Tamur's groan was loud as Conan followed Zutan into the dark.

They walked to the yurts in silence. The nomad would not deign to converse with a trader, and Conan had his own thoughts to occupy him. Why did this Samarra wish to speak with him? Her sorcerous arts could have told her the true reason for his presence in Hyrkania, but only if she had purposely sought it out. In his experience of such things nothing was found unsought, and nothing was sought casually. Knowledge had its price when gained by thaumaturgical means, and though he had met sorcery and magic in many forms, never had he known it used to satisfy mere curiosity.

Had this Samarra been a man he could have first explained, then, an that did not work, slain the fellow. But it was not in him to kill a woman.

Lost in the workings of his mind, Conan started when the other halted before a huge yurt and motioned him to enter. The structure of felt stretched on wooden frames was at least twenty paces across, fit for a chief. But then, he told himself, a shamaness who could summon chiefs .would certainly live as well as they. Without another glance at Zutan, he pushed open the flap and went in.

He found himself in a large chamber within the yurt, its "walls"

brocaded hangings. The ground was covered by Kasmiri carpets in a riot of colors, dotted with cushions of silk. Gilded lamps hung on golden chains from the wooden frames of the roof, and a charcoal fire in a large bronze brazier provided warmth against the chill outside.

So much he had time to note, then his eyes popped as eight girls burst from behind the hangings. From lithe to full-bodied they ranged, and their skins from a paleness that spoke of Aquilonia to Hyrkanian brownness to the yellow of well-aged ivory. Gilded bells tinkled at their ankles as they ran giggling to surround him; such was the whole of their costume.

His vision seemed filled by rounded b.r.e.a.s.t.s and b.u.t.tocks as they urged him to a place on the cushions before the brazier. A scent of roses hung about them.

No sooner was he seated than two darted away to return with damp cloths to wipe his face and hands. Another set a chased silver tray of dates and dried apricots by his side, while a fourth poured wine from a crystal flagon into a goblet of beaten gold.

The music of flutes and zithers filled the chamber; the remaining girls had taken up the instruments and, seating themselves cross-legged, played. The four who had served him began to dance.

"Where is Samarra?" he asked. "Well? Answer me! Where is she?" The music soared, and the dancers with it, but none spoke.

He picked up the goblet, but put it down again untouched. Strong powders could be put in wine; he wagered that this shamaness knew of them. Best he neither eat nor drink till he was gone from Samarra's dwelling place. And best he not eye the girls too closely, either. Mayhap the shamaness had a reason for wishing his attention occupied. He kept a close watch on the hangings, and a hand on his sword.

But despite his intentions he found his eyes drifting back to the dancing girls. Graceful as gazelles they leaped, legs striding wide on air, then rolled to the carpets, hips thrusting in abandon. Sweat beaded his forehead, and he wondered if perhaps the fire in the brazier made the yurt too hot. Did this Samarra remain away much longer, he might forget himself. Eventhough they would not talk, these girls might be willing to disport themselves with a young northerner.

A single sharp clap sounded above the music. Immediately the girls left off playing and dancing, and dashed behind the hangings. The grin that had begun on Conan's face faded, and his hand returned to his sword as he sprang to his feet. The hangings parted, and the woman who had taunted him earlier appeared. The cloak was gone now, and long hair as black as night hung in soft waves about her shoulders. Her long kirtle clung to her curves.

"I prefer the dancing of young men," she said, "but I did not think you would share my taste."

"You?" Conan said incredulously. "You are Samarra?"

She gave a throaty laugh. "You are disappointed that I am not an aged crone, with a beak of a nose and warts? I prefer to remain as I am for as long as the arts of woman and magic combined can keep me so." Her hands smoothed the bosom of her kirtle, pulling it tight over full round b.r.e.a.s.t.s. "Some say I am still beautiful." Delicately wetting her lips, she moved closer. "Do you think so?"

The woman had no need of sorcery for distraction, Conan thought. The musk of her perfume seemed to snare his brain. With no more than what was known to every woman she had his blood inflamed, his throat thick with desire.

"Why did you send for me?" he rasped.

Her dark eyes caressed his face more sensuously than hands might have done, slid lingeringly across his broad shoulders and ma.s.sive chest. Her nostrils flared. "You washed the scent away," she said, a touch of mocking disappointment in her tone. "Hyrkanian women are used to men who smell of sweat and horse and grease. That scent would have gained you many favorable looks. But even so you are an exotic, with your muscles and your size and that pale skin. And those eyes." Her slender fingers stopped a hair's breadth from his face, tracing along his cheek. "The color of the sky," she whispered, "and as changeable. The spring sky after a rain, the sky of a fall morning. And when you are angry, a sky of thunder and storms. An exotic giant. You could have your pick of half the women in this encampment, perhaps three or four at a time, if such is your taste."

Angrily he wrapped an arm about her, lifting her from the ground, crushing her softness against his chest. His free hand tangled in her hair, and the blue eyes that stared into hers did indeed have much of the storm in them. "Taunting me is a dangerous game," he said, "even for a sorceress."

She stared back unperturbed, a secretive smile dancing on her lips.

"When do you mean to enter the Blasted Lands, outlander?"

Involuntarily his grip tightened, wringing a gasp from her. There was naught of the sky in his gaze now, but rather ice and steel. "It is a foolish time to reveal your sorceries, woman."

"I am at your mercy." With a sigh that smacked of contentment she wriggled to a more comfortable position, shifting her b.r.e.a.s.t.s disturbingly against his hard chest. "You could break my neck merely by flexing your arm, or snap my spine like a twig. I can certainly perform no magic held as I am.

Perhaps I have made myself helpless before your strength to prove that I mean you no harm."

"I think you are as helpless as a tigress," he said wryly. Abruptly he set her heels on the carpets; there was a tinge of disappointment in her eyes as she patted her hair back into place. "Speak on, woman. What suspicions caused you to bend your magic to the reason of my coming?"

"No magic except that of the mind," she laughed. "You came in company with Tamur and others who I know crossed the Vilayet to find and slay Baalsham. I know well the horror of those days, for I was one of those who laid the wards that contain what lies within the Blasted Lands."

Conan realized why Tamur had been agitated at hearing her name. "Perhaps I, wishing to trade in Hyrkania, merely took Tamur into service."

"No, Conan. Tamur has many faults, but he, and the others, swore oaths to defy the ban on Baalsham's memory and avenge their blood. That theyreturned with you merely means that they think to find success in the Blasted Lands. Though their oaths led them to defiance, they know that violating the taboo means death for one of Hyrkanian blood, and so sought another to do the deed."

"Then why am I not fighting for my life against your warriors?"

She answered slowly, her voice tense, as if her words held import below the surface. As if there was danger in them for her, danger that she must carefully avoid. "When the barriers were erected, I alone among the shamans believed that they were not enough. I spoke for pursuing Baalsham and destroying him, for surely if he managed to establish his evil elsewhere it would eventually return to haunt us. The others, fearing another confrontation with him, forced me -" She stopped abruptly.

"Forced you to what?" he growled. "Swear oaths? What?"

"Yes," she said, nodding eagerly. "Both oath and geas. Do I break that oath, I will find myself the next dawn scrubbing pots in the yurt of a most repulsive man, unable to magic the pain from a sore tooth or think beyond a desire to obey. Many take it ill that there is a line of women who use the powers, and they would as soon see it end with me." Again her words halted, but her eyes begged him to question further.

"What holds your tongue, woman? What oath did you swear?"

"It took long enough to bring you to it," she sighed, tightness draining visibly from her face. "Firstly, I can speak to no one of the oaths unless asked, and no Hyrkanian but another who, like me, sits Guardian on the Blasted Lands would ask. Betimes one or another of them likes to taunt me with it."

"So you must trick me into asking," Conan muttered.

"Exactly. For the rest, I can aid no Hyrkanian to enter the Blasted Lands or act against Baalsham, nor can I seek out any man to do those things."

A broad smile spread over his features. "But if a man who is not a Hyrkanian seeks you out..."

"...Then I can help him. But he must be the right man, outlander. I will not risk failure." Her mouth twisted as at a foul taste. "Anator, the repulsive toad of whom I spoke, waits for me to fall into his hands. Death I would risk, but not a life with him till I am old and shriveled."

"But you will help me?" he asked, frowning.

"If you are the right man. I must consult the Fire that Burns Backwards in Time. And I must have a lock of your hair for that."

In spite of himself, he took a step back. Hair, spittle, nail parings, anything that came from the body could be used in thaumaturgies that bound the one from whom they came.

"Do you think I need magicks to bind you?" Samarra laughed, and swayed her hips exaggeratedly.

"Take it, then," he said. But a grimace crossed his face as she deftly cut a few strands from his temple with a small golden knife.

Swiftly then she opened a series of small chests against a hanging, removing her paraphernalia. The hair was ground in a small hand-mill, then mixed in an unadorned ivory bowl with the contents of half a score of vials - powders of violent hue and powerful stench, liquids that seethed and bubbled - and stirred with a rod of bone. Setting up a small golden brazier on a tripod, Samarra filled it with ashes, smoothing them with the bone rod. Chanting words unintelligible to Conan, she poured the contents of the bowl onto the dead ash, and set the bowl aside.

Her voice rose, not in volume, but in pitch, till it pierced his ears like red-hot needles. Strange flames rose from the ash, blue flames, not flickering like ordinary fire, but rolling slowly like waves of a lazy sea.

Higher that unnatural fire rose with Samarra's words, to the reach of a man's arm. Unblinking she stared into its depths as she spoke the incantations. A rime of frost formed on the outside of the golden dish that held the flames.

The other fires in the chamber, the flickering lamps and blazing charcoal, sank low, as if overawed, or drained. The Cimmerian realized that his fingernails were digging into his palms. With an oath he unclenched hisfists. He had seen sorcery before, sorcery directed at him with deadly intent.

He would not be affrighted by this.

Abruptly Samarra's chanting stopped. Conan blinked as he looked into the golden dish; half-burned pieces of wood now nestled among ash that was less than it had been. Then Samarra set a golden lid atop the brazier, closing off the blue fire.

For a long time she stared at the brazier before turning to him. "An you enter the Blasted Lands, scores will die," she said bleakly, "among them perhaps Baalsham. And perhaps you, as well. Your bones may feed the twisted beasts that dwell trapped in that accursed place."

"Perhaps?" he said. "What means of divining is this? Even Sharak does not so hedge his star-readings about."

"The fire shows the many things which can be. Men choose which will be by their decisions. What is, is like a line, but at every decision that line branches, in two directions or ten, and each of those will also branch, until numbers beyond counting are reached. I will tell you this: if you enter, you, or Baalsham, or both, will stare Erlik's minions in the eyes. But if you do not, you will surely die. A hundred lines I examined, hoping to find an escape for you, and a hundred times I saw you die, each time more horribly than the last. And if you do not enter, not only will you die. Tens upon tens of thousands will perish fighting the spread of Baalsham's evil, and every day hundreds more will walk willingly to their deaths for his necromancies. Kings and queens will crawl on their bellies to worship at his feet, and such a darkness will cover the earth as has not been seen these many thousands of years, not since the attainted days of foul Acheron."

Conan laughed mirthlessly. "Then it seems I must try to save the world, whether I will or no." His blade leaped into his hand; he tested the edge carefully. "If I must wager my life, the odds will grow no better for waiting.

I will go to these Blasted Lands now."

"No," she said sharply. He opened his mouth, but she hurried on. "Night is best, it is true, but not this night. Think of the girl with you. When you have done this thing, you must go immediately, for others sit Guardian besides me, and they will soon know what has been done. But she cannot stand, much less sit a saddle."

"Then I'll tie her across it," he answered roughly. Already the battle rage was rising in him. If he was to die this night, he would not die easily.

"But if you let me bring her here, I can cure her sore flesh in a day.

She will be able to ride by tomorrow night." Samarra smiled. "Many women have asked me to take the pain from a smarting rump, but this will be the first time I have used my powers for so low a purpose."

"The longer I wait, the greater chance that someone else will remember Tamur."

"But you still cannot enter the Blasted Lands without any help. The barrier of the Outer Circle will slay only those of Hyrkanian blood, but that of the Inner Circle, where you must go if you are to find what you seek, will destroy anything that lives. I must give you special powders to spread, and teach you incantations, if you are to survive."

"Then give them to me," he demanded.

Instead she untied her silk sash and tossed it aside. "No Hyrkanian man," she said, staring him in the eye, "will look at a shamaness as a woman.

I have slaves, young men, full of vigor, but full of fear, too." She began to undo the silver pins that held her garment. "They touch me because I command it, but they do so as if I might shatter, afraid of hurting or angering. Until you put your hands on me, no man in my entire life has touched me as a woman, who will not break for a little roughness in a caress. I can wait no longer."

The long kirtle slid to the carpets and she stood in lush nudity, all ripe curves and womanly softness. Feet apart she faced him, defiance in her eyes, fists on the swelling of her hips, shoulders thrown back so that her b.r.e.a.s.t.s seemed even fuller. "There is a price for my aid. If that makes me a harlot, well, that is something I have never experienced. And I want to experienceeverything that a man and a woman can do to each other. Everything, Conan."

Conan let his sword fall to the ground. Battle rage had changed to a different sort of fire in his blood. "Tomorrow night will be time enough," he said hoa.r.s.ely, and pulled her into his embrace.

XX.

Early the next morning Conan sent a message to Akeba that the Turanian was to see to the trading that day. Soon after, Yasbet was brought to the shamaness's yurt on a litter borne by two of Samarra's muscular young male slaves. Samarra scrambled red-faced to her feet, hastily pulling a silk robe around her nudity. The slaves glared at Conan with covert jealousy.

"Conan, why am I here?" Yasbet almost wept. Lying face down on the litter, she winced at every movement. "I hurt, Conan."

"Your pain will soon be gone," he told her gently. "Samarra will see to you."

Still blushing furiously, the shamaness led the litter-bearers to another part of the yurt. Half a turn of the gla.s.s later she returned, with high color yet in her cheeks. Conan lay sprawled on the silken cushions, occupying himself with a flagon of wine.

" I gave her a sleeping potion as well," she said. "The spell took her pain away immediately, but she needs rest, and it is best if that does not come from magic. If I relieved her fatigue so, she would repay it ten times over, later. The powers always demand repayment."

All the while she spoke she remained across the chamber from him, rubbing her hands together as if in nervousness. He motioned her to him. "Come sit, Samarra. Do not make me play host under your roof."

For a moment she hesitated, then knelt gracefully beside him.

"Everything, I said," she murmured ruefully, "but I did not mean to have my own slaves enter while I lay naked in a stupor of l.u.s.t. Not to mention the woman of the man I am lying with. I feel strange to have your lover but a few paces away."

Her ardor had surprised Conan in its fierceness. "What she does not know will not harm her," he said, tugging her robe from a smooth shoulder.

She slapped his hand away. "Is that all women are to you? A tumble for the night, and no more?"

"Women are music and beauty and delight made flesh." He reached for her again. She shrugged him away, and he sighed. So much for poetry, even when it was true. "Someday I will find a woman to wed, perhaps. Until then, I love all women, but I'll not pretend to any that she is more to me than she really is.

Now, are you ready to remove that robe?"

"You know not your own vigor," she protested. Attempting to stretch, she stopped with a wince. "I am near as much in need of aid for sore muscles as that poor girl."

"In that case, I might as well return to Akeba and the others," he said, getting to his feet.

"No," she cried. Ripping the robe from her, she scrambled on her knees to throw her arms around his legs. "Please, Conan. Stay. I... I will keep you here by brute force, if I must."

"Brute force?" he chuckled.

She gave a determined nod. Laughing, he let her topple him to the pillows.

By two gla.s.ses after sunfall he was ready to go. Briefly he looked in on Yasbet. She slept naturally now; the potion had worn off. He brushed her cheek with his fingers, and she smiled without waking.

When he returned to the larger chamber Samarra had donned her kirtle, and put on a somber mien as well. "You have the powder?" she demanded. "You must take care not to lose it.""It is here," he replied, touching the pouch that hung from his belt along with sword and dagger. Within were two small leather bags containing carefully measured powders would weaken the barrier of the Inner Circle enough for him to pa.s.s it, one portion for entering and one for leaving.

"The incantation. You remember the incantation?"

"I remember. Do not worry so."

He tried to put his arms around her, but she stepped back out of his embrace, her face a mask. "The G.o.ds be with you, Conan." She swallowed, and whispered, "And with all of us."

There was more help in steel than in G.o.ds, Conan thought as he went into the night. The moon hung bright in a cloudless sky, bathing the countryside in pale light, filling the camp with shadows. It seemed a place of the dead, that camp. No one was about, and even the guard dogs huddled close to the yurts, only lifting their heads to whine fretfully as he pa.s.sed. He gathered his cloak against the chill of the wind, and against a chill that was not of the wind.

Akeba, Sharak, and Tamur were waiting, as they had agreed, east of the crescent of yurts. The rest of the Hyrkanians remained in their small camp, so that it should not be found empty. The horses remained in camp as well; the sound of hooves in the night might attract unwanted attention.

Tamur peered beyond Conan nervously and whispered, "She did not come with you, did she?"

"No," Conan said. Tamur heaved a heavy sigh of relief. "Let's do this and be done," he went on. "Tamur, you lead."

Hesitantly, the Hyrkanian started to the east. Akeba followed, horsebow in hand and arrow nocked, to one side of Conan. Sharak labored on the other, leaning on his staff and muttering about the footing despite the bright moonlight.

"Tamur almost did not come," Akeba said quietly, "so afraid is he of Samarra. Did he hate Jhandar one iota less, he would have ridden for the coast, instead."

"But he does hate Jhandar," Conan replied. "He will lead us true."

"I wonder you have energy for this night, Conan," Sharak snickered, "after a day and a night with this witch-woman. I saw little of her, not nearly so much as you," he paused to cackle shrilly, "but I'd say she was a woman to sap a man's strength."