Moulay had chosen a dozen warriors, all of his own tribe and fanatically loyal to Hathor-Ka. Each was muffled to the eyes in the cowl and veil of their tribe, and dressed in close-fitting trousers and tunic covered by a flowing robe. Their garments were dyed grey and tan to blend well with the desert. They bore swords, daggers, and short bows. Each man wore beneath his tunic a jerkin of fine mail sewn down to a silken vest so as to make no sound. Their black eyes gleamed with eagerness, for they were raiders by temperament and found their sentry duties here tedious.
'All is ready, my lady,' Moulay said. Grooms led in their horses, bridled with rope and shod with rawhide for the sake of quiet. She signaled and they mounted.
'We climb the eastern escarpment to the high desert,' Hathor-Ka announced. 'By the time the moon stands high above the river we shall arrive at the sphinx of King Rahotep. We leave the horses there and proceed afoot. When we reach the house of Thoth-Amon you are to remember two things above all: No one is to offer violence to Thoth-Amon, and I want the traitor SenMut alive.'
They sped from the gate and climbed the road toward the great escarpment that separated the fertile valley of the Styx from the high desert. Peasants trudged toward their hovels with tools shouldered, and they looked up curiously to see the horsemen pass. Horses were little used in Stygia, where most travel was by foot or by river. Only caravaneers rode camels, and few but the desert raiders rode horses.
The road that slanted up the escarpment has been carved from the solid rock in ages past as a means of moving troops quickly from the river landings to the border forts where they might be needed. Stygia had faced no enemies from that direction in many centuries, but it was still Hathor-Ka's duty, as owner of the adjacent land, to keep the road in good order against future need.
The desert atop the escarpment was all but uninhabited, yet it was dotted here and there with the ruins of ancient forts, temples erected to forgotten gods, the hovels of long-dead hermits and desert mystics, and the enigmatic statues and monuments that stand in every corner of Stygia. Despite the concentration of the vast bulk of the population in the narrow, fertile strip bordering the great river, the priest-kings felt it necessary to make their mark wherever they claimed sway over the land.
Moulay rode in the lead, unerringly finding their path through the desert night, while Hathor-Ka scanned the moonlit sky for sign of flying minions of her sorcerous rival. Should she catch sight of a batwinged form, she had spells ready to render it invisible to the watcher, or to bring it crashing to the desert. The drugs she had brewed and consumed caused her vision to reach farther than mortal eyes should see, and everything she perceived was bathed in shimmering silver light.
The sphinx of King Rahotep reared its immense bulk against the starry sky, and they reined their horses in the shadow between its great paws. No man now could say for what purpose it had been erected, or, rather, carved, for it had been hewn from a single outcropping of sandstone. So ancient was it that little now was known of Rahotep except for his name
and a reputation for abominable practices. Above the lion's body, with its dragon's wings, the face of the wizard-king glared into the desert as it had for uncounted centuries.
'I saw no watchers as we rode,' Hathor-Ka said.
'There were none on the desert,' Moulay told her. She removed her robe and stowed it in a saddlebag. Beneath it she wore garments similar to those of the men, save hers were made of fine black silk. She wore no mail and bore no weapons, but slung from her shoulder was a bag containing items of great potency.
Before setting out on the last leg of their journey, Moulay sent out two men to screen their flanks and another to travel a hundred paces ahead.
Then they set off, not at a walk but at a loping run. As they ran, the men chewed on the petals and leaves of the blue lotus for strength and stamina.
Mile after mile they covered, until they came to the crest of a ridge that overlooked a small oasis fringed with palms. Near the dark pond stood a featureless house surrounded by a high wall.
'Guards?' Hathor-Ka whispered.
'I see three atop the wall,' Moulay said.
One of the desert men came to them and stretched forth an arm, pointing to a movement just north of the house. 'Roving patrol,' he reported. 'They come this way.'
'We can deal with them,' Moulay told Hathor-Ka. 'And we can gain the top of the wall undetected. Know you the way into the house?'
'I have had a spy there for many years,' she said, 'but now I do not know whether she has been sending me true information.'
'Give us our orders, mistress, and we shall do your bidding,' Moulay said.
'First, remove that patrol. Then, get me atop that wall. A glance should tell me whether my intelligence is correct. I shall have further orders for you at that time.'
Creeping along the ground, keeping to the shadows painted on the
desert by moonlight, rock, and bush, Moulay and several of his men reached unseen a spot beside the track that Thoth-Amon's guards were treading. There was a faint clicking of harness as the guards drew nearer, and Moulay's men readied themselves, some drawing daggers, others holding bowstrings between their hands.
The approaching footsteps slowed and then stopped. The lead guardsman, wearing a helm never meant to encase a human head, turned this way and that, as if sensing something. It emitted a loud hiss but no more as a bowstring whipped around its neck and was drawn taut. At the same instant the other guards were suffering the same fate as a desert man garrotted each from behind while another man in front gutted it with a curved dagger. Sounds of struggle were brief and faint.
Hathor-Ka came close to examine the corpses as her men cleaned their weapons. 'Lizardmen from the isles east of ancient Lemuria,' she said.
'Thoth-Amon cast his net of conjury wide to find these.'
With the same uncanny silence and swiftness, the raiding party approached the wall guarding the house. The guards atop the wall were oblivious of the recent slaughter and spoke to one another in the unmistakable voices of men. At the base of the wall one of the desert dwellers knelt on all fours and another stood atop him, back to the wall and cupped hands held before. A third sprang lightly up and his foot was caught by the second man, who boosted him to the top of the wall. In this fashion six men gained the walk inside the wall unseen and unheard.
Within the space of a few heartbeats one of the men was waving to those below and the rest ascended the wall. The sentries lay dead at their posts.
Hathor-Ka surveyed the courtyard with slitted eyes. There were no more guards in evidence, but that did not mean that the house was without protection. With her enhanced vision she could see a circle of strange runes investing the house in a narrow band on the ground.
'All of you follow me closely,' she ordered.
They descended to the ground and followed Hathor-Ka until they stood in a small group next to the magical barrier.
'We must not interrupt the magical circle,' Hathor-Ka said.
Moulay nodded, although he could see nothing on the ground to which
his mistress pointed.
She arranged the men in a tight huddle and took a short wand from her pouch. Starting at a point to one side of the band of men, she began to draw a loop of similar runes encircling them, rejoining the great circle on the other side. As she drew she saw the runes glow with a weird greenish light, though the others saw nothing. When the second circle was complete she erased the runes before them and led her men across the barrier. Behind them, the circle, now with a peculiar loop, continued to glow in a fashion only Hathor-Ka could see.
The great door stood open. Thoth-Amon apparently believed his human, unhuman, and sorcerous defenses to be more than adequate. The band entered the house, which was silent except for the sound of a small fountain that tinkled in the vestibule. No candle or lamp relieved the darkness, and Hathor-Ka muttered a spell. She could see, but her men needed light if they were to be of any use. A point of light appeared by her head and gre
w into a softly glowing sphere that drifted to the ceiling, revealing bizarre frescos of strange worlds and beings.
A single door opened from the vestibule, revealing only a rectangle of blackness. Hathor-Ka walked past the fountain and entered the room. The ball of sorcerous light followed, as did the men. She signaled for the others to halt. At the far end of the chamber, seated on a throne atop a low dais, was Thoth-Amon. The great mage wore an enveloping black robe, and all that was visible of him was his ascetic, shaven head and his hands.
'Is this what you seek, Hathor-Ka?' he asked, holding up a large ragged-edged piece of parchment.
'You know that well. Give it back to me, and all shall be as though naught has passed between us.'
'Let us not bandy foolish words, Hathor-Ka. Would I have subverted your acolyte and revealed my knowledge of your hidden tunnel if I had intended to return what I took from you?'
'No. And you would not now be speaking if you had not some offer to make. Name your price.'
'It is true,' the wizard said, 'that you entered so easily because I willed it so. What I have for you is not a price, but an offer of alliance.'
'Alliance?' she said suspiciously. 'Why should I wish to ally myself with you?'
'Because you have no chance of making yourself supreme mage otherwise.' He held up the parchment once more. 'This is useless to you without the full text of the Great Summoning of Powers.'
'I command that spell!' Hathor-Ka insisted.
'You do not. Only two mages in all the world have the full knowledge of the greatest of all spells. I am one. The other is the Vendhyan, Jaganath.
Nine others have the incomplete version which you learned from Khepteh-Sebek, whom you seduced and then murdered.'
Hathor-Ka bristled and glared, but she did not try to deny the accusation.
'Your efforts were wasted,' Thoth-Amon continued. 'Six lines of verse are missing from this version, along with five important gestures. To attempt this spell at the great conjunction would result only in a death unsurpassingly hideous. By Father Set I swear this.'
'What is your proposal?'
'I shall instruct you in the proper ritual of the Great Summoning.
When you travel by the Double-Goer spell to Ben Morgh upon the equinox, you shall take with you my own spirit-double. When the ceremony is complete we shall be equally powerful and shall rule jointly.'
''Trust him not, mistress,' hissed Moulay. 'If he has this spell, as well as the fragment, why does he not take all and become sole ruler?'
'Because he has no way of travelling to Ben Morgh by the equinox,' she answered. 'Had he found the Skelos fragment first, he would not be bargaining with me now.'
'Do you accept?' Thoth-Amon demanded.
She considered the possibilities. Without the true Summoning she faced a horrible death. What if Thoth-Amon were to teach her a false spell? He had nothing to gain from that, as it would mean only that Jaganath would become supreme mage instead of her. Besides, there
would be plenty of time to betray Thoth-Amon later. 'I accept. But I want the traitor SenMut.'
'Agreed. I have no use for him. He would betray me as easily as he did you.' Thoth-Amon gestured, and two of his human servants entered with SenMut bound between them.
Hathor-Ka stared at the traitor with reptilian eyes, and he shrank beneath her gaze. 'There is yet one ceremony to perform,' she said. 'It requires a sacrifice. You will do nicely, SenMut.' His eyes widened as he realised what she meant, and the servants dragged him away screaming.
XII
In the Caverns of the Demon
'There must be an opening somewhere,' Chulainn said. The sun had been up for an hour or more, and they were combing the bizarre pit in search of an entryway to the subterranean lair of the evil beings they had seen.
Conan rapped at the stone futilely, using the pommel of his dirk.
Everything sounded and felt solid. Cha was examining the strange and grotesque formations scattered about the pit. Some of them were carved from the natural rock, others seemed to have been moulded from melted stone. Still others were of no stone from this area and seemed in some odd way to have grown there.
'Khitan!' Conan called out. 'Come help us find a way in. You can see the sights later.'
'You too impatient,' Cha said. 'Much of interest here. Maybe never get opportunity to study such things again.' He kicked one of the organic-looking stone objects lightly. 'This thing not from this world. It is from the empty spaces beyond our planets. Never see its like before.'
Conan, who was not sure what a planet was, refused to be impressed.
'No time for that. We must go in there and find our people and be out before the sun sets and they are on the mountain again.'
The Khitan made a circuit of the walls and studied the floor of the pit.
'No way in here,' he reported at last. 'I think I know how they doing it, but we cannot use their way. We go higher up, into Crom's cave, maybe find a way there.'
Chulainn shook his head. 'We go in there only for the most important ceremonies. Few but chiefs ever enter that cave. We do not want to earn the disfavor of Crom.'
Conan noted paths worn in the loose stone and soil, as if there had been a good deal of traffic between the cave and the pit.
'With the houseguests he been getting lately,' Cha assured them, 'two unwashed barbarians, one Khitan wizard, he probably never notice.' He led the way up the mountainside toward the gaping mouth of Crom's cave.
Inside, the cave was foul-smelling, its floor littered with wreckage and refuse, like a site where an ill-disciplined army has camped. The Cimmerians bristled at this further desecration of their god's sanctuary, but they said nothing. Conan nudged a pile of burned wood aside with his foot and uncovered several well-gnawed human bones.
They passed farther inside, where the weak sunlight scarcely reached.
Ahead was an immense rock formation and the cavern expanded, its ceiling rising to disappear into the gloom overhead. Then they could see that the rock formation was actually the carved likeness of a pair of colossal feet. As their eyes adjusted to the dimness they saw that the sculpture towered out of sight overhead. It was in the form of a giant seated upon a throne, but they could see no higher than its chest. The head was lost in the obscurity.
'This is Crom,' Conan said. 'Nowhere will you see another likeness of him. Who carved his image I know not, for my people do not have that art.'
'Once they did,' Cha said quietly. 'Your people are far more ancient than you can imagine, Conan. They were not always savages living in stony mountains.'
Chulainn stared up in reverent awe, overcome by the gloomy majesty of his god. Then he lowered his gaze and saw a great rent in the stone just before the huge feet of the statue. He pointed, calling out: 'What is this?
The chiefs never said anything of a cave at Crom's feet.'
'There was none,' Conan said, striding over to look. 'Mitra! They've carved stairs down to their lair!'
Cha examined the stairs slanting down into the darkness. 'No, they did not carve them down. These stairs carved up from below. Look at tool marks.' The Cimmerians had no knowledge of stonecarving, but they were willing to take Cha's word for it.
'Gather some of this wood and brush,' Conan told Chulainn. 'We will need torches.' They found enough of the refuse to make several crude torches when bound together with withies. 'They must have made the prisoners carry this up from below,' Conan said, taking a flint from his pouch.
'I light,' Cha said.
The others expected him to recite a spell to make fire. Instead, he reached into his rags and drew forth an odd mechanical contrivance of steel and stone, with a small bowl of oil-soaked tinder. Cocking a spring, he snapped it a few times, shedding sparks until the tinder burst into flame.
'Must be careful about using magic now,' he explained. 'These things maybe feel our presence if I disturb the ether with spells.'
Conan stepped onto the stair and a warm breeze from below ruf
fled the flame of his torch. The breeze carried the taint of ancient evil and they could hear a faint sussuration, like the breathing of some vast animal.
Each Cimmerian kept his free hand on his sword hilt as they descended, with Cha tiptoeing behind the two barbarians. The steps were not only wide but high, as if they were made for beings other than men.
Against all expectation the cavern grew perceptibly warmer as they descended. At the bottom of the steep stair they entered a long, smooth-floored tunnel that still continued to descend, but far more gently.
Cha called for the others to stop for a moment while he took a close look at the walls. Instead of the bare stone of the higher tunnel, these were covered with a thin, hairlike growth of moss. He shook his head. 'This place very, very old. Not like stair above. Either these creatures make way to surface from ancient cavern, or else they been digging for a very long time.'
They continued the descent. Now they began to encounter smaller side tunnels meeting with the main one. 'Keep to the big tunnel,' Conan said.
'That way we'll not get lost.'
'What if our people are down one of these?' Chulainn pointed to one of the side tunnels.
'We can do only our best,' Conan said. 'We'll do nobody any good by getting lost.'
The cavern began to widen, and the floor became less smooth and more like that of a natural cave. The warmth of unknown origin continued to grow. In the lower spots water had collected. The fine growth of moss on the walls became rank, and larger forms of sunless growth began to appear: huge toadstools, great ledges of thick, leprous fungus, hanging growths curled like a ram's horns, many other things far less describable.
In the distance, out of the light from their torches, they could see that some of the growths glowed with a sickly luminescence.
'What kind of foul place is this?' asked Chulainn. The others had no answer for him. Now they could hear distinct sounds ahead of them. There was light coming from ahead too. They extinguished the burning torches and left the others beneath an especially hideous mushroom, where they could be sure of finding them again.
The Conan Chronology Page 187
