“But Thoth-Amon miscalculated. He never dreamed that I should smash Pantho so quickly, nor that the oracle of Nuadwyddon would send the White Druid to apprise me of the plot. Nor did he know that the spring rains would block the mountain passes out of Zamora, delaying the master thieves and ruining his delicate timing.
“He thinks me still in the North, chasing Pantho over the hilltops of Poitain. Believing me ignorant of his plan, he has no cause to suspect otherwise. The White Druid has kept our descent into Stygia invisible to the magical vision of the Stygian, or as invisible as possible. With luck, we shall be at his gates ere he knows we are within a hundred leagues of him.”
“What is this thing he so desperately wants?” asked Trocero.
“I know, Count!” said the boy. “It is …”
Pallantides cantered up and saluted. “The baggage is over the river, O King!” said the general. “The men are ready to march.”
Conan nodded. “Give the signaclass="underline" east along the river for three leagues, till we come to a small tributary, the Bakhr. Then south, ascending that stream for half a league. I am coming shortly.”
Conan glared inland, into the dawn-reddened reaches of shadow-haunted Stygia.
“Twice in as many years,” he mused, “a plot has struck at my throne out of this accursed land of crumbling tombs and crawling sands. This time I will carry the battle to the enemy’s doorstep. Mayhap his sorcery will strike us dead, but I think not. The Gods of Light fight on our side. And, come death or victory, I shall beard Thoth-Amon in his lair and see if he can magic away a yard of good Aquilonian steel through his guts!”
The bugles blew and they rode down the slope to join the host.
FIVE: The City of Tombs
A curse seemed to overhang Stygia. The further the Aquilonian warriors marched into it, the more they became aware of it. It was a subtle thing: mocking whispers in an eerie wind, muttering voices that spoke too low to be understood. Small, whispering winds slunk among the dunes and rattled the palm fronds. The soldiers had the haunting sensation of unseen eyes at their backs. The sun glared pitilessly from behind a thin veil of white cirrus, and the dry air gave the marchers a feeling of constant thirst.
They passed another village—a jumble of low, dun-colored mud huts whose brown-skinned inhabitants fled yammering over the waste at the sight of the mailed host. The Bakhr proved to be a small, stagnant, muddy watercourse, from whose banks several monstrous cocodrills slithered ponderously into the water at the approach of the force.
The army turned inland—south—and marched up the tributary, skirting the reed banks and thickets that flanked it. The men muttered uneasily and fingered amulets or mumbled litanies and mantras under their breath. But the force strode on, ever deeper into shadow-haunted Stygia.
Prince Conn cast an eye at the sun and cantered forward to come up with his sire. “Father, are we not riding due south?”
Conan grunted assent.
“But,” persisted the boy, “I have always heard that this Thoth-Amon dwelt in an oasis called Khajar, far to the west of here!”
Conan shrugged. “At least, lad, your tutors have taught you to read maps. But Thoth-Amon dwells no more in that scarlet sink of iniquity. Now he makes his lair in Nebthu.”
“Nebthu?”
“A ruined city to the south; we shall be there soon. Years ago, lad, Thoth-Amon rose to power in this land and became prince of the Black Ring, the world-wide guild of black magicians, whose secret headquarters, I am told, lies at Nebthu. The better to keep this unholy brotherhood under his governance, he removed from his lair in the west to Nebthu.
“Once he lost his magical ring of power, and his enemies among the sorcerers cast him out. He fell into the hands of slavers and was brought as far from his home as Aquilonia.”
“Was it he who sent the demon that would have slain you, but for the sign of the phoenix on your sword?”
“The same. By happenstance, Thoth-Amon recovered his ring and returned to Khajar. Meanwhile a rival sorcerer, Thutothmes, had risen to command of the Black Ring, making his headquarters in Khemi. Thutothmes based his power upon a mighty talisman called the Heart of Ahriman.
“For a time, the Black Ring was riven into two factions, that of Thutothmes and that of Thoth-Amon. But, ere the battle between them was fairly joined, Thutothmes perished in combat with a crew of Khitan wizards who had followed me thither to slay me.The Khitans died also, and I bore the Heart back to Tarantia.
“Now however, Thoth-Amon has again seized control of the Black Ring, seeking to draw all the black magicians of the world into his circle of confederates. The oracle tells me that he is at Nebthu.”
Conn nodded thoughtfully. Count Trocero, who had been listening closely, asked:
“Is this city well guarded?”
Conan shrugged. “Mitra knows. The last rumor I heard was that it was long since abandoned and crumbling into ruin. Perchance the wizards have rebuilt it and patched its walls. But even if they have, with ten thousand sharp swords at our backs I am sure we can storm it.”
“We shall be doing just that, belike.” said the shrill voice of the druid, bumping along behind them in his mule cart.
Trocero turned in his saddle to look at the little man, who seemed to be drunk as usual. The count forced a polite smile and muttered:
“It likes me not, this empty, accursed land.” Conan made no answer; they rode on in silence.
The sun was declining when scouts came galloping back to the column to report. Nebthu was dead.
Soon the army came within sight of the ruin. The huge wall that had once encircled the city had crumbled, leaving upright only the great pylons that once flanked the gate. These pylons, carved with the leering gargoyle masks of grinning monsters, still rose above the drifted sands.
Save for a few birds that rose from the ruins and whirred away, there was no sign of life. No plume of smoke rose from cooking hearth or guardhouse Fire. Roofs had fallen in; buildings had decayed into mere mounds of crumbling mud brick.
Conan’s horse shied at a round white stone in the roadway. As the black’s hoof grazed it, the thing rolled a little way before halting. Black holes peered up. It was a skull, fit emblem of Nebthu, city of immemorial tombs. Naught moved here save the scuttling scorpion, the gliding sand viper, or perhaps the wandering ghosts of long-buried Stygian kings.
“Now what do we do?” murmured the count of Poitain.
“Make camp and fetch water from the Bakhr,” growled the king. “After that, we shall see.” The skull grinned up at them in silent mockery.
SIX: The Thing That Crouched in the Waste
They made camp outside the broken walls of the ruined city. Conan knew that his warriors would not sleep easily in the sand-drifted streets or rubble-choked squares of the Stygian metropolis. Magical influences often lingered about any ancient ruin, and this was all the more true of age-accursed Stygia than of other, more wholesome, lands.
While a detachment of soldiers cut armfuls of the feathery reeds that grew along the Bakhr, for fodder for the horses, scouts explored the desert about the walls of Nebthu. Soon the scouts rode back to report that nothing lived or moved amidst the dunes. They had, however, found one thing in the waste: a gigantic idol or monument. As the afternoon waned, Conan led a party to investigate, while the cooking fires were lit in the camp. Conan’s big black shied, rolled its eyes, and laid back its ears as they approached the stone monster.