However, Khezal was of much the same mind as Conan—the words "friendly" and "wizard" did not belong in the same sentence. Both would also have doubted that even a wizard who professed friendship would keep a bargain, rather than taking his gold and fleeing at once for the land of the Hyperboreans.
In any case, the lack of magical assistance for the journey north was only the first and least of Khezal's frustrations. The next was Conan's insistence on waiting until the two Afghulis who were riding north were fit to travel.
"Do you doubt my word, that they will be safe here among the Greencloak garrison of the Virgin's Oasis?" Khezal asked, laughing to cover his fury.
Conan, wholly sober, shook his head. "I doubt not your word, not even your command over your men as long as your eye is on them. But your eye will be on the slopes of the Kezankians, and your men here. That's another matter, and the name for the matter would be 'blood feud' if anything happened to the Afghulis."
Khezal considered this. Neither he nor any Turanian had much love for the Afghulis, but they were not among the realm's leading foes. The Iranistanis were otherwise—and the Afghulis were even less friendly to Iranistan than to Turan. There would hardly be gratitude toward a man who made blood foes of Turan among the Afghulis.
More important than any lack of gratitude in court circles would be the enmity of proven captains in war. Khezal would have endangered their men, and imperiled their victories. Lack of gratitude among courtiers, Khezal could endure. Knives in the dark, wielded on the orders of men whom he had trusted to guard his back from Yezdigerd, would make life sin-gularly futile for the short time it might last.
"As you wish. I trust that your friends are as hardy as the tale-tellers have them, though. We do not want one of my enemies ambushing us with half a regiment as we cross the caravan route, because a spy has told a tale in the palace!"
"Khezal, I am no more a lover of palaces and what goes on in them than you are. Trust me for that, and my Afghulis for swift healing."
To Khezal's relief, the Afghulis were standing within a day and riding within two. They moved stiffly at first, but that they were fighting-fit was proved on the third day.
A groom boy, so green that he had hardly wiped his mother's milk from his lips, grew curious about Farad's dagger. He reached out to touch it—and found himself on his back some paces away, lip split and several teeth scattered about on the sand.
"The lad should call himself lucky," was all Khezal could get out of Conan. "And you should call your chief groom a fool, for letting into the field a witling who'll touch another's steel without asking."
"That won't heal the boy."
Conan shrugged, then dipped into his belt pouch. An Iranistani silver prince-piece came out. The Cimmerian tossed it high, then slapped it out of the air with one hand, into the palm of another.
"Here. Even a fool deserves a trifle of poppy syrup to soothe his hurts."
"Perhaps I should hold on to those jewels after all. We may need them to silence the angry and heal the hurt, if we have many more of these exchanges."
"At your pleasure, my friend. But I will talk to Farad and Sorbim, if you will talk to your people."
"I will, and pray to Mitra that all listen!"
"Halt! Who seeks to pass?"
Captain Muhbaras's mind had lurched up out of sleep before his body was ready to follow. That sentry had to be one of the new recruits, a "settled" nomad. How settled any of the tribesmen could become was a matter of some debate. It was evident that he had not learned sentry drill as thoroughly as could be wished.
The reply came in a woman's voice, which finished the work of awakening the captain's body. He could make out no words, but there was no need for that. The only women out and about here by night were the Maidens of the Mist, and the most likely reason they would be here was something either dire, urgent, or both.
Across the single room in the hut, blankets roiled and heaved like water in a millrace. A round face with a crinkly black chin beard rose above the blankets, like an otter surfacing from a dive.
"A woman?" the face said. The mouth was a thin gash, unwholesomely out of proportion to the rest of the face. It always seemed a marvel to the captain that Ermik's tongue was not forked, like that of a serpent.
"A Maiden."
"Ah. No doubt seeking to end that—"
In a moment the captain was out of his blankets and off his pallet. In another moment he had taken two strides and was standing over the other. His hand was on the hilt of his sword. His gaze was fixed on the wall of the hut.
If he allowed his gaze to drift downward, he knew he might draw the sword and thrust it into the thick neck below the round face. That would silence the greasy voice, but raise a howling and a shrieking back in Khoraja that would not end until he himself was dead, and likely many of his men dead with him. Men he had sworn to lead out of these Hell-cursed mountains, as he had sworn to lead them in.
"You may think that, if you wish, and risk both body and soul if the Lady of the Mist hears your thoughts. Do not ever let them pass your lips. Not where a Maiden can hear them. Not where I can hear them. Not where a hawk, a mouse, or a beetle can hear them!
"Do you understand?"
The small dark eyes above the blankets resembled a pig's eyes, but they were as unblinking as a serpent's.
"Do you?" the captain repeated.
"I do."
"Then hold your tongue and go back to sleep."
"I must visit the—"
"After I am done with the Maiden."
The other's mouth opened again, and the captain's hand tightened on the age-darkened leather of the sword's grip. Even one bawdy word from the other might send him over the brink—and perhaps he could buy his life and his men's by saying that the Maidens would have slain Ermik, the Grand Council's spy, had the captain not done so.
The Maidens—or their mistress. It would sound dreadful enough to persuade the Council.
Indeed, it might even be the truth.
"Do not be long."
The other could foul his blankets for all that the captain cared, save that the hut reeked enough as it was.
"I shall be no longer than the Maiden detains me. How long that will be depends on her errand, and I offer you another piece of wisdom."
"Will you have any wisdom left if you keep offering me pieces of it?"
The captain ignored the pert reply as he would have the yelping of a cur in the streets. "The shorter the time I am gone, the worse the news the Maiden bears."
That opened Ermik's eyes agreeably wide. They stared after the captain as he strode out into the night.
Conan was seated cross-legged on a carpet in the Afghulis' tent, watching the surgeon's Vendhyan slave tend Farad's wounds. Before him on the rug stood a jug of wine. A small bribe had procured it from the surgeon's stores, and after a cup of it, Conan felt a trifle more reconciled to the world as it was.
The slave jerked a dressing from Farad's ribs, taking a scab with it. Blood trickled, Farad glared, the slave cringed and muttered something under his breath. It was probably not a curse, although, like most Vendhyans, the slave could hardly be overly fond of Afghulis. Centuries of border raids, burned villages, and looted caravans had seen to that.
However, Conan understood several of the Ven-dhyan dialects, and the first time the slave ill-wished the Afghulis, he said as much. He added that if the slave could not keep his tongue between his teeth by the power of his will, either his tongue or his teeth might be removed, or perhaps his lips sewn shut. Mutes were not always the best slaves, but if muting them improved their manners—