'How came you here?' thundered Numedides. 'The doors were locked!'
The dark-skinned sorcerer's sibilant voice was the crack of a whip. 'Your Majesty! I warned you not to molest my servants!'
The king scowled. We were just playing a harmless game. And who are you to warn a god of aught? Who is the ruler here?'
Thulandra Thuu smiled a thin and bitter smile. 'You reign here, but you do not rule. I do.'
Numedides's jowls empurpled with his waxing wrath. 'You blasphemous ghoul! Out of my sight, ere I blast you with my lightnings!'
'Calm yourself, Majesty. I have news-'
The king's voice rose to a scream: 'I said get out! I'll show you-'
Numedides's groping hand brushed the hilt of the Sword of State. He drew the ponderous blade from its jewelled scabbard and advanced upon Thulandra Thuu, swinging the weapon with both hands. The sorcerer calmly awaited his approach.
With an incoherent shriek, the king whirled the sword in a decapitating blow. At the last instant Thulandra, whose expression had not changed, brought up his staff to parry. Steel and carven wood met with a ringing crash, as if Thulandra, too, wielded a massive sword. With a dexterous twirl of his staff, the sorcerer whipped the weapon from the king's hands and sent it flying upwards, turning over and over in the air. As it descended, the blade struck Numedides in the face, laying open a finger-long gash in the king's cheek. Blood trickled into his rusty beard.
Numedides clapped a hand to his cheek and stared stupidly at the blood dripping from his fingers. 'I bleed, just like a mortal!' he mumbled. 'How can that be?'
'You have a distance yet to go ere you wear the mantle of divinity,' said Thulandra Thuu with a narrow smile.
The king bellowed in a sudden rage of fear: 'Slaves! Pages! Phaedo! Manius! Where in the nine hells are you? Your divine master is being murdered!'
'It will do him no good,' said Alcina, evenly. 'He told me that he had ordered all his servants elsewhere in the palace, so I might scream my head off to no avail.' And she tossed back her night-tipped hair with her uninjured hand.
'Where are my loyal subjects?' whimpered Numedides. 'Valerius! Procas Thespius! Gromel! Volmana! Where are my courtiers? Where is Vibius Latro? Has everyone deserted
me? Dues no one love me any more, despite all I have done for Aquilonia?' The abandoned monarch began to weep.
'As you know in your more lucid moments,' the sorcerer said sternly, 'Procas is dead; Vibius Latro has fled; and Gromel has deserted to the enemy. Volmana is fighting under Count Ulric, as are the others. Now, pray sit down and listen; I have things of moment to relate.'
Waddling to the throne, Numedides sank down, his spotted robe billowing about him. He pulled a dirty kerchief from his sleeve and pressed it to his wounded cheek, where it grew red with blood.
'Unless you can better control yourself,' said Thulandra Thuu, 'I shall have to do away with you and rule directly, instead of through you as before.'
'You never will be king!' mumbled Numedides. 'Not a man in Aquilonia would obey you. You are not of royal blood. You are not an Aquilonian. You are not even a Hyborian. I begin to doubt if you are even a human being.' He paused, glowering. 'So even if we hate each other, you need me as much as I need you.
'Well, what is this news at which you hint? Good news, I hope. Speak up, sir sorcerer; do not keep me in suspense '
'If you will but listen ... I cast our horoscopes this afternoon and discovered the imminence of deadly peril.'
'Peril? From what source?'
'That I cannot say; the indications were unclear. It surely cannot be the rebel army. My visions on the astral plane, confirmed by yesterday's message from Count Ulric, inform me that the rebels are penned beyond Elymia. They will soon retreat in the face of hopeless odds, disperse in despair, or suffer annihilation. We have naught to fear from them.'
'Could that devil Conan have slipped past Count Ulric?'
'Alas, my astral visions are not clear enough to distinguish individuals from afar. But the barbarian is a resourceful rascal; when you drove him into flight, I warned you might not have seen the last of him.'
'I have had reports of bands of traitors within sight of the city walls,' said the king, lips quivering in petulant uncertainty.
'That is gossip and not truth, unless some new leader has arisen among the disaffected of the Central Provinces.'
'Suppose such scum does wash ashore and lap the city walls? What can we do with the Black Dragons far away? It was your idea to have them join Count Ulric.' The king's voice grew shrill, as fear and rage snapped the thin thread of his composure. He ranted on:
'I left the management of this campaign to you, because you claim a store of arcane wisdom. Now I see that in military matters you are the merest tyro. You have bungled everything! When you sent Procas into Argos, you said that this incursion would snuff out the rebel menace, once and for all; but it did not. You assured me that the rabble would never cross the Alimane, and lo! the Border Legion was broken and dispersed. Quoth you, they had no chance of passing the Imirian Escarpment, and yet the rebels did. Finally, the plague you sent among them, you said, would surely wipe the upstarts out, and yet-'
'Your Majesty!' A young voice severed the king's recriminations. 'Pray, let me in! It is a dire emergency!'
'That is one of my pages; I know his voice,' said Numedides, rising and going to the still-locked door on the left side of the throne. When he had turned the key, a youth in page's garb burst in, gasping: 'My lord! The rebel Conan has seized the palace!'
'Conan!' cried the king. What has befallen? Speak '
'A troop of the Black Dragons —or men apparelled in their garb - galloped up to the palace gates, crying that they had urgent messages from the front. The guards thought nothing of it and passed them through, but I recognised the huge Cimmerian when I saw his scarred face in the lighted anteroom. I knew him in the Westermarck, ere I came to Tarantia to serve Your Majesty. And so I ran to warn you.'
'Mean you he is about to burst upon us, with no guards in the palace save a scrawny pack of striplings?' Eyes ablaze with fury, he turned to Thulandra
Thuu. 'Well, you sorcerous scoundrel, work a deterrent spell!'
The magician was already making passes with his staff and speaking in a sibilant, unknown tongue. As the sonorous valences rolled out, a strange phenomenon occurred. The candles dimmed, as if the room were filled with swirling smoke or roiling fogs from evening marshes, dank with decay. Darker and darker grew the atmosphere, until the Chamber of Private Audience became as black as a dungeon rock-sealed for centuries.
The king cried out in terror: 'Have you blinded me?'
'Quiet, Majesty! I have cast a spell of darkness over the palace, a magical defence. If we do lock the doors and speak in whispers, the invaders will not discover us.'
The page felt his way across the wide expanse of carpet and turned the great key in the left pair of doors, while Alcina, lithe as a jaguar, likewise barred the right-hand portal. The king retreated to his throne and sat in silence, too terrified to speak. Alcina sought the slender body of the sorcerer and huddled at his feet in mute supplication. The page, uncertain of his whereabouts, shrank back from the door whose key he turned and wished himself home in the humble alleys of Tarantia. The silence was complete, save for the beating of four frightened hearts.
Suddenly the page's door sprang open, and a chant could be heard in the ancient Hyborian tongue. The blackness thinned and rolled away, and the light of many candles once more flooded the utmost corners of the audience chamber.
In the open doorway stood Con an the Cimmerian, bloody sword in hand; and at his side Dexitheus, the priest of Mitra, still crooned the final phrases of his potent incantation.
'Slay them, Thulandra,' shrieked Numedides, eyes starting at the sight of his former general. He held the bloody kerchief to his injured cheek and moaned. Alcina shrank closer to her mentor and stared with baleful eyes upon the man who had survived her deadly potion.
<
br /> Thulandra Thuu raised his carven staff, thrust it at Conan, and, in the language of his undiscoverable born, spat out
a curse or else a ringing invocation to an unknown god. A rippling flash of light, like a blue streak of living fire, sped from the staff tip towards the Cimmerian's armoured breast. With the dread rattling of a thunderclap, the bolt shattered against an unseen barrier, spattering sparks.
Frowning, Thulandra Thuu repeated his cantrip, louder and in a voice of deep authority, shifting his aim to Dexitheus. Again the blue flame zigzagged across the intervening space and spread out, like water tossed against a pane of glass.
As Conan started for the sorcerer, his blue eyes blazing with the lust to kill, Captain Silvanus jostled past him, shouting:
'You who slew my daughter! I seek revenge I'
Silvanus, with madness glinting in his bloodshot eyes, rushed at the sorcerer, sword raised above his head. But before he had gone three paces, the magician pointed his staff and once again cried out. Again the blue lightning illumined the room with its awful radiance; and Silvanus, uttering a scream of horror, pitched forward on his face.
A hole the thickness of a man's thumb opened on the back plate of his cuirass, and the blackened steel curled into the petals of a rose of death. A red stain slowly spread over the Iranistani carpet and mingled with the jewelled tones of its weaving.
Conan wasted no time lamenting his companion but strode briskly towards the sorcerer, his sword upraised to strike. The page, ashen-pale, scuttled behind the throne; Alcina and the king flattened themselves against opposing walls.
But Thulandra Thuu had not exhausted his resources. He gripped the two ends of his staff in his bony hands and held it at arm's length in front of him, chanting the while in a tongue that was old when the seas swallowed Lemuria. As Conan took another step, he encountered a strange resistance that brought him to a halt.
Elastic and yielding was this invisible surface; yet it confounded Conan's most strenuous attack. The cords in his massive neck stood out; his face darkened with his almost
superhuman effort; his muscles writhed like pythons. Yet the barrier held. As he thrust his sword into that invisible substance, he saw Thulandra's staff bend in the middle, as if impelled by an opposing force, but it did not break. Dexitheus's mightiest magic had no power against the .staff and the protection it afforded to Thulandra Thuu.
At last the sorcerer spoke, and his voice was weary with the weight of many years. 'I see yon renegade priest of Mitra has armoured you against my bolts; but for all his puny magic, he cannot destroy me. Aquilonia is unworthy of my efforts. I shall remove to a land beyond the sunrise, where people will value my experiments and the gift of life eternal. Farewell I'
'Master! Master! Take me with you!' cried Alcina, raising her arms in humble supplication.
'Nay, girl, stay back! I have no further use for you.'
Thulandra Thuu edged to the door by which he had entered the audience chamber. As he moved, the elastic barrier he maintained retreated also. Lips bared in a mirthless grin, blue eyes ablaze, Conan followed the lean sorcerer step by step. His magnificent body quivered with the controlled fury of a lion deprived of its prey.
As they reached the doorway whence the sorcerer had entered, Thulandra Thuu began to sway, then to revolve. He spun faster and faster, until his dark figure became a blur. Suddenly he vanished.
As the wizard disappeared, the unseen barrier faded. Conan sprang forward, his sword upraised for a murderous slash. With a blistering curse, he rushed into the corridor. But the hall was empty. He listened, but he could detect no footfall.
Shaking his tousled mane as if to put a dream to flight, Conan turned back to the Chamber of Private Audience. He found Dexitheus guarding the other door, Alcina pressed against the farther wall, and King Numedides seated on his throne, dabbing his injured face with his bloody kerchief. Conan strode quickly to the throne to confront the king.
'Stand, mortal!' bawled Numedides, pointing a pudgy
forefinger. 'Know that I am a god! I am King of Aquilonia!'
Conan shot out an arm in which the hard muscles writhed like serpents. Seizing the king's robe, he hauled the madman to his feet. 'You mean,' he snarled, 'you were king. Have you aught to say before you die?'
Numedides wilted, a pool of molten tallow in a burned-out candle. Tears coursed down his flabby face to mingle with the blood that still oozed from his wound. He sank to his knees, babbling:
'Pray, do not slay me, gallant Conan! Though I have committed errors, I intended only well for Aquilonia! Send me into exile, and I shall not return. You cannot kill an ageing, unarmed man!'
With a contemptuous snort, Conan hurled Numedides to the floor. He wiped his sword on the hem of the fallen monarch's garment and sheathed it. Turning on his heel, he said:
'I do not hunt mice. Tie up this scum until we find a madhouse to confine him.'
A sudden flicker of movement seen beyond the comer of his eye and sharp intake of breath by Dexitheus warned Conan of impending danger. Numedides had found the poisoned dagger dropped by Alcina and now, weapon in hand, he rose to make one last, desperate lunge to stab the Liberator in the back.
Conan wheeled, shot out his left hand and caught the descending wrist. His right hand seized Numedides's weakened throat and, straining the mighty muscles in his arm, Conan forced his attacker down upon the throne. With his free hand the king wrenched in vain at Conan's obdurate wrist. His legs thrashed spasmodically.
As Conan's iron fingers dug deeper into the pudgy neck, Numedides's eyes bulged. His mouth gaped, but no sound issued forth. Deeper and deeper sank Conan's python grip, until the others in the room, standing with suspended breath, heard the cartilage crack. Blood trickled from the corner of the king's mouth, to mingle with the sanguine rheum that had besmeared his face and beard and hair,
Numidides's face turned blue, and little by little his flailing arms went limp. The poisoned dagger thudded to the floor and spun into a corner. Conan maintained his crushing grip until all life had fled.
At last Conan released the corpse, which tumbled off the throne in a dishevelled heap. The Cimmerian drew a long breath, then spun around and whipped his blade from its scabbard, as running feet and rattling armour clattered down the hall. A score of his men, who had been wandering around the palace in search of him, crowded into the doorway to the chamber. All voices stilled, all eyes were turned upon him, as he stood, legs spread and sword in hand, beside the throne of Aquilonia, a look of triumph in his blazing eyes.
What thoughts raced through Conan's mind at that moment, none ever knew. But finally he sheathed his sword, bent down, and tore the bloody crown from the bedraggled head of dead Numedides. Holding the slender circlet in one hand, he unbuckled the chin strap of his helmet with the other and tugged the headpiece off. Then he raised the crown in both his hands and placed it on his head.
Well,' he said, 'how does it look?'
Dexitheus spoke up: 'Hail, King Conan of Aquilonia I'
The others took up the cry; and at last even the page, who stared owl-eyed from bis hiding place behind the throne, joined in.
Alcina, moving forward with the seductive dancer's grace that had so excited Conan in Messantia, glided in front of him and fell prettily to her knees.
'Oh, Conan!' she cried, 'it was ever you I loved. But alas, I was ensorcelled and forced to do the bidding of that wicked thaumaturge. Forgive me and I will be your faithful servant forevermore!'
Frowning, Conan looked down upon her, and his voice was thunder rumbling in the hills. 'When someone has sought to murder me, I'd be a fool to give that one a second chance. Were you a man, I'd slay you here and now. But I do not war on women, so begone.
'If after this night you are found within those parts that
have declared for me, you'll lose your pretty head. Elatus, accompany her to the stables, saddle her a horse, and see her to the outskirts of Tarantia.'
Alcina went, the black cloud of her
silken hair hiding her countenance. At the door she turned back to look once more at Conan, tears glistening on her cheeks. Then she was gone. Conan kicked the corpse of Numedides. 'Stick this carrion's head on a spear and display it in the city, then carry it to Count Ulric in Elymia, to convince him and his army that a new king rules in Aquilonia.'
One of Conan's troopers shouldered his way into the crowded room. 'General Conan I' 'Well?'
The man paused to catch his breath. His eyes were big as buttons. 'You ordered Cadmus and me to guard the palace gates. Well, just now we heard a horse and chariot coming from the stables, but neither beast nor carriage did we see. Then Cadmus pointed to the ground, and there was a shadow on the moonlit road, like to a horse and cart. It ran along the ground, but naught there was to cast the shadow I' 'What did you?'
'Did, sir? What could we do? The shadow passed through the open gates and vanished down the street. So I came running to tell you.'
'The late king's sorcerer and his man, I doubt not,' said Conan to his assembled company. 'Let them go; the he-witch said he would betake himself to some distant eastern bourn. He'll trouble us no more.' Then turning to Dexitheus, he said: We must set up a government on the morrow, and you shall be my chancellor.'
The priest cried out in great distress. 'Oh, no, Gen-Your Majesty! I must take up a hermit's life, to atone for my resort to magic despite the regulations of my order.'
'When Publius joins us, you may do so with my blessing. In the interim we need a government, and you are wise in matters politic. Round up the officials and their clerks by noon.'
Dexitheus sighed. 'Very well, my lord King.' He looked
down on Silvanus's body and sadly shook his head. 'I much relict tin: death of this young man, but I could not maintain defensive fields around you both.'
'lie died a soldier's death; we'll bury him with honours,' Oman said. 'Where can one take a bath in this marble barn?'
Newly shaven and shorn, his mighty frame arrayed in ebon velvet, Conan rested on the purple-pillowed throne in the Chamber of Private Audience. All traces of violence had been erased - the bodies removed, the poisoned dagger buried, the carpet scrubbed free of bloodstains. An expectant smile lit Conan's craggy countenance.
The Conan Chronology Page 610
