The Hour of the Dragon

  3

  The Cliffs Reel

  The Aquilonian host was drawn up, long serried lines of pikemen andhorsemen in gleaming steel, when a giant figure in black armor emergedfrom the royal pavilion, and as he swung up into the saddle of the blackstallion held by four squires, a roar that shook the mountains went upfrom the host. They shook their blades and thundered forth their acclaimof their warrior king--knights in gold-chased armor, pikemen in mailcoats and basinets, archers in their leather jerkins, with theirlongbows in their left hand.

  The host on the opposite side of the valley was in motion, trotting downthe long gentle slope toward the river; their steel shone through themists of morning that swirled about their horses' feet.

  The Aquilonian host moved leisurely to meet them. The measured tramp ofthe armored horses made the ground tremble. Banners flung out longsilken folds in the morning wind; lances swayed like a bristling forest,dipped and sank, their pennons fluttering about them.

  Ten men-at-arms, grim, taciturn veterans who could hold their tongues,guarded the royal pavilion. One squire stood in the tent, peering outthrough a slit in the doorway. But for the handful in the secret, no oneelse in the vast host knew that it was not Conan who rode on the greatstallion at the head of the army.

  The Aquilonian host had assumed the customary formation: the strongestpart was the center, composed entirely of heavily armed knights; thewings were made up of smaller bodies of horsemen, mounted men-at-arms,mostly, supported by pikemen and archers. The latter were Bossoniansfrom the western marches, strongly built men of medium stature, inleathern jackets and iron head-pieces.

  The Nemedian army came on in similar formation, and the two hosts movedtoward the river, the wings in advance of the centers. In the center ofthe Aquilonian host the great lion banner streamed its billowing blackfolds over the steel-clad figure on the black stallion.

  But on his dais in the royal pavilion Conan groaned in anguish ofspirit, and cursed with strange heathen oaths.

  'The hosts move together,' quoth the squire, watching from the door.'Hear the trumpets peal! Ha! The rising sun strikes fire fromlance-heads and helmets until I am dazzled. It turns the rivercrimson--aye, it will be truly crimson before this day is done!

  'The foe have reached the river. Now arrows fly between the hosts likestinging clouds that hide the sun. Ha! Well loosed, bowmen! TheBossonians have the better of it! Hark to them shout!'

  Faintly in the ears of the king, above the din of trumpets and clangingsteel, came the deep fierce shout of the Bossonians as they drew andloosed in perfect unison.

  'Their archers seek to hold ours in play while their knights ride intothe river,' said the squire. 'The banks are not steep; they slope to thewater's edge. The knights come on, they crash through the willows. ByMitra, the clothyard shafts find every crevice of their harness! Horsesand men go down, struggling and thrashing in the water. It is not deep,nor is the current swift, but men are drowning there, dragged under bytheir armor, and trampled by the frantic horses. Now the knights ofAquilonia advance. They ride into the water and engage the knights ofNemedia. The water swirls about their horses' bellies and the clang ofsword against sword is deafening.'

  'Crom!' burst in agony from Conan's lips. Life was coursing sluggishlyback into his veins, but still he could not lift his mighty frame fromthe dais.

  'The wings close in,' said the squire. 'Pikemen and swordsmen fight handto hand in the stream, and behind them the bowmen ply their shafts.

  'By Mitra, the Nemedian arbalesters are sorely harried, and theBossonians arch their arrows to drop amid the rear ranks. Their centergains not a foot, and their wings are pushed back up from the streamagain.'

  'Crom, Ymir, and Mitra!' raged Conan. 'Gods and devils, could I butreach the fighting, if but to die at the first blow!'

  * * * * *

  Outside through the long hot day the battle stormed and thundered. Thevalley shook to charge and counter-charge, to the whistling of shafts,and the crash of rending shields and splintering lances. But the hostsof Aquilonia held fast. Once they were forced back from the bank, but acounter-charge, with the black banner flowing over the black stallion,regained the lost ground. And like an iron rampart they held the rightbank of the stream, and at last the squire gave Conan the news that theNemedians were falling back from the river.

  'Their wings are in confusion!' he cried. 'Their knights reel back fromthe sword-play. But what is this? Your banner is in motion--the centersweeps into the stream! By Mitra, Valannus is leading the host acrossthe river!'

  'Fool!' groaned Conan. 'It may be a trick. He should hold his position;by dawn Prospero will be here with the Poitanian levies.'

  'The knights ride into a hail of arrows!' cried the squire. 'But they donot falter! They sweep on--they have crossed! They charge up the slope!Pallantides has hurled the wings across the river to their support! Itis all he can do. The lion banner dips and staggers above the melee.

  'The knights of Nemedia make a stand. They are broken! They fall back!Their left wing is in full flight, and our pikemen cut them down as theyrun! I see Valannus, riding and smiting like a madman. He is carriedbeyond himself by the fighting-lust. Men no longer look to Pallantides.They follow Valannus, deeming him Conan as he rides with closed vizor.

  'But look! There is method in his madness! He swings wide of theNemedian front, with five thousand knights, the pick of the army. Themain host of the Nemedians is in confusion--and look! Their flank isprotected by the cliffs, but there is a defile left unguarded! It islike a great cleft in the wall that opens again behind the Nemedianlines. By Mitra, Valannus sees and seizes the opportunity! He has driventheir wing before him, and he leads his knights toward that defile. Theyswing wide of the main battle; they cut through a line of spearmen, theycharge into the defile!'

  'An ambush!' cried Conan, striving to struggle upright.

  '_No!_' shouted the squire exultantly. 'The whole Nemedian host is infull sight! They have forgotten the defile! They never expected to bepushed back that far. Oh, fool, fool, Tarascus, to make such a blunder!Ah, I see lances and pennons pouring from the farther mouth of thedefile, beyond the Nemedian lines. They will smite those ranks from therear and crumple them. _Mitra, what is this?_'

  He staggered as the walls of the tent swayed drunkenly. Afar over thethunder of the fight rose a deep bellowing roar, indescribably ominous.

  'The cliffs reel!' shrieked the squire. 'Ah, gods, what is this? Theriver foams out of its channel, and the peaks are crumbling! The groundshakes and horses and riders in armor are overthrown! The cliffs! Thecliffs are falling!'

  With his words there came a grinding rumble and a thunderous concussion,and the ground trembled. Over the roar of the battle sounded screams ofmad terror.

  'The cliffs have crumbled!' cried the livid squire. 'They have thundereddown into the defile and crushed every living creature in it! I saw thelion banner wave an instant amid the dust and falling stones, and thenit vanished! Ha, the Nemedians shout with triumph! Well may they shout,for the fall of the cliffs has wiped out five thousand of our bravestknights--Hark!'

  To Conan's ears came a vast torrent of sound, rising and rising infrenzy: 'The king is dead! _The king is dead! Flee! Flee! The king isdead!_'

  'Liars!' panted Conan. 'Dogs! Knaves! Cowards! Oh, Crom, if I could butstand--but crawl to the river with my sword in my teeth! How, boy, dothey flee?'

  'Aye!' sobbed the squire. 'They spur for the river; they are broken,hurled on like spume before a storm. I see Pallantides striving to stemthe torrent--he is down, and the horses trample him! They rush into theriver, knights, bowmen, pikemen, all mixed and mingled in one madtorrent of destruction. The Nemedians are on their heels, cutting themdown like corn.'

  'But they will make a stand on this side of the river!' cried the king.With an effort that brought the sweat dripping from his temples, heheaved himself up on his elbows.

  'Nay!' cried the squire. 'They cannot! They are broken! Routed! Oh
gods,that I should live to see this day!'

  Then he remembered his duty and shouted to the men-at-arms who stoodstolidly watching the flight of their comrades. 'Get a horse, swiftly,and help me lift the king upon it. We dare not bide here.'

  But before they could do his bidding, the first drift of the storm wasupon them. Knights and spearmen and archers fled among the tents,stumbling over ropes and baggage, and mingled with them were Nemedianriders, who smote right and left at all alien figures. Tent-ropes werecut, fire sprang up in a hundred places, and the plundering had alreadybegun. The grim guardsmen about Conan's tent died where they stood,smiting and thrusting, and over their mangled corpses beat the hoofs ofthe conquerors.

  But the squire had drawn the flap close, and in the confused madness ofthe slaughter none realized that the pavilion held an occupant. So theflight and the pursuit swept past, and roared away up the valley, andthe squire looked out presently to see a cluster of men approaching theroyal tent with evident purpose.

  'Here comes the king of Nemedia with four companions and his squire,'quoth he. 'He will accept your surrender, my fair lord--'

  'Surrender the devil's heart!' gritted the king.

  He had forced himself up to a sitting posture. He swung his legspainfully off the dais, and staggered upright, reeling drunkenly. Thesquire ran to assist him, but Conan pushed him away.

  'Give me that bow!' he gritted, indicating a longbow and quiver thathung from a tent-pole.

  'But your Majesty!' cried the squire in great perturbation. 'The battleis lost! It were the part of majesty to yield with the dignity becomingone of royal blood!'

  'I have no royal blood,' ground Conan. 'I am a barbarian and the son ofa blacksmith.'

  Wrenching away the bow and an arrow he staggered toward the opening ofthe pavilion. So formidable was his appearance, naked but for shortleather breeks and sleeveless shirt, open to reveal his great, hairychest, with his huge limbs and his blue eyes blazing under his tangledblack mane, that the squire shrank back, more afraid of his king than ofthe whole Nemedian host.

  Reeling on wide-braced legs Conan drunkenly tore the door-flap open andstaggered out under the canopy. The king of Nemedia and his companionshad dismounted, and they halted short, staring in wonder at theapparition confronting them.

  'Here I am, you jackals!' roared the Cimmerian. 'I am the king! Death toyou, dog-brothers!'

  He jerked the arrow to its head and loosed, and the shaft feathereditself in the breast of the knight who stood beside Tarascus. Conanhurled the bow at the king of Nemedia.

  'Curse my shaky hand! Come in and take me if you dare!'

  Reeling backward on unsteady legs, he fell with his shoulders against atent-pole, and propped upright, he lifted his great sword with bothhands.

  'By Mitra, it _is_ the king!' swore Tarascus. He cast a swift look abouthim, and laughed. 'That other was a jackal in his harness! In, dogs, andtake his head!'

  The three soldiers--men-at-arms wearing the emblem of the royalguards--rushed at the king, and one felled the squire with a blow of amace. The other two fared less well. As the first rushed in, lifting hissword, Conan met him with a sweeping stroke that severed mail-links likecloth, and sheared the Nemedian's arm and shoulder clean from his body.His corpse, pitching backward, fell across his companion's legs. The manstumbled, and before he could recover, the great sword was through him.

  Conan wrenched out his steel with a racking gasp, and staggered backagainst the tent-pole. His great limbs trembled, his chest heaved, andsweat poured down his face and neck. But his eyes flamed with exultantsavagery and he panted: 'Why do you stand afar off, dog of Belverus? Ican't reach you; come in and die!'

  Tarascus hesitated, glanced at the remaining man-at-arms, and hissquire, a gaunt, saturnine man in black mail, and took a step forward.He was far inferior in size and strength to the giant Cimmerian, but hewas in full armor, and was famed in all the western nations as aswordsman. But his squire caught his arm.

  'Nay, your Majesty, do not throw away your life. I will summon archersto shoot this barbarian, as we shoot lions.'

  Neither of them had noticed that a chariot had approached while thefight was going on, and now came to a halt before them. But Conan saw,looking over their shoulders, and a queer chill sensation crawled alonghis spine. There was something vaguely unnatural about the appearance ofthe black horses that drew the vehicle, but it was the occupant of thechariot that arrested the king's attention.

  He was a tall man, superbly built, clad in a long unadorned silk robe.He wore a Shemitish head-dress, and its lower folds hid his features,except for the dark, magnetic eyes. The hands that grasped the reins,pulling the rearing horses back on their haunches, were white butstrong. Conan glared at the stranger, all his primitive instinctsroused. He sensed an aura of menace and power that exuded from thisveiled figure, a menace as definite as the windless waving of tall grassthat marks the path of the serpent.

  'Hail, Xaltotun!' exclaimed Tarascus. 'Here is the king of Aquilonia! Hedid not die in the landslide as we thought.'

  'I know,' answered the other, without bothering to say how he knew.'What is your present intention?'

  'I will summon the archers to slay him,' answered the Nemedian. 'As longas he lives he will be dangerous to us.'

  'Yet even a dog has uses,' answered Xaltotun. 'Take him alive.'

  Conan laughed raspingly. 'Come in and try!' he challenged. 'But for mytreacherous legs I'd hew you out of that chariot like a woodman hewing atree. But you'll never take me alive, damn you!'

  'He speaks the truth, I fear,' said Tarascus. 'The man is a barbarian,with the senseless ferocity of a wounded tiger. Let me summon thearchers.'

  'Watch me and learn wisdom,' advised Xaltotun.

  His hand dipped into his robe and came out with something shining--aglistening sphere. This he threw suddenly at Conan. The Cimmeriancontemptuously struck it aside with his sword--at the instant of contactthere was a sharp explosion, a flare of white, blinding flame, and Conanpitched senseless to the ground.

  'He is dead?' Tarascus' tone was more assertion than inquiry.

  'No. He is but senseless. He will recover his senses in a few hours. Bidyour men bind his arms and legs and lift him into my chariot.'

  With a gesture Tarascus did so, and they heaved the senseless king intothe chariot, grunting with their burden. Xaltotun threw a velvet cloakover his body, completely covering him from any who might peer in. Hegathered the reins in his hands.

  'I'm for Belverus,' he said. 'Tell Amalric that I will be with him if heneeds me. But with Conan out of the way, and his army broken, lance andsword should suffice for the rest of the conquest. Prospero cannot bebringing more than ten thousand men to the field, and will doubtlessfall back to Tarantia when he hears the news of the battle. Say nothingto Amalric or Valerius or anyone about our capture. Let them think Conandied in the fall of the cliffs.'

  He looked at the man-at-arms for a long space, until the guardsman movedrestlessly, nervous under the scrutiny.

  'What is that about your waist?' Xaltotun demanded.

  'Why, my girdle, may it please you, my lord!' stuttered the amazedguardsman.

  'You lie!' Xaltotun's laugh was merciless as a sword-edge. 'It is apoisonous serpent! What a fool you are, to wear a reptile about yourwaist!'

  With distended eyes the man looked down; and to his utter horror he sawthe buckle of his girdle rear up at him. It was a snake's head! He sawthe evil eyes and the dripping fangs, heard the hiss and felt theloathsome contact of the thing about his body. He screamed hideously andstruck at it with his naked hand, felt its fangs flesh themselves inthat hand--and then he stiffened and fell heavily. Tarascus looked downat him without expression. He saw only the leathern girdle and thebuckle, the pointed tongue of which was stuck in the guardsman's palm.Xaltotun turned his hypnotic gaze on Tarascus' squire, and the manturned ashen and began to tremble, but the king interposed: 'Nay, we cantrust him.'

  The sorcerer tautened the reins and swung th
e horses around.

  'See that this piece of work remains secret. If I am needed, let Altaro,Orastes' servant, summon me as I have taught him. I will be in yourpalace at Belverus.'

  Tarascus lifted his hand in salutation, but his expression was notpleasant to see as he looked after the departing mesmerist.

  'Why should he spare the Cimmerian?' whispered the frightened squire.

  'That I am wondering myself,' grunted Tarascus.

  Behind the rumbling chariot the dull roar of battle and pursuit faded inthe distance; the setting sun rimmed the cliffs with scarlet flame, andthe chariot moved into the vast blue shadows floating up out of theeast.