Conan the Barbarian Page 5

  The young men broke ranks and sprinted in a pack for the hills.

  Conan watched them go, astonishment slackening his jaw.

  Corin peered into the bowl, then tossed his son an egg. “By Crom, boy, what are you waiting for?”

  Conan popped the egg into his mouth and ran off, letting his shock and anger speed him. As he pressed to catch up, he saw the first of the others slip and fall, broken yolk and blue shell staining his chin. The young man spat disgustedly and tossed snow at the boy who had knocked him down, but the others did not notice.

  Cunning. Tempering. Conan’s blue eyes narrowed. The race wasn’t just about speed, but about completing the circuit with the egg intact. The boy who fell, had he not broken the egg, could have gotten back up again. So the egg is everyone’s weakness.

  Ardel, never having been the swiftest of the youths his age, had also figured this out. As he and others worked their way up the hills, then along the grand circuit, he jostled the competition. He swept one boy’s legs, plunging him face-first into the snow. Egg erupted from his mouth. Ardel even swung a fist at Conan, but the younger boy ducked.

  Cunning. While the other boys smashed against one another, Conan cut off the trail. The extra duties his father had assigned to him over the winter had given him a familiarity with the area that none of the others came close to possessing. He leaped over rocks and ducked beneath fallen trees. He cut diagonally across a hillside, using saplings to slow and redirect himself. When he returned to the trail, he’d passed the largest boys. He raced ahead, leaping and cutting, their snarls forcing him to smile.

  Then he caught it. Movement through the forest around them, pacing them. For a moment he thought wolves might have come hunting them, so quickly and furtively did the figures move from shadow to shadow. Then he caught a flash of foot here, a hand there, a motion only a man could make.

  He slowed, instinctively raising a hand to warn the others. Picts!

  The other boys stopped dead. One of them cried out, then choked on his egg. As four Pictish scouts, heads shaved at the sides, hair stiffed with porcupine quills, emerged from the forest, the other boys turned and ran.

  Conan, his nostrils flaring, stood his ground, balling his fists.

  A bola whirled in one Pict’s hands. It spun through the air, the leather laces tangling Conan’s ankles, drawing them together and dumping him to the ground. The boy turned over, wiping snow from his face, as the quartet of Picts drew slowly toward him. They didn’t seem to fear him—rather, they viewed him as more of a curiosity than anything else, and this dismissal kindled anger in Conan’s heart.

  Conan looked past their tribal paint and the double axes they bore. Their wariness came tinged with weariness. The Picts were far from home, had no supplies, and had a haunted look on their faces. They had no idea what to make of him, and began discussing his fate in their harsh tongue.

  One pointed back toward the south, then again to the west and the Pictish homelands. The others gesticulated wildly. Their tattoos and paint suggested they were Otters, who usually raided down near the Aquilonian border. What they were doing so far north and east Conan didn’t know, but clearly they were up to deviltry.

  While their discussion distracted them, Conan dug fingers into the leather lacing that bound his feet together. He resisted the urge to struggle, since that would only draw the leather thongs more tightly together. He turned one foot, then pushed on a lace. He tugged another. Then, as the Pict leader grabbed a handful of Conan’s hair and jerked his head back to stretch his throat for the skinning knife he held high in his hand, Conan slid his feet from his boots and brought one of the bola’s weights up in a short, sharp arc.

  The leather-wrapped stone caught the Pict on the right side of his face. His cheekbone cracked and an eye socket crumbled. The man spun, blood spurting, his face misshapen, and crashed down beside the barefoot Cimmerian boy.

  Conan tugged the ax from the downed man’s belt and threw himself backward. The second Pict’s ax blow would have crushed his skull had he been a heartbeat slower. Conan somersaulted backward, then came up. He ignored the cold as his feet dug into the snow. All that was important was that he maintain his balance.

  The third Pict charged him, ax raised for a blow that would split him from crown to crotch. Conan brought his ax up in the high-right guard, blocking the blow. The Pict’s eyes widened and he raised the ax again. But Conan rushed forward, slipping inside his guard, and smashed the ax into the man’s knee. The blade sheared through leather leggings and flesh. The knee buckled and the Pict went down.

  Conan’s next blow slammed into the Pict’s breastbone, shattering it. Spitting blood, the warrior crashed onto his back. Conan spun away from a feeble swipe at his legs, then brought his ax up high left. He blocked the fourth Pict’s blow, then spun beneath his arm. He used the man’s body to shield him from the last Pict, then tripped him.

  The second Pict closed quickly, but the Cimmerian was quicker. Conan kicked out, catching him over the right hip. The Pict leaped back, steadied himself. His eyes widened for a moment, then he lowered his shoulders and bull-rushed the boy.

  All of Corin’s training kicked in. The endless hours of repetition slowed time for Conan. The Pict meant to overwhelm him, to use his size advantage, though not great, to bowl the boy over. All the man had to do was to block any blow Conan might deliver, then weight and speed would grant him victory. He’d knock Conan down, then dash his brains out.

  Conan stabbed the ax toward the Pict as if to fend him off. The warrior slashed to batter the ax out of the way, but Conan dipped his ax beneath the other man’s. The Cimmerian took a step forward and to the left, twisting like a suddenly opening gate to let the Pict rush past, bringing his ax up to his left shoulder. Conan backhanded the ax through the Pict’s line of attack, catching him solidly in the spine, just above his hips. His legs died and he stretched limply on the snowy ground.

  The last Pict had gathered himself, brushing snow from a furious face. As the death throes of the man with the broken spine slackened, Conan spun away from him and engaged his last foe. The Cimmerian ducked beneath a wild ax stroke at his head, then buried his own ax in the Pict’s belly.

  The man collapsed around it, slamming into the ground face-first. He sagged to the side, desperately trying to suck in breath. He lifted an arm to ward Conan off, but Conan snapped it with an overhand blow. Another blow crushed the back of the man’s skull, and the battlefield became silent save for the rasping breath of the third Pict and the scolding call of a raven.

  Conan crouched and studied his surroundings for any other movement. He saw nothing, then recovered his boots. By the time he’d pulled them on, the third Pict had stopped breathing.

  Conan bent down and recovered the skinning knife that had been intended to drink his blood.

  And he set about some very grim work.

  WHEN THE FIRST of the young men returned, dejected, chins stained with broken egg, Corin felt no concern. That was normal, and the boys would learn. He took pride in the fact that Conan was not among them. But then, as the largest boys came running in, eyes wide with panic, fear began to coil in his belly.

  Then Ronan stopped one of the boys—his son, Ardel—and glanced back at Corin. “Corin! Picts in the woods. They hunted the boys.”

  Corin scanned the back trail. “How many, Ardel?”

  “Too many.” The young man looked up, ashen-faced. “There were too many.”

  “And you came straight here? You led them back to us?”

  Ardel sank to his knees. “Too many.”

  Corin turned to summon more warriors, but saw a human form emerging from the forest to the south. He started in that direction, then stopped, waiting.

  The form began to jog toward the village. Conan, his pace steady, his breath coming in thick vapor, wended his way to the center of the village. Covered in blood, he paid no attention to what the others were saying, to their gasps or their encouraging nods. He did not look at the other b
oys, but instead continued on, his face half masked by his hair but his blue eyes burning fearsomely.

  He tossed the Picts’ severed heads at his father’s feet, then spat out the egg. He looked up into his father’s eyes. “The only thirst I know is for blood. The only cold I know is the cold edge of steel. My courage is tempered. I fear not death. I do not rush foolishly toward it. Speed and strength, cunning and balance. I am ready to train as a warrior.”

  Corin smiled. You are indeed ready, my son. “How many?”

  “Four, only four.” Conan toed a head. “Exhausted, no supplies, so they have a camp somewhere.”

  Corin looked around at the warriors. “I want warriors to scour the hills. Go!”

  “Me, too, Father?”

  Corin nodded. “Yes, my son, I called for warriors, didn’t I?”

  “Yes, Father.” Conan beamed and the sight of his joy warmed his father’s heart. The boy turned to run off back the way he’d come.”

  “Conan.”

  “Yes, Father?”

  “Go get your Aquilonian sword.” Corin nodded solemnly. “You’re a warrior, by Crom, and I fear, by the end of this day, your blade will have drunk its fill.”

  CHAPTER 7

  CONAN, SWORD BARED, ran into the hills west of the village. The other scouts had fanned out toward the south, but the boy headed toward where he had killed the Picts. He could start from there and then backtrack.

  Pure joy bubbled through him. He imagined himself—now properly armed—killing a dozen of the painted savages. Maybe the four he’d slain were the vanguard of a war band! While he knew this wasn’t true, given their ragged condition, he could wish it were true. It would make for a better telling of the story.

  That thought sobered him. Though he cared only for what his father thought, he couldn’t help but notice the looks on the other faces. Ardel and the other young men looked shamed—as well they should—and resentful. They’d given in to panic while a younger man had not. Even at that young age, Conan recognized that they would eventually forget their shame, and instead revel in remembering that they had been present when Conan brought his trophies to the village.

  The others—the warriors—their reactions had been easy to read as well. Some refused to believe. Some of them had been in combat, but had never killed an enemy. Others, knowing just how difficult that was, couldn’t believe so young a man had done it alone. But the vast majority remembered the omen of his birth. For them, his return, his accomplishment, only confirmed their belief in his destiny. While this made most of them happy, a few had looked away from him, believing that such a great destiny would afford Conan a life poor in peace and happiness.

  Had he been older, he would have understood that sentiment, but even if he had, it wouldn’t have mattered. Crom gave men courage. Crom meant for men to survive by their wits and the strength of their arms. Crom guaranteed nothing more, and certainly no peace or happiness. Conan was a Cimmerian warrior, and a warrior’s life he would lead.

  Conan cut through the forest and scaled the rock face leading toward the meadow where he had placed his traplines. As he clambered to the top and crouched to rest, he heard the jingle of tack and the creak of leather. Below, along the track at the cliff’s base, came a half-dozen riders, armored in leather and light mail. Conical steel caps covered their heads and bloodred scarves half hid their faces.

  Conan crouched behind a fallen tree. He’d never seen such men before, not even on the trip south with his father to visit a market town. Even so, something about their swarthiness and the shape of their helmets struck a chord with him. His grandfather had spoken of such men from his travels. Zamora? Zingara? It was someplace distant and exotic.

  The riders slowed as they cut across his track. The leader glanced toward the rock face, where the tracks ended, and shook his head. Then he studied Conan’s back trail, but the forest and hills, with their deep drifts of snow, provided no easy passage for horsemen. With the wave of a hand and a harsh command, he started his men farther down the game trail that would, a mile or so farther north, cut across a road that led to the village.

  Outrage, contempt, and fear warred in Conan’s breast. That such men would dare come into Cimmeria infuriated him. They had to be very foolish, though a small part of him imagined they might have come north to settle some generational blood feud with his grandfather.

  The way the lead rider studied the tracks and didn’t even bother to glance up at the top of the cliff fortified Conan’s suspicion that they were stupid. Sure, the size of his track, the length of his stride, suggested that he was still a boy, but to so casually imagine that a rock face could not be climbed was folly. Steppes dwellers! Conan spat disgustedly, then cut down and around off the hill. Though going back down the cliff face would be faster, if the horsemen returned, he’d be trapped.

  He picked his way across the horsemen’s back trail, stepping only in the tracks they’d left, then plunged through brush and cut slightly south. If he ran fast, if he encountered no trouble, he could reach the village before the horsemen and warn his father. Noting that he’d heard no blasts from the signal horns the other Cimmerians carried, he felt a surge of courage—not because he had a desire to be a hero, but because he did not want to leave his village unprotected.

  At no point had it occurred to him that the riders might be innocent travelers. They’d had the look of hard men about them. They had no remounts or pack animals in tow, which meant they’d entrusted those things to others. They had to have known his tracks were fresh, yet they did not call out in a friendly manner. And the trail they rode branched off from the larger trade route to the south, which would have afforded them a direct and easy path to the village.

  No, he was certain that they were part of something larger and, worse yet, imagined they were part of a cordon to make sure no one got away. His grandfather had talked about having had such duties, but had never said too much or anything good about them.

  Conan burst from the woods, his lungs burning, aghast at the sight of his village.

  Flaming arrows rose from the south, arcing down like falling stars. They landed among the southernmost huts, sticking deep in thatched roofs. The huts began to burn. The breeze swirled dark smoke through the rest of the village, washing it over the Cimmerian defensive lines.

  And there, at the center, stood Corin, magnificent, the great sword he’d forged for his son held high. He directed the defenses, pointing men and women to their places in the lines. Conan instinctively understood what his father was doing and desperately wished he were at his side. A couple hundred yards of snowy fields separated him from the village, so he rose to sprint.

  A loud metallic hiss to his right stopped him. Armored men in closed ranks were stepping from the forest. Aquilonians, surely, for Conan had seen their like before. The short swords they unsheathed in unison were not unlike the sword he bore. And their shields, tall ovals, were standard in Aquilonian legions, though he’d never seen the crest before. A human face, or so it appeared, with tentacles writhing around it—the very sight of the crest set Conan’s flesh to crawling.

  The Aquilonians began a measured march toward the village. Two drummers paced behind them, hammering out a rhythm to which the soldiers marched. Conan’s heart pounded double time to that beat, and he sprinted twice as fast, quickly outdistancing the Aquilonians.

  Then trumpets blasted and horsemen broke from the wood lines, racing across the snowy fields. No lightly armed scouts these, but heavily armored cavalry, with horses encased in layers of steel armor. The warriors bore curved swords with heavy points, equally suited to slashing or stabbing. The warriors would have towered over Conan were they on foot, but in the saddle, they became juggernauts of destruction.

  Hoofbeats thundered despite the muffling snow. Conan ducked and dodged to avoid being trampled beneath steelshod hooves. He spun to the ground, escaping the last of them, ending on his knees, facing away from the village. He struggled to his feet and started to turn, but th
e centermost Aquilonian ranks parted as if they were a curtain, and a lone warrior came riding through.

  It would have been easy to mistake him for one of the cavalry, for his horse had been similarly armored and his sheathed sword bore a resemblance to the scimitars the others carried. But something about him, about the way he sat tall in the saddle and studied the battlefield with a hawk’s serene gaze, marked him as different. He, too, bore a shield with the tentacled mask on it, but less as a tool of war than as a proud emblem.

  Conan didn’t know who he was, but he knew he was dangerous. He spun and sprinted for the village, certain that if that man reached it, no one would be left alive.

  The young Cimmerian warrior plunged headlong into the furious battle, hyperaware of everything going on around him. Sounds sorted themselves into the harsh din of metal-on-metal impact, or the wet crack of sword cleaving bone. The hiss of air from punctured lungs differed from the wet gush of entrails flowing from a slashed belly. Men shouted. Some gave orders, others begged for mercy. Words came in hard, guttural tongues and in the more familiar Cimmerian. Light flashed from blades, blood splashed red and filled the air with a tang that erased the scent of smoke.

  Conan caught the first glimmer of the knowledge that would keep him alive: combat appeared to be chaotic, but, in fact, had an order and flow. Currents ran through it, strength channeled against weakness, and weakness ebbed until it could attack greater weakness. Lines surged and collapsed, voids opened and were filled. To move with the energies was to survive. To hesitate or defy them was to be drowned in a river of blood.

  More arrows sped through the air, launched by female warriors. Conan grabbed the arm of an Aquilonian warrior and spun him around, using him as a shield. Three arrows thudded into his chest, but Conan slipped from beneath his falling body, then slashed another Aquilonian across the hamstrings, crippling him.

  Hulking warriors whose skin was so dark it almost appeared purple, with round shields and long spears, rushed through the village, impaling victims. Before Conan could finish the Aquilonian, one of the Kushites knocked him to the ground. Conan leaned away from the thrust that should have pinned him to the earth, then stabbed up. His blade opened the man’s belly and he ripped the sword free. Blood sprayed and the warrior fell, but Conan was already up and away.