Conan of Venarium

After another hour's trudge through the dark, gloomy forest, Granth stopped caring what had happened to Hondren. All he cared about was making sure the same thing, whatever it had been, did not happen to him. He said, "We'll never prove the Cimmerians did him in."

"Maybe we'll kill ten of them anyway, just for the sport of it," said Benno. "We ought to start with the cursed smith in that village. You know the fellow I mean? Big, ugly bruiser, and his eyes measure you for a coffin every time you walk past his doorway. I wouldn't be surprised if he was the one who knocked Hondren over the head."

"He doesn't hunt much himself," said Granth. "He usually sticks close to the forge and sends his son out instead."

"Maybe the boy did for Hondren," suggested Vulth. "That lad will be bigger than the blacksmith when he's done."

"He's not small now," said Granth.

"His beard hasn't even begun to sprout," said Benno with a scornful laugh. "If he put paid to Hondren, to hell with me if Hondren didn't deserve to die." That was cruel, but not too far from what Granth was also thinking.

A goldfinch fluttered across the game trail, a bright splash of color against the endless dark greens of the Cimmerian forest: warm brown back, black and white head, crimson face, and broad yellow chevrons on black wings. Three or four others danced through the air behind it, calling sweetly. Then they were gone, and shadows and silence ruled once more.

No, not quite silence, for a stream murmured and splashed just on the edge of hearing. Granth cocked his head to one side, to gauge the direction. "Shall we go over there?" he asked, pointing. "My water bottle is about empty."

"Well, have a swig from mine." Vulth took it off his belt and held it out to Granth. "I don't want to waste any time with side trips, and Hondren won't be in that stream unless he went and drowned himself."

"He wouldn't do anything like that," said Benno. "Too many people would thank him if he did."

Granth raised his cousin's water bottle to his lips, tilted back his head, and drank. Sweet, strong Poitanian wine ran down his throat. He took a long pull, then gave the bottle back to Vulth, saying, "I made a good trade, for my bottle held nothing but water."

"Wine is sovereign against a flux of the bowels," said Vulth solemnly.

"No doubt," said Benno. "It also goes down smoother than water."

Laughing, the three Aquilonians went on down the track. Not a bowshot away, the stream chuckled to itself. Whatever secrets it held, secret they would stay.

Conan knew the invaders were beating the woods for their missing fellow. He saw search parties going into the forest ever)' morning. He slipped in amongst the tall trees himself more than once, shadowing the Gundermen and Bossonians as he had shadowed Hondren. Here, though, he remained but a shadow. Had he revealed himself to the blundering Aquilonians, they might have wondered if he had done the same to their missing soldier.

He wanted to brag about what he had done. He wanted to clamber up on his rooftop and shout out the news to all of Duthil —no, to all of Cimmeria. Making himself keep silent might have been harder than slaying Hondren. But the thought of what the invaders would do to his village —and, even more, the thought of what his father would do to him — held his lips sealed.

Mordec noticed how much trouble he had keeping quiet. After a few days, Conan's father asked, "How would you like to go and spend some time with Nectan, boy? If you're helping him watch his sheep, you'll be keeping your secret from only one man, not from the whole village. Maybe that will be easier for you."

"All right, Father. I'll go," said Conan, who was always eager to give the shepherd a hand. Then he hesitated. "Will Mother be all right with just you here to take care of her?"

"I was taking care of your mother before you were born, you know," said Mordec. "I'll go on doing it as long as we both live. Don't you worry about that. I know she snaps at me. Don't you worry about that, either. It's her way; she's short-tempered because of her sickness. But we understand each other well enough."

Reassured, Conan threw a loaf of brown bread and some smoked mutton into a leather sack and hurried out to the meadows to join Nectan. The shepherd seemed not at all surprised to see him. Only later did he wonder if his father had come this way before speaking to him.

"Good to have an extra pair of hands and an extra set of eyes with me," said Nectan. "It's lambing time now, and I don't deny I can use you here."

He did not set Conan to helping him help the ewes who had trouble giving birth. Conan had no idea how much good Nectan's ministrations did the ewes. As always, the blacksmith's son marveled at how quickly the newborn lambs could start gamboling across the grass after their mothers —and how quickly they could go gamboling off straight into trouble.