Part 21 (1/2)

As Conan ruminated this, a step brought him about, to see Ivanos approaching.

”Hah!” Conan scowled. ”I told you to watch while the men slept!”

”They are too hungry to sleep,” retorted the Corinthian, suspiciously eyeing the Yuets.h.i.+.

”Crom!” growled the Cimmerian. ”I cannot conjure food out of the air.

They must gnaw their thumbs until we find a village to loot-”

”I can lead you to enough food to feed an army,” interrupted Vinashko.

Conan said, his voice heavy with menace: ”Don't mock me, my friend! You just said the Hyrkanians-”

”Nay! There's a place near here, unknown to them, where we stored food.

I was going thither when I saw you.”

Conan hefted his sword, a broad, straight, double-edged blade over four feet long, in a land where curved blades were more the rule. ”Then lead on, Yuets.h.i.+, but at the first false move, off goes your head!”

Again the Yuets.h.i.+ laughed that wild, scornful laugh, and motioned them to follow. He made for the nearer cliff, groped among the brittle bushes, and disclosed a crack in the wall. Beckoning, he bent and crawled inside.

”Into that wolf's den?” said Ivanos.

”What are you afraid of?” said Conan. ”Mice?”

He bent and squeezed through the opening, and the other followed him.

Conan found himself, not in a cave, but in a narrow cleft of the cliff.

Overhead a narrow, crooked ribbon of blue morning sky appeared between the steep walls, which got higher with every step. They advanced through the gloom for a hundred paces and came out into a wide circular s.p.a.ce surrounded by towering walls of what looked at first glance like a monstrous honeycomb. A low roaring came from the center of the s.p.a.ce, where a small circular curbing surrounded a hole in the floor, from which issued a pallid flame as tall as a man, casting a wan illumination about the cavity.

Conan looked curiously about him. It was like being at the bottom of a gigantic well. The floor was of solid rock, worn smooth as if by the feet of ten thousand generations. The walls, too regularly circular to be altogether natural, were pierced by hundreds of black square depressions a hand's breadth deep and arranged in regular rows and tiers. The wall rose stupendously, ending in a small circle of blue sky, where a vulture hung like a dot A spiral stairway cut in the black rock started up from ground level, made half a complete circle as it rose, and ended with a platform in front of a larger black hole in the wall, the entrance to a tunnel.

Vinashko explained: ”Those holes are the tombs of an ancient people who lived here even before my ancestors came to the Sea of Vilayet There are a few dim legends about these people; it is said they were not human, but preyed upon my ancestors until a priest of the Yuets.h.i.+ by a great spell confined them to their holes in the wall and lit that fire to hold them there. No doubt their bones have all long since crumbled to dust. A few of my people have tried to chip away the slabs of stone that block these tombs, but the rock defied their efforts.” He pointed to heaps of stuff at one side of the amphitheater. ”My people stored food here against times of famine. Take your fill; there are no more Yuets.h.i.+ to eat it.”

Conan repressed a shudder of superst.i.tious fear. ”Your people should have dwelt in these caves. One man could hold that outer cleft against a horde.”

The Yuets.h.i.+ shrugged. ”Here there is no water. Besides, when the Hyrkanians swooped down there was no time. My people were not warlike; they only wished to till the soil.”

Conan shook his head, unable to understand such natures. Vinashko was pulling out leather bags of grain, rice, moldy cheese, and dried meat, and skins of sour wine.

”Go bring some of the men to help carry the stuff, Ivanos,” said Conan, staring upward. ”I'll stay here.”

As Ivanos swaggered off, Vinashko tugged at Conan's arm. ”Now do you believe I'm honest?”

”Aye, by Crom,” answered Conan, gnawing a handful of dried figs. ”Any man that leads me to food must be a friend. But how did you and your tribe get here from the valley of the Akrim? It must be a long steep road.”

Vinashko's eyes gleamed like those of a hungry wolf. ”That is our secret. I will show you, if you trust me.”

”When my belly's full,” said Conan with his mouth full of figs. ”We're following that black devil, Artaban of Shahpur, who is somewhere in these mountains.”

”He is your enemy?”