≡ The Sons of Conan
copyright2010W.E. Fripp III
Chapter One
In the red light of the failing sun, Conan the Second, King of Aquilonia, stood on a hill and surveyed the first great battlefield of his reign.
The young king’s mighty sire, Conan the Great, then in his sixties, had abdicated his throne and disappeared into legendry five years ago, some say to meet his bane, others claiming the barbarian king and hero of a thousand tales was a demi-god, an immortal who yet lived, still battling his way west, across the oceans and continents of the world still unmapped and unexplored by any in the Hyborian age.
Whatever Conan’s fate, his eldest son, known to his family and friends as Conn, was left to rule the greatest nation state in their part of the known world, and his legendary father’s many enemies saw Conan’s abdication and disappearance as an opportunity to seize power for themselves.
Not the least of these was a man named Titus, a once powerful nobleman from Tauran who had sided against Conan when the former king had first claimed the throne of Aquilonia decades earlier. At first, Titus was reluctant to test Conn, fearing his ferocious sire would return at his moment of triumph and crush him, as he had done so many times before. However, when Conan had not returned after three years and rumors of his death at the hands of the red shadows that had plagued his kingdom shortly before his departure reached Aquilonia, Titus had begun plotting the overthrow of the young king.
In secret, he allied himself with the Picts, the wild men of the west who had for centuries fought the ancestors of those who now ruled over lands that had once belonged to their ancestors. Savage and undisciplined, the Picts were nonetheless capable and ferocious fighters, fearless in the face of death and able to withstand brutal punishment ere they fell. All they lacked was leadership. Indeed, had the Picts the discipline to organize and band their factious clans together rather than fight amongst themselves, they may still have inhabited all of the lands the white men now warred over, but they were a jealous and barbarous people, given to slaughtering one another over the slightest insult and feuds between clans sometimes went on for decades.
More than once they had rallied under the leadership of one of their spiritual leaders, powerful shamans whose magic could invoke supernatural horrors, who used fear to control them and drive them to a blood crazed frenzy, hurling them against the war machines and cold steel of the men of Aquilonia and her allies. Each time they had been driven back, their shaman slain and their will broken. The last two times this had happened, it was Conan himself who had delivered the fatal stroke and then years later when at last he had torn the bloody crown of Aquilonia from the depraved king Numedides with own hands and declared himself king, the Picts had faded back into the night haunted forests and kept to themselves, content not to test the giant berserker who had in battle after battle claimed so many of their fathers and brothers.
Now, however, they were told that Conan had gone and had left on his throne a young heir, untested, they heard, in real battle and the man who told them these lies had also promised them their lands back and much wealth to boot should they aid him. The Picts had believed him, and laying aside old feuds, had banded together to form an army of savages that numbered in the thousands.
For the first time, the Picts were given arms to match their foes and trained to use them, taught the ways of steel and iron, given armor to cover their naked and vulnerable bodies. At first, they balked, looking on the armor and the swords as the cowardly weapons of the enemy, who they considered beneath them. Then there rose among them a new shaman, Sagayetha, who’s magic, it was said, was very strong, who was master over the beasts of the forest and whose gaze could mesmerize a man at a glance rendering him completely under the witch’s control.
Rumor had it that during a midnight council meeting where dozens of warring clans had gathered under a totem of truce, Sagayetha had summoned from the forest a giant saber toothed cat, thought to be long extinct. It was said that the beast, a twenty foot monster with two foot tusks and paws the size of small shields, at Sagayetha’s command, had glided from the gloomy mist of the great forest, gone directly to the shaman and lain down, head bowed at his dusky feet. This was the sign that they had waited for, the omen that had convinced them to join with the white man and his soldiers who sought to help them overthrow the hated Aquilonians once and for all. From that night forward, they were committed to defeating Conn; they would stop at nothing to see him, his family and any who opposed them roasting over open pits.
Now, a year later, the Picts, under the leadership of Titus and Sagayetha, had crossed the Black River in their blood mad hordes and over run the Bossonian Marches. They slaughtered all who stood in their way; men, women, children – none were spared as the swart brown marauders hacked and slew their way toward the Aquilonian border.
As soon as the reports of the massacre reached Tarantia, the glittering capitol of Aquilonia, Conn had mustered his army and rode out to meet them.
His army had been shocked to see the Picts armored and carrying steel and at first, they faltered, seeming confused and disoriented. Then a figure clad in black armor emblazoned with a golden lion, the harness of the king, rode in amongst them, striking right and left, dispatching the Picts as though they were stalks of wheat under the scythe and bellowing the Cimmerian war cry taught him by his titanic sire. To his men, it was as if Amra (which was Conan’s nickname) himself had returned from the west to lead them and they rallied to his cry. In an explosion of violent action, they mowed down the Picts, slaughtering all to the last man.
Atop the hill, the young king assayed the gory scene before him. Now unhelmeted, Conn wiped the sweat from his brow and watched as his dead and wounded were removed from the field and any wounded Picts were dispatched. From behind him, he heard a familiar voice mutter,
“So, this is what war is like.”
Conn turned and gave a grim smile to the commander of his personal guard and his younger brother, Taurus. Conn himself was the very image of his father, square jawed and grim, with coarse black hair and strikingly blue eyes. His brother, while as powerfully built, was a foot shorter than Conn, and favored more his mother Zenobia, who had died giving birth to their sister, Radegund. There was about them both, however, the stamp of their barbarian sire that set them apart from other men and which bonded them together as closely as two brothers could be.
“Pretty, isn’t it?” Conn taunted him.
Taurus did not return the jest. “No, brother, it is not pretty. It is gory and horrific. Is it necessary to kill the wounded? Surely they cannot harm us now.”
Conn turned back to face the battlefield. This was the basic difference between them. Conn had received more attention from their father, been in the field with him, had fought beside him while Taurus still toddled in the palace court. He knew that in the world in which they lived, only the strong lived long enough to have tales written about them and songs sung about the campfires retelling their deeds. Taurus was still young; he had not been exposed to the world that existed outside of Aquilonia.
Neither one of them could be matched in battle. Taurus’ position as commander of the Black Legion was not given because he was the king’s brother; he had earned it by trial and through battle in several small skirmishes that had arisen after Conan’s sudden departure, but today had been his first real combat in a major battle. He had accounted himself well; dozens of Picts had fallen under his sword, but the experience had left an impression on him and it came through now in his voice as he talked with his brother. Conn tried to pretend he had not heard it.
“Better to have them dead now then have to fight them again later.”
“As you say.”
Taurus moved to stand beside him. He squatted down and scooped a handful of dirt in his hands, letting it sift through his fingers as he looked out over the field. The vultures had begun to circle and the first had landed to begin its macabre buffet. He shuddered.
“What a waste,” he grunted, disgust in his voice.
“A waste you say, brother? How so?”
“Look about you, Conn,” he said gesturing with a sweeping motion at the scene before them. “These poor bastards had no chance. Twere better they were still naked and squatting in some hut somewhere than be food for the vultures. It sickens me.”
Conn looked down at his younger brother, grim faced and earnest. “I did not attack them, Taurus. It was they that crossed the river and murdered women and children. I feel no pity for these. They got what they asked for.”
Taurus rose and faced Conn. “I know, brother. I do not fault you. It is Titus who is the real enemy here. It is he who raised this army. He and the witch are responsible for this carnage.” Again, he turned away from his brother and looked out over the field as the last remnants of pink and red were fading away to dusk. “Still, it saddens me that these simple brutes must bear the brunt of his folly.”
Conn placed a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “You have a good heart, brother, and it serves you well, but know this,” he turned Taurus toward him and looked him in the eyes, “the Picts have been fighting our ancestors since before Atlantis fell, since the time of Kull of Valusia and until they pull themselves from the barbarousness from which they came, they will continue to fight us. It is in their nature; they are taught to hate us. I will not hunt them as long as they do not hunt me, but today was not the end. This was merely Titus and his shaman sizing us up, reconnoitering us. The final battle of this conflict has not yet been fought but when it is, many will die on both sides. War is not a thing which brings happiness, Taurus, but it is a thing that must be done if we want our children and the children of those who look to us for protection to live to have children of their own.”
The two sons of Conan the Conqueror stood for a minute, eyes locked together, sharing the bond that only one brother can have with another. As they turned and left the little hilltop and headed for their encampment, the sun finally sank below the distant horizon and darkness fell like a shroud over the dead and the living alike.
