any man trailing them on foot.
He followed another set of tracks back into the jungle and located the place where the assassins had left their mounts. Bridles and reins hung from the trees to which they had been bound. Saddles sat in the middle of black puddles upon which falling leaves floated, and up through which rose white bones that appeared to be etched by years of weathering. How the creatures had died he really could not assess, save that several skulls sat in puddles slightly removed from those of the closest body. It suggested that the mounts had been somehow linked to the assassins. What he had done to the assassins had been done to their mounts, and he did not find himself regretting that.
He was a Cimmerian. Other men might have wanted a mount to carry him along the coast and eventually through mountain passes. He had been born to the mountains. Turning his back to the sea, he headed inland and up. He moved through the mountains with the ease of a raven winging its way through the sky. And while he did eventually steal a horse, it was only after no mountains stood between him and Asgalun, and straight roads sped him on his way.
CHAPTER 30
THE WORLD SWAM in and out of focus before Tamara’s eyes. The poison had rendered her largely senseless during the ride. She actively sought to forget what little of it she recalled. The mounts had made blasphemous noises as they traveled, a soul-rending screeching with all of the shrill notes of steel etching steel, but in no way sounding regular or right. Arrival at Khor Kalba had not made things better because though the poison’s effects were slowly draining, her body felt as if she were still on the move.
Four robed acolytes surrounded her as she marched through Khalar Zym’s domain. The hallways were so wide and the ceilings so high, she imagined she’d shrunk to the size of a child’s doll. That seemed a more plausible explanation than believing in a giant race that needed such space, or the arrogance of man believing he deserved it. The floors and pillars had been carved of black marble, worn smooth by countless feet and yet colder than the darkest winter night.
Ahead of her Marique stalked through the hallway. She moved with the prideful ease of a house cat within its own domain. She raised a hand as she came to massive iron doors, and they parted before her as if they were servants withdrawing before their master. Their retreat revealed a cavernous room that once had possessed a stately elegance; but its time had since passed.
The room had been transformed by the addition of statuary and other artifacts of times best forgotten. Elder gods crouched on thrones, their webbed feet crushing beneath them the skulls of screaming children. Mosaics had been pieced together on the walls, depicting ancient rituals that involved more bloodletting than religious devotion —though a devotion to bloodletting was not hidden. Here and there, the Mask of Acheron appeared, sometimes worn, always venerated, and clearly feared.
Tamara thanked the gods that she could not see more. She stumbled into the chamber and collapsed at Marique’s feet.
“Behold, Father, I have returned with the girl.”
Khalar Zym slowly roused himself from a daybed. He had been staring intently at the mask. He moved easily enough, but was clearly reluctant to tear his eyes from that most valuable relic of Acheron. Wearing a dark robe, he strode across the floor, his hooded eyes clearing gradually. He smiled, but it was the same smile with which he’d stared at the mask, not a pleasurable response to the arrival of his daughter.
He dropped to a knee and took Tamara’s jaw in his hand. He turned her face left and then right. “So, elusive one, you have joined us finally.”
Tamara tried to shake her head, but she lacked the strength, and even the attempt made the world spin. “You are mistaken. I am no one. I am not the one you seek.”
Khalar Zym glanced up. “Does she tell the truth, Marique?”
Marique stroked a Stygian talon against Tamara’s neck, eliciting a sharp cry. She withdrew it, a drop of blood hanging there. “Would you care to taste, Father?”
He shook his head.
Marique greedily sucked the blood off the talon, then licked the droplet that had risen on Tamara’s neck. “Hot and sweet, Father; the fullness of Acheron’s Royal House pulses through her.”
“Excellent.” Khalar Zym stood. “Preparations are almost complete, and shall be by the eve of the Dead Moon.”
His daughter hissed in Tamara’s ear. “Yes, when the tide has ebbed, and the ruins are dry, when the moon is eager to rise from the grave, then shall Acheron be brought forth again.”
Khalar Zym reached down and stroked his daughter’s cheek. “You have made me proud, so very proud, Marique.”
The sorceress purred.
Tamara, despair welling up inside her, bowed her head and sobbed.
CONAN MOVED THROUGH the fetid alleys of Asgalun, choosing his path by diverting ever deeper into shadow. He could feel the eyes upon him, measuring him. From him thieves could not hear the ripe peal of gold coins in a pouch, just the purposeful jingle of a swordman’s livery and the soft rustle of mail. Most of the watchers dismissed him because of his size alone. Others for the quick certainty of his step. Though he did not belong in the thieves’ quarter of the city, he was not drunk, not a foppish noble seeking adventure and stumbling about without purpose. Those who studied him knew that, at best, attacking him would be a lethal exercise that promised little return for their efforts.
The Cimmerian moved into a tiny courtyard and drove straight at the door beneath the sign of the seven daggers. He pushed the dark, oaken door open and ducked his head to enter. The Den of Blades spread out and down before him; lit poorly, a labyrinth of tables, benches at various levels, and shadows. Hard men and harder women filled it, but none favored him with a glance. To do that would betray concern, and no one here had any concerns in the world.
At least, none that could not be dealt with through a knife in the back, or some tincture of black lotus in a goblet of spiced wine.
Conan read the room as a wolf would read a flock of sheep. He didn’t see Ela Shan, but that did not bother him. Thieves seldom kept schedules and he didn’t know if the small man had even made it back to Asgalun. But someone in the room would know, and that someone appeared to be a fat Argosian perched back in the corner halfway between the bar and the hearth.
He made for the fat man directly, well aware that he was violating customs and protocols. As a young thief in the Maul, he had learned them and understood them, then dismissed them as silly laws imposed by the lawless on other outlaws, a mere parody of the rules of the civilizations upon which they preyed. Had they imposed them to mock those who despised them, Conan would have understood and abided by such laws. But their intent came from pride and pretense, and for that Conan had no use.
He towered over the fat man. “I am looking for a thief.”
“Looking for a thief, are you?” The fat man spread his arms wide, contempt twisting his features. “You accuse us, here, of being thieves, then?”
The Cimmerian’s expression sharpened. “I seek Ela Shan.”
The fat man’s jowls quivered with laughter. “And who do you think you are, barbarian?”
Conan caught the man by the throat and lifted him from his chair. He raised his voice. “I seek Ela Shan.”
The fat man’s face became purple. His nostrils flared. All around Conan, knives slid from sheaths. Table legs scraped and benches squeaked as they were pulled away. Steel sprouted in shadows and silence, save for the pop of the fire and the fat man’s wheezing.
“Stand away, you fools.” Ela Shan appeared from a darkened doorway off to Conan’s left. Dressed in black velvet finery chased with silver threads, and looking as if he had bathed within the day, Ela Shan presented an image that Conan almost failed to recognize. The furtive glances, the haunted eye; they had vanished, and he’d even gained a few pounds—not counting the weight of the half-dozen knives he had secreted over his person.
Ela Shan pushed aside bared blades and moved to the heart of what would have been the killing ground.
