Caravan routes lay across the length and breadth of Shem like an intricate system of arteries, bearing the ceaseless trade that was the mighty nation's lifeblood. From the gleaming ziggurats of the lush western coast to the sprawling tent-cities of the arid east, Shem, in all her contrasts, was united by the continuous flow of commerce. The routes the trading caravans followed ranged from broad roadways of bare, hard-packed earth to vague trails but rarely traversed.

Two days' travel east out of Akkharia, the Caravan Road forked, sending a branch questing north toward prosperous Eruk and ancient Shumir, while the original route continued east toward the ill-regarded city of Sabatea. Countless sub-routes broke south out of the main road,

seeking the smaller cities and villages built along the fertile coast of the world-girdling River Styx.

Along the central route to Sabatea came four riders leading two well-laden pack horses. The party moved at a steady pace upon a dusty road that cleft luxuriant meadows blanketing low, rolling hills. The sun shone down from a cloudless, bra.s.sy sky. Off to the north, where the hills rose in slow undulations, a scattered herd of cattle grazed in a sea of waving gra.s.s.

Conan of Cimmeria tugged at the throat of his new shirt of white silk, popping st.i.tches in the collar to loosen it around his bull neck. Also new were the blue cotton breeches tucked into the tops of his battered old boots. Heng Shih had reluctantly furnished the barbarian with clothes from his own wardrobe. The size and weight of the two men were similar, but the shape of their frames was so different that Conan found the garments binding where they should have been loose and baggy where they should have been tight. The collar of the shirt emitted another pop as he pulled at it, then ripped jaggedly down across his breast, revealing Conan's weathered and rust-spotted mail beneath.

Heng Shih winced at the tearing sound and let loose a sigh audible even above the clomping of the horses' hooves. Turning in the saddle, Conan gave the Khitan a wide grin of infuriating friendliness. Then the Cimmerian nudged his mount up toward Neesa.

The scribe had never ceased looking about herself in wide-eyed wonder since they had pa.s.sed through Akkharia's gates. As Conan moved up beside her, she took her eyes from the distant hills, lowered the hand shading her face from the sun and favored him with a shy smile. The barbarian nodded expressionlessly. For the last two days Neesa had taken pains to address him only when necessary, and then to speak only in the most bland and business-like fashion. Now her smile was warm and friendly, if somewhat wary. He wondered once again how long he would have to live before he found the ways of women to be predictable.

He reined up alongside the Lady Zelandra, who led the small caravan on her roan. The sorceress took little note of him, her eyes focused on the hazy, far-off point where the road met the horizon.

Conan noticed a bulky leather pouch attached to her belt. It thumped heavily against her rounded hip with each step her horse took.

"Milady," said Conan roughly, "that looks to be uncomfortable. There is room in my saddlebags. If you wish, you can stow it there."

Zelandra shook her head. "No, Conan, this is my cask of Emerald Lotus.

I must have it on my person at all times in case the craving grows too great." As she spoke, her voice softened with shame and her gaze fell to the road pa.s.sing beneath the horses' hooves.

"Crom," murmured the Cimmerian, "you are a canny woman and a sorceress in the bargain. How is it that you are enslaved to a magical powder?"

The barbarian's natural bluntness did not seem to disturb the Lady Zelandra. She sat up straight in her saddle. The warm breeze drew her silver-threaded hair out for a moment in a fluttering pennant.

"I have lived on an inheritance for all of my life, Conan. It left me free to indulge in my studies in sorcery and the healing arts. The inheritance is now much depleted. Of almost a score of servants, now only Heng Shih, Neesa, and a pair of drunken guardsmen remain."

Conan, having witnessed the incompetence of her guardsmen firsthand, merely nodded. "With the inheritance gone, you sought employment with King Sumuabi as his Court Wizard."

"Yes, it seemed a worthy way to continue my lifestyle as scholar and sorceress. I should have been granted the position immediately if Shakar the Keshanian had not also offered his services to the king. To think that Sumuabi cannot choose between that jester and me!"

The Cimmerian frowned reflectively. "I have heard rumors that King Sumuabi may soon lead Akkharia to war. If this be so, he would likely seek a wizard with war-like skills. Perhaps he meant to set you and the Keshanian at each other's throats and select the stronger as his sorcerer."

Zelandra looked at the barbarian, her brows raised in surprise. "I hadn't thought of that. How barbaric!" She flushed. "I'm sorry, Conan.

I didn't mean-"

"It is nothing, though that sort of guile sounds d.a.m.ned civilized to me."

"Well, we were at a stand-off in any case. When Ethram-Fal sought audience with me in the guise of Eldred the Trader, I was pleased to see that he offered a number of rare and exotic magical components for sale. I should have been more wary when he claimed to have acquired a quant.i.ty of the Emerald Lotus."

"You knew of this lotus?"

"It is legend, supposedly created by Cetriss, a mage of Old Stygia, who bargained with the Dark G.o.ds for it. It is said that the sorcerous power of the lotus helped the seers of Old Stygia keep the world-hungering empire of Acheron at bay almost three thousand years ago. Legends disagree as to its uses and effect, but all agree that Cetriss saw little value in his lotus or in any of the works of man and that he devoted his life to the pursuit of immortality. Disdaining his fame and power, he disappeared into the wilderness, taking the secret of the Emerald Lotus with him. You see? The Emerald Lotus is like the perfect love philter or the fountain whose waters bestow youth: a fable born of men's wishful imagining."

Conan squinted skeptically in the sun. "Yet you accepted it from a stranger?"

"It was easy to ascertain that it was not a natural lotus and easier still to determine that it was not a poison. When Eldred-I mean Ethram-Fal-told me that he had just sold a casket of it to Shakar the Keshanian, I felt bound to at least experiment with the stuff. How could I know?" She paused, mouth twisting into a wry smile. "He sold it to me at a very reasonable price," she added with measured irony, drawing a gusty laugh from the barbarian.

"I'll wager he did at that. And the next thing you know the powder has you by the throat?"

Zelandra's left hand shot out to seize his thick right forearm in a cold-fingered grasp. She stared at the Cimmerian with darkly imploring eyes.

"You don't know what it's like. When I first sampled it I felt that there was nothing in the world that I might attempt that would not come to success. There was a mad confidence and exhilaration unlike anything I have ever known. My sorcery almost doubled in its potency. Complex spells seemed obvious. Spells I knew increased in power and effectiveness. It was like a wild and glorious dream until it began to fade. Then came the craving, and I knew that I was lost."

Her hand fell from his arm. She blinked rapidly, as though holding back tears. Conan pretended not to notice her discomfiture, looking ahead wordlessly.

"It is like a leech upon the flesh of my soul." Zelandra's voice had dropped to a husky whisper, but she continued to speak as though driven by some grim compulsion. "At first I could think of nothing but the d.a.m.nable powder and the power it brought, but I held myself in check. I vowed that each dose I took would be smaller than the last, if only by a few grains. And so it has been since the first time I tasted it. I had hoped to lower the quant.i.ty until I needed none. It is not so easy.

My supply is running low and there is simply not enough left to safely purge myself of it. If I could get more, then I might be able to taper off completely, but without a greater supply of Emerald Lotus I shall surely die."

For a moment there was a silence, broken only by the scuff of hooves, the creaking of saddle gear, and the soft surge of the summer wind.

"So," Conan said evenly, "we ride into Stygia and maybe into h.e.l.l itself just to get you more of this cursed powder?"

"No!" Zelandra's head snapped up, her profile hawklike against the clear sky. "No, Ethram-Fal deceived and poisoned me as an experiment.

And now the arrogant b.a.s.t.a.r.d would use his drug's power over me to make me his slave. I'll see him die for it."

The Cimmerian grinned fiercely and, digging his heels into his horse's flanks, urged the beast to greater speed.

Chapter Fifteen.

Though Shakar the Keshanian was exhausted after slaying his bodyguard and performing necromancy upon the corpse, the sorcerer could not take his rest. Time seemed to slow in its course, evening moving into night with glacial deliberation. All through the following day he meditated in his chambers, striving to stabilize his drugged metabolism and fill himself with strength. At first he was successful. Shakar was proud of the power that he had exhibited in the ensorcellment of Gulbanda.

Without the unnatural augmentation of the Emerald Lotus, he doubted that he would have been able to accomplish it. Pride in his achievement gave him faith and courage.

But into the second day his body weakened and his consciousness fell into a tighter and tighter orbit around the small silver box which lay upon the mahogany desk in his study. Now he sat at his window, staring out through his garden without seeing it and sipping nervously from the crystal decanter of Brythunian wine he had used to lull Gulbanda.

Ignoring a growing tightness in his breast, the Keshanian turned his mind once again to the skilled wizardry he had worked upon his bodyguard, trying to draw comfort from the abomination that he had created and set in motion to accomplish his ends.

"He'll get it," said Shakar to the empty room. "He won't fail. He'll bring it to me or I'll leave his soul sealed within his animated corpse forever. He won't fail because only I can release him into true death."

He paused, then repeated: "He will not fail." His voice trailed off as he began to fear that which he had not even allowed himself to imagine until this moment.

What if Gulbanda did not return in time?

The most impressive feat of sorcery that he had ever performed had been brought about by a great sacrifice. The silver-chased box on his desk was empty. The two spoonfuls that he had taken before slaying Gulbanda with the bamboo spike had been the last, save for a few speckles of green residue.

The tightness in his breast grew more insistent, more difficult to ignore. Shakar turned his eyes away from the west, where the sun set in a b.l.o.o.d.y welter of tattered clouds, and looked upon the silver box where it gleamed dully in the study's serene twilight. The Keshanian rose from his chair in a halting manner, as though his body were not set on doing that which his mind desired. He walked slowly to the desk and stared down upon the burnished silver casket.

Pain blossomed in Shakar's chest, sending strident bands of tense agony around his torso. The sorcerer cried out and stumbled against the desk, seizing the silver box with hands that shook uncontrollably, hands that pried open the casket to reveal that which he already knew to be true.

"Empty," wept Shakar. "I know that it's empty." Slumping against the desk, he held the cold metal box to his breast and tried to draw a deep breath. The belt of pain that wrapped his ribs loosened a notch.

Through the door the Keshanian saw a flicker of yellow light play along the wall of the hallway outside his study. He blinked in the deepening dusk. A sudden surge of hope drove new vitality through the sorcerer's veins. He pushed himself away from the desk with one hand and stumbled toward the door, still clutching his box. The sinking sun's last rays stained the floor scarlet before him as he half walked, half staggered down the hall. Ahead, flares of multicolored light shone through the open door of his bedchamber.

"Eldred?" The name was a harsh croak. "Eldred, I must speak with you!"