Ferian smiled as Conan leaned an elbow on the bar, though his small black eyes remained watchful, and he did not cease his wiping. “Hannuman’s Stones, Cimmerian,” he said quietly. “They say all roads lead to Aghrapur—at least, they say it in Aghrapur—and seeing you walk in here, I believe it. A year more, and all of Shadizar will be here.”
“Who else from Shadizar is in the city?” Conan asked.
“Rufo, the Kothian coiner. Old Sharak, the astrologer. And Emilio, too.”
“Emilio!” Conan exclaimed. Emilio the Corinthian had been the best thief in Zamora, next to Conan. “He always swore he’d never leave Shadizar.”
Ferian chuckled, a dry sound to come from one so plump. “And before that he swore he would never leave Corinthia, but he left both for the same reason—he was found in the wrong woman’s bed. Her husband was after him, but her mother wanted him even more. Seems he’d been bedding her as well, and lifting bits of her jewelry. The older wench hired a bevy of knifemen to see that Emilio would have nothing to offer another woman. I hear he left the city disguised as an old woman and did not stop sweating for half a year. Ask him about it, an you want to see a man turn seven colors at once, the while swallowing his tongue. He’s upstairs with one of the girls now, though likely too drunk to do either of them any good.”
“Then they’ll be there till the morrow,” Conan laughed, “for he’ll never admit to failure.” He laid two coppers on the bar. “Have you any Khorajan ale? My throat is dusty.”
“Do I have Khorajan ale?” Ferian said, rummaging under the bar. “I have wines and ales you have never heard of. Why, I have wines and ales I have never heard of.” He drew out a dusty clay crock, filled a leathern jack, and made the coppers disappear as he pushed the mug in front of Conan. “Khorajan ale. How stand affairs in the Gilded Bitch of the Vilayet? You had to leave in a hurry, did you?”
Conan covered his surprise by drinking deeply on the dark, bitter ale, and wiped white froth from his mouth with the back of his hand before he spoke. “How knew you I have been in Sultanapur? And why think you I left hurriedly?”
“You were seen there these ten days gone,” Ferian smirked, “by Zefran the Slaver, who came through here on his way back to Khawarism.” It was the tavernkeeper’s major fault that he liked to let men know how much he knew of what they had been about. One day it would gain him a knife between his ribs. “As for the rest, I know naught save that you stand there with the dust of hard riding on you, and you were never the one to travel for pleasure. Now, what can you tell me?”
Conan drank again, pretending to think on what he could tell. The fat man was known to trade knowledge for knowledge, and Conan had one piece of it he knew was not yet in Aghrapur, unless someone had grown wings to fly it there ahead of him.
“The smuggling is much abated in Sultanapur,” the Cimmerian said finally. “The Brotherhood of the Coast is in disarray. They sweat in the shadows, and stir not from their dwellings. ’Twill be months before so much as a bale of silk passes through that city without the customs paid.”
Ferian grunted noncommittally, but his eyes lit. Before the sun next rose, men who would try to fill the void in Sultanapur would pay him well.
“And what can you tell me of Aghrapur?”
“Nothing,” Ferian replied flatly.
Conan stared. It was not the tapster’s way to give less than value. His scrupulousness was part and parcel of his reputation. “Do you doubt the worth of what I’ve told you?”
“’Tis not that, Cimmerian.” The tavernkeeper sounded faintly embarrassed. “Oh, I can tell you what you can learn for yourself in a day’s listening in the street. Yildiz casts his eyes beyond the border, and builds the army accordingly. The Cult of Doom gains new members every day. The—”
“The Cult of Doom!” Conan exclaimed. “What in Mitra’s name is that?”
Ferian grimaced. “A foolishness, is what it is. They’re all over the streets, in their saffron robes, the men with shaven heads.”
“I saw some dressed so,” Conan said, “chanting to a tambourine.”
“’Twas them. But there’s naught to them, despite the name. They preach that all men are doomed, and building up earthly treasures is futile.” He snorted and scrubbed at his piggish nose with a fat hand. “As for earthly treasure, the cult itself has built up quite a store. All who join give whatever they possess to the Cult. Some young sons and daughters of wealthy merchants, and even of nobles, have given quite a bit. Not to mention an army of rich widows. There’ve been petitions to the throne about it, from relatives and such, but the cult pays its taxes on time, which is more than can be said of the temples. And it gives generous gifts to the proper officials, though that is not well known.” He brightened. “They have a compound, almost a small city, some small distance north, on the coast. Could I find where within their treasures are kept … well, you are skillful enough to make your fortune in a single night.”
“I’m a thief no more,” Conan said. Ferian’s face fell. “What else can you tell me of the city?”
The fat man sighed heavily. “These days I know less than the harlots, whose customers sometimes talk in their sleep. In these three months past, two thirds of those who have given me bits and pieces, servants of nobles and of those high in the Merchant’s Guild, have been murdered. What you have told me is the best piece of intelligence I have had in a month. I owe you,” he added reluctantly. He was not one to enjoy indebtedness. “The first thing I hear that you might use to advantage, I will place in your hands.”
“And I will hear it before anyone else? Let us say two days before?”
“Two days! As well as a year. Knowledge spoils faster than milk under a hot sun.”
“Two days,” Conan said firmly.
“Two days, then,” the other man muttered.
Conan smiled. Breaking his word was not among Ferian’s faults. But this matter of the murders, now … . “It seems beyond mere chance that so many of your informants should die in so short a time.”
“No, friend Conan.” To the Cimmerian’s surprise, Ferian refilled his mug without asking payment. That was not like him. Perhaps he hoped to pay off his debt in free drink, Conan thought. “Many more have died than those who had a connection to me. There is a plague of murder on Aghrapur. More killings in these three months than in the whole year before. Were it not for the sorts who die, I might think some plot was afoot, but who would plot against servants and Palace Guards and the like? ’Tis the hand of chance playing fickle tricks, no more.”
“Conan!” came a shout from the stairs at the rear of the common room. The big Cimmerian looked around.
Emilio stood on the bottom step with his arm around a slender girl in gauds of brass and carnelian and a long, narrow strip of red silk wound about her in such a way as almost to conceal her breasts and hips. She half supported him as he swayed drunkenly, which was no easy task. He was a big man, as tall as Conan, though not so heavily muscled. He was handsome of face, with eyes almost too large for a man. His eyes and his profile, he would tell anyone who would listen, drew women as honey drew flies.
“Greetings, Emilio,” Conan called back. “No longer dressing as an old woman, I see.” To Ferian he added, “We’ll talk later.” Taking his mug, he strolled to the staircase.
Emilio sent the girl on her way with a swat across her pert rump, and eyed Conan woozily. “Who told you that tale? Ferian, I’ll wager. Fat old sack of offal. Not true, I tell you. Not true. I simply left Zamora to seek rich—” he paused to belch “—richer pastures. You’re just the man I want to see, Cimmerian.”
Conan could sense an offer of cooperation coming. “We no longer follow the same trade, Emilio,” he said.
Emilio did not seem to hear. He grabbed the arm of a passing serving girl, ogling her generous breasts as he did. “Wine, girl. You hear?” She nodded and sped off, deftly avoiding his attempted pinch; he tottered and nearly fell. Still staggering, he managed to fall onto a stool at an empty t
able and gestured drunkenly toward another. “Sit, Conan. Sit, man. Wine’ll be here before you know it.”
“Never before have I seen you so drunk,” Conan said as he took the stool. “Are you celebrating, or drowning sorrows?”
The other man’s eyes had drifted half shut. “Do you know,” he said dreamily, “that a blonde is worth her weight in rubies here? These Turanian men will kill to have a fair-haired mistress. Does she have blue eyes, they’ll kill their mothers for her.”
“Have you turned to slaving, then, Emilio? I thought better of you.”
Instead of answering, the other man rambled on.
“They have more heat in them than other women. I think it’s the hair. Gods put color in a woman’s hair, they must have to take some of her heat to do it. Stands to reason. Davinia, now, she’s hotter than forge-fire. That fat general can’t take care of her. Too much army business.” Emilio’s snicker was at once besotted and lascivious. Conan decided to let him run out of wind. “So I take care of her. But she wants things. I tell her she doesn’t need any necklace, beautiful as she is, but she says a sorcerer laid a spell on it for a queen. Centuries gone this happened, she claims. Woman wears it, and she’s irresistible. Thirteen rubies, she says, each as big as the first joint of a man’s thumb, each set on a moonstone-crusted seashell in gold. Now that’s worth stealing.” He snickered and leaned toward Conan, leering. “Thought she’d pay me for it with her body. Set her straight on that. I already have her body. Hundred gold pieces, I told her. Gold, like her hair. Softest ever I tangled my hand in. Softest skin, too. Buttery and sleek.”
The serving girl returned to set a mug and wine-jar on the table, and stood waiting. Conan made no move to pay. He had no hundred gold pieces coming to him. The girl poked Emilio in the ribs with her fist. He grunted, and stared at her blearily.
“One of you pays for the wine,” she said, “or I take it back.”
“No way to treat a good customer,” Emilio muttered, but he rooted in his pouch until he came up with the coins. When she had gone he stared at the Cimmerian across the table. “Conan! Where did you come from? Thought I saw you. It’s well you are here. We have a chance to work together again, as we used to.”
“We never worked together,” Conan said levelly. “And I thieve no more.”
“Nonsense. Now listen you close. North of the city a short distance is an enclosure containing much wealth. I have a commission to steal a—to steal something from there. Come with me; you could steal enough to keep you for half a year.”
“Is this enclosure by any chance the compound of the Cult of Doom?”
Emilio rocked back on his seat. “I thought you were fresh come to the city. Look you, those seven who supposedly entered the compound and were never seen again were Turanians. These local thieves have no skill, not like us. They’d last not a day in Shadizar or Arenjun. Besides, I think me they did not go to the compound at all. They hid, or died, or left the city, and men made up this story. People will do that, to make a place they do not know, or do not like, seem fearful.”
Conan said nothing.
Ignoring his mug, Emilio swept up the clay wine-jar, not lowering it until it was nearly drained. He leaned across the table, pleading in his voice. “I know exactly where the—the treasure is to be found. On the east side of the compound is a garden containing a single tower, atop which is a room where jewelry and rarities are kept. Those fools go there to look at them. The display is supposed to show them how worthless gold and gems are. You see, I know all about it. I’ve asked questions, hundreds of them.”
“If you’ve asked so many questions, think you that no one knows what you intend? Give it over, Emilio.”
A fur-capped Hyrkanian stepped up to the table, the rancid odor of his lank, greased hair overpowering the smells of the tavern. A scar led from the missing lower lobe of his left ear to the corner of his mouth, pulling that side of his face into a half-smile. From the corner of his eye the Cimmerian saw four more watching from across the room. He could not swear to it, but he thought he had encountered these five earlier in the day.
The Hyrkanian at the table spared only a glance to Conan. His attention was on Emilio. “You are Emilio the Corinthian,” he said gutturally. “I would talk with you.”
“Go away,” Emilio said without looking at him.
“I know no Emilio the Corinthian. Listen to me, Conan. I would be willing to give you half what I get for the necklace. Twenty pieces of gold.”
Conan almost laughed. Dead drunk Emilio might be, but he still thought to cheat his hoped-for partner.
“I would talk with you,” the Hyrkanian said again.
“And I said go away!” Emilio shouted, his face suddenly suffusing with red. Snatching the wine-jar, he leaped to his feet and smashed it across the Hyrkanian’s head. With the last dregs of the wine rolling down his face, the scarred nomad collapsed in a welter of clay fragments.
“Crom!” Conan muttered; a deluge of rank-smelling men in fur caps was descending on them.
Conan pivoted on his buttocks, his foot rising to meet a hurtling nomad in the stomach. With a gagging gasp the man stopped dead, black eyes goggling as he bent double. The Cimmerian’s massive fist crashed against the side of his head, and he crumpled to the floor.
Emilio was wallowing on the floor beneath two of the Hyrkanians. Conan seized one by the back of his sheepskin coat and pulled him off of the Corinthian thief. The nomad spun, a dagger in his streaking hand. Surprise crossed his face as his wrist slapped into Conan’s hand. The Cimmerian’s huge fist traveled no more than three handspans, but the fur-capped nomad’s bootheels lifted from the floor, and then he collapsed beside his fellow.
Conan scanned the room for the fifth Hyrkanian, but could not find the remaining nomad anywhere. Emilio was getting shakily to his feet while examining a bloody gash on his shoulder. Ferian was heading back toward the bar, carrying a heavy bungstarter. Another instant and Conan saw a pair of booted feet stretched out from behind a table.
“You get them out of here,” Ferian shouted as he reached the bar and thrust the heavy mallet out of sight. “You dirtied my floor, now you clean it. Get them out of here, I say!”
Conan seized one of the unconscious men by the heels. “Come on, Emilio,” he said, “unless you want to fight Ferian this time.”
The Corinthian merely grunted, but he grabbed another of the nomads. Together they dragged the unconscious men into the street, shadowed with night, now, and left them lying against the front of the rug dealer’s shop.
As they laid out the last of the sleeping men—Conan had checked each to make sure he still breathed—Emilio stared up at the waxing pearlescent moon and shivered.
“I’ve an evil feeling about this, Conan,” he said. “I wish you would come with me.”
“You come with me,” Conan replied. “Back inside where we’ll drink some more of Ferian’s wine, and perhaps try our luck with the girls.”
“You go, Conan. I—” Emilio shook his head. “You go.” And he staggered off into the night.
“Emilio!” Conan called, but only the wind answered, whispering down shadowed streets. Muttering to himself, the Cimmerian returned to the tavern.
III
When Conan came down to the common room of the Blue Bull the next morning, the wench with the beads in her hair accompanied him, clutching his arm to her breast, firm and round through its thin silk covering, letting her swaying hip bump his thigh at every step.
Brushing her lips against his massive shoulder, she looked up at him smokily through her lashes. “Tonight?” She bit her lip and added, “For you, half price.”
“Perhaps, Zasha,” he said, though even at half price his purse would not stand many nights of her. And those accursed beads had quickly gotten to be an irritation. “Now be off with you. I’ve business.” She danced away with a saucy laugh and a saucier roll of her hips. Mayhap his purse could stand one more night.
The tavern was almost empty at t
hat early hour. Two men with sailors’ queues tried to kill the pain of the past night’s drink with still more drink, while morosely fingering nearly flat purses. A lone strumpet, her worknight done at last and her blue silks damp with sweat, sat in a corner with her eyes closed, rubbing her feet.
At the bar Ferian filled a mug with Khorajan ale before he was asked.
“Has aught of worth come to your ear?” Conan asked as he wrapped one big hand around the leathern jack. He was not hopeful, since the fat tavernkeeper had once more failed to demand payment.
“Last night,” the stout man said, concentrating on the rag with which he rubbed the wood of the bar, “it was revealed that Temba of Kassali, a dealer in gems who stands high in the Merchant’s Guild, has been featuring Hammaran Temple Virgins at his orgies, with the result that fourteen former virgins and five priestesses have disappeared from the Temple, likely into a slaver’s kennels. Temba will no doubt be ordered to give a large gift to the Temple. Last night also twenty-odd murders took place, that I have heard of so far, and probably twice so many that have not reached my ears. Also, the five daughters of Lord Barash were found by their father entertaining the grooms of his stable and have been packed off into the Cloisters of Vara, as has the Princess Esmira, or so ’tis rumored.”
“I said of worth,” the Cimmerian cut off. “What care I for the virgins or princesses? Of worth!”
Ferian gave a half-hearted laugh and studied his bit of scrub cloth. “The last is interesting, at least. Esmira is the daughter of Prince Roshmanli, closest to Yildiz’s ear of the Seventeen Attendants. In a city of sluts she is said to be a virgin of purest innocence, yet she is being sent away to scrub floors and sleep on a hard mat till a husband can be found.” Suddenly he slammed his fist down on the bar and spat. The spittle landed on the wood, but he seemed not to see it. “Mitra’s Mercies, Cimmerian, what expect you? It’s been but one night since I told you I know nothing. Am I a sorcerer to conjure knowledge where there was none? An you want answers from the skies, ask old Sharak over there. He—” Suddenly his eye lit on the globule of spit. With a strangled cry he scrubbed at it as if it would contaminate the wood.