Conan The Freelance (14 page)

“And past that?”

“The Mist Mage lives in the weed. He has a floating castle in the middle. No one has ever gone there and returned, save his creatures.”

“Best hope we catch the selkies before then,” Conan said.

Aye.

Thayla and Blad counted the dead Pili they found along the riverbank. There were at least a dozen, and the Dragon knew how many more might have been washed downstream out of sight. That fool, her husband, did not seem to be among the corpses. Thayla was unsure of how to react to this. While Blad moaned over dead comrades, Thayla felt that the discovery was somewhat a mixed blessing. Had the king been among the fallen, her chase would have been over. She would be queen, could choose some pliant male as consort-maybe even Blad here-and live out her days in what luxury she could force from the Pili.

But as long as Rayk lived, there existed the chance that he would find out about Conan. Of course, she had survived such rumors before, because the transgressor in question had always been devoured and therefore had been unable to answer any questions about the matter. Even a fool expected no reply from a boiling pot of soup. But Conan lived, and as long as he and her husband both continued to do so, she was in peril.

“We need a raft,” Thayla told Blad. “Construct one so that we may cross.”

“At once, my queen.”

“You need your strength now,” she said, smiling at the young male, “but after we cross the river, perhaps I can find a way to suitably reward you for your steadfast service, Blad my worthy.” Might as well bind him to her personally, she decided.

The young male stared at her. “I need no reward, milady.”

Thayla shrugged out of her heavy travel robe, then quickly removed her undergarments. After

a moment, she stood naked before him. “But you shall have one anyway. If you hurry.”

As she redressed, Thayla smiled and thought to herself that never had she seen a Pili move with such alacrity.

Where was the talisman?

That was the question that filled Kleg’s mind to bursting. How could it have been lost? When? Where?

As he made his way back toward the inn, he went over in his mind for the hundredth time all the events and places of the last day. He had still had the talisman in the room he had taken for sleeping. He had opened the pouch to check. Somehow, he had failed to secure the leather strings properly, and somehow, the magic Seed had fallen from its container.

Had it been during the run downstairs? Or when he had seen that beast? Or when … ?

Wait. He had bumped into somebody on the street, some fool gawking at the inn, he had shoved the man aside—

Yes! That was it! He must have flung the talisman loose during that encounter.

In the dark, perhaps no one had noticed it. It was not remarkable to look upon, a brownish gray, mostly round, and pointed-on-both-ends seed, looking like nothing so much as a giant fruit pit.

With the coming of daylight, however, someone might notice the Seed.

Kleg moved quickly, but he kept to alleyways and next to buildings as much as possible. Dawn brought an end to the shadows in which he had hidden from the Pili, and there were at least a few who had not met their end at the jaws of the beast. Of course, they should not be inside the village, so they would also have to be less than obvious in their movements. A single Pili here and there would likely raise a few eyebrows but no real alarm. Half a dozen spear-bearing lizard men marching abreast would have the local guard out in a hurry, and they had to know that.

The Prime selkie crossed a narrow side road, moving quickly past an old man throwing grain into a penful of swine. The old man stared, but Kleg did not speak or slow his pace.

And what of that monster? What had happened to it? He had not seen it again during his dodgings, but he doubted that the creature had been slain by the Pili, or by anybody else.

Ah, this was all becoming too complicated. He had to find that talisman, and he had to find it quickly!

Seihman looked up from his strewing of near-fermented grain to the pigs to see the selkie march past. The old man shook his head. Strange goings-on about here of late. There was that demon thing in the street, this selkie, and early this morning, when the cock still crowed, he had seen one of them lizard men skulking about, too. It added up to a bad omen, he reckoned, and best he step lightly so as not to get stuck in the middle of whatever was going on.

He tossed the final bucket of slops to the pigs, dropped the wooden container next to the rail fence, and figured it was time to go and get something to drink for breakfast. The goatherder ought to be coming round about now, and maybe he could get a bit of free wine out of him with the story about the monster.

Oh, and that pit he had found, maybe he could take that by Old Talow’s and get a copper or two for it.

Seihman reached inside his shirt for the seed.

Whups. Not there. Hmm. Musta dropped it somewheres. Ah, well, no help for it. Probably not worth anything, anyways.

Keg could not recall a worse day in his life. The time He Who Creates caught him with the kitchen maid had been bad, as had the occasion when he accidentally ripped a thousand-year-old tapestry down from one of the castle walls. This, however, made those as nothing.

He had returned to the street outside the destroyed tavern. The monster was gone, fortunately. Unfortunately, the magic talisman was also absent. If he had in fact dropped the item in the street and he could not think otherwise then somebody or something had picked it up.

The sun’s light slanted down from on high, and Kleg could not tarry for fear of being spotted by the Pili. He had seen a pair of them lurking behind a shed earlier, but luckily they had not been aware of him.

The selkie leaned against the back wall of the

Wooden Fish, hidden in a patch of thick shade: What was he going to do? To return to face He Who Creates without the talisman meant a painful, messy death, and no doubt of that. To fail to return would hardly be better. Kleg knew that no matter how fast or how far he ran, he could not escape the vengeance of his master. He could put off the inevitable for a time, but as sure as the sun went down each night so would Kleg go down, and if his death for failure would be bad, his end for trying to get away would be thrice as horrible, were such a thing possible. He Who Creates had raised the selkies from the slime of the lake bottom and made them stronger and faster than the men who ruled most of the earth. One who could turn bottom fish into selkies with a wave of His hand could certainly find one of His creations and squash him as easily as a child could squash a bothersome gnat.

No, neither of those options offered the Prime selkie the slightest joy.

The only road to redemption was the road that led to the talisman. But how? He could hardly walk around asking every passerby if he had happened to find a magic Seed stolen from the Tree Folk, now, could he? And mayhaps the Pili had already found it.

Kleg shook his head. Why had he been put in this position? All he asked from life was to be allowed access to females and game fish! It was hardly fair. He had done what he was supposed to do. Surely He Who Creates, Who Knew All, could see that?

Aye. And perhaps this was part of the test. To see how hard His servant would strive to accomplish his given task.

Kleg shook his head again. Why me?

Evening began drawing her black cloak about the land when Conan and his party finally caught up with Tair and the second group of Tree Folk. There was some rejoicing to see those still living, and also sorrow for those who had perished along the way.

As the two small units of Tree Folk mingled, Conan stood apart. Not far from them, a huge black rock lay embedded in the earth, as if dropped by the hand of a careless god.

The greetings and commiserations done, Tair and Cheen came to stand next to Conan.

“The village of Karatas lies just beyond the black rock,” Tair said. “The last of the selkies have attained sanctuary there. There was a battle at a river a ways back, between the selkies and a large group of Pili.”

“Aye,” Conan said, “we saw signs of it.”

“Apparently the Pili also chased the selkies. Somehow, they, too, have managed to get inside the walls surrounding the village.”

“Then that is where we must go.”

Tair nodded. “Aye, but there is a problem. Due to some trouble, the normal gate guard has been trebled, and they are allowing no strangers to enter. Even one who is as brave and strong as I cannot hope to break through the entrance.”

Conan shrugged. “So we find another way to get inside.”

“I am given to understand that the walls of Karatas have not been breached since they were built,” Cheen said. “Some have tried.”

“I did not offer to breach them,” Conan said. “Do you not think that you can climb them?”

Tair grinned widely and slapped Conan on one hard shoulder. “By the Green Goddess, surely you jest? There is nothing I cannot climb!”

“And the others?”

“Well, they are not so adept as I, certainly, but a wall of wood can hardly offer much challenge. The palisade is, after all, nothing more than a bunch of trees without limbs.”

“Then we should find an unwatched spot and climb,” Conan said. “When darkness is the deepest.”

“Aye, a clever idea. We can drop a line for you once we are atop the wall.”

“I think I can manage the climb on my own.

Aye, he thought, or die trying before allowing himself to be pulled up on a rope. The Tree Folk had no more fingers or toes than did Cimmerians, and if they could scale that wall, he would be cursed forever if he could not do the same.

“I shall send a scout to find a good place,” Tair said. “Meanwhile, let us eat and speak of our adventures. I have much to say.”

Conan grinned. Aye, he was certain of that fact. Never had he met a people so full of themselves. They had raised the standards of bragging, to be sure.

Thayla chewed on a hard root and grimaced at the taste and texture. There was some milky fluid in the thing that spurted into her mouth, producing a salty and slightly bitter tang. While sustaining, it was hardly part of a diet she would desire given choice. Still, one had to make do. There was no time to hunt meat and still maintain their watch on the Tree Folk and that accursed Conan.

Next to her under the cover of thick shrubbery, Blad smiled at her. Simpleton that he was, he required very little to make him happy. After crossing the river where so many of their kind had died, Thayla had gifted the young Pili with a treasure he had never thought to attain, and now he belonged to her, body and spirit. Males were so predictable it was laughable.

“They are settled, you say?”

“Aye, milady. They eat and talk among themselves.”

Thayla digested this bit of information along with another bit of root. Whatever idea she had had about slaying the Tree Folk one at a time vanished when Conan and his group joined another, larger band of the accursed humans. There were nearly a score of them gathered together now, and a misstep on Blad’s part would likely see him skewered. Not that such an idea greatly distressed her, since she thought of males as disposable-one Pili was as good as another; they all looked alike under the moon-but since Blad here was the only one she had, Thayla was loath to give him up-at least until she had a suitable replacement.

“We are near the village?” she said.

“Aye, my queen. A few minutes’ walk.”

What, she wondered, were the Tree Folk up to now? And where was that fool husband of hers? The village squatted on the edge of a vast lake, and he had to be inside the walls-unless he was in the water or somehow on the weed therein, neither of which she thought likely. So what was he doing in there?

“Go and watch the men,” Thayla ordered. “Report back immediately if anything happens.”

The smile vanished from Blad’s face. Doubtless he had something other in mind than lying alone in the brush spying on their quarry. Thayla reached out and stroked his arm. She gave him a half-lidded look and a sultry smile. “I shall wait here for your return.”

The grin blossomed again on Blad’s face and he jumped up almost eagerly. “At once, my queen!”

After he was gone, Thayla shook her head. Truly males were driven by something other than their brains.

The thick of night found Kleg sitting unhappily in a rat-infested tavern near the docks. A sign outside proclaimed the tavern to be the Bright Hope. The name was a huge joke, for there was neither brightness nor hope within.

Kleg brooded over a wooden cup of kral under the flickering light of sputtering fat lamps. The rough, filthy room was filled with smoke and perhaps a score of low-caste men and half as many bottom-of-the-barrel trulls seeking to service them. The planks of the walls were warped and colored a dead gray, with torn fishnets draped here and there as an attempt at decorations. A vile place. Kleg was only in it because he thought it unlikely anyone would think to look for him here.

Kleg sipped at his drink. The crowd of men was a rough one, cutpurses, dock thugs, and the like, with a thin leavening of more upright citizens: at a table near the selkie, a goatherder and a swinekeeper drunkenly told each other tales in loud voices.

None of the riffraff bothered Kleg. It was well known that a selkie was no easy mark, being stronger than a man even on land and quick to anger if irritated. Small consolation.

“… No, wait, let me tell ye about the time I slew a direwolf with naught else but my sling-“

“No, no, no, I heared that story a hundred times! Let me tell you o’ the monster at the inn!”

The goatherder splashed wine down the front of his already-stained and stinking sheepskin jerkin. “Ah, go on with ye, it’s lies ye be tellin’! “

“No, no, no! I was there, I tell you! It come right through the wall o’ the Fish, tore the wood like it was a spider’s web and come right at me! Big as a house”-Here the swinekeeper waved his mug of wine to emphasize the size of the thing about which he spoke, and sloshed a goodly portion of the wine into a high arc that ended on the dirt floor-“it were, and me standin’ there in the street all alone, nothin’ between it ‘n’ me, and I says to myself, by Mitra, my time is come, so’s I might as well go out like a man. I stared it in the eye, I did, I dared it to come for me, and it see’d my face and turned away!”