Other than the odd jewelry and dress, what suddenly struck at Kern were the wounds his warriors now seemed to be living with every day. Not one among them who did not have at least a few ugly bruises, fading from dark purples to sickly yellows, spreading across some part of their body. And cuts aplenty. Crusted scabs and deeper wounds that had had to be sewed shut or even slapped with hot iron. Wallach’s arm, still seeping with blood and even some dark pus at the stubbed wrist. Ehmish’s side. Reave’s shoulder.
Kern stepped out from beneath the falls after his turn, the pounding roar still filling his ears, his skin tight and puckered but showing an actual hint of false color beneath its usual waxy sheen. The water had been cold, but then true cold had never bothered him overmuch. Slicking back his mane of frost blond hair, he stomped his boots to kick some of the water out of them and set about drying himself with a fresh kilt.
Ehmish whooped high and shrill as he took his turn under the falls. Reave splashed through a small puddle and found a bench of fairly dry rock near Kern. He had an old sword scar, pink and puckered, curling across his right shoulder, and several new ones as well. Another across his left shoulder. A short, bold slice across his ribs. Reave saw Kern taking inventory of his scars, and shrugged. Water dripped from his coarse hair and his dark, brushy beard. Reaching up, he toyed with the many earrings in his left ear while watching Nahud’r get dressed again nearby, the pierced nipple dangling a teardrop of solid gold.
“Think that’d hurt.”
It wasn’t a question, but Kern shrugged. Then, because he knew Reave would never ask the taciturn Shemite, waved Nahud’r over. The dark-skinned man had pulled on his old, Aquilonian-style breeches, now cut off ragged at the knees after so many months of hard journeying. He pulled a leather jerkin overhead as he shuffled over, and wound a woolen scarf loosely about his neck, to be tightened up later into the covering headdress he preferred to wear.
“Your piercing. Is it . . . normal for Shemite people?”
Nahud’r’s hand reached up to brush across his chest. His teeth all but glowed in the dimness, so white and large was his smile. “Unwritten law of desert,” he said, speaking in a mixture of Aquilonian and Cimmerian. The hash of language was difficult for many outside of their group to follow, but those who had spent months in the black man’s company were quite used to him. “Anything shows—weapons, jewels—take by bandits, or by friends after death, is accepted. Is . . . right. This”—he tapped his chest again—“for God. For one who bury us. Not leave body rotting on desert floor. Important to Shemite.”
Reave leaned forward, intrigued. “Women do this as well?”
He had spent some time talking to Nahud’r in the past, though not so much as Kern, who had even learned to write a few words thanks to the Shemite’s teaching. But none of them knew so much about the legendary deserts of Shem that they weren’t fascinated by such tales.
Also, Nahud’r was a natural storyteller. It was he who had first created a tale of Conan, wrapping the dark hero of Cimmeria into adventures that roughly paralleled exploits seen by Kern’s small band at Taur, and over the Pass of Blood.
“Women, too,” Nahud’r promised. Then, eyes flashing with mischief, he leaned over to Reave. He whispered, but it was loud enough for Kern and a few others who sat nearby to hear as well. “Some, they add more piercings. Two or three at times. Enjoy it, they say. Breasts and navel. Even . . .” He raised eyebrows. Nodded.
Reave’s eyes bolted wide, and his were not the only ones. Mogh and Brig glanced between each other as if not sure whether or not to believe the tale. Reave, though, obviously believed every word. He glanced over at Desa, who had pulled on a damp shift and was shaking out her kirtle with sharp, violent snaps. He winced, as if imagining the kind of pain that would be asking for, then it was an expression of comical shock all over again. As if the large man simply could not wrap his head around the idea, though it both excited and repulsed him.
Mogh shook his head. “Next he’ll be a-saying that Conan once stole a ruby the size of my thumb from a lady who wore it there. And she never knew it.”
Nahud’r did not laugh. “Story of Conan and pirate queen talk of her ebony beauty, and heard I have of tale where she follow this custom.”
“What would that be like?” Brig asked no one in particular.
“Men I know to have tried say it like nothing they ever know before. Good for them. Good for both. Better,” the Shemite said, leaning away as if it meant nothing, “when man pierced as well.”