“I thought it best to keep from sight,” the tattooed veteran told Conan quietly. “As we arrived, two score men-at-arms passed, chasing another band as large, and twice parties of light cavalry have gone by at the gallop. Scouts, the last, no doubt.”
“Unless I miss my guess,” Narus added in a low voice that would not travel far, “Iskandrian seeks action this night, and the nobles seek to avoid him until their strength is gathered. Never did I think that when the final battle for Ophir occurred, I would be scaling a mountain.”
“Go to Taurianus, then,” Conan growled, “if you seek glory!” Irritably he shook his black-maned head. Such edginess was not his usual manner, but his thoughts scarcely seemed his own. With a desperation foreign to him he fought to cling to his purpose of mind, struggled against images of Synelle and lust that threatened to overwhelm him.
“Is that the famous staff?” Machaon asked. “It has no look of magic to me.”
“It is,” the Cimmerian replied, “and it has.” He hoped he did not lie. Unfastening the strips of cloth that held the length of wood, he clutched it in one hand and drew his sword with the other. “This is the last chance to change your minds. Let any man unsure of what he does step aside.” The soft and deadly susuration of steel sliding from scabbards was his answer. Conan nodded grimly. “Then hide the horses in yon copse of trees and follow me.”
“Your armor,” Machaon said. “ ’Tis on your saddle.”
“There is no time,” Conan said, and without waiting for the others he started up the stony slope.
Crom was not a god men prayed to; he gave nothing beyond his first gift. But now Conan offered a prayer to any god that would listen. If he died for it, let him be in time.
A silent file of purposeful men fell in behind him in his climb, on their way to beard a god in his den.
The lash struck across her shoulders again, and Karela gritted her teeth against the howl she wanted to let pass. Bound between posts topped with the obscene head of Al’Kiir, she knelt, all but the last layer of thin blue silk torn away from her sweat-slick body. It was not the pain from the incessant bite of leather that made her want to cry out, or not alone; she would have died before giving her tormentors the satisfaction of acknowledging that. But the burning stripes that made scarlet lattices on her body were as pin-pricks beside the flaming desire the ointment with which Synelle had anointed her brought unbidden. Uncontrollably Karela writhed, and wept for the humiliation of it.
The silvery-haired noblewoman danced before her, spinning and dipping, chanting words that defied hearing in rhythm to haunting flutes and the pounding of scabbarded swords on the stone floor of the vaulting cavern. Between Synelle and Karela stood the bronze she had stolen from Conan, but its evil was overpowered by the waves of horror that radiated from the huge sanguinary image that dominated the chamber. Three ebon eyes that seemed to drink in light held her own. She tried to tear her eyes from that hellborn gaze, she prayed for the strength to pull away, but like a bird hypnotized by a serpent she had no will left.
The lashes struck, again and again. Her hands quivered in her bonds with the effort of not shrieking, for that demonic scarlet figure had begun to vibrate, giving off a hum that blended with the flutes and wrenched at the core of her that made her a woman. Conan, she cried silently, where are you?
Stirring where neither time nor space existed, where endless nibility was all. Awakening almost full, as pleasure overwhelming lanced through the impenetrable shield. Irritation, vaster than the minds of all men together could encompass, flared. Would these torments never cease, these returnings of ancient memories near gone and better forgotten? Would not … Full awareness for the first time in eons, awareness cold enough to freeze suns and stay worlds in their motion. There was direction. A single pristine strand of crystalline desire and pain stretching into the infinite. Slowly, with a wariness born of long centuries of disappointment, from the midst of nothingness the gleaming thread of worship was followed.
Conan peered around the edge of a huge, moss-covered block of marble which had once been intended for construction. Crickets chirped in the dark, and a nightbird gave a haunting cry. All else was still.
Roofless walls of niveous stone and truncated alabaster columns, never completed and now wreathed by thick vines, covered the leveled top of the mountain. Among the columns were more than a score of men in black armor and horned helms, the torches a third of them carried casting flickering shadows over the weather-beaten ruins. He wanted to sigh with relief at the symbol picked out in scarlet on their chests. It was clearly the head of the image Karela had stolen, the head of Al’Kiir. Not until that moment had he allowed himself to fear he might be coming to the wrong place.
The black-armored man had to be guarding an entrance to chambers below, Conan thought, where the horrible rite was to take place. Boros had said the tomb lay buried in the heart of the mountain. At least, they were supposed to be standing guard. The sinister reputation of Tor Al’Kiir made it unlikely anyone would come there, most especially in the night, and that made them careless. Some leaned against pale fluted marble. Others sat and talked among themselves. No eye was directed outward to watch for intruders.
Conan signaled with his hands; long practiced, the nine men behind him slid soundlessly away. The Cimmerian counted silently, knowing how long it would take each man to reach his place.
“Now!” he shouted, and burst from concealment to hurl himself at the guards. As he had known it would, his shout and the appearance of a lone man charging froze them for an instant, long enough for nine bowstrings to twang, for nine feathered shafts to drink life.
The guards of Al’Kiir had been chosen for their skill, though, and even as their comrades were falling the survivors darted for cover behind the columns. But then Conan was among them. Thrusting the staff like a lance he took a man under the chin; throat cartiledge snapped loudly, and blood spilled from a mouth that could no longer scream.
“For Conan!” he heard behind him. “Conan!”
A blade thrust at him, and his ancient steel severed the arm that held it. He ducked beneath a decapitating cut and, wielding his broadsword like an axe, chopped through his attacker’s midsection almost to the spine. Kicking the body away, he straightened to find no black-armored man standing. His mercenaries stood among the bodies, gripping bloody swords and warily watching for more of the enemy.
“Are they all dead?” Conan demanded.
Machaon shook his head. “Two managed to run down there.” He pointed to a dark opening where steps had led down into the mountain.
“Crom!” the Cimmerian muttered. With quick strides he moved to the opening and started down. Wordlessly the others followed.
Sweat trickling down her sleek form, Synelle moved in the ancient forms and patterns, her body swaying and bending in an exaltation of lust and pain. Time-forgotten words spilled from her mouth, echoed against the walls, supplicating and glorifying her dire god. The monstrous horned malevolence before which she danced pulsated like the string of a harp. The drone that came from it now drowned out the flutes and the pounding scabbards and even the slap of leather on flesh, yet seemed to merge with and amplify her voice.
A part of her mind noted that the auburn-haired woman, naked now to the lash, sagged in her bonds, but struggled still against surrender. Not once had a cry passed her lips. That was well, Synelle thought, not pausing an instant in either movements or incantation. She was certain that the success she seemed to be having was as much due to the stubborn pride of this Karela as to the bronze image. Much better than any of the haughty noblewomen, who in the end always wept and begged and offered their bodies to the men whipping them in exchange for even a moment’s surcease.
One of her guards, his chain-mail rent and bloodied, burst into the chamber. “We are attacked, my lady!” he gasped. “Hundreds of them! They cry, for Conan!”
Synelle faltered, then desperately continued with dance and invocation. To stop now would mean disa
ster, doom better undreamed of. Yet her mind spun. Conan? It was impossible. But then it was impossible that any should dare brave the night slopes of Tor Al’Kiir. Then who …
Thoughts and words and movement died as one. All sound stopped as the great horned head turned toward her and three lidless eyes, black as death, regarded her like dark flames of unholy life.
Men in black chain-mail, their horned helmets making them seem more demons than men in the dim light of fires burned low in iron cressets, appeared as if from the walls to defend the roughcut stone passage. Demons they might appear, yet they died like men. Into the midst of them Conan waded, his ancient broadsword tirelessly rising and falling in furious butchery, till its length was stained crimson and blood fell from it as if the steel itself had wounds. A charnel house he made, and those who dared confront him died. Many could not face that gory blade nor the deathly cold eyes of he who wielded it, and darted past the one man to face instead the nine behind.
The Cimmerian spared no thought for those who refused him combat. What they guarded and what he sought lay ahead, and he did not cease his slaying until he had hacked his way into a huge cavern. The blood chilled in his veins at what he saw.
Twenty more of the black-armored men stood there, but they were as frozen as he, and seemed as insignificant as ants beside what else the chamber contained. Karela, her lush nakedness welted, hanging by her wrists from two wooden pillars. Synelle, oddly garbed in black silk that clung damply to her, a horned chaplet on her brow. And beyond her a shape out of madmen’s nightmares, its skin the color of dead men’s blood. Al’Kiir awakened threw back his head, and from a broad fanged gash of a mouth came laughter to curdle the heart of heroes.
Even as the evil god’s laughter stunned Conan’s mind, Synelle’s presence filled it. The staff fell from his fingers, and he took a step toward her.
The dark-eyed noblewoman pointed a slender finger at the young giant. As if commanding more wine she said, “Kill him.”
The strange lethargy that had affected him of late when he was about her slowed Conan’s hand, but his sword took the head of the first man to turn toward him before that man had his blade half-drawn. Nobles could prate while they lounged at their ease of chivalry in battle, though they rarely practiced it; a son of the bleak northland knew only how to fight to win.
The others came at him then, but he retreated to the entrance, wide enough for only three at a time to get near. With a frenzy approaching madness he fought, and his steel did murderous work among them. Synelle filled his brain. He would get to Synelle if he must wade to his waist in blood.
A scream drew his eye beyond the men struggling to slay him. Al’Kiir had seized Synelle in a clawed hand that almost encircled her narrow waist, lifting her before that triad of ebon eyes for inspection.
Conan redoubled his efforts, and the fury of his attack, seeming reckless of death, forced the mail-clad men to fall back before him.
“Not me!” Synelle screamed, her face contorted in terror. “I am thy faithful slave, o mighty Al’Kiir! Thy priestess! She is the one brought for thy delight!”
Al’Kiir turned his horned head to Karela, and his lipless mouth curled in a fanged smile. He took a step toward her, reaching out.
“No!” Conan roared, desperation clawing at him. “Not Karela!” His foot struck something that rolled with the sound of wood on stone. The Staff of Avanrakash.
Ignoring the men who still faced him, Conan seized the staff from the floor and hurled it like a javelin. Straight to the chest of the monstrous figure the plain wooden staff flew, struck, and pierced. Al’Kiir’s free hand tugged at the length of wood, but it could as well have been anchored with barbs. Black ichor poured out around it, and the horned god shrieked, a piercing cry that went on without end, shattering thought and turning muscles to water.
Steel clattered to the stone floor as black-mailed men dropped their swords and fled, pushing past Conan as if he held no weapon at all. And he, in turn, paid them no heed, for the scream that would not stop allowed room for awareness of nothing else.
Around the staff drops of ichor hardened like beads of obsidian, and the hardening widened, spreading steadily through the malevolent shape.
Synelle plucked frantically at the claw-tipped fingers that held her; her long legs kicked wildly. “Release me,” she pleaded. “Release thy faithful priestess, o mighty Al’Kiir.” Now she struggled with fingers of stone. Slowly, as if it moved with difficulty, the horned head turned to look at her. “Release me!” she screamed. “Release me! No! Mitra, save me!” Her kicking slowed, then her legs were frozen, her cries stilled. Her pale skin gleamed like polished marble in the light from the torches. There was silence.
Flight. Flight from pain great enough to slay a thousand worlds. Flight back to the hated prison of nothingness. Yet something had been brought along. It was clothed in the flesh it had once worn, and a beautiful, naked woman, dark of eye and silvery of hair, floated in the void, mouth working with screams that were not worth bearing. Evil joy, black as the depths of the pit. Long centuries of delight would come from this one before the pitiful spark that was human essence faded and was gone. But the pain did not end. It grew instead. The crystalline thread that linked this place of nonexistence with that other world was still intact, unseverable. Yet it must be ended, least endless eons of agony follow. It must be ended.
Conan shook his head as if waking from a fever dream, and ran to Karela. Quickly he severed her bonds, caught her as she would have fallen.
The beautiful red-haired bandit turned her sweat-streaked face up to him. “I knew you would come,” she whispered hoarsely. “I prayed for you to rescue me, and I hate you for it.”
The Cimmerian could not help smiling. Whatever had happened to her, Karela was unchanged. Sheathing his sword, he picked her up in his arms. Sighing weakly, she put her arms around his neck and pressed her face to his chest. He thought he felt the wetness of tears.
His gaze went to the stone shape pierced by the wooden staff, the sanguinary horned monstrosity clutching the alabaster figure of a struggling woman, her face frozen in horror for eternity. All the raging feelings and confusions that had filled him were gone as if they had never been. Bewitched, he thought angrily. Synelle had ensorceled him. He hoped that wherever she was she had time for regret.
Machaon and Narus ran into the chamber, bloody swords in hand, and skidded to a halt, staring in awe. “I’ll not task what happened here,” the gaunt-faced man said, “for I misdoubt I’d believe it.”
“They flee from us, Cimmerian,” Machaon said. “Ten of them together, and they ran down a side passage at the sight of us. Whatever you did took all the heart right out of them.”
“The others?” Conan asked, and the tattooed mercenary shook his head grimly.
“Dead. But they collected their ferryman’s fees and more.”
Suddenly Narus pointed at the huge stone figure. “It’s—it’s—” He stammered, unable to get any more words out.
Conan spun. The petrified body of the god was quivering. A hum came from it, a hum that quickly rose in pitch until it pierced the ears like driven nails.
“Run!” the Cimmerian shouted, but could not hear his own words through the burning pain that clawed at his skull.
The other two men needed no urging, though. The three of them sped through the rough-hewn stone passages, Conan keeping up easily despite carrying Karela. In their headlong flight they leaped over the bodies of the dead, but saw no one living. And the mind-killing vibration followed them up sloping tunnels, level after level, up the stone steps to the ruins.
As the Cimmerian dashed out among the over-grown columns, the skull-piercing sound ceased. Birds and crickets had fled; the loudest noise to be heard was their own blood thrumming in their ears. Before a breath could be drawn in the silence, the mountain shook. Half-built columns toppled and mossy walls collapsed, blocks of marble large enough to crush a man splashing dirt like water, but the sound of their fall w
as swallowed by the rumbling that rose from the granite bowels of Tor Al’Kiir.
Dodging through clouds of dust and flying chips of shattered rock, Conan hurtled down the slope, Karela’s naked form clutched to his chest. The side of a mountain in the night was no place to be during an earthquake, but neither was the midst of crumbling marble walls. He had a feeling the only safe place to be in this earthquake was as far from Tor Al’Kiir as it was possible to run. And run he did, over ground that danced like the deck of a ship in a storm, fighting to keep his balance for rocks bouncing beneath his feet and stones flying through the air like hail. He no longer knew if Machaon and Narus ran with him, nor could he spare a thought for them. They were men, and must take their risks. Conan had to get Karela to safety, for some primal instinct warned him that worse was to come.
With a sound like the splitting of the earth, the peak of Tor Al’Kiir erupted in fire, mountaintop and alabaster columns and marble walls alike flung high into a sky now lit by a fiery glow. The blast threw Conan into the air; he twisted so that his own huge frame took the bone-jarring impact of landing. It was no longer possible to gain his feet. He put his body over that of Karela, sheltering her from the stones that filled the air. As he did one image remained burned into his brain, a single flame towering a thousand paces from the destroyed top of Tor Al’Kiir, a single flame that took the form of the Staff of Avanrakash.
Epilogue
In the paleness before full dawn Conan peered toward Ianthe, towers thrusting into the early morning mist, glazed red roof tiles beginning to gleam with the light of a sun not yet risen. An army approached the city, men-at-arms with gaily colored pennons streaming, long columns of infantry with shields slung on their backs, tall plumes of dust rising beneath thousands of pacing hooves and tramping feet. A victorious army, he thought. But whose?
Avoiding looking at the steaming, cratered top of Tor Al’Kiir, he picked his way through the huge, misshapen boulders that now littered the mountain slope. A quarter of its height had the great granite mound lost in the night, and what lay at its new peak the Cimmerian neither knew nor wanted to know.
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