L. Camp - Conan Of The Isles

At length, even Sigurd's spirit began to fail. The dark, dank dungeon with its silent stone walls, the pall of gloom that weighed down their spirits, and the threat of an unknown doom all spread a mood of sullen, hopeless depression heavy enough to bow down the brightest spirits.

Several times Sigurd, with the help of the strongest men in the company, tried to break the chains that bound them. The links were fashioned of what looked like fragile glass - but no glass he had ever seen was as tough as this transparent material. It was as strong and unyielding as bronze. No amount of pulling, pounding, stamping, twisting, or jerking did more than slightly mar its slick, iridescent surface.

No, escape appeared to be beyond their powers. They could only wait for doom to strike in its own good time. And, at last, strike it did.

The metallic clash of spears on shields aroused Sigurd from uneasy slumbers. He started up from the straw to see the room filled with small, flat-faced soldiers and to see his comrades being prodded into wakefulness and their hands being bound behind them.

'What is it, Captain?' muttered Goram Singh.

Sigurd shook his head, so that the unkempt, graying red beard wagged. 'Crom and Mitra know, shipmate!' he growled. Then he raised his voice: 'Look alive, lads! Straighten up and show these brown dogs we be men, even though kenneled here in our own filth like beasts. If it be the executioner's block, then by the green beard of Lir and the red heart of Nergal, we'll show these stinking pigs how men can die, eh lads? Be ye with old Sigurd to the last?'

His exhortations raised a ragged cheer from the pirates, who croaked: 'Ay, Redbeard!'

'Good lads, all! And mayhap 'twill be only the slave-dealer's mart, eh? With the luck of the Brotherhood, I think such lusty lads as we will be purchased by high-born ladies, for special service in their boudoirs!' He gave an exaggerated wink.

The men responded with a chorus of catcalls and obscene jests. Sigurd grinned and chuckled, but it was all pretense. For he thought he could guess the terrible end that awaited them, here among the black-hearted heathen of these cursed islands at the edge of the world.

Sigurd was right. Blinking blearily in the unaccustomed sunlight, the pirates gazed around them, awestruck at the spectacle. Above soared the blue vault of heaven, like a sapphire dome in some palace of the gods. The sun stood almost overhead, blazing down upon them with a furnace-like heat that was welcome after the cool darkness of the stinking dungeon. They drank in the fresh sea breeze from the harbor, knowing that it might be their last chance in this world to draw a lungful of salt air.

They had issued from the portals of the grim, gray citadel called the Vestibule of the Gods into the square of the great red-and-black pyramid. The pyramid towered up in front of them, over the heads of the thousands of An-tillians who thronged the square.

At the head of the line, Sigurd looked back upon his comrades. They were a sorry-looking lot, ragged and filthy, with long hair and matted beards. Ribs showed through the holes in their tattered shirts from the meager, unwholesome diet.

Ranks of soldiers kept a lane open through the throng from the Vestibule to the base of the pyramid., and along this lane the pirates' guards prodded their captives until they came to the tail of a tine of naked AntiUians.

Priests in feathered robes and stilted shoes, towering over the throng, bustled officiously about, while others stood in ranks at the base of the pyramid, holding up curious standards and banners.

The pyramid loomed above them now. Whips sang and cracked over the bedraggled pirates' shoulders as the soldiers herded them into place at the end of the file of naked AntiUians. The latter toiled slowly, silently, and unresistingly up the steep stone stair that climbed the near face of tiie ziggurat.

Sigurd tipped back his head, gazing through slitted, watering eyes at the top of the pyramid and trying to see what was happening there against the glare of the noonday subtropical sky. He made out a great black stone altar and, next to it, a tall throne on which sat a feather-robed figure.

One by one, the silent Antillians were led with bowed heads to the temple at the top. Sigurd could see beast-masked, feather-robed priests seizing them by the arms, cutting their bonds, and stretching them on their backs on the stone. Then another figure stepped forward in an even more fantastic costume of plumes and jewels, although it was too far to make these out clearly. He extended a gaunt, brown arm to trace some cryptic symbol on the naked chest of the supine Antillian. Then . ..

Sigurd's eyes suddenly watered, and he lowered his head to wipe them. When he could look up again, it was to see the arm of the high priest raised with something in its fist - a knife that glittered Like glass. The knife descended in a sharp arc. The figure on the stone gave a convulsive jerk. For an instant the hierarch bent over his victim, sawing with his knife and groping with his free hand.

Then the lean, crimsoned brown arms rose again, lifting agains the bright sky a dripping, crimson mass - the heart of the victim, cut from his body while he was still alive.

The assembled thousands gasped. The priests set up a low-pitched chant, swaying in time to their slow, hypnotic song, which reminded Sigurd of the rhythmic murmur of the sea. The sacrificial fire next to the altar gushed dark smoke as the heart of the sacrifice was added to the many already heaped upon the glowing coals. The corpse was dragged away beyond Sigurd's vision by the crimson-splashed attendants, and the next silent victim was led forward. Numbly, Sigurd wondered how long this grisly rite had been going on.

The guards urged the line forward another step. The pirates behind Sigurd were as silent as he, struck dumb by the terror that lurked above them on the pyramid. The old freebooter felt nothing but a cold emptiness, as if time had stopped and the universe had shrunk to the dimensions of his own body. A few moments more and all would be over, the long voyage ended, the tale told. And what did it all matter? Was every human life as meaningless as his had proved to be ? And yet...

Within his bristling chest, Sigurd's stout old heart surged with abhorrence. His manhood revolted at this spineless submission to fate. Was he no better than these dwarfish islanders? By Thor's hammer, no! Death he did not fear. He and it were old shipmates. What, then, was the gust of revulsion that rose within him ? Pride! Aye, by Badb and Morrigan, that was it; sheer pride!

Sigurd gave a bark of laughter that brought looks of wonder and surprise to the faces of the pirates nearest to him in the slow-moving line. Aye, this was a Hell of a way for an old Vanr to die!

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

IN THE DRAGON'S LAIR

He hears the scrape of scales on stone

And Arnra learns he is not alone . . .

- The Voyage of Amra

At first he thought he was dead - that the sea of life had washed his waterlogged corpse up on the lightless shores of the afterworld. For a time he lay still, only blinking his eyes to clear them of the water that blurred his vision. Then, little by little., his senses awoke, and Conan knew he had somehow survived.

Incredibly, he still lived. By all odds he should.be a corpse, drowned by the weight of its mail shirt, rolling and bumping along the bottom of the swift stream.

He levered himself up on one elbow and stared around him. He lay in another vast cavern; and, curiously enough, it was not altogether dark. As his vision cleared, he made out thousands of little points of glowing green light on the distant walls and ceiling of the cave. For a fleeting in­stant he thought he was lying out of doors, and that the green glows were stars; but then he realized that no stars would be all of the same brightness or so uniformly dis­tributed.