The black woman snorted. “That has no humor even if it is meant to be a joke. I would choose Conan.”
“Because he saved your life?” Jehnna felt a flash of anger, and could not understand it. “Why not Bombatta?”
“That one would be brutal, thinking it made him seem strong, yet I could bend him to my will like bending a reed. Conan can be strong and gentle at the same time, and he would not bend easily if at all. As well lie with a rabbit as with a man you can bend too easily.” Zula gave her a sidelong glance; Jehnna knew her face was flushed, and the other woman’s obvious amusement made her color deepen. “Do not worry, child. I will not try to take him from you.”
Jehnna found herself stammering. “Take him … but he is not … I mean … .” She drew a deep breath and tried to sit very straight in her saddle, as Taramis did at her most imperious. “Do not call me child,” she said frostily. “I am a woman.”
“Of course. Forgive me, Jehnna.” Zula was silent for a time before continuing. “Among my people there is a custom at the death of a lover. I will lie with no man for one year from the day of T’car’s dying. He would have done the same had I died.”
It was Jehnna’s turn to ride in silence, mulling over what had been said. Little of it seemed to be of any use to her. There were no women to challenge over Conan, even if she knew how to fight them, and even if she was sure that was what she wanted. As for the rest … . .
“Zula, thrice now you have spoken of lying with a man. What does that mean?”
The black woman’s face went slack with amazement. “By all the gods,” she breathed, “you are a child.”
Jehnna opened her mouth for an angry retort, and froze with it open. Before them lay another mountain, or rather half of a mountain, for its top had long since disappeared. Even from below it was plain that a vast crater holed that truncated peak.
“Conan,” she whispered, then shouted it, “Conan! The key! I can feel it pulling me! The key is in that crater!” Eagerly she urged her horse to a gallop.
xi
“Wait, Jehnna,” Conan called for the tenth time, but he knew it was already too late. She had outdistanced all of them, and even as he spoke she topped the crater’s rim and disappeared.
Cursing, he sped after her as fast as his horse would take the mountain slope. The others were strung out behind him in a long line, but he could not wait for them. Over the rim he galloped, and gasped as he started down the other side.
At the bottom of the mammoth pit lay a lake unruffled by any breeze, its dark blue speaking of great depth. On either side of the glassy waters rose sheer walls. Below him was a small beach of black sa
nd, rushes growing on its edges. Jehnna’s mount was already halfway to the water in its headlong plunge. And on the far side of the lake stood a palace of crystal, an impossible structure of glittering facets that made the hair stand up on the back of his neck.
By the time he caught up to her, Jehnna’s panting horse had its muzzle in the lake, and the girl stared with eager eyes at the distant crystalline towers. The crater’s deepness created an early dusk on the sands.
“The key is in that palace?” Conan said.
She nodded excitedly. “Yes. I can feel it, pulling me.”
“We must leave the crater, then,” he told her, “and go around the side of the mountain. There is no way from here except to swim.”
The others began to arrive, first Bombatta and Zula almost together, then Akiro, and lastly Malak, with the packhorse.
“Are you all right, child?” Bombatta shouted at the same instant that Zula cried, “Jehnna, are you unharmed?” The scar-faced man and the ebon woman glared at one another.
“This is the way,” Jehnna said insistently. “This is the proper way.”
“How?” Conan demanded.
Even Bombatta looked doubtful. “We could go around, child. It can make no difference.”
“This is the way,” Jehnna repeated.
Suddenly Malak leaped down from his horse and waded into the rushes. When he came out again he was dragging a long, narrow boat of hides stretched over a wooden frame. He held up a handful of cords and bone fish-hooks. “Villagers provide the way, eh?” he grinned. “The fisherman will not care if we borrow his boat. There are paddles in it, too.”
“Convenient,” Akiro murmured, “to find it here. Mayhap too convenient.”
“What do you mean?” Conan asked.
The wizard tugged at a dangling gray mustache and peered toward the palace, sparkling still even now that direct sunlight was gone. “I do not think the Karpash Mountain folk are fishermen. And even if they were, would you fish in a place where that was?”
“But … here it is,” Malak protested. “You cannot deny your eyes.”