Conan wheeled supplely, sweeping the shadows with a fiercely questing
stare. There was no sign of the murdered man's body; only yonder the
tall lush grass was trampled and broken down and the sward was dabbled
darkly and wetly. Conan stood scarcely breathing as he strained his ears
into the silence. The trees and bushes with their great pallid blossoms
stood dark, still and sinister, etched against the deepening dusk.
Primitive fears whispered at the back of Conan's mind. Was this the work
of the priests of Keshan? If so, where were they? Was it Zargheba, after
all, who had struck the gong? Again there rose the memory of Bît-Yakin
and his mysterious servants. Bît-Yakin was dead, shriveled to a hulk of
wrinkled leather and bound in his hollowed crypt to greet the rising sun
for ever. But the servants of Bît-Yakin were unaccounted for. There was
no proof they had ever left the valley.
Conan thought of the girl, Muriela, alone and unguarded in that great
shadowy palace. He wheeled and ran back down the shadowed avenue, and he
ran as a suspicious panther runs, poised even in full stride to whirl
right or left and strike death blows.
The palace loomed through the trees, and he saw something else--the glow
of fire reflecting redly from the polished marble. He melted into the
bushes that lined the broken street, glided through the dense growth and
reached the edge of the open space before the portico. Voices reached
him; torches bobbed and their flare shone on glossy ebon shoulders. The
priests of Keshan had come.
They had not advanced up the wide, overgrown avenue as Zargheba had
expected them to do. Obviously there was more than one secret way into
the valley of Alkmeenon.
They were filing up the broad marble steps, holding their torches high.
He saw Gorulga at the head of the parade, a profile chiseled out of
copper, etched in the torch glare. The rest were acolytes, giant black
men from whose skins the torches struck highlights. At the end of the
procession there stalked a huge negro with an unusually wicked cast of
countenance, at the sight of whom Conan scowled. That was Gwarunga, whom
Muriela had named as the man who had revealed the secret of the
pool-entrance to Zargheba. Conan wondered how deeply the man was in the
intrigues of the Stygian.
He hurried toward the portico, circling the open space to keep in the
fringing shadows. They left no one to guard the entrance. The torches
streamed steadily down the long dark hall. Before they reached the
double-valved door at the other end, Conan had mounted the other steps
and was in the hall behind them. Slinking swiftly along the column-lined
wall, he reached the great door as they crossed the huge throne-room,
their torches driving back the shadows. They did not look back. In
single file, their ostrich plumes nodding, their leopard-skin tunics
contrasting curiously with the marble and arabesqued metal of the
ancient palace, they moved across the wide room and halted momentarily
at the golden door to the left of the throne-dais.
Gorulga's voice boomed eerily and hollowly in the great empty space,
framed in sonorous phrases unintelligible to the lurking listener; then
the high priest thrust open the golden door and entered, bowing
repeatedly from his waist, and behind him the torches sank and rose,
showering flakes of flame, as the worshippers imitated their master. The
gold door closed behind them, shutting out sound and sight, and Conan
darted across the throne-chamber and into the alcove behind the throne.
He made less sound than a wind blowing across the chamber.
Tiny beams of light streamed through the apertures in the wall, as he
pried open the secret panel. Gliding into the niche, he peered through.
Muriela sat upright on the dais, her arms folded, her head leaning back
against the wall, within a few inches of his eyes. The delicate perfume
of her foamy hair was in his nostrils. He could not see her face, of
course, but her attitude was as if she gazed tranquilly into some far
gulf of space, over and beyond the shaven heads of the black giants who
knelt before her. Conan grinned with appreciation. 'The little slut's an
actress,' he told himself. He knew she was shriveling with terror, but
she showed no sign. In the uncertain flare of the torches she looked
exactly like the goddess he had seen lying on that same dais, if one
could imagine that goddess imbued with vibrant life.
Gorulga was booming forth some kind of a chant in an accent unfamiliar
to Conan, and which was probably some invocation in the ancient tongue
of Alkmeenon, handed down from generation to generation of high priests.
It seemed interminable. Conan grew restless. The longer the thing
lasted, the more terrific would be the strain on Muriela. If she
snapped--he hitched his sword and dagger forward. He could not see the
little trollop tortured and slain by these men.
But the chant--deep, low-pitched and indescribably ominous--came to a
conclusion at last, and a shouted acclaim from the acolytes marked its
period. Lifting his head and raising his arms toward the silent form on
the dais, Gorulga cried in the deep, rich resonance that was the natural
attribute of the Keshani priest: 'Oh, great goddess, dweller with the
great one of darkness, let thy heart be melted, thy lips opened for the
ears of thy slave whose head is in the dust beneath thy feet! Speak,
great goddess of the holy valley! Thou knowest the paths before us; the
darkness that vexes us is as the light of the midday sun to thee. Shed
the radiance of thy wisdom on the paths of thy servants! Tell us, oh
mouthpiece of the gods: what is their will concerning Thutmekri the
Stygian?'
The high-piled burnished mass of hair that caught the torchlight in dull
bronze gleams quivered slightly. A gusty sigh rose from the blacks, half
in awe, half in fear. Muriela's voice came plainly to Conan's ears in
the breathless silence, and it seemed, cold, detached, impersonal,
though the Cimmerian winced at the Corinthian accent.
'It is the will of the gods that the Stygian and his Shemitish dogs be
driven from Keshan!' She was repeating his exact words. 'They are
thieves and traitors who plot to rob the gods. Let the Teeth of Gwahlur
be placed in the care of the general Conan. Let him lead the armies of
Keshan. He is beloved of the gods!'
There was a quiver in her voice as she ended, and Conan began to sweat,
believing she was on the point of an hysterical collapse. But the blacks
did not notice, any more than they identified the Corinthian accent, of
which they knew nothing. They smote their palms softly together and a
murmur of wonder and awe rose from them. Gorulga's eyes glittered
fanatically in the torchlight.
'Yelaya has spoken!' he cried in an exalted voice. 'It is the will of
the gods! Long ago, in the days of our ancestors, they were made taboo
and hidden at the command of the gods, who wrenched them from the awful
jaws of Gwahlur the king of darkness, in the birth of the world. At the
command of the gods the teeth of Gwahlur were hidden; at their command
they shall be brought forth again. Oh star-born goddess, give us your
leave to go to the secret hiding-place of the Teeth to secure them for
him whom the gods love!'
'You have my leave to go!' answered the false goddess, with an imperious
gesture of dismissal that set Conan grinning again, and the priests
backed out, ostrich plumes and torches rising and falling with the
rhythm of their genuflexions.
The gold door closed and with a moan, the goddess fell back limply on
the dais. 'Conan!' she whimpered faintly. 'Conan!'
'Shhh!' he hissed through the apertures, and turning, glided from the
niche and closed the panel. A glimpse past the jamb of the carven door
showed him the torches receding across the great throne-room, but he was
at the same time aware of a radiance that did not emanate from the
torches. He was startled, but the solution presented itself instantly.
An early moon had risen and its light slanted through the pierced dome
which by some curious workmanship intensified the light. The shining
dome of Alkmeenon was no fable, then. Perhaps its interior was of the
curious whitely flaming crystal found only in the hills of the black
countries. The light flooded the throne-room and seeped into the
chambers immediately adjoining.
But as Conan made toward the door that led into the throne-room, he was
brought around suddenly by a noise that seemed to emanate from the
passage that led off from the alcove. He crouched at the mouth, staring
into it, remembering the clangor of the gong that had echoed from it to
lure him into a snare. The light from the dome filtered only a little
way into that narrow corridor, and showed him only empty space. Yet he
could have sworn that he had heard the furtive pad of a foot somewhere
down it.
While he hesitated, he was electrified by a woman's strangled cry from
behind him. Bounding through the door behind the throne, he saw an
unexpected spectacle in the crystal light.
The torches of the priests had vanished from the great hall outside--but
one priest was still in the palace: Gwarunga. His wicked features were
convulsed with fury, and he grasped the terrified Muriela by the throat,
choking her efforts to scream and plead, shaking her brutally.
'Traitress!' Between his thick red lips his voice hissed like a cobra.
'What game are you playing? Did not Zargheba tell you what to say? Aye,
Thutmekri told me! Are you betraying your master, or is he betraying his
friends through you? Slut! I'll twist off your false head--but first
I'll--'
A widening of his captive's lovely eyes as she stared over his shoulder
warned the huge black. He released her and wheeled, just as Conan's
sword lashed down. The impact of the stroke knocked him headlong
backward to the marble floor, where he lay twitching, blood oozing from
a ragged gash in his scalp.
Conan started toward him to finish the job--for he knew that the
priest's sudden movement had caused the blade to strike flat--but
Muriela threw her arms convulsively about him.
'I've done as you ordered!' she gasped hysterically. 'Take me away! Oh,
please take me away!'
'We can't go yet,' he grunted. 'I want to follow the priests and see
where they get the jewels. There may be more loot hidden there. But you
can go with me. Where's the gem you wore in your hair?'
'It must have fallen out on the dais,' she stammered, feeling for it. 'I
was so frightened--when the priests left I ran out to find you, and this
big brute had stayed behind, and he grabbed me--'
'Well, go get it while I dispose of this carcass,' he commanded. 'Go on!
That gem is worth a fortune itself.'
She hesitated, as if loth to return to that cryptic chamber; then, as he
grasped Gwarunga's girdle and dragged him into the alcove, she turned
and entered the oracle room.
Conan dumped the senseless black on the floor, and lifted his sword. The
Cimmerian had lived too long in the wild places of the world to have any
illusions about mercy. The only safe enemy was a headless enemy. But
before he could strike, a startling scream checked the lifted blade. It
came from the oracle chamber.
'Conan! Conan! She's come back!' The shriek ended in a gurgle and a
scraping shuffle.
With an oath Conan dashed out of the alcove, across the throne dais and
into the oracle chamber, almost before the sound had ceased. There he
halted, glaring bewilderedly. To all appearances Muriela lay placidly on
the dais, eyes closed as in slumber.
'What in thunder are you doing?' he demanded acidly. 'Is this any time
to be playing jokes--'
His voice trailed away. His gaze ran along the ivory thigh molded in the
close-fitting silk skirt. That skirt should gape from girdle to hem. He
knew, because it had been his own hand that tore it as he ruthlessly
stripped the garment from the dancer's writhing body. But the skirt
showed no rent. A single stride brought him to the dais and he laid his
hand on the ivory body--snatched it away as if it had encountered hot
iron instead of the cold immobility of death.
'Crom!' he muttered, his eyes suddenly slits of bale-fire. 'It's not
Muriela! It's Yelaya!'
He understood now that frantic scream that had burst from Muriela's lips
when she entered the chamber. The goddess had returned. The body had
been stripped by Zargheba to furnish the accouterments for the
pretender. Yet now it was clad in silk and jewels as Conan had first
seen it. A peculiar prickling made itself manifest among the short hairs
at the base of Conan's scalp.
'Muriela!' he shouted suddenly. 'Muriela! Where the devil are you?'
The walls threw back his voice mockingly. There was no entrance that he
could see except the golden door, and none could have entered or
departed through that without his knowledge. This much was
indisputable: Yelaya had been replaced on the dais within the few
minutes that had elapsed since Muriela had first left the chamber to be
seized by Gwarunga; his ears were still tingling with the echoes of
Muriela's scream, yet the Corinthian girl had vanished as if into thin
air. There was but one explanation that offered itself to the Cimmerian,
if he rejected the darker speculation that suggested the
supernatural--somewhere in the chamber there was a secret door. And even
as the thought crossed his mind, he saw it.
In what had seemed a curtain of solid marble, a thin perpendicular crack
showed, and in the crack hung a wisp of silk. In an instant he was
bending over it. That shred was from Muriela's torn skirt. The
implication was unmistakable. It had been caught in the closing door and
torn off as she was borne through the opening by whatever grim beings
were her captors. The bit of clothing had prevented the door from
fitting perfectly into its frame.
Thrusting his dagger-point into the crack, Conan exerted leverage with a
corded forearm. The blade bent, but it was of unbreakable Akbitanan
steel. The marble door opened. Conan's sword was lifted as he peered
into the aperture beyond, but he saw no shape of menace. Light filtering
into the oracle chamber revealed a short flight of steps cut out of
marble. Pulling the door back to its fullest extent, he drove his dagger
into a crack in the floor, propping it open. Then he went down the steps
without hesitation. He saw nothing, heard nothing. A dozen steps down,
the stair ended in a narrow corridor which ran straight away into gloom.
He halted suddenly, posed like a statue at the foot of the stair,
staring at the paintings which frescoed the walls, half visible in the
dim light which filtered down from above. The art was unmistakably
Pelishtim; he had seen frescoes of identical characteristics on the
walls of Asgalun. But the scenes depicted had no connection with
anything Pelishtim, except for one human figure, frequently recurrent: a
lean, white-bearded old man whose racial characteristics were
unmistakable. They seemed to represent various sections of the palace
above. Several scenes showed a chamber he recognized as the oracle
chamber with the figure of Yelaya stretched upon the ivory dais and huge
black men kneeling before it. And there were other figures, too--figures
that moved through the deserted palace, did the bidding of the
Pelishtim, and dragged unnamable things out of the subterranean river.
In the few seconds Conan stood frozen, hitherto unintelligible phrases
in the parchment manuscript blazed in his brain with chilling clarity.
The loose bits of the pattern clicked into place. The mystery of
Bît-Yakin was a mystery no longer, nor the riddle of Bît-Yakin's
servants.
Conan turned and peered into the darkness, an icy finger crawling along
his spine. Then he went along the corridor, cat-footed, and without
hesitation, moving deeper and deeper into the darkness as he drew
farther away from the stair. The air hung heavy with the odor he had
scented in the court of the gong.
Now in utter blackness he heard a sound ahead of him--the shuffle of
bare feet, or the swish of loose garments against stone, he could not
tell which. But an instant later his outstretched hand encountered a
barrier which he identified as a massive door of carven metal. He pushed
against it fruitlessly, and his sword-point sought vainly for a crack.
It fitted into the sill and jambs as if molded there. He exerted all his
strength, his feet straining against the door, the veins knotting in his
temples. It was useless; a charge of elephants would scarcely have
shaken that titanic portal.
As he leaned there he caught a sound on the other side that his ears
instantly identified--it was the creak of rusty iron, like a lever
scraping in its slot. Instinctively action followed recognition so
spontaneously that sound, impulse and action were practically
simultaneous. And as his prodigious bound carried him backward, there
was the rush of a great bulk from above, and a thunderous crash filled
the tunnel with deafening vibrations. Bits of flying splinters struck
him--a huge block of stone, he knew from the sound, dropped on the spot
he had just quitted. An instant's slower thought or action and it would
have crushed him like an ant.
Conan fell back. Somewhere on the other side of that metal door Muriela
was a captive, if she still lived. But he could not pass that door, and
if he remained in the tunnel another block might fall, and he might not
be so lucky. It would do the girl no good for him to be crushed into a
purple pulp. He could not continue his search in that direction. He must
get above ground and look for some other avenue of approach.
He turned and hurried toward the stair, sighing as he emerged into
comparative radiance. And as he set foot on the first step, the light
was blotted out, and above him the marble door rushed shut with a
resounding reverberation.
Something like panic seized the Cimmerian then, trapped in that black
tunnel, and he wheeled on the stair, lifting his sword and glaring
murderously into the darkness behind him, expecting a rush of ghoulish
assailants. But there was no sound or movement down the tunnel. Did the
men beyond the door--if they were men--believe that he had been disposed
of by the fall of the stone from the roof, which had undoubtedly been
released by some sort of machinery?
Then why had the door been shut above him? Abandoning speculation, Conan
groped his way up the steps, his skin crawling in anticipation of a
knife in his back at every stride, yearning to drown his semi-panic in a
barbarous burst of blood-letting.
He thrust against the door at the top, and cursed soulfully to find that
it did not give to his efforts. Then as he lifted his sword with his
right hand to hew at the marble, his groping left encountered a metal
bolt that evidently slipped into place at the closing of the door. In an
instant he had drawn this bolt, and then the door gave to his shove. He
bounded into the chamber like a slit-eyed, snarling incarnation of fury,
ferociously desirous to come to grips with whatever enemy was hounding
him.
The dagger was gone from the floor. The chamber was empty; and so was
the dais. Yelaya had again vanished.
'By Crom!' muttered the Cimmerian. 'Is she alive, after all?'
He strode out into the throne-room, baffled, and then, struck by a
sudden thought, stepped behind the throne and peered into the alcove.
There was blood on the smooth marble where he had cast down the
senseless body of Gwarunga--that was all. The black man had vanished as
completely as Yelaya.