Conan The Hero (24 page)

“No matter.” Sempronius shrugged in profound unconcern. “The dead are of no use to us. It would hardly serve our purpose to parade heroic corpses before the mob. General Abolhassan can appoint some good-looking Turanian to play the role, or else fill it himself.” Already moving as if he owned the raft, among passengers who parted respectfully before him, the eunuch conducted them around the cabin and onto the less crowded foredeck. “We will have much to occupy us, what with the reception, the palace tour, and your decoration.” As he spoke, Sempronius signaled his voiceless slave to set down his baggage in a vacant place along the raft’s bulwark. The servant immediately began opening parcels.

“Tell me,” Conan asked with some interest, “will we get to see the emperor’s pearl-lined baths? I have heard much about them, and of the skill of the masseuses employed there—”

“You will need to bathe sooner than that! I will have my slave rub you down with scented oil.” Sempronius turned back to Conan, holding a piece of iridescent silk that might have been intended as raiment. “When we were astern with the cattle, I did not notice it so much”—the eunuch wrinkled his nose primly—“but frankly, Sergeant, you smell.”

“Smell, do I?” Conan shot an angry glance aside at Juma. “Hardly more than yourself, foppish gelding, with your stinking pomade and courtly fragrance! In the jungle, indulgences of that sort would get you quickly tracked and killed.” He bunched a heavy fist, flourishing it before his detractor’s face; the eunuch and his slave only edged closer together, confronting him stubbornly. “If your nose were mashed flat against your pretty face, I do not think my smell would bother you so much!” Conan glanced again at Juma, who, beneath the dull passiveness of intoxication, looked vaguely concerned.

“But—ah, well, what matters it? No need for an oil-rub by a scented steer!” Abruptly, Conan relaxed his belligerent posture. Shaking off the miserable rag of his vest and stepping out of his torn breeks, he strode up onto the bulwark, then over the side of the raft into the water, splashing the startled watchers with the spray of his plunge.

Swimming was not really necessary, since the river current rolled at the same resolute speed as the raft. An occasional kick was enough to keep Conan alongside, bobbing and cavorting in the water. Beyond him the nearer riverbank rolled by, bushy with reeds and screened by a few low-hanging trees. Amused passengers offered to watch out for crocodiles; they shouted many spirited warnings, most of them unjustified. Meanwhile, passing sailboats steered close to the barge to see the cause of the commotion.

Before long Juma too had stripped and leaped in. Shedding most of his winy stupor in the brisk morning coolness of the water, he proved that he too possessed the rare knack of swimming. Whilst the two ruffians sported and strove to drown each other, Sempronius leaned overside and emptied a gleaming blue glass jug over their heads, anointing them with soapy, perfumed oil.

Their frolicking went on a considerable time before the chancery assistant persuaded both men to climb back on board, remain there long enough to dry off, and don some of his silken finery. When this was accomplished, the two had a decidedly gaudy, imposing look. Yet Sempronius’s costly silver-gray version of the standard expeditionary tunic contrasted strangely with the wearers’ unshorn heads and bestubbled, jungle-scorched faces. To remedy this, the eunuch bound their wet scalps in supple violet turbans. He then made each man in turn submit to the gleaming razor of his mute, solemn slave.

With their faces freshly shaven and oiled, the two looked merely splendid. Iron-trim bodies and bright, sharp gazes lent both a dashing, aristocratic appearance. Their fellow passengers, mostly farmers and merchants, watched every step of the transformation and applauded its result; afterward they dispersed politely as dates and palm wine were produced from one of the baskets to reward the troopers’ obedience.

The only real disagreement was over the veterans’ battered, disreputable jungle knives, which they would not surrender. The sweat-grimed shagreen hilts, Sempronius insisted, jutted too obscenely from the pleated sashes of the bright new outfits. To settle the matter, he finally had to barter the weapons for his own and his servant’s gemmed, gold-hilted daggers; these, on careful inspection, the warriors found to be of equal keenness to the mute slave’s steel razor.

The mighty Ilbars straightened its course to eastward, rolling now at a swifter rate toward the capital and the sea. The croplands on either bank showed the change, looking steadily tamer and more populated. Yet progress was still too slow for Sempronius, who grew more and more restless as the sun approached its zenith. “Where is that boat?” he muttered distractedly to the others. “‘Twould be an ill omen if my pigeon were downed by a hawk! The rabble would hardly care for that, nor would the emperor.”

But at last a gilded canoe appeared, gliding upstream through shady shallows on the river’s southern bank. It raced smoothly under the expert paddles of eight kneeling oarsmen, their pace set by a red-turbanned drummer seated astern. In graceful response to the hails of the eunuch, who waved imperiously from the raft’s bulwark, the canoe circled out amidstream. No sooner had the rowers sculled to a halt alongside, than Sempronius was stepping aboard and beckoning to his charges. “Come, we must not be late! You,” he told his slave, “bring down that quaint tree! But stay aboard the raft yourself and see to the rest of the baggage!” The man turned silently away to comply.

In moments the canoe raced ahead with Conan and Juma in its waist, waving farewell to their cheering admirers. The potted tree had been placed in the bows for balance; the three passengers squatted amidships on polished benches set athwart the wooden hull. The speed of the oarsmen redoubled that of the river, as was apparent whenever the craft angled near the bank. There reeds, trees, and rude cottages flashed by at a breathtaking rate, faster than the fastest courser could gallop.

Yet for the most part they stayed out in midstream. The oarsmen effortlessly skirted larger, slower ships that were likewise availing themselves of the swiftest currents. Small, maneuverable vessels kept a careful distance, respecting the gold Imperial plaque affixed below the eagle-headed prow of the canoe.

Once only, Conan laid a hand on the shoulder of one of the paddlers, offering to relieve the man and try out his own skill. But the naked rower, scarcely breaking stroke, glanced back haughtily; he shook his head in obvious resentment at the interruption. So Conan squatted idle with the others, sipping syrupy palm wine, a new flask of which Sempronius had produced. Lulled by the oars’ liquid whisper, the throb of the hardwood drum, and the low chant the rowers occasionally hummed to match its rhythm, they sat watching the passing scenery.

In an amazingly short time, the eastern sky had begun to color with the coppery haze of ten thousand city smokes; simultaneously, more buildings and stone quays began to appear on either bank. River traffic increased, yet posed no hindrance to the expert crew—particularly since the river broadened here. More islands lay in its midst, some surmounted by walled, domed villas of the high-ranking rich. On the now-swampy southern bank, communities of small, decaying boats abounded, the leaky dwellings of poor river-folk.

Then, looming above the graceful droop of willows, Conan spied the city wall of Aghrapur. Crenellated and curving, it stretched away southward, its slim, minaretted towers piercing the smoke-tinted haze at stately intervals.

To Conan’s surprise, the canoe landed before the city wall, at a broad stone quay abristle with masts. ‘Twas a thriving port, clearly, for the pier abutted a stone plaza ringed with custom-houses and merchants’ stalls. Yet the bustle of the place, as the Cimmerian could not help noticing, seemed particularly intense this afternoon; at first, though lulled by wine, he experienced mild alarm, imagining that a siege was underway. But as Sempronius led him and Juma through milling crowds of cavalry troopers and their prancing, brightly harnessed mounts, he realized that a parade was forming up.

“Make way! Move aside, there, I bring the heroes!” Sempronius’s commands were officious and sharp, delivered in the high-pitched voice his boyhood mutilation had left him. “Where, under the gods, is the chariot of honor? Spatulus, you miserable eunuch, who commands this mess? Ah, yonder is the general! Hail, great sir, we are arrived! The triumph can now proceed.”

Conan was dragged before a tall, black-turbaned officer, whose eye passed over him briefly and incuriously. By the time he heard the name “Abolhassan” muttered somewhere nearby and realized who the man was, Conan’s rumored enemy had turned away to mount a gold-trimmed chariot. Meanwhile, Sempronius led him and Juma up to a broad, low, rectangular box decked with embroidered pillows. The enclosure was obviously meant to be sat in.

“What is it, a raft?” Conan asked of no one in particular, letting himself be ushered inside and deposited on a pillow. “Or is it a howdah?” he asked Juma as the Kushite climbed in opposite him. “If it is one, how do we get up on the elephant’s back?”

Sempronius, afire with his official duties, hurried off without answering; Conan’s curiosity was satisfied only when four pairs of silk-shirted slaves marched up. Each pair bore a long, polished pole, all four of which they fitted under brackets in the sides of the platform, two transversely and two lengthwise. Suddenly, seemingly without effort, the box was borne up to shoulder height: a plush, open-topped sedan carriage.

Conan did not feel exactly comfortable at being trundled aloft thus, like a trussed pig on its way to a feast. On the other hand, the motion of the ride was even smoother than an elephant jaunt, the litter-bearers seeming to maneuver every bit as skillfully as the rowers of the royal canoe. Striding between cavalry and infantry columns, they crossed the busy courtyard to arrive at the road. There, the city’s eastern gate loomed open before them, its entry festooned with flower chains and bunting.

An interminable wait ensued, with the bearers stooping in stylized, ready submissiveness like well-trained dogs around the grounded litter. But finally a trumpet salute blared ahead, and drums rattled an answer. The litter was borne aloft and the march began.

“I do not see the need for this armored escort,” Conan observed to Juma, “when the canoe could have taken us straight to the dock of the Imperial Palace.”

“You think all this is for our benefit?” The Kushite, though drunker and more complacent than Conan, was not too drunk to smile cynically. “Butchering far-off enemies is only one of the uses they have for us, you will come to learn. Our greatest service to the empire, possibly our last and fatal one, still lies ahead!”

Meanwhile the litter, moving near the front of the procession, passed through the city gate. For Conan it was an odd feeling to travel supine, gazing up at the slits and loopholes of the overarching gatehouse and the sharp metal teeth of the cullises. Trumpets blared from the battlements, whence, instead of stones and hot oil, flowers rained down on the marchers.

Arriving at the plaza inside the gate, the litter drew up smartly, the whole column halting likewise before and behind it. A gray-bearded city official in a gleaming gold turban stepped up onto a platform to place garlands over both the passengers’ necks. Then, to the heroes’ surprise, a pair of lush-hipped harem-maids in diaphanous, flowing costumes clambered into the litter, there to wriggle down cozily in place beside the passengers. The watching crowd, consisting of little more than a backing-up of the normal gate traffic plus a few market idlers, whistled and hooted appreciatively as the procession moved on.

“Well, maidens, you are a welcome reward for weary soldiers!” Conan squirmed close against his plump, pleasing wench, patting her soft olive flank as she turned to wave to the cheering onlookers. The litter was moving along smoothly once again, its bearers apparently not overburdened by the added weight of the women; the only noticable differences were a bit more sluggishness starting out, and some additional sway on the turns.

“Nay, sir, behave yourself We are meant only as adornments for your journey, like your flower wreaths!” The harem maid turned her pert, carefully painted smile on Conan and lifted his hand from her thigh. “Pray do not disarrange my gown so.”

“Do not worry yourself about it, child.” Conan clasped an arm about her dimpled shoulders. “If you are chilled in this scanty garb, I’ll cover you and keep you warm.”

“Nay, sir, not here!” she answered primly. “Just wave to the crowd and enjoy yourself.” Disengaging his hand from her soft skin, she raised it above his head and waggled it high in a limp salute. “There will be ample time for sport later, at the palace.”

Juma was evidently meeting similar, skillful rebuffs from his squirming companion. By calling their attention to the onlookers outside the litter, the wenches could unerringly dampen the men’s ardor, Conan realized. While giving the appearance of passionate wantons, the houris actually directed all their seductive charms to the crowd, with little more than polite professionalness left over for their seatmates. Discouraged at last, Conan contented himself just sitting up among the cushions in what he hoped was a dignified posture, watching his surroundings race by.

The procession moved down a broad, straight avenue of high-walled estates, with ample room along either side for onlookers. These were few, estate slaves mainly, stretched beside the road in two narrow, broken lines; but the procession seemed well-equipped to attract more. Led by a phalanx of brightly clothed, fez-hatted heralds whose incessant trumpet-blasts echoed sourly down the street, the column promptly widened to a quadruple rank of drummers; Conan could see their tassles and drumsticks bouncing in the air far ahead.

Behind them came threescore crack garrison infantry, followed by their arrogant commander: General Abolhassan, standing alone at the reins of a splendid four-horse chariot. Its black-and-gilt colors matched those of the stallion team, whose glossy ebon backs were set off by gilded harness. Conan, watching the general’s own black-robed, gold-plated back as the officer postured before the crowd, could not help feeling a twinge of jealousy. He observed how much more the hero Abolhassan contrived to look than himself, plumped in an unmanly litter, foppishly dressed, armorless, and blithely ignored by a pair of crowd-teasing harlots.