Roland Green - Conan and The Gods of The Mountains

Ryku judged that almost any words he spoke now were likely enough to be his last. He shrugged instead.

Chabano laughed. It was laughter that drowned out the rain and even warred against the thunder. "I do not know much about the God-Men," he said at last. "But you will tell me more, true?"

Ryku nodded.

"I rejoice. And my spies swore oaths to me, so they will obey even if it aids the God-Men. Did. you not know that?"

Ryku confessed ignorance.

"Then you have as much to learn about the Kwanyi as I have about the God-Men. Perhaps more.

Remember that, and guard your tongue when next we meet."

Ryku was ready to swear potent oaths to do so when he realized that he was about to swear to the darkness. Chabano had vanished, as silently as a cobra for all that he more resembled the honey-seeking bear.

TEN

The verdant hills on the western shore of the Lake of Death had long since swallowed the sun. Now moon-silvered clouds were swallowing the stars. A wind blew from the lake onto the island of the Ichiribu, gentle for now, but with a hint of strength to come.

On the summit of the highest hill on the island, Conan stood on one side of the dance-drum, contemplating Aondo standing on the other side. Both wore no more than loinguards, leather braces on their ankles and wrists, and looks of grim determination.

At least Aondo had donned such a look. Conan had merely allowed his face to assume its natural expression, which others had told him was grim enough for any occasion.

"You look ready to challenge the gods themselves if they give you half an excuse," a woman had told him some years ago in a distant land. She had intended it as praise, being one who doubted the gods' very existence.

Conan's own beliefs did not go that far. He merely doubted everything the priests said about the gods, and waited for the gods to speak for themselves. As they had so far remained silent, he felt he had good cause to rely on his own skill and strength.

He took on a more lighthearted expression and studied Aondo. The man's wits were nothing to boast of, but his look of being as slow as a mired ox was deceptive. Conan had seen too much of Aondo's swiftness in their previous contests. Also, Aondo knew the art of the drum-dance from boyhood, while Conan's life—and now Valeria's, curse the woman!— hung upon the Cimmerian's learning it within a few moments.

There was nothing more to learn about Aondo. Conan turned his attention to the drum itself.

It was a monstrous creation, a rough circle a good twenty paces across. The drum-frame was made of timber stout enough for building a war galley or the roof of a temple. In the torchlight, the drumhead had the russet hue of well-tanned oxhide, but a sheen as of tiny scales hinted of some other origin. Knowing how many strange beasts this part of the jungle seemed to harbor, the Cimmerian refused to let this unsettle him. If the drumhead would support his weight until he had won life and freedom for himself and Valeria, he did not much care if it was made of the hide of creatures from the moon!

From behind the circle of onlookers, Dobanpu and Seyganko stepped forward. Conan though he saw Emwaya and Valeria somewhere in the circle, but the crowd was too thick for him to be certain. It seemed that everyone who could walk or be carried had contrived to be here tonight, from babes in arms to venerable grandsires.

The wind gusted, and the torches flared, their smoke coiling serpentlike about Conan. He smelled exotic resins and herbs, like nothing he had encountered in the Black Kingdoms. The tribes of the Lake of Death, he would wager, were apart even from their kinsfolk nearer the coast.

Time to learn more about them when he had won. He raised his arms and clasped his hands over his head in the signal that he .was ready. Aondo did the same.

From somewhere beyond the circle of torchlight, a drumming began. It was not that of one of the great talking drums, this one—it might have been a child tapping ;away. But it was the ritual signal for the dancers to take their place.

Conan found the notched timber that served for a ladder, but disdained it. Instead, he gripped the edge of the drum, flexed at the knees, and soared onto the drumhead in a single leap.

The drum boomed like all the drums of all the war galleys in all the fleets of the world sounding the stroke at once. It seemed to Conan that the flames of the torches themselves froze for a moment. Certainly he could read surprise on every face… including Aondo's.

The Ichiribu champion at least had the wits not to attempt Conan's feat. He climbed by way of his notched log, and only then leaped into the center of the drum.

Once more the thunderous booming rolled out across the hilltop until it was lost in the darkness over the lake. Conan rode the drumhead by again flexing his knees, for now the art seemed no more difficult than balancing oneself on a ship's deck, easier than standing on the back of a horse. He did not expect it to remain that easy.

Wobeku watched with a sober eye as the two dancers began the serious work of the night. He doubted that Aondo's greater experience would outweigh his natural arrogance. Nothing could keep him from underestimating his opponent—and against this Conan, that would be folly.

So much the better. The more Aondo owed to Wobeku, the more pliant a tool in the hands of Chabano's spy the warrior would be. The more tales Wobeku could bear to the Kwanyi chief, the higher his place when the other tribe at last ruled the lands about the Lake of Death.

Wobeku patted the pouch at his belt. It seemed the common warrior's pouch, which might contain a spoon and eating gourd, a bone needle and sinew for mending garments, or a few strips of sun-dried meat and salted fish.

It contained all of these things, to deceive the casual searcher. Below them, it also held the two lengths of a short blowgun and a fish-skin pouch of darts for it.

The blowgun was not the man-tall weapon of the tribes of the forests to the south. Its range was less than half that of a good spear-throw. But it would not need range tonight, when its victim suspected nothing.

Nor would it need to do more than pierce her bare skin for the poison to do its work. The art of keeping cobra venom potent in the air was known only to the God-Men, and the darts were part of their gifts to Chabano. A small part, considering that Wobeku had only three darts. Was the spell for preserving the venom so difficult to bring about, or were the God-Men merely being closefisted with their magic as was their custom? Yet when one dart would do the work, three should be ample. The prey would suspect nothing, and cobras were not so rare on the island that anyone would suspect more than ill fortune, until it was too late. Too late for both Wobeku's prey and her bond-mate on the dance-drum.

The breeze now held a chill hint of yet more rain. Conan was sweating in spite of this. So was Aondo, and the sweat of both men was pouring onto the already-smooth drumhead, causing their footing to be even less certain.

More than Aondo's sweat was making the Cimmerian fight to remain on his feet. At unpredictable intervals, the Ichiribu warrior would fling himself down on his knees, or even on his belly, then slap the drumhead with both massive hands to begin his rise. These gestures gave the drumhead whole new kinds of movement, also unpredictable.

Conan himself foreswore such tricks. He learned swiftly that no movement of the drumhead put him in much danger of losing his footing… as long as he was prepared for it, at least, which meant feet well spread and legs ready to be either loose or rigid, as the drumhead demanded.

The drum-dance was unlike anything the Cimmerian had done before. But it called on skills that he had honed for a good few years, until they were as keen as the edge of his broadsword. From the yarn of these skills, he could weave victory.