Fear clawed at Conan’s vitals. Now he knew the meaning of the bowl-shaped altar, and why they had been chained upright. As the first cold coil of the semi-solid vapor settled about him, he realized the full horror of the doom that Nenaunir had planned for them.
For Damballah himself was materializing on this earthly plane, and the coils of the Father of Evil would soon fully condense from empty air, first to crush them both to pulp and then to feed on their shuddering souls.
ELEVEN: Moon of Blood
Ignoring the cold that bit through him, the giant Cimmerian threw his full strength against the last chain that bound his son to the altar. The brazen ring broke with a crack.
The insubstantial coils were heavy about Conan now. They weighed down his brawny limbs, and their interstellar cold struck deep into his hot core of vitality. With effort he bent and drew from his boot the poniard that Murzio had given him. He sank the weapon to the hilt in the thickening coils that encumbered his body.
“Father!” cried Conn, glimpsing the demonic thing that Nenaunir had conjured from transgalactic hells.
“Run, boy!” gasped Conan. “The gates! Save yourself and try to let the army in!”
Again and again, Conan drove the dagger into the massive coils. Although his stabs bit deep, they did not seem to hurt the apparition slowly solidifying about him. Scales like saucers rasped against his hide. He staggered under the incredible weight of the monstrous serpent. Far above, Damballah’s wedge-shaped head swayed against the burning moon while eyes of scarlet flame locked into his own.
A cruel, cunning, malignant intelligence lay behind those reptilian eyes; a vast weariness, an endless despair, and a bottomless hunger. Conan’s soul quailed as he stared into the eyes of the demon that for a million years had striven to trample his race back into the mud from which it had slowly and painfully emerged.
The cold was bone-deep now. The weight of the shifting coils was crushing. Slowly the first coil tightened about his chest, squeezing heart and lungs as in a vise. The hand that held the poniard went numb, and the dagger fell to tinkle on the marble.
Conan fought on, but no longer was it a mere struggle of flesh with flesh. Now it was a battle of indomitable wills, pitted in a struggle of the spirit alone, on some plane of consciousness alien to Conan. It seemed to Conan that his mind, will, and soul formed an extension of his body. He threw the vigor of his unbroken will against the spiritual negativity of the serpent-demon, as he might hurl a javelin against a foe of flesh and blood.
He was no longer conscious of his body, which was benumbed from head to heel. In a dim way, he knew that he still stood upright, tangled in the tightening coils of the Great Serpent. His heart was slowing, his muscles were locked in the rigor of approaching death, and the very blood was congealing in his veins. But deep within him lay an untapped core of strength on which he drew. Into the shadowy battle of wills he threw his courage, his manhood, and his very lust for life. Against this last, the demon had no weapon, for it was a thing of death and decay; its compelling lust was to destroy all life.
But the strength of the serpent god was colossal, like the force that holds mountains erect and sustains the planet in its course. It hurled against its adversary the cold breath of fear, cowardice, and self-doubt. These were the weapons of the Abyss. With them, Damballah sapped the manhood of heroes, poisoned patriots with the venom of treachery, and drank the souls of nations and empires.
The cold intelligence of that transmundane being knew that it would in time destroy the earth and quench the fires of the very sun. Now it hurled that invincible vampiric force against a single mortal man. No living thing, however brave, could stand against the leeching power that drains the strength of suns.
Conan’s mind darkened, his consciousness faded, but his sheer instinct for survival kept him fighting with every ounce of power his soul possessed. He fought on against the darkness that sucked him down into the abyss of nothingness, while the red moon leered down and King Nenaunir laughed.
TWELVE: Death in the Night
Suddenly the deathly cold that numbed Conan’s body lessened. The crushing pressure on his body lightened.
The exhaustion that clouded his brain faded before a surge of fresh vigor.
He came slowly to himself. He was lying on his back at the bottom of the marble bowl, staring up at friendly, twinkling stars. The moon, once again a disk of lucid silver, poured its light down upon him.
An uproar brought him to his feet, only to sink dizzily back to his knees. His full strength had not yet returned. When he could bring himself erect once more, he saw an amazing sight.
A few paces from the edge of the marble bowl lay Nenaunir, struck down in his hour of triumph. Beside him, gleaming in the moonlight, lay the poniard that Murzio had given to Conan, and which Conan had dropped in his struggle with the demon-god. Beyond, struggling in the clutches of terror-smitten blacks, stood the assassin.
It was Prince Conn, disheveled and panting. The boy glared like a beast of prey from under tousled hair. Freed from his chains by Conan’s last effort, the lad had not fled as ordered. He had, instead, picked up the fallen dagger and flung himself across the square to where Nenaunir stood, eyes ablaze with blood-lust and triumph. All present were engrossed by the cosmic struggle in the black marble bowl, and none but Thoth-Amon had seen Conan’s son make his suicidal charge, against the entranced wizard-king of Zembabwei.
Thoth-Amon had stayed his hand for a fatal instant of hesitation, while jealousy struggled with prudence. That second was enough; the dagger was buried in Nenaunir’s heart, and the vicar of Damballah lay sprawled in his blood. The spell that sustained Damballah on the earthly plane was broken in time to rescue Conan’s withering soul from extinction. Above the bowl of sacrifice, the serpent form dissolved again into formless vapor, and Conan lived.
Before the blacks who seized Conn could make up their minds whether to slay him on the spot, a howling horde of black warriors erupted from the side streets and attacked the worshipers of Damballah from all sides. The dense, orderly lines of Nenaunir’s men melted into chaos, while noncombatants raced madly for safety. Leaderless, the partisans of Nenaunir, easily distinguishable by their plumed headdresses, went down by scores.
A brazen trumpet rang over the plaza, and the tramp of booted feet sounded. Conan grinned; his Aquilonians had come. He staggered through the wrack of combat and gasped out orders to his men. He saw Mbega, followed by a hundred partisans, dropping from the roof of one of the low buildings beside the square and racing into the fray with spear and ax and war-club.
Then the square resounded with a clatter of dropped spears as hundreds of Nenaunir’s men threw away their weapons and groveled on the pavement, begging for mercy. Mbega rushed from group to group to stop the general slaughter.
Conan stood on half-numb legs. He staggered as Conn rushed across the square and threw himself into his father’s arms. Conan hugged him briefly, spoke a gruff word of comfort, and looked around for Thoth-Amon.
The Stygian sorcerer was not to be seen. Presently a wyvern spread its batlike wings and soared out from the top of one of the towers. A swarthy man in a green robe sat astride the winged reptile. The monster circled the doomed city once, then flew off into the south. No eye but Conan’s marked it in its flight. And as he watched, his brows grew together in a thoughtful scowl. South lay nothing but countless leagues of jungle, and the terminus of the continent itself, where a nameless beach fronted an unknown sea. That southernmost point of land was the edge of the known world, as far as anyone could say. Thoth-Amon had lost his final ally; he was alone, now, having lost even the favor of his merciless god. He could flee no further, Conan grimly knew. There was no place left for him to go.