Conan and the Shaman's Curse (3 page)

Tosco’s grey eyes narrowed to slits, and a frown clouded his sunburned face. “Ha! We be a private merchant in a Stygian priest’s hire. Yer bits of bronze and oafish sword-work together would nae be enough to secure ye as much as a place on the thwarts. And we have scant provisions, not for sharin’ with the likes o’ ye!”

Conan tensed, readying himself for an attack. But he knew that Tosco’s gibes were the time-honoured Argossean way of testing a stranger’s mettle. “Among my bits of bronze,” he said, opening his makeshift sack just enough to palm a gold piece, “is a gold dragon.” He flipped the heavy coin to Tosco, who deftly caught it. Fingering the thick golden disc, he examined its markings: a Nemedian king’s likeness on one side and a royal coat of arms on the other. Grinning, the first mate stuffed it into the pocket of his soiled brown vest. “Bend yer back at the bench. I’ll ask the captain if we need another hand. Though yer wits be as slack as yer shoulders are broad, perhaps ye can be trained to row.”

Conan suppressed the urge to fling the rude Argossean pig overboard. Scowling, he turned his back to Tosco and moved toward a vacant forward rower’s position. Tosco nodded to a short, bald Vendhyan. The little fellow picked up a wooden mallet and sat cross-legged on the poop deck, next to a weather-worn drum. The Vendhyan began pounding his drum to set a pace for the oar strokes.

Irked by Tosco’s derisive comments, Conan felt the raw energy of anger revitalizing his weary limbs. He would show this fat sea-cur how to move a boat through becalmed waters. Forgetting his fatigue, the Cimmerian gritted his teeth and sat in the foremost centre between the thwarts, gripping an oar in each hand.

Tosco seemed in no hurry to disturb the captain. He stood on the poop deck like a king on a throne, barking guttural commands to his subjects. “Lay forward! Bend yer backs, dogs—to Stygia, afore our beards turn grey!” he boomed.

He had scarcely ceased his bellowing when Conan began rowing rhythmically. At the bottom of each stroke, the enraged barbarian lowered himself to the deck, then lifted his body for the next pull. Knotted sinews rippled beneath his bronzed skin as the drummer quickened his beats, and the other rowers laboured to maintain Conan’s arduous pace.

The oars protruded fifteen feet from the sides of the vessel, their wide blades dipping smoothly into the placid sea. Conan did not bother to pace himself; he doubted that he would need to sustain this effort for too long before Tosco accepted him into the crew. And the irascible first mate had not demanded the Cimmerian’s, weapon or attacked him for the sack of Zariri gold.

Slowly, the Mistress gained speed, propelled by Conan’s vigorous rowing and the strained efforts of the men behind him. The Cimmerian timed his breathing with practised skill; he was no stranger to the hard life of an oarsman. Many times had a taskmaster’s whip laid open his heaving back while he sat seething, chained to a slaver’s thwart, and the memory stoked the coals of his fury. Faster and faster he rowed, until two of his strokes marked a drummer’s single beat.

The gasping rowers behind him were robust men, but they could only match half of Conan’s mark. As the Mistress leapt forward, a gentle breeze stirred across the deck. She cruised west-southwest, within view of Zembabwei’s jungle-choked coastline. The Vendhyan pacer’s wrists hastened to match Conan’s gruelling pace, and the drum beats took on a feverish pitch. A wooden crack sounded behind Conan; from the comer of his eye, he saw that an oarsman had collapsed from exhaustion. The Cimmerian’s oar smashed into the oarsman’s fallen, idling blade.

Tosco, who had kept silent, snorted and spoke to the helmsman in Stygian, lowering his voice—but not low enough to keep his commands from reaching Conan’s keen ears. “That insolent cur rows well. He’ll fetch a pretty price on the slaver’s block in Luxur!”

Conan’s blood surged, his face an angry thundercloud. His eyes blazed—fiery blue torches framed by his tousled mane of black hair. Bracing his legs against the deck, he heaved upward and snapped the oars off at the tholepins, raising the spear-length pieces over his head and turning to face Tosco. “Argossean bilge rat! Perhaps you would care to match your sword with these twigs—or is your dog-like yapping meant to conceal a feeble bite?”

Roaring, the Argossean whipped the curved three-foot blade from his belt and jumped to the deck between the thwarts, his heavy boots thumping on the hard planking. Racing past the mast and shoving rowers out of his way, he swung his tulwar with brutal ferocity, aiming for Conan’s neck.

The Cimmerian smoothly stepped back, blocking the lethal sweep with one oar-shaft and swinging the other with all the force he could muster. It struck Tosco’s neck, knocking his head back in the opposite direction. A loud crack sounded beneath the thick flesh of his throat as Tosco’s spine snapped like a twig. Twitching, the bulky Argossean stumbled, head wobbling, his right ear lying against his shoulder. Then his eyes rolled upward as his last breath wheezed from his crushed windpipe. He fell over the rail while the panting rowers, drummer, and helmsman froze in amazement.

“You there,” Conan pointed to the Stygian helmsman. “Tell the captain that a new first mate is taking Tosco’s place. He’ll find the going quicker when his ship’s run by Conan of Cimmeria—” Belatedly, he bit off the hasty, damning words.

Gasping, the helmsman abandoned the tiller, sliding a slim-bladed throwing dagger from his copper-studded belt.

Conan ducked and rolled between the thwarts, stopping behind the partial cover provided by the ship’s single mast and drawing his sword.

The Stygian’s well-aimed dagger found a fleshy target, burying inches of steel in Conan’s calf. Bending and pulling out the dagger with a grunt, Conan fell to one knee. The knife had sunk into his shin bone. His sword, jarred loose when he struck the deck, clattered beyond his reach.

“Captain!” the frantic Stygian cried, pounding on the hatch to a cabin below decks.

Conan planted his back against the mast, readying himself for a last stand. He longed to toss his knife at the Stygian, but it was his only weapon. With it, he could bring down a crewman and grab a better weapon.

The dazed rowers regained their senses, rising stiffly from their benches and surrounding the Cimmerian. They pummelled and kicked him unmercifully, but Conan struck back with blind sweeps of the Stygian knife. Three rowers clutched bleeding wounds and backed away, but the others overwhelmed Conan by sheer numbers. Five men held him down while two others wrenched away his dagger.

Then the captain burst out of his cabin, drawing his double-edged dagger from a high-topped boot and strolling toward the pinned barbarian.

Conan groaned, seeing that the captain was Stygian, taller and swarthier than many of his race. The high, curving collar of his thick leather jerkin protected his neck. His head was shaven at the sides, forming a forward-pointing triangle of raven-black hair that ended above the bridge of his nose. At his sharp command, the rowers backed away-—and Conan immediately saw the captain’s scar, slanting from his high forehead to the stump of his ear. His bloodshot eyes, the stubble of whiskers on his face, the hasty manner in which he had laced his wine-splashed jerkin—they all hinted that he might have been sleeping off a night of drinking. How else could he have slept through Conan’s encounter with Tosco?

He seemed to be fully awake now. Lifting a heavy boot, he kicked Conan in the belly just as the Cimmerian was rising to one knee. Another boot lashed out at Conan’s head, burying its hard toe under his jaw and sending a ripple of agony through his skull. Fighting to stay conscious, Conan managed to shake off the blinding pain of the captain’s kicks.

The Stygian chuckled, a low, dry laugh that froze Conan’s blood, lifting the fog from an old memory. That sneering face was different—aged and scarred—but it was the face of a Stygian admiral he had met years ago. Conan, back in his days of piracy, had put that scar on Khertet’s face.

It had been a lucrative raid, surprising the admiral by its very boldness. Too late had Khertet reacted, and his fleet had let the Tigress slip through with rich plunder destined for the treasury of the Stygian king and queen. Only Khertet’s flagship had caught up with the Tigress, but the ferocious defence of the pirates had driven back the admiral.

The Stygian admiral had sunk low indeed, from commanding a fleet of warships to captaining a miserable Vendhyan merchant vessel. Now Conan would bear the brunt of an anger that had doubtless been festering for years.

The Cimmerian tried to rise, but his reserves of strength were drained. All he could do was lie upon the planks while the rowers bound his hands and feet with thick ropes. “Admiral Khertet,” he panted, then mouthed a crude oath in Stygian.

“Conan.” Khertet spoke the word slowly, rolling it around in his mouth like a bite of bitter food. He fingered his scarred jaw and earlobe, then dug the point of his dagger into the skin above Conan’s ear. “After you burned my flagship, the king exiled me, ending my glorious career in Stygia. Since that day, I have prayed to Set for retribution. He has finally answered my prayers.” Khertet spat into the prone Cimmerian’s face. “Your dying agonies will bring me great pleasure....”

Khertet dug his knife into the flesh of Conan’s jaw until blood welled from a deep groove. Laughing cruelly, the red-eyed Stygian slashed the Cimmerian’s face, notching Conan’s earlobe with a single vicious swipe.

IV

Nightmare at Sea

Khertet surveyed his bloody knife-work while Conan glared at him from the deck, straining against the ropes. The captain had sliced both sides of his face, and slick blood coated his jaw and ears. The Cimmerian had endured the ordeal stoically, although he lacked the energy to resist, even to hurl any oaths at his tormentor.

The Stygian licked Conan’s blood from the dagger and spat it into the barbarian’s face. Then he took the sack of loot away, peering inside and chuckling.

“This is but a tithe of what I shall have from the king in Luxur. You are fortunate that he has offered a reward to whomever brings you to his feet alive. Killing you would bring me great joy, but I want my command back, and your capture will restore the king’s faith in me.” His eyes gleamed, and a smile played on his blood-smeared lips. “It is enough for me to know that you will suffer for hours as a serpent of Set eats you alive, digesting you slowly, dissolving the flesh from your bones. You will whimper and beg for death.”

Fingering his scar, Khertet bent his face down until Conan smelled his hot, sour breath. “Death will bring you no mercy. Your soul will be banished to our Serpent-God’s Hell, doomed to the eternal agony of a thousand unspeakable tortures.”

The Cimmerian seethed at his helplessness and ground his teeth, trying to shut off the throbbing pain that permeated his head. Beads of perspiration dripped from his face, dampening his thick mane of blood-matted hair and loosening the dark clots. His blue eyes blazed with the fires of rage, and a measure of his strength returned. “Stygian jackal,” he rasped. “Your dogs will not save you when we meet in Hell—where all lackeys of Set are sent as reward for their misbegotten loyalty.”

“Empty words, barbarian fool,” Khertet said smugly. “In four months, when we reach Luxur, you will beg for my mercy and whine for the privilege of licking bilge-water from my boots. You Cimmerians are stubborn and hardy, and you can survive the voyage with little food and water. Alive you will be when I take you before the king... alive, but broken and mewling, a feeble husk of wretchedness.” He turned his back and spoke to a white-bearded Vendhyan, who had come through the hatch and quietly watched Khertet’s cruelty. “Jhatil! Wash the dog-blood from this oaf’s head and bind his wounds. He must suffer but not die—I shall have my command back!”

The aged Vendhyan wordlessly went about his task, pouring stinging salt water over Conan’s raw wounds. His inflamed head burned as though thrust into a brazier of coals. He suppressed a grunt of agony while the wrinkled old man knotted a filthy rag over the red furrows that had been dug in his face. The cloth’s rough, stiff edge bit into Conan’s skin but did not block his vision or gag him. He saw Khertet motioning to two oarsmen.

“Devwir and Matara, take this piece of offal to the cargo hold and bind him to an empty crate. And be sure that you use the stoutest rope aboard; this Cimmerian is more dangerous than he seems. I have seen him in battle, bleeding from wounds but still fighting like a cornered tiger. Pour a dipperful of water down his throat once a day, but give him rations only every third day.

“Take shifts standing watch at the door to the hold. I shall personally check once during every shift, and the head of any watchmen whom I find sleeping will decorate the bowsprit. The rest of you dogs, bend your backs and pray for the trade winds to return. If we reach Luxur in three months, each of you will be paid double as reward. Lay out!” he bellowed, swaggering back to the poop deck. He nodded to the short Vendhyan drummer and barked orders to the Stygian helmsman.

The burly rowers heaved Conan from the blood-splashed planks and hauled him through the ship’s narrow fore hatch. A small, stout door opened into the cramped hold. Letting their burden drop to the hard deck, the oarsmen emptied a large, solid crate of its Vendhyan carpets, which they crammed into the few niches that the hold offered. The Vendhyans were muscular, but their combined strength was needed to lift and position the empty container. Jhatil had followed them through the hatch, carrying a coil of rope that was twice the girth of Conan’s thumb.

The Vendhyans wound the heavy cord around his already-trussed body, lashing him to the crate with cunning knots that would tighten if Conan struggled. When they were done, he could barely move his fingers and toes. They had left his face directly under a narrow iron gate in the hold’s ceiling, which provided meagre light and ventilation.

Khertet’s cruel face looked down at him through the grate. The Stygian’s mocking laughter echoed maddeningly. Weakened by loss of blood and the constant pangs from his raw, oozing wounds, the Cimmerian fell into a sleep of exhaustion.