Conan the Triumphant (Robert Jordan's Conan Novels 4)

Conan grinned back at him. “I wager Lord Antimides will know what to do with her, whether she likes it or not.”

“That he will. Wait you here.” Belly shaking with mirth, the soldier disappeared through the gate. In a few moments he was back with a slender man, his black hair streaked with gray, in a tabard of gold and green, Antimides’ colors.

The slender man turned a supercilious gaze on the big Cimmerian. “I am Ludovic,” he said sharply, “Count Antimides’ steward. You’ve come to see the count? Who are you?” He appeared to ignore Conan’s burden.

“I am Conan of Cimmeria, Captain of the Free-Company in service to Baron Timeon.”

Ludovic stroked his beard thoughtfully with a single finger, his eyes traveling to the wriggling girl over Conan’s shoulder, then nodded. “Follow me,” he commanded. “Perhaps the count will grant you a brief time.”

Conan’s mouth tightened. All this obsequiousness and play-acting was enough to turn his stomach. But he followed the slender man under the portcullis and into the royal palace.

If a fortress from the outside, the seat of the Kings of Ophir was still a palace within. Gleaming white marble walls, floors covered with a profusion of many-hued mosaicks, fluted alabaster columns. Golden lamps depending on silver chains from high vaulted ceilings, painted with scenes from Ophir’s glorious history. Gardens, surrounded by shaded colonnades and filled with rare blossoms from the far corners of the world. Courtyards, tiled with greenstone, where ladies of the court in diaphanous gowns that concealed little of their curves dabbled pale fingers in the babbling waters of ornate fountains.

Their passage left a wake of giggles and murmurs, and stares at the towering Cimmerian and the burden across his broad shoulder. No fear was there here in noticing the unusual, and commenting on it. High-born, hot-eyed women speculated loudly on the pleasures to be found in being carried so—without the cords, of course.

The slender man scowled and increased his pace, muttering under his breath. Conan followed and wished the steward would go faster still.

Finally Ludovic stopped before a wide door carved with the ancient arms of Ophir. “Wait,” he said. “I willl see if the count will give you audience.”

Conan opened his mouth, but before he could speak, the slender man disappeared through the door, carefully closing it behind him. Audience, he thought disgustedly. Antimides already acted as if he wore the crown.

The door swung open, and Ludovic beckoned him. “Hurry, man. Count Antimides can spare you but a few moments.”

Muttering to himself Conan bore his burden within. Immediately he saw the room, his eyebrows lifted in surprise. Perhaps to the casual observer the room would not seem odd, but to one who knew Antimides’ ambitions it was clearly a small throne room. An arras depicting a famous battle scene, Moranthes the Great defeating the last army of Acheron in the passes of the Karpash Mountains, hung across one wall. On a dais before the great tapestry was a massive chair with a high back, its dark wood carved with a profusion of leopards and eagles, the ancient symbols of Ophirean Kings.

If the chair seemed not grand enough by itself for a throne, the man seated there made it so. Deep-seated, piercing black eyes flanked a strong, prominent nose. His mouth was hard above a firm chin with its precisely trimmed fashionable beard. Long fingers bearing swordsman’s callouses played with a ruby chain hanging across the chest of a robe of cloth-of-gold, slashed to show emerald silk beneath.

“My lord count,” Ludovic said, bowing to the man on the dais, “this is the man calling himself Conan of Cimmeria.”

“’Tis my name,” Conan said. He lowered Tivia to the thick-carpeted floor, layered in costly multi-colored rugs from Vendhya and Iranistan. She crouched there silently, fright seeming at last to have stilled her rage.

“Count Antimides,” Ludovic pronounced grandly, “wishes to know why you have come to him.”

“The girl is Tivia,” Conan replied, “late mistress of Baron Timeon. Until she did poison him this morn.”

Antimides raised a finger, and Ludovic spoke again. “But why have you brought her to him? She should be given to the King’s justices.”

Conan wondered why the count did not speak for himself. But the ways of nobles were as strange as those of sorcerers. And there were more troublesome matters to concern him. Time for his gamble had come. “As Baron Timeon supported Count Antimides in his quest to succeed Valdric, it seemed proper to bring her before the count. My Free-Company is now without a patron. Perhaps the count can find—”

“My quest!” Antimides burst out, his face choleric with rage. “How dare you accuse me of … .” He broke off, grinding his teeth. Ludovic stared at him in obvious surprise. Tivia, her mouth working futilely at her gag, seemed transfixed by his gaze. “You, jade,” he breathed. “So you poisoned your master, and were caught at it by this barbar mercenary. Pray that justice is mercifully swift for you. Take her away, Ludovic.”

Desperately and futilely Tivia attempted to force words past the cloth gagging her. She flung herself against her bonds as the steward seized her, but the slender man bore her behind the arras with little effort. A door opened and closed behind the hanging, and her cries were cut off.

The Cimmerian reminded himself that Tivia was a self-confessed murderer, and for gold. Still, it pained him to have a hand in a woman’s death. In his belief women were not meant to die violently; such was for men. He forced himself to stop thinking of her, and put his attention on the hawk-eyed man on the dais. “Count Antimides, there is still the matter of my Free-Company. Our reputation is well known, and—”

“Your reputation!” Antimides snarled. “Your patron assassinated, and you speak of your reputation. Worse, you come to me with vile accusations. I should have your tongue torn out!”

“Pray, Antimides, what accusations are these to put you in such a rage?”

Both men started at the question; so intent had they been on each other that neither had noticed the entrance of another. Now that Conan saw her, though, he drank her in appreciatively. Long of leg and full of breast, an exotic beauty blending the extraordinary combination of hair like fine, spun silver and large, dark eyes that spoke of deep wells of untapped passion, she moved with sinuous grace, her shimmering scarlet robe, barely opaque and slit up one thigh to a rounded hip, clinging to the curves of breast and thigh.

“Why do you come here, Synelle?” Antimides demanded. “I will not be bothered by your sharp tongue today.”

“I have not seen this chamber since you came to the royal palace, Antimides,” she said with a dangerous smile. “Seeing it, a suspicious mind might think you sought the crown after all, no matter your public pronouncements of disdain for those who strive beyond the city walls.” Antimides’ face darkened, and his knuckles grew white on the arms of the chair; Synelle’s smile deepened. “But as to why I came. It is said in the palace that a giant northlander came to you bearing a woman wrapped like a package from a fishmonger. Surely I could not miss seeing that? But where is this gift? She is a gift, is she not?”

“This does not concern you, Synelle,” Antimides grated. “Go back to your woman’s concerns. Have you not needlework waiting?”

Synelle merely arched her eyebrows