Conan the Victorious by Robert Jordan
The small room was sparsely furnished, with a cot against one wall and an upright chest with many small drawers against another. A table that leaned on a badly mended leg sat in the middle of the bare wooden floor, a single stool beside it. A few garments hung on pegs in the walls. All seemed old and weathered, and the stooped man was a match for his possessions. Sparse white hair and olive skin blotched with age and wrinkled like often-folded parchment made the fellow seem able to claim a century. His hands were like knobby claws as they clutched a packet of oilskin, and his dark eyes, hooded and glaring, were the only part of him that showed any spark of vitality.
“My apologies,” Conan said quickly. He wracked his brain for the old man’s name. “I did not mean to enter so abruptly, Ghurran.” That was it. “I fish with Hordo.”
Ghurran grunted and bent to peer fussily at the packets and twists of parchment atop the rickety table. “Hordo, eh? His joints aching again? He should find another trade. The sea does not suit his bones. Or perhaps you come for yourself? A love philtre, perhaps?”
“No.” Half of Conan’s mind was on listening for the soldiers below. Not until they were gone could he risk putting his nose outside. “What I truly need,” he muttered, “is a way to become invisible until I reach the harbor.”
The old man remained bent over the table, but his head swiveled toward the big youth. “I compound herbs, and occasionally read the stars,” he said dryly. “You want a wizard. Why not try the love philtre? Guaranteed to put a woman helpless in your arms for the night. Of course, perhaps a handsome young man like you does not need such.”
Conan shook his head distractedly. The parties of guardsmen had met at the mouth of the alley. A thin murmuring floated to him, but he could not make out any words. They seemed in no hurry to move on. All of this trouble, and he did not even know why. A Vendhyan plot, those he had overheard had said. “May their sisters sell for a small price,” he muttered in Vendhyan.
“Katar!” Ghurran grunted. The old man lowered himself jerkily to his knees and fumbled under the table for a dropped packet. “My old fingers do not hold as once they did. What was that language you spoke?”
“Vendhyan,” Conan replied without taking his mind from the soldiers. “I learned a little of the tongue, since we buy so much fish from Vendhyans.” Most of the smugglers could speak three or four languages after a fashion, and his quick ear had already picked up considerable Vendhyan as well as smatterings of several others. “What do you know of Vendhya?” he went on.
“Vendhya? How should I know of Vendhya. Ask me of herbs. I know something of herbs.”
“It is said that you will pay for herbs and seeds from far lands, and that you ask many questions of these lands when you buy. Surely you have purchased some herbs from Vendhya.”
“All plants have uses, but the men who bring them to me rarely know those uses. I must try to draw the information from them, asking all they know of the country from which the herbs or seeds came in order to sift out a few grains that are useful to me.” The old man got to his feet and paused for breath, dusting his bony hands on his robes. “I have bought some trifles from Vendhya, and I am told it is a land full of intrigue, a dangerous land for the unwary, for those who too easily believe the promises of a man or the flattery of a woman. Why do you wish to know of Vendhya?”
“It is said in the streets that a prince has been slain, or perhaps a general, and that Vendhyans hired the killing done.”
“I see. I have not been out the entire day.” Ghurran chewed at a gnarled knuckle. “Such a thing is unlikely at this time, for it is said that wazam of Vendhya, the chief advisor to King Bhandarkar, visits Aghrapur to conclude a treaty, and many nobles of the royal court at Ayodhya visit as well. Yet remember the intrigues. Who can say? You still have not told me why you are so interested in this.”
Conan hesitated. The old man provided poultices and infusions for half the smugglers in Sultanapur. That so many continued to trust him was in his favor. “The rumor is that the assassin was a northlander, and the City Guard seems to think I am the man.”
The parchment-skinned man tucked his hands into the sleeves of his robe and peered at Conan with his head tilted. “Are you? Did you take Vendhyan gold?”
“I did not,” Conan replied. “Nor did I kill a prince, or a general.” Assuredly no man he had faced that day had been either.
“Very well,” Ghurran said. His lips tightened reluctantly. Then he sighed and took a dusty dark-blue cloak from the wall. “Here. This will make you somewhat less conspicuous than the one you wear now.”
Surprised, Conan nonetheless quickly exchanged his white cloak for the other. Despite the dust and folds of hanging, perhaps for years, the dark-blue wool was finely woven and showed little wear. It was tight across the Cimmerian’s shoulders, yet had obviously been made for a man bigger than Ghurran.
“Age shrinks all men,” the stooped herbalist said as though he had read Conan’s mind.
Conan nodded. “I thank you, and I will remember this.” The sound of the soldiers had faded away while he was talking. He cracked the door and peered out. The narrow street was jammed with people, but none were guardsmen. “Fare you well, Ghurran. And again, my thanks.”
Without waiting for the other man to speak again, Conan slipped out, descended the stairs and melded into the crowd. The harbor district, he thought. Once he reached that, there would be time to consider other matters.
CHAPTER III
The patrols of guardsmen were a nuisance to the young Turanian who made his way out of the harbor district and into an area that seemed favored, as nearly as he could tell, solely by beggars, bawds and cutpurses. He avoided the soldiers deftly, and none of the area’s denizens favored him with a second glance.
A Corinthian mother had given him features that were neither Corinthian nor Turanian, but rather simply dark-eyed and not quite handsome. Clean-shaven at the moment, he could pass as a native of any one of a half a score of countries and had done so more than once. He was above medium height, with a rawboned lanky build that often fooled men into underestimating his strength, several times to the saving of his life. His garb was motley, a patched Corinthian doublet that had once been red, baggy Zamoran breeches of pale cotton, well-worn boots from Iranistan.
Only the tulwar at his side and his turban, none too clean and none too neatly wrapped, were Turanian, he thought sourly. Four years gone from his own country and before he was back a tenday, he found himself skulking about the dusty streets of Sultanapur trying to avoid the City Guard. Not for the first time since leaving home at nineteen, he regretted his decision not to follow in his father’s footsteps as a spice merchant. As always, though, the regret lasted only until he could remind himself of how boring a spice merchant’s life was, but of late that reminding took longer than it once had.
Turning into an alley, he paused to see if anyone took notice. A single footsore trull began to flash a smile at him, then valued his garb in her mind and trudged on. The rest of the throng streamed by without an eye turning his way. He backed down the stench-filled alley, keeping a watch on the street, until he felt a rough wooden door under his fingers. Satisfied that he was still unobserved, he ducked through the doorway into darkness.
Instantly a knife at his throat stopped him in his tracks, but all he did was say quietly, “I am Jelal. I come from the West.” Anything else, he knew, and the knife wielder would have used his blade, not to mention the two other men he was sure were in the pitch-black room.
Flint struck steel, light flared, and a lamp that smoked and reeked of rancid oil was held to his face. Two, he saw, beside the one who still held a razor edge to his throat, and even the man with the lamp, a thick half-moon scar curling around his right eye, clutched a bared dagger.
The scar-faced man stepped aside and jerked his head toward a door leading deeper into the building. “Go on,” he said. Only then was the knife lowered from Jelal’s throat.
Jelal did not say anything
The windowless room he entered was what was to be expected in this quarter of the city, rough walls of clay brick, a dirt floor, a crude table tilted on a cracked leg. What was not to be expected were the beeswax candles giving light, the white linen cloth spread on the table top, or the crystal flagon of wine sitting on the cloth beside two cups of hammered gold. Nor was the man seated behind the table one to be expected in such a place. A plain dark cloak, nondescript yet of quality too fine for that region of Sultanapur, covered much of his garb. His narrow thinnosed face, with mustaches and small beard neatly waxed to points, seemed more suited to a palace than a district of beggars. He spoke as soon as Jelal entered.
“It is well you come today, Jelal. Each time I must come out into the city increases the risk I will be seen and identified. You have made contact?” He waved a soft-skinned hand with a heavy gold seal-ring on the forefinger toward the crystal flagon. “Have some wine for the heat.”
“I have made contact,” Jelal replied carefully, “but—”
“Good, my boy. I knew that you would, even in so short a time. Four years in Corinthia and Koth and Khauran, posing as every sort of merchant and peddler, legal and otherwise, and never once caught or even suspected. You are perhaps the best man I have ever had. But I fear your task in Sultanapur has changed.”
Jelal drew himself up. “My lord, I request to be reposted to the Ibari Scouts.”
Lord Khalid, the man who ordered and controlled all the spies of King Yildiz of Turan, stared in amazement. “Mitra strike me, why?”
“My lord, you say I was never once suspected in four years, and it is true. But it is true because I not only acted the part, I was a merchant, or a peddler as the instant demanded, spending most of my days buying and selling, talking of markets and prices. My lord, I became a soldier in part to avoid becoming a merchant like my father. I was a good soldier, and I ask to serve Turan and the King where I can serve them best, as a soldier once more in the Ibari Mountains.”
The spy master drummed his fingers on the table. “My boy, you were chosen for the very reasons you cite. Your service was all in the southern mountains, so no western foreigner is likely to ever have seen you as a soldier. Your boyhood training to be a merchant not only prepared you to play that part to perfection, but also, because of a merchant’s need to winnow fact from rumor to find the proper market and price, it made sure that you could do the same with other kinds of rumors and give reports of great value. As you have. You serve Turan best where you are.”
“But, my lord—”
“Enough, Jelal. There is no time. What do you know of events in Sultanapur this day?”
Jelal sighed. “There are many rumors,” he began slowly, “reporting everything but an invasion. Piecing together the most likely, I should say that Prince Tureg Amal was killed this morning. Beyond that I should say the strongest rumor is that a northlander was involved. As it was not what I came to Sultanapur for, I put no more than half my mind to it, I fear.”
“Half your mind, and you get one of two right.” The older man nodded approvingly. “You are indeed the best of my men. I do not know where the rumor of a northlander was born. Perhaps someone saw such a man in the street.”
“But the guardsmen, my lord. They seek—”
“Yes, yes. The rumors have spread even to them, and I’ve done nothing to change that state of affairs for the moment. Let the true culprits think they have escaped notice. It is not the first time soldiers have been sent chasing shadows, nor will it be the last. And a few innocent foreigners—if any of them can truly be called innocent—a few such put to the question, or even killed, is a small price to pay if it helps us take the true villains unaware. Believe me when I say the throne of Turan could be at stake.”
Jelal managed a nod. He was aware from experience just how coldly practical this soft-appearing man could be, even if the stakes were considerably less than the Turanian throne. “And the prince, my lord? You said I was half right.”
“Tureg Amal,” Kalid sighed, “drunkard, wastrel, lecher, and High Admiral of Turan, died this morning of a poisoned needle thrust into his neck. Not by a northern giant, as the rumors say, but by a woman. A Vendhyan assassin, according to reports.”
“An assassin?” Jelal said. “My lord, the prince’s ways with women are well know. Could he not perhaps simply have driven some wench to murder?”
The spy master shook his head. “As much as I should prefer it so, no. The servants at Tureg Amal’s palace have been questioned thoroughly. A Vendhyan woman was delivered to the palace this morning, supposedly a gift from a merchant of that country seeking added protection for his cargoes on the Vilayet. Within the hour the prince was dead, the keeper of his zenanna drugged, and the woman had disappeared unseen from a heavily guarded palace.”
“It certainly sounds the work of an assassin,” Jelal agreed, “but—”
“There could be worse,” the older man cut him off. “The commander of the prince’s bodyguard, one Captain Murad, was also slain this morning, along with two of his men, apparently in a tavern brawl. I do not like such coincidences. Perhaps it was unrelated, and perhaps they were silenced after effecting the woman’s escape. And if men of the High Admiral’s bodyguard took gold to aid in his death…well, that scandal could do more harm than the old fool’s murder.”
“Be that as it may, my lord, the other does not make sense. I understand that the wazam of Vendhya is in Aghrapur to negotiate a treaty with King Yildiz. Surely the King of Vendhya would not countenance an assassination while his chief counselor was in our capital, in our very hands. And if he did, why the High Admiral? The King’s death would create turmoil, while the prince’s creates only anger toward Vendhya.”
“The King’s death by a Vendhyan assassin would also create war with Vendhya,” Khalid said dryly, “while Tureg Amal’s…” He shrugged. “I do not know the why of it, my boy, but Vendhyans suck intrigue with their mothers’ milk and do nothing without a purpose, usually nefarious. As for the wazam, Karim Singh sailed from Aghrapur yesterday. And the treaty? I was suspicious of it before, now I am doubly so. Less than five years ago they nearly went to war with us over their claims to Secunderam. Now, without a protest, the wazam puts his seal on a treaty that does not so much as mention that city. And one that favors Turan on several other points, as well. I had thought they sought to lull us while they prepared some stroke. Now I no longer know what to think.” He began to roll the tip of his beard between his thumb and forefinger, the greatest outward sign of inner turmoil that he ever showed.
Reluctantly Jelal felt the puzzle catching at him, as it so often had before. The desire to return to soldiering was still there but pushed to the back of his mind. For the moment. “What can I do, my lord?” he asked at last. “The Vendhyan assassin is surely no longer in the city.”
“That is true,” the spy master replied, and his voice hardened as he spoke. “But I want answers. I need them. The King depends on me for them. What is Vendhya up to? Are we to expect a war? Captain Murad’s death may lead to some answers. Use the contacts you have made with the lawless underside of Sultanapur. Find a trail to the answers I need and follow it all the way to Vendhya if you must. But bring me the answers.”
“I will, my lord,” Jelal promised. But to himself he promised that this was the last time. Whether he was returned to the Ibari Scouts or not, after this one last puzzle, he would be a spy no more.
CHAPTER IV
Despite the cloak Ghurran had given him, Conan kept close to the sides of the narrow, bustling streets, on the edges of the continuous flow of people. It was true that the dark-blue cloak would not bring a moment’s glance from a guardsman looking for one of white linen, and the hood did hide his face and damning blue eyes, but the sheer size of him was difficult to miss. Few men in Sultanapur came close to his height or breadth of shoulder, and certainly none of them
Five times after leaving the herbalist Conan was forced to turn aside for patrols of guardsmen, their precisely slanted spears glinting in the bright sun as though to give warning of their coming, but luck seemed at last to be with him. His progress toward the harbor was constant, if zig-zag. High-wheeled ox-carts began once more to be almost as numerous as people. The long stone shapes of warehouses rose about him, and the tall white towers of the city granaries. Men with the calloused hands and sweat-stained tunics of dockers and roustabouts outnumbered all but those with the rolling walk and forked queues of seafarers. Half the women were trulls in narrow girdles of jingling coin and thin silk or less, while most of the rest cast a sharp eye for a purse to cut or a bolt of silk or lace that could be snatched from a cart. Here, too, were people who knew him.
“An hour’s pleasure, big man?” cooed a buxom doxy with hennaed hair piled high on her head and gilded brass hoops in her ears. She moved closer and pressed nearly bare breasts against his arm, dropping her voice for his ear alone. “You fool, the City Guard has already taken up three dockers just for being tall. And they are questioning outlanders, so you’re doubly at risk. Now, put your arm around me, and we will go to my room. I can hide you till it all quiets. And I’ll charge you but—oh, Mitra, I’ll not charge you at all.”
Conan grinned despite himself. “A generous offer, Zara. But I must find Hordo.”
“I’ve not seen him, Conan. And you cannot risk looking. Come with me.”