The Flame Knife

THREE: The Hidden Ones

Conan reached the foot of the cliffs and began mounting the steep road without having seen any human being. The trail wound interminably up a succession of ramps, with low, massive, cyclopean walls along the outer edges. This was no work of Ilbarsi hillmen; it looked ancient and as strong as the mountain itself.

For the last thirty feet, the ramps gave way to a flight of steep steps cut in the rock. Still no one challenged Conan. He passed through a line of low fortification along the edge of the mesa and came upon seven men squatting over a game.

At the crunch of Conan's boots on the gravel, the seven sprang to their feet, glaring wildly. They were Zuagirs… desert Shemites, lean, hawk-nosed warriors with fluttering kaffias over their heads and the hilts of daggers and scimitars protruding from their sashes. They snatched up the javelins they had laid beside them and poised them to throw.

Conan showed no surprise, halting and eyeing them tranquilly. The Zuagirs, as uncertain as cornered wildcats, merely glared.

"Conan!" exclaimed the tallest of the Zuagirs, his eyes ablaze with fear and suspicion. "What do you here?"

Conan ran his eyes over them all and replied: "I seek your master."

This did not seem to reassure them. They muttered among themselves, moving their javelin arms back and forth as if to try for a cast. The tall Zuagir's voice rose:

"You chatter like crows! This thing is plain: We were gambling and did not see him come. We have failed in our duty. If it is known, there will be punishment. Let us slay him and throw him over the cliff."

"Aye," agreed Conan. "Try it. And when your master asks: 'Where is Conan, who brought me important news?' say 'Lo, you did not consult with us about his man, so we slew him to teach you a lesson!' "

They winced at the irony. One growled: "Spear him; none will know."

"Nay! If we fail to bring him down with the first cast, he'll be among us like a wolf among sheep."

"Seize him and cut his throat!" suggested the youngest of the band. The others scowled so murderously at him that he fell back in confusion.

"Aye, cut my throat," taunted Conan, hitching the hilt of his scimitar around within easy reach. "One of you might even live to tell of it!"

"Knives are silent," muttered the youngster. He was rewarded by a javelin butt driven into his belly, which doubled him up gasping. Having vented some of their spleen on their tactless comrade, the Zuagirs grew calmer. The tall one asked Conan:

"You are expected?"

"Would I come otherwise? Does the lamb thrust his head unbidden into the lion's maw?"

"Lamb!" The Zuagir cackled. "More like a gray wolf with blood on his fangs."

"If there is fresh-spilt blood, it is but that of fools who disobeyed their master. Last night, in the Gorge of Ghosts …"

"By Hanuman! Was it you the Sabatean fools fought? They said they had slain a Vendhyan merchant and his servants in the gorge."

So that was why the sentries were careless! For some reason the Sabateans had lied about the outcome of the battle, and the Watchers of the Road were not expecting pursuit.

"None of you was among them?" said Conan.

"Do we limp? Do we bleed? Do we weep from weariness and wounds? Nay, we have not fought Conan!"

"Then be wise and make not their mistake. Will you take me to him who awaits me, or will you cast dung in his beard by scorning his commands?"

"The gods forbid!" said the tall Zuagir. "No order has been given us concerning you. But if this be a lie, our master shall see to your death, and if be not a lie, then we can have no blame. Give up your weapons and we will take you to him."

Conan gave up his weapons. Ordinarily he would have fought to the death before letting himself be disarmed, but now he was gambling for large stakes. The leader straightened up the young Zuagir with a kick in the rump, told him to watch the Stair as if his life depended on it; then barked orders at the others.

As they closed around the unarmed Cimmerian, Conan knew their hands itched to thrust a knife into his back. But he had sown the seeds of uncertainty in their primitive minds, so that they dared not strike.

They started along the wide road that led to the city. Conan asked casually:

"The Sabateans passed into the city just before dawn?"

"Aye," was the terse reply.

''They couldn't march fast," mused Conan. ''They had wounded men to carry, and the girl, their prisoner, to drag."

One man began: "Why, as to the girl …"

The tall leader barked him to silence and turned a baleful gaze on Conan. "Do not answer him. If he mocks us, retort not. A serpent is less crafty. If we converse with him he'll have us beguiled ere we reach Yanaidar."

Conan noted the name of the city, confirming the legend Balash had told him.

"Why mistrust me?" he demanded. "Have I not come with open hands?"

"Aye!" The Zuagir laughed mirthlessly. "Once I saw you come to the Hyrkanian masters of Khorusun with open hands, but when you closed those hands the streets ran red. Nay, Conan, I know you of old, from the days when you led your outlaws over the steppes of Turan. I cannot match my wits against yours, but I can keep my tongue between my teeth. You shall not snare and blind me with words. I'll not speak; and if any of my men answer you I will break his head."

"I thought I knew you," said Conan. "You are Antar the son of Adi. You were a stout fighter."

The Zuagir's scarred face lighted at the praise. Then he recollected himself, scowled, swore at one of his unoffending men, and marched stiffly ahead of the party.

Conan strolled with the air of a man walking amidst an escort of honor, and his bearing affected the warriors. By the time they reached the city they were carrying their javelins on their shoulders instead of poised for a thrust at Conan.

The secret of the plant life became apparent as they neared Yanaidar. Soil, laboriously brought from distant valleys, had been used to fill the many depressions pitting the surface of the plateau. An elaborate system of deep, narrow irrigation-ditches, originating in some natural water supply near the center of the city, threaded the gardens. Sheltered by a ring of peaks, the plateau would present a milder climate than was common in these mountains.

The road ran between large orchards and entered the city proper … lines of flat-roofed stone houses fronting each other across the wide, paved main street, each with an expanse of garden behind it. At the far end of the street began a half-mile of ravine-gashed plain separating the city from the mountain that frowned above and behind it. The plateau was like a great shelf jutting out from the massive slope.

Men working in the gardens or loitering along the street stared at the Zuagirs and their captive. Conan saw Iranistanis, Hyrkanians, Shemites, and even a few Vendhyans and black Kushites. But no Ilbarsis; evidently the mixed population had no connection with the native mountaineers.

The street widened into a 8uk closed on the south side by a broad wall, which enclosed the palatial building with the gorgeous dome.

There was no guard at the massive, bronze-barred, gold-worked gates, only a gay-clad Black who bowed deeply as he opened the portals. Conan and his escort came into a broad courtyard paved with colored tile, in the midst of which a fountain bubbled and pigeons fluttered. East and west, the court was bounded by inner walls, over which peeped the foliage of more gardens. Conan noticed a slim tower, which rose as high as the dome itself, its lacy tile work gleaming in the sunlight.

The Zuagirs marched across the court until they were halted on the pillared portico of the palace by a guard of thirty Hyrkanians, resplendent in plumed helmets of silvered steel, gilded corselets, rhinoceros-hide shields, and gold-chased scimitars. The hawk-faced captain of the guard conversed briefly with Antar the son of Adi. Conan divined from their manner that no love was lost between the two.

Then the captain, who was addressed as Zahak, gestured with his slim yellow hand, and Conan was surrounded by a dozen glittering Hyrkanians and marched up the broad marble steps and through the wide arch whose doors stood open. The Zuagirs, looking unhappy, followed.

They passed through wide, dimly-lit halls, from the vaulted and fretted ceilings of which hung smoking bronze censers, while on either hand velvet-curtained alcoves hinted at inner mysteries. Mystery and intangible menace lurked in those dim, gorgeous halls.

Presently they emerged into a broader hallway and approached a double-valved bronze door, flanked by even more gorgeously-clad guardsmen. These stood impassively as statues while the Hyrkanians strode by with their captive or guest and entered a semi-circular room. Here dragon-worked tapestries covered the walls, hiding all possible apertures except the one by which they had entered. Golden lamps hung from an arched ceiling fretted with gold and ebony.

Opposite the great doorway stood a marble dais. On the dais stood a great canopied chair, scrolled and carved like a throne, and on the velvet cushions which littered the seat sat a slender figure in a pearl-sewn robe. On the rose-colored turban glistened a great golden brooch in the shape of a hand gripping a wavy-bladed dagger. The face beneath the turban was oval, light-brown, with a small, pointed black beard. Conan guessed the man to be from farther east, Vendhya or Kosala. The dark eyes stared at a piece of carven crystal on a pedestal in front of the man, a piece the size of Conan's fist, roughly spherical but faceted like a great gem. It glittered with an intensity not accounted for by the lights of the throne room, as if a mystical fire burned in its depths.

On either side of the throne stood a giant Kushite. They were like images carved of black basalt, naked but for sandals and silken loincloths, with broad-tipped tulwars in their hands.

"Who is this?" languidly inquired the man on the throne in Hyrkanian.

"Conan the Cimmerian, my lord!" answered Zahak with a swagger.

The dark eyes quickened with interest, then sharpened with suspicion. "How comes he into Yanaidar unannounced?"

''The Zuagir dogs who watch the Stair say he came to them, swearing that he had been sent for by the Magus of the Sons of Yezm."

Conan stiffened at that title, his blue eyes fixed with fierce intensity on the oval face. But he did not speak. There was a time for silence as well as for bold speech. His next move depended upon the Magus' words. They might brand him as an impostor and doom him. But Conan depended on the belief that no ruler would order him slain without trying to learn why he was there, and the fact that few rulers wholly trust their own followers.

After a pause, the man on the throne spoke: "This is the law of Yanaidar: No man may ascend the Stair unless he makes the Sign so the Watchers of the Stair can see. If he does not know the Sign, the Warder of the Gate must be summoned to converse with the stranger before he may mount the Stair. Conan was not announced. The Warder of the Gate was not summoned. Did Conan make the Sign, below the Stair?"

Antar sweated, shot a venomous glance at Conan, and spoke in a voice harsh with apprehension: "The guard in the cleft did not give warning. Conan appeared upon the cliff before we saw him, though we were vigilant as eagles. He is a magician who makes himself invisible at will. We knew he spoke truth when he said you had sent for him, otherwise he could not have known the Secret Way …"

Perspiration beaded the Zuagir's narrow forehead. The man on the throne did not seem to hear his voice. Zahak struck Antar savagely in the mouth with his open hand. "Dog, be silent until the Magus deigns to command your speech!"

Antar reeled, blood starting down his beard, and looked black murder at the Hyrkanian, but said nothing. The Magus moved his hand languidly, saying:

"Take the Zuagirs away. Keep them under guard until further orders. Even if a man is expected, the Watchers should not be surprised. Conan did not know the Sign, yet he climbed the Stair unhindered. If they had been vigilant, not even Conan could have done this. He is no wizard. You may go. I will talk to Conan alone."

Zahak bowed and led his glittering swordsmen away between the silent files of warriors lined on each side of the door, herding the shivering Zuagirs before them. These turned as they passed and fixed their burning eyes on Conan in a silent glare of hatred.

Zahak pulled the bronze doors shut behind them. The Magus spoke in Iranistani to Conan: "Speak freely. These black men do not understand Iranistani."

Conan, before replying, kicked a divan up before the dais and settled himself comfortably on it, with his feet propped up on a velvet footstool. The Magus showed no surprise that his visitor should seat himself unbidden. His first words showed that he had had much dealings with Westerners and had, for his own purposes, adopted some of their directness. He said: "I did not send for you."

"Of course not. But I had to tell those fools something or else slay them all."

"What do you want here?"

"What does any man want who comes to a nest of outlaws?"

"He might come as a spy."

Conan gave a rumbling laugh. "For whom?"

"How did you know the Road?"

"I followed the vultures; they always lead me to my goal."

"They should; you have fed them full often enough. What of the Khitan who watched the cleft?"

"Dead; he wouldn't listen to reason."

"The vultures follow you, not you the vultures," commented the Magus. "Why sent you no word to me of your coming?"

"By whom? Last night in the Gorge of Ghosts a band of your fools fell upon my party, slew one, and carried another away. The fourth man was frightened and fled, so I came on alone when the moon rose."

''They were Sabateans, whose duty it is to watch the Gorge of Ghosts. They did not know you sought me. They limped into the city at dawn, with one dying and most of the others wounded, and swore they had slain a rich Vendhyan merchant and his servants in the Gorge of Ghosts. Evidently they feared to admit that they ran away leaving you alive. They shall smart for their lie, but you have not told me why you came here."

"For refuge. The King of Iranistan and I have fallen out."

The Magus shrugged. "I know about that Kobad Shah will not molest you for some time, if ever. He was wounded by one of our agents. However, the squadron he sent after you is still on your trail."

Conan felt the prickling at his nape that magic aroused in him. "Crom! You keep up to date on your news."

The Magus gave a tiny nod towards the crystal. "A toy, but not without its uses. However, we have kept our secret well. Therefore, since you knew of Yanaidar and the Road to Yanaidar, you must have been told of it by one of the Brotherhood. Did the Tiger send you?"

Conan recognized the trap. "I know no Tiger," he answered. "I need not be told secrets; I learn them for myself. I came here because I had to have a hiding place. I'm out of favor at Anshan, and the Turanians would impale me if they caught me."

The Magus said something in Stygian. Conan, knowing he would not change the language of their conversation without a reason, feigned ignorance.

The Magus spoke to one of the blacks, and that giant drew a silver hammer from his girdle and smote a golden gong hanging by the tapestries. The echoes had scarcely died away when the bronze doors opened long enough to admit a slim man in plain silken robes, who bowed before the dais … a Stygian from his shaven head.

The Magus addressed him as "Khaza" and questioned him in the tongue he had just tested on Conan. Khaza replied in the same language.

"Do you know this man?" said the Magus.

"Aye, my lord."

"Have our spies included him in their reports?"

"Aye, my lord. The last dispatch from Anshan bore word of him. On the night that your servant tried to execute the king, this man talked with the king secretly an hour or so before the attack. After leaving the palace hurriedly he fled from the city with his three hundred horsemen and was last seen riding along the road to Kushaf. He was pursued by horsemen from Anshan, but whether these gave up the chase or still seek him I know not."

"You have my leave to go."

Khaza bowed and departed, and the Magus meditated for a space. Then he lifted his head and said: "I believe you speak the truth. You fled from Anshan to Kushaf, where no friend of the king would be welcome. Your enmity toward the Turanians is well-known. We need such a man. But I cannot initiate you until the Tiger passes on you. He is not now in Yanaidar but will be here by tomorrow's dawn. Meanwhile I should like to know how you learned of our society and our city."

Conan shrugged. "I hear the secrets the wind sings as it blows through the branches of the dry tamarisks, and the tales the men of the caravans whisper about the dung-fires in the serais."

"Then you know our purpose? Our ambition?"

"I know what you call yourselves." Conan, groping his way, made his answer purposely ambiguous.

"Do you know what my title means?" asked the Magus.

"Magus of the Sons of Yezm … magician-in-chief of the Yezmites. In Turan they say the Yezmites were a pre-Cataclismic race who lived on the shores of the Vilayet Sea and practiced strange rites, with sorcery and cannibalism, before the coming of the Hyrkanians, who destroyed the last remnants of them."

"So they say," sneered the Magus. "But their descendants still dwell in the hills of Shem."

"So I suspected," said Conan. "I've heard tales of them, but until now I scorned them as legends."

"Aye! The world deems them legends … but since the Beginning of Happenings the Fire of Yezm has not been wholly extinguished, though for centuries it smoldered to glowing embers. The Society of the Hidden Ones is the oldest cult of all. It lies behind the worship of Mitra, Ishtar, and Asura. It recognizes no difference in race or religion. In the ancient past its branches extended all over the world, from Crondar to Valusia. Men of many lands and races belong and have belonged to the society of the Hidden Ones. In the long, long ago the Yezmites were only one branch, though from their race the priests of the cult were chosen.''

"After.the Cataclysm, the cult reestablished itself. In Stygia, Acheron, Koth, and Zamora were bands of the cult, cloaked in mystery and only half-suspected by the races among which they dwelt But, as the millennia passed, these groups became isolated and fell apart, each branch going its separate way and each dwindling in strength because of lack of unity.''

"In olden days, the Hidden Ones swayed the destinies of empires. They did not lead armies in the field, but they fought by poison and fire and the flame-bladed dagger that bit in the dark. Their scarlet-cloaked emissaries of death went forth to do the bidding of the Magus of the Sons of Yezm, and kings died in Luxur, in Python, in Kuthchemes, in Dagon.''

"And I am a descendant of that one who was Magus of Yezm in the days of Tuthamon, he whom all the world feared!" A fanatical gleam lit the dark eyes.

"Throughout my youth I dreamed of the former greatness of the cult, into which I was initiated as a child. Wealth that flowed from the mines of my estate made the dream a reality. Virata of Kosala became the Magus of the Sons of Yezm, the first to hold the title in five hundred years.''

"The creed of the Hidden ones is broad and deep as the sea, uniting men of opposing sects. Strand by strand I drew together and united the separate branches of the cult: the Zugites, the Jhilites, the Erükites, the Yezudites. My emissaries traveled the world seeking members of the ancient society and finding them … in teeming cities, among barren mountains, in the silence of upland deserts. Slowly, surely, my band has grown, for I have not only united all the various branches of the cult but have also gained new recruits among the bold and desperate spirits of a score of races and sects. All are one before the Fire of Yezm; I have among my followers worshippers of Gullah, Set, and Mitra; of Derketo, Ishtar, and Yun.''

''Ten years ago, I came with my followers to this city, then a crumbling mass of ruins, unknown to the hillmen because their superstitious legends made them shun this region. The buildings were crumbled stone, the canals filled with rubble, and the groves grown wild and tangled. It took six years to rebuild it. Most of my fortune went into the labor, for bringing material hither in secret was tedious and dangerous work. We brought it out of Iranistan, over the old caravan route from the South and up an ancient ramp on the western side of the plateau which I have since destroyed. But at last I looked upon forgotten Yanaidar as it was in the days of old. Look!"

He rose and beckoned. The giant blacks closed in on each side of the Magus as he led the way into an alcove hidden behind a tapestry. They stood in a latticed balcony looking down into a garden enclosed by a fifteen-foot wall. This wall was almost completely masked by thick shrubbery. An exotic fragrance rose from masses of trees, shrubs, and blossoms, and silvery fountains tinkled. Conan saw women moving among the trees, scantily clad in filmy silk and jewel-crusted velvet … slim, supple girls, mostly Vendhyan, Iranistani, and Shemite. Men, looking as if they were drugged, lay under the trees on silken cushions. Music wailed melodiously.

"This is the Paradise Garden, such as was used by the Magi of old times," said Virata, closing the casement and turning back into the throne room. "Those who serve me well are drugged with the juice of the purple lotus. Awakening in this garden with the fairest women of the world to serve them, they think they are in truth in the heaven promised for those who die serving the Magus." The Kosalan smiled thinly. "I show you this because I will not have you 'Taste Paradise' like these. You are not such a fool as to be duped so easily. It does no harm for you to know these secrets. If the Tiger does not approve of you, your knowledge will die with you; if he does, you have learned no more than you would in any event as one of the Sons of the Mountain. You can rise high in my empire. I shall become as mighty as my ancestor. Six years I prepared; then I began to strike. Within the last four years, my followers have gone forth with poisoned daggers as they went forth in the old days, knowing no law but my will, incorruptible, invincible, seeking death rather than life."

"And your ultimate ambition?"

"Have you not guessed it?" The Kosalan almost whispered it, his eyes wide and blank with fanaticism.

"Who wouldn't?" grunted Conan. "But I had rather hear it from you."

"I shall rule the world! Sitting here in Yanaidar, I shall control its destinies. Kings on their thrones shall be but puppets dancing on my strings. Those who disobey my commands shall die. Soon none will dare disobey. Power will be mine. Power! Yajur! What is greater?''

Conan silently compared the Magus' boasts of absolute power with the role of the mysterious Tiger who must decide Conan's fate. Virata's authority was evidently not supreme after all.

"Where is the girl, Nanaia?" he demanded. "Your Sabateans carried her away after they murdered my lieutenant Hattusas."

Virata's expression of surprise was overdone. "I know not to whom you refer. They brought back no captive."

Conan was sure he was lying but realized it would be useless to press the question further now. He thought of various reasons why Virata should deny knowledge of the girl, all disquieting.

The Magus motioned to the black, who again smote the gong. Again Khaza entered, bowing.

"Khaza will show you to your chamber," said Virata. There food and drink will be brought to you. You are not a prisoner; no guard will be placed over you. But I must ask you not to leave your chamber unescorted. My men are suspicious of outsiders, and until you are initiated…" He let the sentence trail off into meaningful silence.