Part 4 (2/2)
Producing a great hunk of bread from somewhere, with a copper jug of wine, he carried the lot to Yasmina, who had risen from her pallet and was regarding him doubtfully.
”Rough fare for a Devi, girl, but our best,” he grunted. ”It will fill your belly, at least.”
He set the platter on the floor, and she was suddenly aware of a ravenous hunger. Making no comment, she seated herself cross-legged on the floor, and taking the dish in her lap, she began to eat, using her fingers, which were all she had in the way of table utensils. After all, adaptability is one of the tests of true aristocracy. Conan stood looking down at her, his thumbs hooked in his girdle. He never sat cross-legged, after the Eastern fas.h.i.+on.
”Where am I?” she asked abruptly.
”In the hut of Yar Afzal, the chief of the Khurum Wazulis,” he answered. ”Afghulistan lies a good many miles farther on to the west.
Well hide here awhile. The Kshatriyas are beating up the hills for you-several of their squads have been cut up by the tribes already.”
”What are you going to do?” she asked.
”Keep you until Chundar Shan is willing to trade back my seven cow-thieves,” he grunted. ”Women of the Wazulis are crus.h.i.+ng ink out of shoki leaves, and after a while you can write a letter to the governor.”
A touch of her old imperious wrath shook her, as she thought how maddeningly her plans had gone awry, leaving her captive of the very man she had plotted to get into her power. She flung down the dish, with the remnants of her meal, and sprang to her feet, tense with anger.
”I will not write a letter! If you do not take me back, they will hang your seven men, and a thousand more besides!”
The Wazuli girl laughed mockingly, Conan scowled, and then the door opened and Yar Afzal came swaggering in. The Wazuli chief was as tall as Conan, and of greater girth, but he looked fat and slow beside his hard compactness of the Cimmerian. He plucked his red-stained beard and stared meaningly at the Wazuli girl, and that wench rose and scurried out without delay. Then Yar Afzal turned to his guest.
”The d.a.m.nable people murmur, Conan,” quoth he. They wish me to murder you and take the girl to hold for ransom. They say that anyone can tell by her garments that she is a n.o.ble lady. They say why should the Afghuli dogs profit by her, when it is the people who take the risk of guarding her?”
”Lend me your horse,” said Conan. ”I'll take her and go.”
Tis.h.!.+” boomed Yar Afzal. ”Do you think I can't handle my own people?
I'll have them dancing in their s.h.i.+rts if they cross me! They don't love you-or any other outlander-but you saved my life once, and I will not forget. Come out, though, Conan; a scout has returned.”
Conan hitched at his girdle and followed the chief outside. They closed the door after them, and Yasmina peeped through a loop-hole. She looked out on a level s.p.a.ce before the hut. At the farther end of that s.p.a.ce there was a cl.u.s.ter of mud and stone huts, and she saw naked children playing among the boulders, and the slim erect women of the hills going about their tasks.
Directly before the chiefs hut a circle of hairy, ragged men squatted, facing the door. Conan and Yar Afzal stood a few paces before the door, and between them and the ring of warriors another man sat cross-legged.
This one was addressing his chief in the harsh accents of the Wazuli which Yasmina could scarcely understand, though as part of her royal education she had been taught the languages of Iranistan and the kindred tongues of Ghulistan.
”I talked with a Dagozai who saw the riders last night,” said the scout. ”He was lurking near when they came to the spot where we ambushed the lord Conan. He overheard their speech. Chunder Shan was with them. They found the dead horse, and one of the men recognized it as Conan's. Then they found the man Conan slew, and knew him for a Wazuli. It seemed to them that Conan had been slain and the girl taken by the Wazuli; so they turned aside from their purpose of following to Afghulistan. But they did not know from which.village the dead man was come, and we had left no trail a Kshatriya could follow.
”So they rode to the nearest Wazuli village, which was the village of Jugra, and burnt it and slew many of the people. But the men of Khojur came upon them in darkness and slew some of them, and wounded the governor. So the survivors retired down the Zhaibar in the darkness before dawn, but they returned with reinforcements before sunrise, and there has been skirmis.h.i.+ng and fighting in the hills all morning. It is said that a great army is being raised to sweep the hills about the Zhaibar. The tribes are whetting their knives and laying ambushes in every pa.s.s from here to Gurashah valley. Moreover, Kerim Shah has returned to the hills.”
A grunt went around the circle, and Yasmina leaned closer to the loop-hole at the name she had begun to mistrust.
”Where went he?” demanded Yar Afzal.
”The Dagozai did not know; with him were thirty Irakzai of the lower villages. They rode into the hills and disappeared.”
”These Irakzai are jackals that follow a lion for crumbs,” growled Yar Afzal. ”They have been lapping up the coins Kerim Shah scatters among the border tribes to buy men like horses. I like him not; for all he is our kinsman from Iranistan.”
”He's not even that,” said Conan. ”I know him of old. He's an Hyrkanian, a spy of Yezdigerd's. If I catch him I'll hang his hide to a tamarisk.”
”But the Kshatriyas!” clamored the men in the semicircle. ”Are we to squat on our haunches until they smoke us out? They will learn at last in which Wazuli village the wench is held. We are not loved by the Zhaibari; they will help the Kshatriyas hunt us out.”
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