Part 29 (1/2)
A sharp eye and sharper steel ainst Marr the Piper and all his works
The second night and second day repeated the pattern of the first
Breaking caht, they heard the sound of men on the march, and Conan went to scout He returned to report that they were a band of peasants
”They on before they saw me,” Conan said ”So I lay close and watched They were forty oronly their work clothes and ar tools Oh, a ht have carried as a free lance But nobody had provided theives hope,” Raihna said ”If Syzambry had called them out, surely he would not have left them a rabble”
”If he had spare ar to Syzaes, likely as not”
Raihna spat ”They are fools, then They rush to ery bear”
”They do not know that,” Marr said ”They are desperate, and that fogs the wits Or have you coot that?”
Raihna gasped and glared Conan stared hard at the piper The Ci about Raihna's birth Have you been reading her thoughts against her will, as you said you could not do?”
Marr looked away, then lifted his pipes Conan raised a hand, ready to snatch them Now the Cimmerian's look said, ”Earn your pardon ords, not with youryou a witling,” the piper said ”You are no such thing But I hear Bossonia in your speech, and I know sos, you did not know enough,” Raihna muttered, but she see peasants died away, and they resuht came down
The would-be rescuers neither heard nor met any further bands on their journey to the valley This was not altogether by chance Marr knew every hill, every valley, and it sometimes seemed to Conan, every tree in the forests He knehich drew hunters and woodcutters, even in troubled times like these, and which were left to the birds and the wolves
”There was once a good number of bears in these forests,” the piper added ”But enerations back I know of two villages where they go in fear of the beasts, so a few may still den up and live off deer and the odd sheep”
”So? We're not here to hunt anierie,” Raihna said
”I do not babble without cause,” the piper said ”One of those villages is close to our path”
”Then take us wide of it, for Crom's sake!” Conan snapped It was the fifth day of their journey Marr talked less in riddles than he formerly had, but when he did, Conan had less patience with hiainst half of the warriors of the Pougoi, or strength against the wizards' beast, si about in an inhdspitable land
”I cannot lead you too wide of it,” the piper said, ”unless you wish to pass through the Blasted Land”
”From what I have heard of that land, I'd take ers both,” Raihna said Conan nodded in agreeoi watch the farther side of the Blasted Land, and few escape their sentries, if they cross the Land at all without taking the bone-burning sickness”
”We'll fight neither beasts nor wizards with our bones turning to water within our flesh,” Conan growled ”Lead as you wish”
The floor under Count Syzaic conjured up an earthquake?
No, it was his body swaying and his legs threatening to give way under hih wind He gripped the bedpost with one hand and held out the other
”My sword!”
Zylku, the surgeon's apprentice, stared One of the men-at-arms lifted the count's blade from the bench at the foot of the bed
”No We cannot be sure that steel-”