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asked Conan.
    “In a manner of speaking, it’s the man who is forged, not the blade. I know, for I am a forger of men. Come, take the first guard position! Raise your shield, so!”
    By spring, when Toghrul pulled up stakes and moved to another section of the country, the young Cimmerian had a working knowledge of all the elementary weapons. So skilful was he in their use that he no longer flung himself on his pallet each night an aching mass of bruises from Uldin’s blows and thrusts.
    Yet, for all the trainer’s well-intentioned discipline, Conan’s lot did not grow easier. To satisfy their lust for sadistic spectacles, the Northlanders had devised many cunning ways to rip out a man’s life. Sometimes Conan and his opponents fought chained together, distanced only by a girdle’s length, each man being furnished with a short dirk and a firm grip on his foe's wrist. For variety, Toghrul and the other pit masters would dress their fighters as animals, encasing them in hides or furs and homed helmets in the likeness of beasts, and attaching metal claws to hands and feet.
    Nor were his adversaries always men. One day Uldin told Conan, “You’re to fight a Hyperborean tonight.”
    “What manner of folk are they?" asked Conan, who had heard vaguely that Hyperborea was a land lying east of Asgard. “I saw one once when we were both slaves of the Wheel; but we had no speech in common.”
    “A tall, lean, light haired people, for the most part,” said the trainer. "Dangerous foes, reputed to be wizards and sorcerers."
    On this occasion, Conan and his antagonist were sent into the Fit in loincloths and sandals, with short swords in their hands and bucklers on then left arms.
    Conan was amazed to discover that he faced a woman. She was slim and long legged, and almost the height of Conan himself, who, now full-grown, towered a head above even the tall Vann. The woman’s hair, the colour of moonbeams, was woven into a thick braid, and her small breasts were bare. Although her supple body exuded an aura of sensuality, her green eyes were deathly cold. From the way she grasped her weapon, Conan sensed that she was well-practised in her art.
    The whistle blew, and the light was on. The combatants circled warily, then engaged. Steel rang on steel and thudded against the wood and leather of the shields, the clatter resounding above the shouts of the spectators. Despite the sinewy strength in the warrior-woman’s arms, Conan’s musculature, toughened at the Wheel and hardened in the Pit, was decisive. For all her skill, and speed, and subtlety, Conan stolidly batted her sword aside time after time.
    A heavy blow knocked the sword from the woman’s hand. From the benches above rose a yell of “Drep! Kill!” For an instant, the woman presented a wide opening, standing immobile as if reconciled to death.
    Conan hesitated. Among the compelling customs of the Cimmerians, drilled into the boy Conan, was that a man’s foremost duty was to protect the women and children of the tribe. Although Cimmerians might cheerfully ambush and murder the men of another clan with whom they were at war, deliberately to slay a woman who had done no crime was an unheard-of brutality.
    Conan’s hesitation lasted no longer than two heartbeats. Then the Hyperborean woman sprang back, retrieved her fallen sword, and rushed upon Conan with renewed fury. When one of her blows gashed his forehead and blood dripped into his eyes, he was hard put to defend himself.
    At last, fatigue slowed the warrior-woman’s attacks. Striking alternately with sword and shield, Conan beat her back against the wall of the Pit. A powerful backhand stroke split her shield and ploughed into her side. As blood gushed forth, staining her white flesh, the young woman cried out and slumped to the rough dirt floor, pressing her hand against the gaping wound, as if to hold back her entrails.
    Conan stepped back and glanced up. Toghrul caught his eye, pointed, and made a chopping