The Hour of the Dragon - Robert E. Howard (great reads .TXT) 📗

class="calibre2">walls of Tarantia, and loops southward like a great shining serpent.

This boat differed from the ordinary craft plying the broad Khorotas-fishermen and merchant barges loaded with rich goods. It was long and

slender, with a high, curving prow, and was black as ebony, with white

skulls painted along the gunwales. Amidships rose a small cabin, the

windows closely masked. Other craft gave the ominously painted boat a

wide berth; for it was obviously one of those “pilgrim boats” that

carried a lifeless follower of Asura on his last mysterious pilgrimage

southward to where, far beyond the Poitanian mountains, a river flowed

at last into the blue ocean. In that cabin undoubtedly lay the corpse

of the departed worshipper. All men were familiar with the sight of

those gloomy craft; and the most fanatical votary of Mitra would not

dare touch or interfere with their somber voyages.

 

Where the ultimate destination lay, men did not know. Some said

Stygia; some a nameless island lying beyond the horizon; others said

it was in the glamorous and mysterious land of Vendhya where the dead

came home at last. But none knew certainly. They only knew that when a

follower of Asura died, the corpse went southward down the great

river, in a black boat rowed by a giant slave, and neither boat nor

corpse nor slave was ever seen again; unless, indeed, certain dark

tales were true, and it was always the same slave who rowed the boats

southward.

 

The man who propelled this particular boat was as huge and brown as

the others, though closer scrutiny might have revealed the fact that

the hue was the result of carefully applied pigments. He was clad in

leather loin-clout and sandals, and he handled the long sweep and oars

with unusual skill and power. But none approached the grim boat

closely, for it was well known that the followers of Asura were

accursed, and that these pilgrim boats were loaded with dark magic. So

men swung their boats wide and muttered an incantation as the dark

craft slid past, and they never dreamed that they were thus assisting

in the flight of their king and the Countess Albiona.

 

It was a strange journey, in that black, slim craft down the great

river for nearly two hundred miles to where the Khorotas swings

eastward, skirting the Poitanian mountains. Like a dream the ever-changing panorama glided past. During the day Albiona lay patiently in

the little cabin, as quietly as the corpse she pretended to be. Only

late at night, after the pleasure boats with their fair occupants

lounging on silken cushions in the flare of torches held by slaves had

left the river, before dawn brought the hurrying fisher-boats, did the

girl venture out. Then she held the long sweep, cunningly bound in

place by ropes to aid her, while Conan snatched a few hours of sleep.

But the king needed little rest. The ardor of his desire drove him

relentlessly; and his powerful frame was equal to the grinding test.

Without halt or pause they drove southward.

 

So down the river they fled, through nights when the flowing current

mirrored the million stars, and through days of golden Sunlight,

leaving winter behind them as they sped southward. They passed cities

in the night, above which throbbed and pulsed; the reflection of the

myriad lights, lordly river villas and fertile fruit groves. So at

last the blue mountains of Poitain rose above them, tier above tier,

like ramparts of the gods, and the great river, swerving from those

turreted cliffs, swept thunderously through the marching hills with

many a rapid and foaming cataract.

 

Conan scanned the shoreline closely, and finally swung the long sweep

and headed inshore at a point where a neck of land jutted into the

water, and fir trees grew in a curiously symmetrical ring about a

gray, strangely shaped rock.

 

“How these boats ride those falls we hear roaring ahead of us is more

than I can see,” he grunted. “Hadrathus said they did-but there’s

where we halt. He said a man would be waiting for us with horses, but

I don’t see anyone. How word of our coming could have preceded us I

don’t know anyway.”

 

He drove inshore and bound the prow to an arching root in the low

bank, and then, plunging into the water, washed the brown paint from

his skin and emerged dripping, and in his natural color. From the

cabin he brought forth a suit of Aquilonian ring-mail which Hadrathus

had procured for him, and his sword. These he donned while Albiona put

on garments suitable for mountain travel. And when Conan was fully

armed, and turned to look toward the shore, he started and his hand

went to his sword. For on the shore, under the trees, stood a black-cloaked figure holding the reins of a white palfrey and a bay war-horse.

 

“Who are you?” demanded the king.

 

The other bowed low.

 

“A follower of Asura. A command came. I obeyed.”

 

“How, ‘came’?” inquired Conan, but the other merely bowed again.

 

“I have come to guide you through the mountains to the first Poitanian

stronghold.”

 

“I don’t need a guide,” answered Conan. “I know these hills well. I

thank you for the horses, but the countess and I will attract less

attention alone than if we were accompanied by an acolyte of Asura.”

 

The man bowed profoundly, and giving the reins into Conan’s hands,

stepped into the boat. Casting off, he floated down the swift current,

toward the distant roar of the unseen rapids. With a baffled shake of

his head, Conan lifted the countess into the palfrey’s saddle, and

then mounted the war-horse and reined toward the summits that

castellated the sky.

 

The rolling country at the foot of the towering mountains were now a

borderland, in a state of turmoil, where the barons reverted to feudal

practises, and bands of outlaws roamed unhindered. Poitain had not

formally declared her separation from Aquilonia, but she was now, to

all intents, a self-contained kingdom, ruled by her hereditary count,

Trocero. The rolling south country had submitted nominally to

Valerius, but he had not attempted to force the passes guarded by

strongholds where the crimson leopard banner of Poitain waved

defiantly.

 

The king and his fair companion rode up the long blue slopes in the

soft evening. As they mounted higher, the rolling country spread out

like a vast purple mantle far beneath them, shot with the shine of

rivers and lakes, the yellow glint of broad fields, and the white

gleam of distant towers. Ahead of them and far above, they glimpsed

the first of the Poitanian holds-a strong fortress dominating a narrow

pass, the crimson banner streaming against the clear blue sky.

 

Before they reached it, a band of knights in burnished armor rode from

among the trees, and their leader sternly ordered the travelers to

halt. They were tall men, with the dark eyes and raven locks of the

south.

 

“Halt, sir, and state your business, and why you ride toward Poitain.”

 

“Is Poitain in revolt then,” asked Conan, watching the other closely,

“that a man in Aquilonian harness is halted and questioned like a

foreigner?”

 

“Many rogues ride out of Aquilonia these days,” answered the other

coldly. “As for revolt, if you mean the repudiation of a usurper, then

Poitain is in revolt. We had rather serve the memory of a dead man

than the scepter of a living dog.”

 

Conan swept off his helmet, and shaking back his black mane stared

full at the speaker. The Poitanian stared violently and went livid.

 

“Saints of heaven!” he gasped. “It is the king-alive!”

 

The others stared wildly, then a roar of wonder and joy burst from

them. They swarmed about Conan, shouting their war-cries and

brandishing their swords in their extreme emotion. The acclaim of

Poitanian warriors was a thing to terrify a timid man.

 

“Oh, but Trocero will weep tears of joy to see you, sire!” cried one.

 

“Aye, and Prospero!” shouted another. “The general has been like one

wrapped in a mantle of melancholy, and curses himself night and day

that he did not reach the Valkia in time to die beside his king!”

 

“Now we will strike for empery!” yelled another, whirling his great

sword about his head. “Hail, Conan king of Poitain!”

 

The clangor of bright steel about him and the thunder of their acclaim

frightened the birds that rose in gay-hued clouds from the surrounding

trees. The hot southern blood was afire, and they desired nothing but

for their new-found sovereign to lead them to battle and pillage.

 

“What is your command, sire?” they cried. “Let one of us ride ahead

and bear the news of your coming into Poitain! Banners will wave from

every tower, roses will carpet the road before your horse’s feet, and

all the beauty and chivalry of the south will give you the honor due

you—”

 

Conan shook his head.

 

“Who could doubt your loyalty? But winds blow over these mountains

into the countries of my enemies, and I would rather these didn’t know

that I lived-yet. Take me to Trocero, and keep my identity a secret.”

 

So what the knights would have made a triumphal procession was more in

the nature of a secret flight. They traveled in haste, speaking to no

one, except for a whisper to the captain on duty at each pass; and

Conan rode among them with his vizor lowered.

 

The mountains were uninhabited save by outlaws and garrisons of

soldiers who guarded the passes. The pleasure-loving Poitanians had

no need nor desire to wrest a hard and scanty living from their stem

breasts. South of the ranges the rich and beautiful plains of Poitain

stretched to the river Alimane; but beyond the river lay the land of

Zingara.

 

Even now, when winter was crisping the leaves beyond the mountains,

the tall rich grass waved upon the plains where grazed the horses and

cattle for which Poitain was famed. Palm trees and orange groves

smiled in the sun, and the gorgeous purple and gold and crimson towers

of castles and cities reflected the golden light. It was a land of

warmth and plenty, of beautiful men and ferocious warriors. It is not

only the hard lands that breed hard men. Poitain was surrounded by

covetous neighbors and her sons learned hardihood in incessant wars.

To the north the land was guarded by the mountains, but to the south

only the Alimane separated the plains of Poitain from the plains of

Zingara, and not once but a thousand times had that river run red. To

the east lay Argos and beyond that Ophir, proud kingdoms and

avaricious. The knights of Poitain held their lands by the weight and

edge of their swords, and little of ease and idleness they knew.

 

So Conan came presently to the castle of Count Trocero.

 

Conan sat on a silken divan in a rich chamber whose filmy curtains the

warm breeze billowed. Trocero paced the floor like a panther, a lithe,

restless man with the waist of a woman and the shoulders of a

swordsman, who carried his years lightly.

 

“Let us proclaim you king of Poitain!” urged the count. “Let those

northern pigs wear the yoke to which they have bent they necks. The

south is still yours. Dwell here and rule us, amid the flowers and the

palms.”

 

But Conan shook his head. “There is no nobler land on earth than

Poitain. But it cannot stand alone, bold as are its sons.”

 

“It did stand alone for generations,” retorted Trocero, with the quick

jealous pride of his breed. “We were not always a part of Aquilonia.”

 

“I know. But conditions are