Conan of Venarium

"Crom!" repeated Mordec; surprises were coming too fast to suit him. He knew the man his son meant, and knew he was indeed a brute. But he also knew of the warning the invaders had laid down. If one of their men was murdered, ten Cimmerians were to escort his spirit out of the world. "Tell me what passed. Tell me all of it. Leave out nothing-nothing, do you hear?"

"Aye, Father." Conan did: a bald, straightforward account. He finished, "The lich is hidden as well as I could hide it. In the forest, the Aquilonians are all fumblefingered fools. I do not think they will come across it. They will decide he had a mishap in the woods— and so he did." Savage pride filled his voice.

Without hesitation, Mordec knocked him down. When he got up, the blacksmith flattened him again. Afterwards, Mordec helped him to his feet. "That was to remind you the Aquilonians will decide Hondren had a mishap in the woods —if you do not brag of what you did. It is a brave and bold thing, a boy beating a warrior trained. But it is your life and nine more if you ever breathe a word of it. Silence, or you die! This is no game. Do you understand?"

"I do, Father." Conan shook his head to clear it; Mordec had not held back with either blow. "You have a hard hand with your lessons."

"And you have a thick skull to drive them through," said the blacksmith with rough affection. "I have to make sure they get home."

"I'll keep quiet," said Conan. "I know what I did. I don't have to shout it in the street—I'm not Balarg."

Mordec threw back his head and laughed. That was his opinion of the weaver, too, although Balarg, no doubt, also had a low opinion of him. Their rivalry did not keep them from working together when they had to. Since the coming of the Aquilonians, they had to ever more often.

But laughter quickly faded. Setting a hand on his son's shoulder, Mordec said, "You did well, son, as well as you could once he attacked you. Now we hope all the invaders are as woodsblind as you say. I think they may be." Even saying that, though, he wished Crom were the sort of god who hearkened to his worshipers' prayers.

Chapter Seven

The Weaver's Daughter

When the Aquilonian army advanced into Cimmeria, it had come through the woods. It had had to; without coming through the woods, it could not have penetrated the country. But pioneers with axes had widened the forest tracks so good-sized columns of men could advance along them, and all of the Gundermen and Bossonians could see one another and draw strength from seeing one another.

Now Granth son of Biemur picked his way along a game trail hardly wider than the spread of his shoulders. He clutched his pike with both hands, ready to impale anything that burst out from among the trees. Behind him tramped his cousin Vulth, who hung on to his pike just as tight. And behind them strode Benno the Bossonian, an arrow nocked in his bow. As far as Granth knew, no other Aquilonians were within a mile or two of his comrades and him.

"Hondren!" he called. "Hondren! You out there? You hear me?" In lower tones, he muttered, "If we do find the stinking dog, we ought to beat his brains in for making us go through this nonsense."

"What makes you think he's got any brains to beat in?" asked Vulth. He too raised his voice: "Hondren! Where are you, you mangy hound?"

Benno spat. "Who cares if we find him or not? I can't stand that bad-tempered bastard, and I don't know anybody who can."

Granth wished the archer had not said that. He did not like Hondren, either, and also knew not a single man who did. Hondren was nothing but trouble for everyone around him. That had been true in the Aquilonian encampment next to Duthil. From things Granth had heard and others he had seen, it had been true in Duthil itself. And it was certainly true now that Hondren had gone missing in the woods.

"We're not looking for him for his sake —Mitra knows that's true," said Vulth. "'We're trying to find out what the devil happened to him. If the Cimmerians knocked him over the head, they've got to pay for it or they'll think we're soft."

That only made Benno spit again. "If it were up to me, I would have paid them to get rid of him."

"He was a good man in a fight," said Granth: as much praise as Hondren was ever likely to get now. He had been missing for three days. None of the search parties had found any trace of him.

"He did like fights," agreed Vulth, but that was not the compliment it might have been, for he went on, "He liked them so well, he'd start them himself."

"If he started one out here, he didn't win it," said Benno. "Something's gnawing the meat off his bones right now." Somber satisfaction filled his voice.

"Something or somebody," said Vulth. "I wouldn't put it past these barbarians to eat man's-flesh."

"Anybody who ate Hondren would sick him up afterwards." Benno made horribly real-sounding retching noises.