Part 25 (1/2)

Conan had expected anything but that Valeria would throw her arrip on his hair, and kiss him soundly

”All the Gods be praised! I did not know I could so easily avoid sitting and waiting to be thrown to so!”

Conan decided that Valeria was actually saying what he had heard, and that neither of theainst him, there would now be any tame submission to death Valeria was not so made

But that sub her alive

If it was her free choice to fling herself into a last battle at his side, then so be it-and the worse for the Ichiribu if they took the verdict of the drum-dance seriously!

NINE

Valeria still did not understand h, though, and she read in all around her the coht that she was mad

For the tenth time since she had sat down in the canoe, she raised her paddle, letting it find its own balance in her long-fingered hands The ilded the drops of water that fell fro, Lake of Death seemed a monstrously false name for such fine water The surface sparkled, emerald-tinted with flashes of azure, and rippled softly under the light breeze Sun flashed fros of whole flocks of birds beating their way high above the island of the Ichiribu toward the distant shore

She put the paddle down and, again for the tenth tiently rocked the canoe to test its balance It was as fine and light a dugout as she had ever known, both the inside and the bottom scraped and oiled until they were as sh, with all that she had done since fleeing that captain's eht have wasted years in that disrace froer have her back

Or she ht have died from a fever, from a fall from horseback, or by the arrow or blade of soes of a Red Brotherhood shi+p Died, without ever feeling a deck under her feet, seeing a sail sith the wind, hearing the chant of rowers as they took a shi+p out of harbor-

She blinked and thrust the past from her For now, she could live only from one moment to the next, from one stroke of the paddle to the next

Otherwise, Conan would have a ers would rejoice, and she would have thrown her life into the scales for nothing

From twenty paces to starboard, Aondo bared rin Then he raised his paddle and thrust it back and forth in an un her thu after it Aondo's grin wavered, then vanished as the onlookers onshore laughed Valeria even heard one or two besides Conan shout her name as if it were a war cry

Fifty paces to port, the two older warriors judging the race sat in the sterns of their canoes Each of the judges' canoes had four paddlers, although one of the boats was hardly larger than the stout craft Aondo was paddling alone

Aondo, Valeria decided, was once hill, and ht it do him! She had chosen a canoe that she was sure she could handle over the whole length of the race It did notas she led hian The Ichiribu drues, but today they had no such task They were to spur her and Aondo on to greater efforts-and their steady, deep ru her as if with strong wine

Valeria tossed her head, her hair brushed her shoulders, and the two judges raised their tridents When those tridents ca their tridents The rainbows had not faded when Valeria's paddle plunged into the water, driving her canoe forward

She paddled as she had learned to, head up so that her arms had free play and all the muscles of her upper body could feed the are his canoe faster through the water His strokes were not as smooth as hers, but his stout thews th between the two canoes as they passed the firstdown her face and body, and her headband growing sodden She thanked Mitra that she had worn only the briefest of loinguards, apart froainst blisters

The race spanned six ment She had fallen farther behind than she liked by the second mark, and by then, her hair was as sodden as her headband

She was not gaining by the third round Aondo also was dripping sweat, and his canoe seemed to be lower in the water than it had been Was the water splashed froes' canoes were keeping up well, but Valeria did not expect e to the Ichiribu, and honorher fate She would do as she had done before-wager all on her own skill and strength and leave the rest to the Gods

Dip, thrust, lift, twist slightly to the other side, dip, thrust, lift, twist again Her thigh and bellyprotests Dip, thrust, lift, twist a little harder this tiun to burn as if they were filled with hot wax

Aondo's canoe had been steering an uncertain course for some time now