He sat on the silver throne is if he bestrode some deep-chested war stallion on the foughten field. One massive hand gripped the black-and-silver mace of justice as if it were an iron-spiked battle mace that he would heave up at any moment to strike down a foe. And the rich robes, crusted with gems and hung with golden medallions and chains, which clothed his lean but mighty form., bore somehow the look of battle harness. For wherever he went - in mirthful banquet hall, in quiet library of ancient, dusty tones, or in silken boudoir - this somber barbarian from the cloud-cloaked wastes of northern Cimmeria carried with him the grim, dangerous atmosphere of the battlefield.
It had been more than a score of years now since a trick of Fate, a whim of the gods, or perhaps his own indomitable will had lifted this black-browed outlander from the ranks of nameless adventurers to a glittering place among the great ones of the world as lord of the richest and most powerful kingdom of the West. Since that night, nearly half a century before, when as a ragged, wild-eyed youth, whirling a length of broken chain, he had fought his way out of a Hyborian slave pen and set forth barehanded on the road that leads but a chosen few to the ultimate heights of power and glory, Conan of Cimmeria had brawled and battled his way across half a world, cutting a red path through a dozen kingdoms from the thundering beaches of the Western Ocean to the misty vales of fabulous Khitai.
As thief, pirate, mercenary, adventurer, chief of barbarous tribes, and general in the armies of kings, he had ventured far and known all that the world afforded of adventure and marvel. With his irresistible sword, the mighty Cimmerian had fought demons, dragons, and shambling horrors of the Elder Dark. A thousand foes had felt the bitter kiss of his whirling blade - bronze-mailed warriors, malevolent wizards, fierce barbarian chieftains, and haughty kings. Even the eternal gods had sometimes fled the fury of his slashing brand.
But the adventure that started here, in the royal Hall of Justice in Tarantia, on this warm spring day, eight thousand years after the fall of Atlantis and seven thousand years before the rise of Egypt and Sumeria, was to be the strangest and most fantastic of all the many that thronged his far-famed and peril-filled career.
It began suddenly and unexpectedly.
One moment, Conan was frowning down upon the fat merchant and his glib, gesticulating advocate. The next, he raised a puzzled glance across the hall to where the elegant figure of his trusted old friend, Count Trocero of Poitain staggered across the polished floor.
'No, no! By all the scarlet fiends of Hell!’
The old nobleman's hoarse voices lifted in harsh tones of terror and despair, broke into the advocate's voluble pleadings. Startled eyes flashed to this stiff-legged, reeling figure. Eyebrows rose. Could it be that the old Count of Poitain had come into the Hall of Justice drunk'?
One look at the stark fear in Trocero's bloodless face banished that idea. Globules of cold sweat glistened on his white features, and his pallid lips worked as if in some inward agony. Black circles ringed his staring eyes.
'Trocero!' barked Conan. 'Are you unwell? What is it, man?'
The king half rose as his oldest friend and closest supporter reeled across the polished marble pave, arms thrust out as if to ward off some unseen attacker. The hall fell silent. Trocero's stalwart son started from the throng, one hand extended to support his sire. In the center of the hall, Trocero halted and stood on trembling limbs, crying:
'Nay, I say! I cannot - you dare not! Oh, Ishtar and Mitra! Mit—' His voice rose to a'screech of anguish.
And then Terror struck.
From the groined and vaulted ceiling above the corners of the spacious hall, shadows flew - shadows as pale and insubstantial as wisps of gauze, dimly red. Shadows of -Terror.
In the blink of an eye, they swarmed about the elderly Poitanian's tottering figure. Dimly through rubescent veils, the others in the hall could glimpse his white, frozen features, fixed in a grimace of torment. It was as if a horde of ghostly vampire bats had swooped to cling about the unwary traveler.
For a long, frozen moment, the red shadows enveloped their victim in rosy veils. Then they and he were gone.
The hall was a motionless tableau. Disbelief was stamped on every face. The old count of Poitain, who for a quarter-century had stood by Conan's throne and fought his wars, had vanished into thin air.
'Father! My Lord—' stammered young Gonzalvio into the ringing silence.
'By Crom's iron heart!' bellowed Conan. 'Black sorcery in my own court? I'll have the head of him who wrought this mischief! Ho, guard I Curse you for a gaping fool - sound the alarm!'
Conan's roar of rage shattered the fragile silence. Women shrieked and swooned. Men swore} rubbed their eyes, and stared blankly at the place where the greatest peer of Aquilonia had stood. Above the babble rose the brazen scream of the war horns. Drums thundered, and the grim-faced warriors of Conan's Black Dragons pushed through the milling confusion, swords in hand, to defend the Lion Banner of Aquilonia, which hung like a canopy over the dais, and the rulers beneath it. But there was no foe to smite: no sly assassin, no skulking spy - or at least none visible.
On the dais, surrounded by his mailed warriors, King Conan searched the hall with the fierce, unwinking gaze of some kingly lion of the veldt. Deep within him, pain lanced his secret heart and a poignant sense of loss assailed him. Trocero of Poitain had been the first to urge Conan's name as leader of the revolt against the degenerate King Numedides. He had led a voyage to the distant shores of Pictland to fetch back the former general of the armies of Aquilonia, then a fugitive from the murderous jealousy of Numedides.
Soon, Conan had ridden out of Zingara at the head of a handful of gallant warriors. Gathering partisans as he moved, he had cut like a red sword through the countryside of Aquilonia to the gates of tower-crowned Tarantia and then to the very steps of the throne. There he had throttled the depraved Numedides with his own hands and set the crown upon his own black head. Deep within him, Conan mourned the loss of his oldest and most trusted friend, the first victim of the Terror...
In the next halfmonth, the Terror struck again and again, until seven hundred citizens of Aquilonia - peer and porter, countess and courtezan, baron and beggar, priest and peasant - had vanished into the weird embrace of the red shadows.
CHAPTER TWO
THE BLACK HEART OF GOLAMIRA
Whilst age on age went rolling past beyond
my phoenix-guarded tomb,
In silent halls of somber gloom I slept,
but now I wake at last.
- The Visions of Epemitreus
Alone and closely guarded in the great, gold-domed chamber of his palace, Conan slept. It was a haunted, restless slumber, for all that he had not slept a single hour in the last three days and nights while he struggled to cope with the weird plague that gripped his kingdom. Through desperate days and nights of endless council, he had sought the advice of the wisest men of the kingdom - hoary sages and learned doctors. He had asked the prayers of the priests of Mitra and Ishtar and Asura. He had listened to the tales of spies and studied the reports of police agents. He had solicited the spells and divinations of wizards and occultists - all in vain.
Now exhaustion had sapped even his iron vigor. The gray, gaunt old wolf lay sprawled in chain mail upon the silken coverlets, his great broadsword near his hand, in a drugged but restless slumber.