Conan the Triumphant (Robert Jordan's Conan Novels 4) - Page 32

Not so much of a youth, Conan saw at second glance; there was that in the man’s manner—a petulant thrust of a too-full lower lip; a sulkiness of eye and stance—that gave an air of boyishness.

“Well, who is he?” the Cimmerian asked. “You speak as if I should know him.”

The youthful appearing man lifted his chin with almost feminine hauteur. “I am Valentius,” he said in a high voice that strained for steadiness, “count now, but King to be. I give you my thanks for this rescue.” His dark eyes flickered uncertainly to Narus and Machaon. “If rescue it indeed is.”

Narus shrugged. “We told him why we are here,” he said to Conan, “but he does not believe. Or not fully.”

“There are two guards below with their gullets slit,” Machaon said, “but we’ve seen no one living. There is madness in this place, Cimmerian. Has Antimides truly fled?”

For an answer Conan jerked his head toward the high-backed chair. The other three hesitated, then moved quickly to look.

Shockingly, Valentius giggled. “However did you make him do this? No matter. ’Tis fitting for his betrayal of my trust.” His fine-featured face darkened quickly. “I came to him for aid and shelter, and he laughed at me. At me! Then he clapped me in irons and left me to rot and fight rats for my daily bowl of swill. So pious, he was. So unctuous. He would not have my blood on his hands, he said, and laughed. He would leave that to the rats.”

“I’ve seen death on many fields, Conan,” Machaon said, “but this is an ugly way to slay a man, for all he deserved killing.” His knuckles were white on his sword hilt as he gazed on the corpse. Narus formed his fingers into a sign to ward off evil.

“I did not kill him,” Conan told them. “Look at his hands on the chain. Antimides slew himself.”

Valentius laughed again, shrilly. “However ’twas done, it was done well.” Moods shifting like quicksilver, his face screwed up viciously, and he spat in the corpse’s bloated face. “I but regret I could not see the doing.”

Conan exchanged glances with his two friends. This was the man with the best blood claim to succeed Valdric on the throne of Ophir. The young Cimmerian shook his head in disgust. The urge to be rid of the youth quickly was strong, but did he simply leave him the fool would have his throat cut in short order. Perhaps that would be the better for Ophir, but such was not his decision to make.

To Valentius he said, “We will take you to the royal palace. Valdric will give you protection.”

The slender young man stared at him, wildeyed and trembling. “No! No, you cannot! Valdric will kill me. I am next in line for the throne. He will kill me!”

“You speak foolishness,” Conan growled. “Valdric has no care for aught but saving his own life. ’Tis likely in a day he’ll not even remember you are in the palace.”

“You do not understand,” Valentius whined, wringing his hands. “Valdric will look at me, knowing that he is dying, knowing that I will be King after. He will think of the long years I have before me, and he will hate me. He will have me slain!” He looked desperately from one face to the next, and finished with a sullenly muttered, “’Tis what I would do, and so will he.”

Machaon spat on the costly Turanian carpet. “What of blood kin?” he asked gruffly “What of friends, or allies?”

The cringing man shook his head. “How can I know who among them to trust? My own guards turned on me, men who have served my house faithfully for years.” Suddenly his voice quickened, and his dark eyes took on a sly light. “You protect me! When I am King, I will give you wealth, titles. You shall have Antimides’ palace, and be count in his stead. You and your men shall be the King’s personal bodyguard. Riches beyond imagining I shall grant you, and power. Choose a woman, noble or common, and she will be yours. Two, do you wish them, or three! Name the honor you desire! Give it name, and I shall grant it!”

Conan grimaced. It was true that there could be no better service for a Free-Company than what Valentius offered, but he would sooner serve a viper. “What of Iskandrian?” he said. “The general takes no part in these struggles, follows no faction.”

Valentius nodded reluctantly. “If you will not serve me,” he said sulkily.

“Then let us leave this place,” Conan said, “and quickly. It would be ill to be found standing over Antimides’ corpse.” As the others hurried from the room, though, he paused for one last look at the dead man. Whatever sorcery Antimides had enmeshed himself in, the Cimmerian was glad it did not touch him. With a shiver he followed the others.

16

Dusk was falling as Conan returned to the house where his company was quartered, and the gray thickening of the air, the coming blackness, fitted his mood well. Iskandrian had taken Valentius under his protection at the army’s barracks readily enough, but the old general had listened to their story with a suspicious eye on the Cimmerian. Only for Valentius’ agreement that Antimides appeared to have strangled himself had the mercenaries left those long, stone buildings unchained, and the petulant glare the young lord gave Conan as he said the words was as clear as a statement that he would have spoken differently could he but be sure he would not himself be implicated.

And then there had been Synelle. Conan had found her in a strange mixture of fury and satisfaction. She already knew of Antimides’ death, though he was not aware the word had spread so quickly; that accounted for her contentment. But she had upbraided him savagely for riding away without her permission, and for taking the time to bring Valentius to Iskandrian’s care.

The last seemed to infuriate her more than the first. He was in her service, not that of the fopling Valentius, and he would do well to remember it. To his own amazement he had listened meekly, and worst of all had had to fight with himself to stop from begging her forgiveness. He had never begged anything from man or woman, god or demon, and it made his stomach turn to think how close he had come.

He slammed open the door of his room, and stopped dead. In the dimness Julia, naked and bound hand and foot, frowned up at him with her mouth working frantically at a gag.

“Machaon!” he shouted. “Narus!” Hastily he untied her gag. Her bonds had been tightly tied, and she had pulled them tighter with her struggles. He had to wield his dagger carefully to cut only the strips of cloth and not her flesh. “Who did this?” he demanded as he labored to free her.

With a groan she expelled a damp wad of cloth from her mouth, and worked her jaw before speaking. “Do not let him see me like this,” she pleaded. “Hurry! Hurry!”

Machaon, Narus and Boros tumbled through the door, all shouting questions at once, and Julia screamed. As Conan severed the last binding, she jerked free of him and scrambled to the bed, snatching a blanket to cover herself.

“Go away, Machaon!” she cried, cowering back. Rubiate color suffused her cheeks. “I will not have you see me so. Go away!”

“’Tis gone,” Boros said drunkenly, pointing to the corner where Conan had hidden the bronze figure.

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