When Zabibi was jerked head-first through the aperture which opened in
the wall behind the idol, her first, dizzy, disconnected thought was
that her time had come. She instinctively shut her eyes and waited for
the blow to fall. But instead she felt herself dumped unceremoniously
onto the smooth marble floor, which bruised her knees and hip. Opening
her eyes she stared fearfully around her, just as a muffled impact
sounded from beyond the wall. She saw a brown-skinned giant in a
loin-cloth standing over her, and, across the chamber into which she had
come, a man sat on a divan, with his back to a rich velvet curtain, a
broad, fleshy man, with fat white hands and snaky eyes. And her flesh
crawled, for this man was Totrasmek, the priest of Hanuman, who for
years had spun his slimy webs of power throughout the city of Zamboula.
'The barbarian seeks to batter his way through the wall,' said Totrasmek
sardonically, 'but the bolt will hold.'
The girl saw that a heavy golden bolt had been shot across the hidden
door, which was plainly discernible from this side of the wall. The bolt
and its sockets would have resisted the charge of an elephant.
'Go open one of the doors for him, Baal-pteor,' ordered Totrasmek. 'Slay
him in the square chamber at the other end of the corridor.'
The Kosalan salaamed and departed by the way of a door in the side wall
of the chamber. Zabibi rose, staring fearfully at the priest, whose eyes
ran avidly over her splendid figure. To this she was indifferent. A
dancer of Zamboula was accustomed to nakedness. But the cruelty in his
eyes started her limbs to quivering.
'Again you come to me in my retreat, beautiful one,' he purred with
cynical hypocrisy. 'It is an unexpected honor. You seemed to enjoy your
former visit so little, that I dared not hope for you to repeat it. Yet
I did all in my power to provide you with an interesting experience.'
For a Zamboulan dancer to blush would be an impossibility, but a smolder
of anger mingled with the fear in Zabibi's dilated eyes.
'Fat pig! You know I did not come here for love of you.'
'No,' laughed Totrasmek, 'you came like a fool, creeping through the
night with a stupid barbarian to cut my throat. Why should you seek my
life?'
'You know why!' she cried, knowing the futility of trying to dissemble.
'You are thinking of your lover,' he laughed. 'The fact that you are
here seeking my life shows that he quaffed the drug I gave you. Well,
did you not ask for it? And did I not send what you asked for, out of
the love I bear you?'
'I asked you for a drug that would make him slumber harmlessly for a few
hours,' she said bitterly. 'And you--you sent your servant with a drug
that drove him mad! I was a fool ever to trust you. I might have known
your protestations of friendship were lies, to disguise your hate and
spite.'
'Why did you wish your lover to sleep?' he retorted. 'So you could steal
from him the only thing he would never give you--the ring with the jewel
men call the Star of Khorala--the star stolen from the Queen of Ophir,
who would pay a roomful of gold for its return. He would not give it to
you willingly, because he knew that it holds a magic which, when
properly controlled, will enslave the hearts of any of the opposite sex.
You wished to steal it from him, fearing that his magicians would
discover the key to that magic and he would forget you in his conquests
of the queens of the world. You would sell it back to the queen of
Ophir, who understands its power and would use it to enslave men, as she
did before it was stolen.'
'And why did _you_ want it?' she demanded sulkily.
'I understand its powers. It would increase the power of my arts.'
'Well,' she snapped, 'you have it now!'
'_I_ have the Star of Khorala? Nay, you err.'
'Why bother to lie?' she retorted bitterly. 'He had it on his finger
when he drove me into the streets. He did not have it when I found him
again. Your servant must have been watching the house, and have taken it
from him, after I escaped him. To the devil with it! I want my lover
back sane and whole. You have the ring; you have punished us both. Why
do you not restore his mind to him? Can you?'
'I could,' he assured her, in evident enjoyment of her distress. He drew
a phial from among his robes. 'This contains the juice of the golden
lotus. If your lover drank it he would be sane again. Yes, I will be
merciful. You have both thwarted and flouted me, not once but many
times; he has constantly opposed my wishes. But I will be merciful. Come
and take the phial from my hand.'
She stared at Totrasmek, trembling with eagerness to seize it, but
fearing it was but some cruel jest. She advanced timidly, with a hand
extended, and he laughed heartlessly and drew back out of her reach.
Even as her lips parted to curse him, some instinct snatched her eyes
upward. From the gilded ceiling four jade-hued vessels were falling. She
dodged, but they did not strike her. They crashed to the floor about
her, forming the four corners of a square. And she screamed, and
screamed again. For out of each ruin reared the hooded head of a cobra,
and one struck at her bare leg. Her convulsive movement to evade it
brought her within reach of the one on the other side and again she had
to shift like lightning to avoid the flash of its hideous head.
She was caught in a frightful trap. All four serpents were swaying and
striking at foot, ankle, calf, knee, thigh, hip, whatever portion of her
voluptuous body chanced to be nearest to them, and she could not spring
over them or pass between them to safety. She could only whirl and
spring aside and twist her body to avoid the strokes, and each time she
moved to dodge one snake, the motion brought her within range of
another, so that she had to keep shifting with the speed of light. She
could move only a short space in any direction, and the fearful hooded
crests were menacing her every second. Only a dancer of Zamboula could
have lived in that grisly square.
She became, herself, a blur of bewildering motion. The heads missed her
by hair's breadths, but they missed, as she pitted her twinkling feet,
flickering limbs and perfect eye against the blinding speed of the scaly
demons her enemy had conjured out of thin air.
Somewhere a thin whining music struck up, mingling with the hissing of
the serpents, like an evil night-wind blowing through the empty sockets
of a skull. Even in the flying speed of her urgent haste she realized
that the darting of the serpents was no longer at random. They obeyed
the grisly piping of the eery music. They struck with a horrible rhythm,
and perforce her swaying, writhing, spinning body attuned itself to
their rhythm. Her frantic motions melted into the measures of a dance
compared to which the most obscene tarantella of Zamora would have
seemed sane and restrained. Sick with shame and terror Zabibi heard the
hateful mirth of her merciless tormentor.
'The Dance of the Cobras, my lovely one!' laughed Totrasmek. 'So maidens
danced in the sacrifice to Hanuman centuries ago--but never with such
beauty and suppleness. Dance, girl, dance! How long can you avoid the
fangs of the Poison People? Minutes? Hours? You will weary at last. Your
swift, sure feet will stumble, your legs falter, your hips slow in their
rotations. Then the fangs will begin to sink deep into your ivory
flesh--'
Behind him the curtain shook as if struck by a gust of wind, and
Totrasmek screamed. His eyes dilated and his hands caught convulsively
at the length of bright steel which jutted suddenly from his breast.
The music broke off short. The girl swayed dizzily in her dance, crying
out in dreadful anticipation of the flickering fangs--and then only four
wisps of harmless blue smoke curled up from the floor about her, as
Totrasmek sprawled headlong from the divan.
Conan came from behind the curtain, wiping his broad blade. Looking
through the hangings he had seen the girl dancing desperately between
four swaying spirals of smoke, but he had guessed that their appearance
was very different to her. He knew he had killed Totrasmek.
Zabibi sank down on the floor, panting, but even as Conan started toward
her, she staggered up again, though her legs trembled with exhaustion.
'The phial!' she gasped. 'The phial!'
Totrasmek still grasped it in his stiffening hand. Ruthlessly she tore
it from his locked fingers, and then began frantically to ransack his
garments.
'What the devil are you looking for?' Conan demanded.
'A ring--he stole it from Alafdhal. He must have, while my lover walked
in madness through the streets. Set's devils!'
She had convinced herself that it was not on the person of Totrasmek.
She began to cast about the chamber, tearing up divan-covers and
hangings, and upsetting vessels.
She paused and raked a damp lock of hair out of her eyes.
'I forgot Baal-pteor!'
'He's in hell with his neck broken,' Conan assured her.
She expressed vindictive gratification at the news, but an instant later
swore expressively.
'We can't stay here. It's not many hours until dawn. Lesser priests are
likely to visit the temple at any hour of the night, and if we're
discovered here with his corpse, the people will tear us to pieces. The
Turanians could not save us.'
She lifted the bolt on the secret door, and a few moments later they
were in the streets and hurrying away from the silent square where
brooded the age-old shrine of Hanuman.
In a winding street a short distance away Conan halted and checked his
companion with a heavy hand on her naked shoulder.
'Don't forget there was a price--'
'I have not forgotten!' She twisted free. 'But we must go to--to
Alafdhal first!'
A few minutes later the black slave let them through the wicket door.
The young Turanian lay upon the divan, his arms and legs bound with
heavy velvet ropes. His eyes were open, but they were like those of a
mad dog, and foam was thick on his lips. Zabibi shuddered.
'Force his jaws open!' she commanded, and Conan's iron fingers
accomplished the task.
Zabibi emptied the phial down the maniac's gullet. The effect was like
magic. Instantly he became quiet. The glare faded from his eyes; he
stared up at the girl in a puzzled way, but with recognition and
intelligence. Then he fell into a normal slumber.
'When he awakes he will be quite sane,' she whispered, motioning to the
silent slave.
With a deep bow he gave into her hands a small leathern bag, and drew
about her shoulders a silken cloak. Her manner had subtly changed when
she beckoned Conan to follow her out of the chamber.
In an arch that opened on the street, she turned to him, drawing herself
up with a new regality.
'I must now tell you the truth,' she said. 'I am not Zabibi. I am
Nafertari. And _he_ is not Alafdhal, a poor captain of the guardsmen. He
is Jungir Khan, satrap of Zamboula.'
Conan made no comment; his scarred dark countenance was immobile.
'I lied to you because I dared not divulge the truth to anyone,' she
said. 'We were alone when Jungir Khan went mad. None knew of it but
myself. Had it been known that the satrap of Zamboula was a madman,
there would have been instant revolt and rioting, even as Totrasmek
planned, who plotted our destruction.
'You see now how impossible is the reward for which you hoped. The
satrap's mistress is not--cannot be for you. But you shall not go
unrewarded. Here is a sack of gold.'
She gave him the bag she had received from the slave.
'Go, now, and when the sun is come up to the palace, I will have Jungir
Khan make you captain of his guard. But you will take your orders from
me, secretly. Your first duty will be to march a squad to the shrine of
Hanuman, ostensibly to search for clues of the priest's slayer; in
reality to search for the Star of Khorala. It must be hidden there
somewhere. When you find it, bring it to me. You have my leave to go
now.'
He nodded, still silent, and strode away. The girl, watching the swing
of his broad shoulders, was piqued to note that there was nothing in his
bearing to show that he was in any way chagrined or abashed.
* * * * *
When he had rounded a corner, he glanced back, and then changed his
direction and quickened his pace. A few moments later he was in the
quarter of the city containing the Horse Market. There he smote on a
door until from the window above a bearded head was thrust to demand the
reason for the disturbance.
'A horse,' demanded Conan. 'The swiftest steed you have.'
'I open no gates at this time of night,' grumbled the horse-trader.
Conan rattled his coins.
'Dog's son knave! Don't you see I'm white, and alone? Come down, before
I smash your door!'
Presently, on a bay stallion, Conan was riding toward the house of Aram
Baksh.
He turned off the road into the alley that lay between the tavern
compound and the date-palm garden, but he did not pause at the gate. He
rode on to the northeast corner of the wall, then turned and rode along
the north wall, to halt within a few paces of the northwest angle. No
trees grew near the wall, but there were some low bushes. To one of
these he tied his horse, and was about to climb into the saddle again,
when he heard a low muttering of voices beyond the corner of the wall.
Drawing his foot from the stirrup he stole to the angle and peered
around it. Three men were moving down the road toward the palm groves,
and from their slouching gait he knew they were negroes. They halted at
his low call, bunching themselves as he strode toward them, his sword in
his hand. Their eyes gleamed whitely in the starlight. Their brutish
lust shone in their ebony faces, but they knew their three cudgels could
not prevail against his sword, just as he knew it.
'Where are you going?' he challenged.
'To bid our brothers put out the fire in the pit beyond the groves,' was
the sullen, guttural reply. 'Aram Baksh promised us a man, but he lied.
We found one of our brothers dead in the trap-chamber. We go hungry this
night.'
'I think not,' smiled Conan. 'Aram Baksh will give you a man. Do you see
that door?'
He pointed to a small, iron-bound portal set in the midst of the western
wall.
'Wait there. Aram Baksh will give you a man.'
Backing warily away until he was out of reach of a sudden bludgeon blow,
he turned and melted around the northwest angle of the wall. Reaching
his horse he paused to ascertain that the blacks were not sneaking after
him, and then he climbed into the saddle and stood upright on it,
quieting the uneasy steed with a low word. He reached up, grasped the
coping of the wall and drew himself up and over. There he studied the
grounds for an instant. The tavern was built in the southwest corner of
the enclosure, the remaining space of which was occupied by groves and
gardens. He saw no one in the grounds. The tavern was dark and silent,
and he knew all the doors and windows were barred and bolted.
Conan knew that Aram Baksh slept in a chamber that opened into a
cypress-bordered path that led to the door in the western wall. Like a
shadow he glided among the trees and a few moments later he rapped
lightly on the chamber door.
'What is it?' asked a rumbling voice within.
'Aram Baksh!' hissed Conan. 'The blacks are stealing over the wall!'
Almost instantly the door opened, framing the tavern-keeper, naked but
for his shirt, with a dagger in his hand.
He craned his neck to stare into the Cimmerian's face.
'What tale is this--_you!_'
Conan's vengeful fingers strangled the yell in his throat. They went to
the floor together and Conan wrenched the dagger from his enemy's hand.
The blade glinted in the starlight, and blood spurted. Aram Baksh made
hideous noises, gasping and gagging on a mouthful of blood. Conan
dragged him to his feet and again the dagger slashed, and most of the
curly beard fell to the floor.
Still gripping his captive's throat--for a man can scream incoherently
even with his tongue slit--Conan dragged him out of the dark chamber and
down the cypress-shadowed path, to the iron-bound door in the outer
wall. With one hand he lifted the bolt and threw the door open,
disclosing the three shadowy figures which waited like black vultures
outside. Into their eager arms Conan thrust the innkeeper.
A horrible, blood-choked scream rose from the Zamboulan's throat, but
there was no response from the silent tavern. The people there were used
to screams outside the wall. Aram Baksh fought like a wild man, his
distended eyes turned frantically on the Cimmerian's face. He found no
mercy there. Conan was thinking of the scores of wretches who owed their
bloody doom to this man's greed.
In glee the negroes dragged him down the road, mocking his frenzied
gibberings. How could they recognize Aram Baksh in this half-naked,
bloodstained figure, with the grotesquely shorn beard and unintelligible
babblings? The sounds of the struggle came back to Conan, standing
beside the gate, even after the clump of figures had vanished among the
palms.
Closing the door behind him, Conan returned to his horse, mounted and
turned westward, toward the open desert, swinging wide to skirt the
sinister belt of palm groves. As he rode, he drew from his belt a ring
in which gleamed a jewel that snared the starlight in a shimmering
iridescence. He held it up to admire it, turning it this way and that.
The compact bag of gold pieces clinked gently at his saddle-bow, like a
promise of the greater riches to come.
'I wonder what she'd say if she knew I recognized her as Nafertari and
him as Jungir Khan the instant I saw them,' he mused. 'I knew the Star
of Khorala, too. There'll be a fine scene if she ever guesses that I
slipped it off his finger while I was tying him with his sword-belt. But
they'll never catch me, with the start I'm getting.'
He glanced back at the shadowy palm groves, among which a red glare was
mounting. A chanting rose to the night, vibrating with savage
exultation. And another sound mingled with it, a mad, incoherent
screaming, a frenzied gibbering in which no words could be
distinguished. The noise followed Conan as he rode westward beneath the
paling stars.