'I accept the compliment,' Rerin said, 'in the spirit which you no doubt intended.'
Conan closely examined his sword for traces of the volatile venom, which might damage it. To his delight he found none. He sheathed the weapon at his waist and went in search of his other belongings.
Sarissa turned excitedly from the mirror. 'Was that not wonderful? He is all I had hoped! This is a true hero. How may we capture him?'
'There are any number of ways, sister,' said Hasta, smiling. 'But why bother? Since they are searching for our slave-queen, they must come here. Let them come to us. I am curious to see how he will try to take her back.'
Sarissa smiled as well, in dawning anticipation.
VIII
The Castle of Giants
On their fifth day in the demon land they encountered the first of the searchers. Conan raised a hand in warning, and old Rerin halted. The old wizard could hear nothing amiss, but by now he knew how preternatural!y keen were the ears of the barbarian.
'Someone is trying to sneak close to us,' Conan said, 'but they do not know how.'
'Human or other?' asked Rerin.
'They go on two feet, whatever that means in this place. There are many of them.'
'Too many?'
'That we shall know when I have tested their mettle.' Conan loosened his sword in its sheath.
He chose a little glade as a good place to meet potential foes. For the last two days they had been travelling through woods where the trees and shrubs preferred to keep their roots properly in the ground. This made for more peaceful sleep, if nothing else.
Shadowy forms began to materialize at the tree line.
They were man-shaped but not human. Their fingers had too many joints and their ears were long and pointed. Their bodies were gaunt and their movements furtive. Conan's sword whispered from its sheath as they came closer.
'You are close enough now,' he cautioned them. 'State your business.'
'We want the woman,' hissed one. Its tongue was not apt at forming human speech, but it was understandable. 'The woman from the world of men. Our master wants her. If you have her, surrender her to us or die!'
Conan smiled grimly. 'We want her too. You are the ones who took her. How did you lose her?'
The demon who had spoken only hissed in hate. Conan could hear Rerin muttering spells behind him. There were a dozen of the things, but they were not large and did not look strong. None of them appeared to be armed. Abruptly the speaker made a complex gesture and chittered out some formula, which Conan took to be a spell.
He was about to split its skull when Rerin stepped forward holding his staff horizontally at shoulder height. He was casting a spell as well, and the demon fell back, covering its face with its arms, as if reacting to a blinding light.
'Had you killed it in the midst of its casting,' Rerin said calmly, 'the full force of its spell would have fallen upon you. You would have rotted where you stand.'
The leader growled out an order, and the demons turned and fled into the brush.
Before it disappeared, the speaker turned and said, 'We shall have you and the woman yet. A hunter comes!' Then it was gone.
'That does not sound good,' said Conan as he sheathed his sword. 'Who is their master?'
'One of the great powers of the demon world, I doubt not,' said Rerin pessimistically. 'If such a one takes too close an interest in us, I fear that my paltry magics must be of little value to us.'
'Between your magic and my sword we have done well enough so far,' Conan contended. 'We may yet win through and find our way back to the real world. I have always trusted in my own strength and skill; you should do the same.'
'Oh, for the confidence of youth,' sighed the old man.
By evening they were within sight of the castle. It hulked upon its mountainside like a dragon, and Conan studied its strange battlements and turrets with the eye of a man accustomed to spying out the weaknesses of such places. 'We'll have to get closer,' he said at last. 'This air is too thick to see small things. It is the small things that let you into a place like that. Are you sure she is in there?'
'I am certain. You may not sense it, but that place sends forth an aura of evil and sorcery that I can feel in my bones.'
'What kind of people dwell there?' Conan asked. 'It looks like a place built by giants.'
'It may well have been. Many peoples live in the demon land, and many more dwelled here in the past. Some of them were giants, and that place has the look of the homes of the ancient, giant peoples. I think, though, that those who dwell there now are somewhat
like us, in external appearance, at least. Within they are as inhuman as those demons we saw.'
'Are they mortal?' Conan asked. 'Can they be cut with steel?'
'I believe so. No inhabitants of this world are truly immortal. Many are hard to kill, as witness that scorpion-thing you slew.'
Conan looked about restlessly. 'What do the folk up there eat? I see no cultivated fields, no sign of villages or commerce. Even the strongholds of robber-chieftains must have a few peasants dwelling nearby to grow food.'
'Life here does not follow the same rhythms as in the world of men,' said old Rerin. 'Whatever concerns occupy the people of that great hall, getting their daily bread is not likely to be among them. Their bodily needs may be satisfied by their command of the dark arts. They could even be vampires, battening upon the blood of human victims.'
'Nonetheless,' Conan said, 'if they huddle behind stone walls they must fear something. If they fear, then they can be hurt. But, we'll know nothing until we get closer. Come.' He set off at a mile-eating stride, and the old man followed after.
It was just after nightfall when they reached the base of the Cyclopean walls. Strange, multicoloured stars gleamed overhead, and the great, green moon shed a malevolent radiance through the thick, water-like air. Conan ran his fingers along the stone in search of the joints and cracks between the blocks that might afford a climber a secure handhold.
'Crom,' he muttered. 'It's all of a piece! There are no joints.'
'This pile was raised by magic, not by human hands,' said Rerin. 'I know a spell that would raise us to the top of the wall, but surely those inside would feel the working of an alien mage so near.'
'I need no magic to climb a wall,' Conan said. 'This stone, if stone it be, is rough and pitted like lava. If it is like this all the way up, can climb it.'
Rerin felt the wall and shook his head doubtfully. 'Perhaps one who is half ape and half mountain goat can climb this, but I fear that I cannot. Had we a rope, you could climb and haul me up after you. As it is, I must abide here until you find one.'
'You had best stay down here at any rate. Hide yourself somewhere beyond the tree line until I return with the queen. In that place, full as you say it is with wizardly people, you would be of little help, and there is no sense in both of us dying in there should I fail. If I come not back by dawn light, you may see if your wiles can prevail where my sword could not.'
'May Ymir aid you in your task, Cimmerian,' the old man said with deep feeling. 'I say again, the queen wrought well in accepting your service.'
Conan scratched his chin. 'I am not sure that Ymir looks into this place. I am sure that Crom does not, for he takes no note of things outside Cimmeria, and little enough there.' He clapped Rerin upon the shoulder. 'Now, get you gone, old man. Find a safe place, and be ready to help us when we come down, for I've no doubt there will be those who will pursue us.'
Conan turned back to the wall and reached up to the full extent of his arms. He felt until his fingertips lodged into minute depressions, and slowly, painfully, he drew himself upward. Scrambling with his feet, he
found a precarious lodgment for his toes and reached up another foot with one hand. Thus, a foot or less at a time, he ascended the wall.
His progress was slow, but it was steady. Few men could have made such a climb save at the expense of great exhaustion and limbs trembling with fatigue, but Cona
n reached the top of the wall with no outward sign of wear. He found himself to be standing atop a battlement that was fully equipped for battle, but which was utterly devoid of inhabitants. He saw no passages into the interior in his immediate vicinity, so he picked a direction at random and began exploring.
There was no courtyard within the wall, but instead the whole castle seemed to be a single structure, with strange towers and other architectural features protruding from it here and there. At intervals he saw sculptured creatures with strange and repellent aspects, some perching atop the battlement, others seeming to rise up through the wallwalk itself. It all appeared to be the work of an utterly demented sculptor.
All was strangely silent, and from time to time he paused to listen, but no sound came to him. His nostrils flared, but the air carried no hint of woodsmoke. He wondered how the inhabitants went about their cooking and heating without fires. His wandering brought him to the base of a hulking tower, with a squat, conical roof. A door flanked by a pair of cadaverous, sculpted guards stood open, yawning into the black interior of the tower.
Slowly and suspiciously Conan entered with sword bared. His free hand touched the wall while his feet slid slowly forward, testing his path into the gloom. Two paces within the doorway his feet found an abrupt drop-off in the floor. He tested it cautiously and found it to be the beginning of a descending stairway. A warm breeze came up from below, and upon it he could faintly discern the strains of wild, bizarre music, thick with the sounds of drum and cymbal. Now he also smelled smoke on the air, but it was incense, not the wood of a cooking fire.
He descended at least one hundred steps before he first caught a glimmer of light. Moving as silently as a ghost, Conan made his way to a doorway, through which the light shone. He was gazing into a lavishly furnished chamber that was strewn with cushions and carpets of what seemed to be woven gold. The light came from odd candles burning in niches, casting an eerie radiance from their circular flames.
As he swept the room with his gaze Conan saw a woman lying amid a tangle of golden coverlets and exotic furs. She wore only elaborate jewellery, and his breath caught at the voluptuous, pale-fleshed beauty thus displayed; full, round breasts and generously curved buttocks. Her face was turned away from him, and he saw no sign of awareness, as if she was asleep or drugged. His feet made no sound as he stepped into the room. Alert for attack, he crossed to the woman and tapped her beneath the jaw with the flat of his sword.
'Wake up, woman. I have some questions in need of answers.' Groggily the woman's head turned and her eyes opened. Conan's own eyes widened in amazement. 'Alcuina!'
It took a few moments for Alcuina's eyes to focus, and in that time Conan saw that she wore a wide collar of iron about her neck and that it was connected to a ring in the floor by a short length of chain.
'Conan,' she breathed at last. 'Have you truly come for me, or is this another of the dreams these hellish people inflict with their drugs and spells? If so, it is a more effective torture than any they have tried thus far.'
'I am real, though I've no idea how to prove it.' He grasped the chain in both hands and tried to pull it from the floor. 'First let's get you free from this place, then we can think of some way to prove that I am real.'
He pulled on the chain until the veins swelled upon his brow, but even his great strength could not break chain or ring. He muttered a curse, and Alcuina, with the drugged fog clearing from her head, became aware of her extreme state of undress.
'A liege man should not see his queen thus,' she said, hiding her embarrassment. She made no futile effort to cover herself; there was too much flesh exposed for two hands even to make a beginning.
Conan shrugged. 'In the South they are not so fussy about clothes. Even queens sometimes wear little more than you are wearing now.' He looked her up and down with frank admiration. 'Have no fear, you've nothing that other women do not have. Perhaps a closer look is in order, just to make sure.'
'We have more important things to concern us,' she said impatiently. 'Can you not free me of this chain?'
'We shall see. I had hoped to do this quietly, but—' With a full-armed overhead swing, he brought his sword down upon the chain. There was a mighty clang and a few sparks, but the only other result was a nick in his blade. 'Cursed hard steel they make hereabout,' he muttered, studying the damaged edge in annoyance.
Alcuina's sharply indrawn breath was the only one, a small window high on one wall admitted a faint light, and there was a single, circular door made of heavy timbers. He had never seen a round door before, and he wondered how it opened, since he could see no hinges.
He lay on his belly and chose a link of one of the chains to work on. He was able to get enough slack to rub the link back and forth along the floor for at least a foot. It seemed futile, but given enough time he might wear a few links down enough to weaken them. At the moment he had nothing but time in any case.
After what he judged to be an hour of this monotonous activity, he examined the link. The side he had rubbed was a bit shinier, but that was the extent of it. This could be a lengthy task. His work was abruptly interrupted when the round door rose into the lintel above it. At least that mystery was solved.
He heard approaching footsteps, and a woman bearing a tray entered the cell. He had expected a neck-ringed slave, but this was one of the spectators of his fight. Unless he was much mistaken, it was the same one who had rendered him unconscious. He could not be sure, as the ones he had seen looked much alike.
'Come over here, you silver-eyed troll,' Conan said affably. 'I'd like to wring your pretty neck.'
To his surprise she answered in a tongue he understood. 'Ah, but then you would not be able to eat this splendid dinner I have brought you.'
Conan smelled the proffered viands and his mouth watered. 'Well,' he grumbled, 'I agree. Give me the food, and I'll not kill you.'
'First, a small precaution.'
There was a rumbling sound and Conan looked down in stupefied puzzlement as two clamps grew from the
floor of the cell and fastened securely about his ankles. Then something writhed about his arms, and they were jerked behind him and strongly pinioned. He was trussed like an ox in a slaughterhouse.
The woman sat directly before him and set the tray between them. She wore a gown so sheer that it might as well have been altogether absent. The generous curves of her were almost as mouth-watering as the food, despite his hunger and the circumstances. She took a small piece of grilled meat on a skewer and inserted it daintily into his mouth.
'My name is Sarissa,' she said. 'You may address me as mistress.'
'Not likely,' Conan assured her. 'How about some of that wine?'
'Disobedience can be a painful experience here.' Nonetheless, she gave him a drink from a crystal goblet.
'I am used to pain. You cannot persuade me that way.'
She continued to feed him. 'You have never experienced the kind of pain I can inflict. I have developed some truly exquisite varieties.' Her trilling laughter was musical, and chilling. 'But, no, pain is for ordinary slaves. You are special, and I have no wish to break you. You shall be the prise of my collection.'
'What kind of collection?' Conan growled.
'Why, my collection of unique human specimens.' She pushed a small morsel of bread into his mouth. He was uncomfortably aware of her delectable smell. 'I have never had a true hero to experiment with. Life grows terribly dull here. You shall furnish us with endless pleasure. You fight like a wild beast, and you have such a superlative body.' She ran her hands freely
IX
The Games of the Masters
Conan was asleep, snoring upon the cold stone floor of his cell, when a sound awakened him. He sat up, straining his ears, and became aware that the collar was no longer about his throat. The collar and its chains lay upon the floor. He examined the collar, which now lay open, but he could find no trace of any fastening.
'More wizardry,' he muttered, dropping it to the floor.
It had been the sound of the thing clanking to the floor that had awakened him, no doubt.
He arose and began pacing tigerishly about the cell, stretching the stiffness out of cramped muscles. He had been released from the chain for a reason, and he wanted to be ready for whatever might befall him. With a rumbling sound the door rose.
Conan crouched, facing it, and waited for whatever might enter. He was unarmed, but he had hands and feet and teeth, and he was prepared to use them. A time passed and nothing approached. Cautious as a hunting wolf, Conan went to the door. He leaped through and
spun through a full circle. He was in a featureless corridor and there were no enemies in sight. In one direction there were a few more of the round doors and then a blank wall. In the other direction the corridor was shrouded in gloom.
With a clank the door to his erstwhile cell dropped shut.
'Did you think I would go back in?' he shouted to those he knew must be watching.
He started down the dark corridor. A few paces along the stone hall he found his sword lying upon the stone. He snatched it up, and the rough feel of the grip immediately raised his spirits. All he needed now was somebody to kill with it. Preferably someone with silver eyes.
'I could use my tunic as well,' he shouted. There was no response. 'Ah, well,' he muttered to himself, 'better naked with a sword than in full armour with no weapon.'
He continued his exploration of the corridor. The fact that his sword had been returned to him meant that he would be needing it, and soon.
He came to a stairway leading upward and began to climb. Although there was no visible light source, the air was suffused with a faint, twilight radiance, which was just sufficient for him to make out his way. At the top of the stair he found another round door. Somehow he was sure that this did not merely lead into another dungeon cell. Slowly the door began to rise.
The Conan Chronology Page 340
