Rubbing her plump buttock she left, but with a steamy-eyed look at Conan that said she might not be averse to selling more were he buying.
“I told him you were no stranger,” Hordo continued, “told him much of you, of our smuggling in Sultanapur. He’d not even listen. Told me you sounded a dangerous sort. Told me to stay away from you. Can you imagine him thinking I’d take an order like that?”
“I cannot,” Conan agreed.
Suddenly the Cimmerian felt the ghost of a touch near his pouch. His big hand darted back, captured a slender wrist and hauled its owner before him.
Golden curls surrounded a face of child-like innocence set with guileless blue eyes, but the lush breasts straining a narrow strip of red silk named her profession, as did the girdle of copper coins low on her hips, from which hung panels of transparent red that barely covered the inner curves of her thighs before and the inner slopes of her rounded buttocks behind. Her fist above his entrapping hand was clenched tightly.
“There’s a woman of sapphires and gold,” Hordo laughed. “What’s your price, girl?”
“Next time,” Conan said to the girl, “don’t try a man sober enough to notice how clumsy your touch is.”
The girl put on a seductive smile like a mask. “You mistake me. I wanted to touch you. I’d not be expensive, for one as handsome as you, and the herbalist says I’m completely cured.”
“Herbalist!” Hordo spluttered in his wine. “Get your hand off her, Conan! There’s nine and twenty kinds of pox in this city, and if she’s had one, she likely has the other twenty-eight yet.”
“And tells me of it right away,” Conan mused.
He increased the pressure of his grip slightly. Sweat popped out on her forehead; her generous mouth opened in a small cry, and her fingers unclenched to drop two silver coins into Conan’s free hand. In a flash he pulled her close, her arm held behind her back, her full breasts crushed against his massive chest, her frightened, sky-blue eyes staring into his.
“The truth, girl,” he said. “Are you thief, whore, or both? The truth, and I’ll let you go free. The first hint of a lie, and I’ll take you upstairs to get my money’s worth.”
She wet her lips slowly. “You’ll truly let me go?” she whispered. Conan nodded, and her shu
ddering breath flattened her breasts pleasantly against his chest. “I am no doxy,” she said at last.
Hordo grunted. “A thief, then. I’ll still wager she has the pox, though.”
“It’s a dangerous game you play, girl,” Conan said.
She tossed her blonde head defiantly. “Who notices one more strumpet among many? I take only a few coins from each, and each thinks he spent them in his cups. And once I mention the herbalist none want the wares they think I offer.” Abruptly she brought her lips to within a breath of his. “I’m not a whore,” she murmured, “but I could enjoy a night spent in your arms.”
“Not a whore,” Conan laughed, “but a thief. I know thieves. I’d wake with purse, and cloak, and sword, and mayhap even my boots gone.” Her eyes flashed, the guilelessness disappearing for an instant in anger, and she writhed helplessly within the iron band of his arm. “Your luck is gone this night, girl. I sense it.” Abruptly he released her. For a moment she stood in disbelief; then his open palm cracking across her buttocks lifted her onto her toes with a squeal that drew laughter from nearby tables. “On your way, girl,” Conan said. “Your luck is gone.”
“I go where I will,” she replied angrily, and darted away, deeper into the tavern.
Dismissing her from his mind he turned back to his wine, drinking deep. Over the rim of the leathern jack his eyes met those of the girl who had seemed out of place. She was looking at him with what was clearly approval, though not invitation, just as clearly. And she was writing on a scrap of parchment. He would wager there were not a handful of women on that entire street who could read or write so much as their own names. Nor many men, for that matter.
“Not for us,” Hordo said, noticing the direction of his gaze. “Whatever she is, she’s no daughter of the streets dressed like that.”
“I care not what she is,” Conan said, not entirely truthfully. She was beautiful, and he was willing to admit his own weakness for beautiful women. “At the moment I care about finding employment before I can no longer afford any woman at all. I spent the day walking through the city. I saw many men with bodyguards. There’s not so much gold in it as in smuggling, but I’ve done it before, and I likely will again.”
Hordo nodded. “There’s plenty enough of that sort of work. Every man who had a bodyguard a year ago has five now. Some of the fatter merchants, like Fabius Palian and Enaro Ostorian, have entire Free-Companies in their pay. There the real money is to be made, hiring out your own Free-Company.”
“If you have the gold to raise it in the first place,” Conan agreed. “I couldn’t buy armor for one man, let alone a company.”
The one-eyed man drew a finger throug a puddle of wine on the table. “Since the trouble started, half of what we smuggle in is arms. Tariff on a good sword is more than the price used to be.” He met Conan’s gaze. “Unless I miscount, we could steal enough to outfit a company without anyone being the wiser.”
“We, Hordo?”
“Hannuman’s Stones, man! When they start telling me who my friends can be, I’m not much longer for smuggling.”
“Then it’s a matter of getting silver enough for enlistment bonuses. For, say, fifty men—”
“Gold,” Hordo cut him off. “The going rate is a gold mark a man.”
Conan whistled between his teeth. “It’s not likely I’ll see that much in one place. Unless you … .”