Conan the Outcast Read online

  "Why so pensive?” she asked, easing down beside him. “Dreaming again of your beloved Hyborian lands? They make the doings of this watering hole look paltry, I suppose.” She placed her pale hands on his sun-bronzed shoulders, insinuating the carnelian gems of her fingernails underneath the embroidered seams of his short, open vest. "And yet if you took more part in the life of this town, you might find it tolerable. Tonight, Conan,” she purred in his ear, "instead of taking me for a stroll though the date orchards or a dally in the oasis, why don’t you spend the night inside the city wall? I hate to think of you crawling back to your barren camp in the desert after leaving my side.” "Umm,” Conan murmured, "that feels good. Scratch lower down.” He shifted his burly shoulders beneath the dancer’s probing fingernails. "But no, girl, I will be at my best ease in my camp outside the wall. I am a Bedouin at heart, I like yon drovers... the sand my pillow, the stars my blanket.” He nodded to indicate the huddled forms drinking and dicing around the fire.

  "Besides,” he added less lyrically a moment later, "if I take up residence in your quarters, idle tongues will whisper that I am kept by a woman. That would not redound well for your reputation here, or mine. Remember, Sharia, I am a drifter, a loose sword. With the next caravan north I'll be gone.”

  "Yes, I see. Of course you are right.” She withdrew her fingers from his back and sat chastely beside him. In time she entered into idle conversation with the tap keeper Anax, who loitered nearby. Conan, though not excluded, was left to wonder how deeply he may have insulted her—with the inner knowledge that, more than her honour, it was his own convenience that decided his actions.

  But the steady flow of arrak, primed with his dwindling supply of drachms from his last caravan, washed most of his worries downstream. In time he even forgot Sharia, his attention turning to another female who sat talking to a succession of others in a corner of the place.

  The open-sided hostelry was laid out with long trencher-tables and benches at its centre, and smaller round tables and wicker chairs off to the sides. At the front it verged on the open yard and the campfire, beneath a canvas awning supported by tent poles; rugs and cushions were spread there for those outdoor types who preferred to squat, as in a desert pavilion. At the back, in the most civilized part of the room, were a booth for dispensing drinks, and the stone stairway to the higher-priced lodgings above. At a round candle-lit table next to those stairs sat the woman who caught Conan’s eye.

  She was dressed in the manner of a desert maiden, in a long, dark, hooded dress. Her mouth and nose were veiled, but her delicate brow was visible under the hood, over kohl-painted eyes as darkly radiant as the plumes of peacocks. She sat sipping from a tiny cup, entertaining different people at her table for short intervals; most were employees and regulars of the caravansary whom Conan recognized. When they sat opposite her by ones and twos, they seemed to engage in some good-natured, ritualized transaction involving no transfer of money or goods. At times, her voice could be heard gently lilting in laughing discourse above the skirling of the musicians’ flutes.

  She had an air of propriety and restraint overall; yet Conan repeatedly caught her looking his way. It was as if she couldn't keep her eyes away, and sometimes he imagined that each hasty glance was followed by a blush. It was unclear whether she meant to summon him, but at length, when the latest female visitor arose and took her leave, he found himself ambling over to sit opposite her.

  “I am Conan, a traveller out of Aquilonia.” Settling into the chair in an easy posture, he smiled into her mystic eyes. “You seem to know most everyone here, but I do not recall seeing you, so I thought I would make your acquaintance. Tell me—when they come to sit and talk with you, what is it you are doing?”

  She was ill at ease, blinking her dark eye-lashes rapidly; there was a definite blush on her veiled face as she looked him up and down. “Doing?” she stammered in slightly breathless accents. “Why, I tell their fortunes!”

  “Aha, you are a seeress!” For just the fraction of an instant Conan baulked—not so much from his mistrust of wizardry, as from his recollections of the vast, inexplicable things other rune-casters had professed to read in his future. But then he chided himself: how could a young woman like this, tender and gentle as she obviously was, bode him any ill?

  Smiling again, he leaned forward on the table. "You do not charge for your services?” “Take people’s money, you mean?” She shook her head, still seeming caught off guard. "No, it is just a pastime for me... a skill I am not fully mistress of. I would not want anyone to take my poor prognostications too seriously."

  " 'Tis only a lark, then,” Conan nodded. "Good. Because... what is your name?”

  "I? I am Inara.”

  He nodded again matter-of-factly. "Because, Inara, I would think that a long, clear look at the future would have to reveal its share of doom and sorrow.”

  "Oh, yes,” she agreed readily, "I have seen that. Fortunately the fate of most people in Qjara, in the near future at least, seems to be... unremarkable.” She spoke a little nervously, still avoiding looking at him directly. “I tell them my visions just for the fun of it, and for practice. I ask no payment, but occasionally..." she raised her veil with two fingers and sipped from her dainty cup, which was nearly empty "... I let someone buy me a portion of Samaran narcinthe to keep me alert.”

  "Narcinthe—the wine of jasmine petals?” Conan picked up her cup between thumb and forefinger and sniffed the fragrant bead of amber liquid within. "Heady stuff, this.” He signalled the tap keeper, holding up her cup and his beaker splayed between the fingers of one hand. "Anax, two more over here.”

  "This will be my second cup—I never take more than two,” she said, her eyes gazing up shyly over her veil into his. "I have to come here for it, we do not have it in the... farm district.” She looked away again, abashed. "It is what brings me my second sight.”

  "What, you mean the narcinthe allows you to see the future?” Conan shook his head. "I never heard of it having that effect. Wipe out the past, yes, wine can do that... but uncloak the future?”

  At his words she stifled a giggle. "I do not read the future as from a scroll, nor see future things enacted in a magic pool or mirror. But yes, it is the narcinthe that brings on the impressions I do have.”

  "And those impressions are?”

  Inara shook her head, flustered. "I just see things about people, and I get a sense of what will happen to them. It has to do with my feelings about them, too.”

  "What things do you see?”

  "I have to take some time and look hard. For instance, that man over there... the one who is watching the dice game at the long table?” "Yes, the Turanian.”

  "Right, in the green turban. He wears a slave collar around his neck.”

  "No he doesn't,” Conan said, turning in surprise from the game's spectator to Inara’s unblinking eyes. "Do we speak of the same man?” "I meant to tell you, I see the bronze collar chained about his neck. That is my vision.” Shaking her head, Inara sipped from her cup. "It means he has been a slave.”

  "Or will be one, you mean.”

  She shook her head. "The collar is old and worn, so I take it to mean he was one before. If it were new and shiny, it might be in his future.” Inara blinked at Conan from behind her veil. "Anyway, I asked him. He showed me the scars on his neck, from the years before he purchased his freedom.”

  "Humm,” Conan grunted. "That proves little, then. We do not need seers to see the past—at least if it is in living memory.”

  "It proves much to me. And I make it a point always to speak truly.”

  "Yes, I don't doubt that you believe it, girl— but how can you tell your visions from what you are really seeing? The turban, say?”

  "There is a certain shimmer to them. I see them clearly only when I look from certain angles—and only when I drink these eastern spirits.” She saluted him daintily with her tiny vessel, tilting up her veil again with two fingers. "And what of the man just below the
turbaned one? The dice-player—the evil-looking fellow with the scar over his eye?”

  "He is not there.” To Conan’s puzzled glance she replied, "I see the cup shake and the knuckle bones go bouncing, but only the dimmest outline of the hand that makes them do it, and of the hand’s owner.” She shook her head sombrely. "Dead or missing, he will be. And very soon, he is already fading from the spirit world.”

  “Humm. Eerie.” Still digesting this, Conan prodded her onward. "And the woman clinging to his arm, the laughing one?"

  "She is fat with child,” Inara said. "The kohl about her eyes is running down her cheeks from tears.”

  "I see—that is, I hear! Your gift may be genuine." Conan looked challengingly at the woman. "And what is it the spirits show you when you look my way, that you find so fascinating?”

  "Why, nothing.” Seeing that he did not believe her, she hedged further. "Anyway, these things are not always important. Often they have no meaning at all but... a whim.” She averted her face.

  "Out with it, girl!” he said, looming over her in his seat. "I’ve faced the worst before this and lived to tell of it!”

  "When... when I look at you,” she stammered, "I see you in a warrior’s outfit, clad only in armour. Nothing else.”

  "In armour.?" Conan muttered. "A full suit, I hope!”

  "No,” she confessed, blushing furiously, her gaze locked to the table. “In a chest plate and greaves only. A gold helmet, too, crested and plumed, with a golden sword... your weapon is so splendid!”

  "Well...” glancing down at his spraddle-legged posture, he found her deep blush suddenly infectious. He hauled his chair up close to the table, planted his elbows on it, and crossed his forearms. "No shame in it, I suppose,” he opined after a moment. "Some Corinthian nobles fight thus, ’tis said. Mayhap it means only what I already believe... that I am bound northward, and to high estate.”

  When at last their eyes chanced to meet, there was no stopping it—both of them broke into laughter. Suddenly*quaking, disintegrating with it, they upset their drinks and drew surprised stares from all over the inn. The young woman leaned back in her chair in a manner unsuited to her dignified dress; the Cimmerian tried to clutch the table for support and to preserve his modesty. In the course of it he also gripped her small, fair hand; when he released it, he did so tenderly, as one sets free a wild bird.

  "So, Inara,” he coughed at last, "what do they think of your occult talents at your home... in the farm district?”

  She shook her head. "They will have none of it. My family are pious followers of the One True Goddess, and rectitude is their law. In our house no spirits are allowed... of either kind, liquorous or mystical.” She righted her cup on the wet, aromatic table. "When I can stand it no longer, I come here to meet my friends.”

  "I see.”

  “Anyway,” she added, "the folk here have more interesting fortunes.”

  Conan scanned the room, his gaze daring any whose attention their laughter had caught to continue staring. None did; even the dancer Sharia had taken up other company—with Babeth and Memchub, the merchant whom Conan had earlier shunted away. As if to shame her erstwhile protector, Sharia now murmured in the rich man’s ear; the wench Babeth sat on his far side, looking a little neglected.

  "Tell me, Inara, what do your visions show you about the caravaneer there, who dandles the dancing-girl beside him?”

  "I see no man,” Inara was quick to answer. "Sharia lounges against the white belly of a richly-dressed, cud-chewing camel!”

  Another gust of mirth followed, as uproarious as the last but shorter—because, in the middle of it, Inara clutched Conan’s hand. "Oh my!” she gasped. “Here are armed men, temple warriors—they must not find me here!”

  As she spoke, Conan saw the guards in their dusty-blue tunics assembling outside—lean, fit swordsmen with long-handled blades sheathed over their shoulders. A half-dozen in line, they fanned out beyond the fire. Then they moved in among the hostel guests, pausing only to peer into a face here, or bark a curt question there. Discipline and arrogance were evident in their every movement. They wore no armour. except bright silver caps, close-fitting, with short cheek-guards and shallow trailing edges at their napes.

  Inara, with trepidation in her eyes, shrank back into the comer to make herself invisible. Conan muttered to her, "Don’t worry, I’ll make a diversion—watch for your chance, then leave.”

  Careful to turn his back first to the seeress, Conan arose from his chair. Then, shoving past other patrons, he swaggered across the inn to where Sharia and her companions sported.

  "So, Conan,” she said as he came near, "you have met the little sprig Inara! Tell me, how went your fortunes with the veiled young tease?”

  Feigning wrath, Conan ignored her words. He hoisted her out of Memchub’s lap, spun her aside, and seized hold of the merchant’s silken sleeve. "Now, knave,” he roared, “you will learn that the penalty for woman-stealing is dearer than that for filching camels!”

  Yanking the unfortunate caravaneer from his bench, he twirled him by an arm, tripped up his shuffling feet, and propelled him onto the table where the dice game was in progress. Outraged shouts and blows immediately erupted, along with strident voices from the sidelines—including the sterner, more authoritative tones of the temple warriors.

  "Hold and desist!” came the most imperative cry, causing Conan to turn and meet the rush of the enforcers. At first he thought they’d drawn blades—but then he saw they brandished sheathed swords whose hard metal scabbards served as cudgels for belabouring the swearing, scuffling patrons.

  The first pair of guards he easily eluded. Sidestepping one, ducking beneath the man's swinging stave, he drove his shoulder up into the other’s midsection. That hurled the fellow onto yet another table of tavern guests, whose collective fighting and fleeing broadened the riot.

  The next temple warrior was harder to best— a slim, knot-muscled fighter whose jaw was square with righteousness and whose gold-trimmed helmet implied higher rank. His quick, aggressive moves anticipated those of the brawling Cimmerian; his scabbard-stave even grazed Conan’s brow as the northerner bolted past, elbowing him deeper into the fray.

  Conan’s strategy then was to move along the fringe of the room. He laid hold of hapless bystanders and hurled them into the fight, interposing their unwilling bodies between himself and the most intrepid of his pursuers. This served his purpose of confusing matters even further—until the brawl ceased, halted by sudden, unmistakable sounds: the chiming of a fine steel sword-blade unsheathed, followed by a cry of "Die, thief!” a crunching stroke and a high, gargling scream.

  Conan turned. Pushing his way through the suddenly slack combatants, he crossed the room to see the cause. There, facedown on the floor near the open corner of the caravansary, one of the inn patrons lay, a gaping sword wound in his side. His guilt, it seemed, was undeniable—in one hand he bore a short, curved dagger; in the other, a plush money belt whose strap had been slit some distance from its still-clasped gold buckle.

  Over the body stood the ranking temple warrior, whose long, gleaming blade was still beaded with fresh blood. With a soft-booted foot he rolled the body over onto its back, making sure it did not stir. After wiping his blade clean with a silk kerchief he took from his waist, he tossed the soiled rag onto the corpse's chest. The caravaneer Memchub bent down meekly to retrieve his purse; the would-be thief, Conan saw, was the dice-player with the scar over his eye, whom Inara had singled out for death.

  “Here you see the consequence of disorder and riot! Henceforth, honour the peace of the One True Goddess!” The warrior-chief scanned the crowd with a look of stern righteousness as he spoke. “There are others here who are at fault—you, outlander, are not schooled to civilized ways. But step carefully in Qjara!” His cold grey eyes honed in on Conan.

  “Why, you blathering windbag, slayer of pickpockets!” Conan thundered. “Dare you to menace me with fist or steel, instead of mere words—?”
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br />   “Enough,” the warrior-priest rapped out carelessly, overriding Conan’s threats. “The death of one miscreant is adequate to enforce the peace for a night.” Again wiping his sword with a silken kerchief, he returned it to the scabbard held out by one of his troops, then addressed the room at large. "Disperse from here—go about your business, and do not interfere with ours!”

  To Conan's astonishment, the crowd’s response to his words was a scattered cheer.

  “Hail Zaius, greatest of the temple warriors! Hail to the goddess Saditha! All hail!”

  And as the crowd parted in obedience to the officer’s dictum, Conan caught enthusiastic whispers from the patrons.

  “Did you see, the thief had a blade—he tried to slay Zaius!”

  “That was his twentieth kill—Zaius will be the greatest temple swordsman of all time!"

  Puzzling at the foreignness of it all, Conan reined in his annoyance and said no more. Scanning the room, he saw that Inara had departed, so his aim was fulfilled. He marvelled. at her prophecy concerning the dead man—surely it proved her skill. He turned to leave, but then his thoughts were galvanized by one last thing he caught being muttered between two of the temple warriors.

  "The rumour we heard was false after all—the Princess Afriandra is not here.”

  IV

  Slaves of Shartoum

  Tulbar the Hyrkanian awoke from his shallow, wary sleep. He lay silent, listening to the fitful breathing of those around him, and to the canvas of the tent tugging and flapping in the night wind. He could not guess the precise hour, for the moon had not yet risen—at least not high enough to cast its glow on the fabric of the tent peak overhead. But if his instincts had not deceived him, the orb would soon dawn high over the eastern crags. Then would be the time to move.