on our behalf Watch over our clan; teth Stand thee ready to lead us in the exercise of our noble privilege, carved aforetimes from the bones and blood of uinary chant, the halloord appeared to blush ever brighter, Conan could now distinctly see candle-flickers playing along a glea The undeniable evidence of sorcery lanced nervously over his shoulder to spy for other lurking shapes aht struck hi low The baron must soon finish his observance, and when he did, he must needs ed to hide behind a coffin and then follow the noble out, he would reach the cataco closed and the heavy dross of the storeroo entoick-ridden crypt , intoning noble, he crept back along the passage Once he put a safe distance between hiht, he paused to watch the baron halt his utterances and, acandles for his ancestor's sword Satisfied that the strange religious observance was ending, Conan groped the rest of the way along the passage and at length back through the darkened storeroo of value he took with hie For as he had lurked in an alcove near the end of that ancient corridor, he found that it contained, in addition to a coffin, a concealed door Cleverly shaped of stone, the portal filled and sealed the niche alh the crack beneath it blew a draft, a war the dank, noiso his face near the floor to sniff it, the northerner had sht
INTERLUDE
The Plain of Smokes
Froh sultry, yellowed daylight a ed line across field and copse, scrah shallow canals
Peasants they were, sturdy arb of their daily toil Yet theyflails and hayforks like swords, their faces wearing a hardened warrior's lack of expression Their home fields and crofts were left far behind, else they danced up in fla fire on either hand
In places along their line where a cottage or a hayrick was set newly alight, groups of ered nearby; weapons laid aside, they crouched in waiting circles As rats, cats and sundry ver heat, the waiting ones seized theers threw off any sign of their huether at the saer teeth
When hules ensued, but the feasting was of a different nature As reedily upon the victitheir prey, each captor would bite down once, hard The victiony and fear, would lie stricken on the ground In ti, to shuffle after their attackers Finally each would take up a weapon, to becon proceeded froh it all, there sounded no druly the conquerors went on of their own accord, with no sign of leadershi+p but one: down a rough dirt path that ran diagonally across the line ofsmokes, a chariot rumbled
It was a rude vehicle cut down froaudy draperies and other petty spoils of the rural can To its heavy poles had been yoked three sturdy farh not wellconveyance rode three figures The driver, a brawny es of soot still shi+ning on his thick arms and unshaven jaw; the fellow beside hi trapper judging by the rich and somewhat unripe appearance of the animal furs in which he was decked from neck to toe These two stood in the front of the chariot, wordless and expressionless, stiffly balancing the weight of their bodies above the jolting axle