Juma wrinkled his brow. "North?"
"Aye, to Hyrkania." Conan laughed. "Have you forgotten that we still have this girl to deliver to her bridegroom?"
Juma's brow wrinkled with greater puzzlement than before, seeing how Zosara's slim, white arms were wound around his comrade's neck and how her small head was nestled contentedly against his mighty shoulder. To her bridegroom? He shook his head; never would he understand the ways of Cimmerians. But he followed Conan's lead and turned his steed toward the mighty Talakma Mountains, which rose like a wall to sunder the weird land of Mem from the windy steppes of Hyrkania.
A month later, they rode into the camp of Kujula, the Great Khan of the Kuigar nomads. Their appearance was entirely different from what it had been when they fled from Shamballah. In the villages on the southern slopes of the Talakmas, they had traded the links from the golden chains that still dangled from Zosara's wrists and ankles for clothing suitable to snowy mountain passes and gusty plains. They wore fur caps, sheepskin coats, baggy trousers of coarse wool, and stout boots.
When they presented Zosara to her black-bearded bridegroom, the khan feasted and praised and rewarded them. After a carousal that lasted for several days, he sent them back to Turan loaded with gifts of gold.
When they were well away from Khan Kujula's camp, Juma said to his friend: "That was a fine girl. I wonder you didn't keep her for yourself. She liked you, too."
Conan grinned. "Aye, she did. But I'm not ready to settle down yet. And Zosara will be happier with Kujula's jewels and soft cushions than she would be with me, galloping about the steppes and being roasted, frozen, and chased by wolves or hostile warriors." He chuckled.
"Besides, though the Great Khan doesn't know it, his heir is already on the way."
"How do you know?"
"She told me, just before we parted."
Juma made clicking sounds from his native tongue. "Well, I will never, never underestimate a Cimmerian again!"