Conan the Freelance Part 22

Aye, he thought, or die trying before allowing himself to be pulled up on a rope. The Tree Folk had no more fingers or toes than did Cimmerians, and if they could scale that wall, he would be cursed forever if he could not do the same.

"I shall send a scout to find a good place," Tair said. "Meanwhile, let us eat and speak of our adventures. I have much to say."

Conan grinned. Aye, he was certain of that fact. Never had he met a people so full of themselves. They had raised the standards of bragging, to be sure.

Thayla chewed on a hard root and grimaced at the taste and texture. There was some milky fluid in the thing that spurted into her mouth, producing a salty and slightly bitter tang. While sustaining, it was hardly part of a diet she would desire given choice. Still, one had to make do. There was no time to hunt meat and still maintain their watch on the Tree Folk and that accursed Conan.

Next to her under the cover of thick shrubbery, Blad smiled at her. Simpleton that he was, he required very little to make him happy. After crossing the river where so many of their kind had died, Thayla had gifted the young Pili with a treasure he had never thought to attain, and now he belonged to her, body and spirit. Males were so predictable it was laughable.

"They are settled, you say?"

"Aye, milady. They eat and talk among themselves."

Thayla digested this bit of information along with another bit of root. Whatever idea she had had about slaying the Tree Folk one at a time vanished when Conan and his group joined another, larger band of the accursed humans. There were nearly a score of them gathered together now, and a misstep on Blad's part would likely see him skewered. Not that such an idea greatly distressed her, since she thought of males as disposable-one Pili was as good as another; they all looked alike under the moon-but since Blad here was the only one she had, Thayla was loath to give him up-at least until she had a suitable replacement.

"We are near the village?" she said.

"Aye, my queen. A few minutes' walk."

What, she wondered, were the Tree Folk up to now? And where was that fool husband of hers? The village squatted on the edge of a vast lake, and he had to be inside the walls-unless he was in the water or somehow on the weed therein, neither of which she thought likely. So what was he doing in there?

"Go and watch the men," Thayla ordered. "Report back immediately if anything happens."

The smile vanished from Blad's face. Doubtless he had something other in mind than lying alone in the brush spying on their quarry. Thayla reached out and stroked his arm. She gave him a half-lidded look and a sultry smile. "I shall wait here for your return."

The grin blossomed again on Blad's face and he jumped up almost eagerly. "At once, my queen!"

After he was gone, Thayla shook her head. Truly males were driven by something other than their brains.

The thick of night found Kleg sitting unhappily in a rat-infested tavern near the docks. A sign outside proclaimed the tavern to be the Bright Hope. The name was a huge joke, for there was neither brightness nor hope within.

Kleg brooded over a wooden cup of kral under the flickering light of sputtering fat lamps. The rough, filthy room was filled with smoke and perhaps a score of low-caste men and half as many bottom-of-the-barrel trulls seeking to service them. The planks of the walls were warped and colored a dead gray, with torn fishnets draped here and there as an attempt at decorations. A vile place. Kleg was only in it because he thought it unlikely anyone would think to look for him here.

Kleg sipped at his drink. The crowd of men was a rough one, cutpurses, dock thugs, and the like, with a thin leavening of more upright citizens: at a table near the selkie, a goatherder and a swinekeeper drunkenly told each other tales in loud voices.

None of the riffraff bothered Kleg. It was well known that a selkie was no easy mark, being stronger than a man even on land and quick to anger if irritated. Small consolation.

". . . No, wait, let me tell ye about the time I slew a direwolf with naught else but my sling-"

"No, no, no, I heared that story a hundred times! Let me tell you o' the monster at the inn!"

The goatherder splashed wine down the front of his already-stained and stinking sheepskin jerkin. "Ah, go on with ye, it's lies ye be tellin'! "

"No, no, no! I was there, I tell you! It come right through the wall o' the Fish, tore the wood like it was a spider's web and come right at me! Big as a house"-Here the swinekeeper waved his mug of wine to emphasize the size of the thing about which he spoke, and sloshed a goodly portion of the wine into a high arc that ended on the dirt floor-"it were, and me standin' there in the street all alone, nothin' between it 'n' me, and I says to myself, by Mitra, my time is come, so's I might as well go out like a man. I stared it in the eye, I did, I dared it to come for me, and it see'd my face and turned away!"

"Aye, I'ud run were I sober and seeing you for the first time meself," the goatherder said. Amused at his own joke, the man laughed loudly, trailing off into a hoa.r.s.e cackle.

"No! I faced 'im down, I did! The street were thick with folk and they every one of 'em ran like water bugs from a carp! But I stood my ground! I'ud show you, it ever comes back, the demon!"

This brought another round of raspy cackles.

Kleg was distracted by his plight, else he would have picked up on the substance of the conversation sooner. As it was, he realized the implications as the goatherder stood and made some comment about emptying his bladder; then stumbled off, weaving awkwardly through the clutter of the room.

If any of this were true, if this old man had been on the street when the monster broke out of the inn last eve, then maybe he had seen the talisman!

Kleg shook his head. It was a faint hope. Still, a faint hope was better than no hope at all.

The selkie stood and moved toward the old swinekeeper.

Even through his drunken haze, the man's face registered his fear as Kleg loomed over him.

"Eh?"

"I heard part of your story," Kleg said. "A man as brave as you deserves more than scorn. What are you drinking?"

"Why, dregwine, what else?"

Kleg waved at the serving woman, a white-haired slattern dressed in a shapeless rag whose original color had become hidden under layers of filth. "Ho, a bottle of your best for my brave friend here."

The swinekeeper's face lit up with besotted joy. "Why, that's kind o' you, milord! You bein' a selkie and all, not that I ever had any disrespect for your kind, you unnerstand."

Kleg nodded. "Tell of this adventure of yours of which I have heard so much talk."

"Much talk, eh? Ha, shows what that fool goatherd knows! Aye, milord, it were a terrible sight! Only last night it happened."

The wizened little man launched into a retelling of the story Kleg had overheard. He paused when the serving woman returned with the wine, poured until his cup overflowed, and drank half the new portion. "Aye, so there I were, all alone, facing the demon with naught but my courage ...."

A hush fell over the room, the conversations around stopping as if by a signal. Kleg glanced up from the old man's rambling, to see what had caused the sudden quiet.

Standing in the doorway, outlined by the fat lamps to either side of the entrance, was a Pili.

The swinekeeper was oblivious and had grown more heroic in his retelling his tale.

". . . so I moved toward it, figurin' to poke its eye out, maybe . . ."

The Pili could hardly see much in the smoky room, Kleg felt, but if he came in and allowed his eyes to adjust to the gloom, it would not be long before he would be able to pick out the only selkie therein.

Kleg surrept.i.tiously fingered his knife. One-on-one, he felt that he could hold his own, especially with surprise on his side.

The Pili strode into the room. No one spoke, save the drunken swinekeeper, who was lost in his own glory. Then a second Pili entered, followed by a third.

Uh-oh. This altered things.

"We are searching for one of the fishmen," the lead Pili said.

Fully half of the room's patrons turned to look at Kleg.

The Pili took note of the action, and his gaze followed the others to where Kleg sat.