3 The Return of the Oracle
Conan wheeled supplely, sweeping the shadows with a fiercely questingstare. There was no sign of the murdered man's body; only yonder thetall lush grass was trampled and broken down and the sward was dabbleddarkly and wetly. Conan stood scarcely breathing as he strained his earsinto the silence. The trees and bushes with their great pallid blossomsstood dark, still and sinister, etched against the deepening dusk.
Primitive fears whispered at the back of Conan's mind. Was this the workof the priests of Keshan? If so, where were they? Was it Zargheba, afterall, who had struck the gong? Again there rose the memory of Bit-Yakinand his mysterious servants. Bit-Yakin was dead, shriveled to a hulk ofwrinkled leather and bound in his hollowed crypt to greet the rising sunfor ever. But the servants of Bit-Yakin were unaccounted for. There wasno proof they had ever left the valley.
Conan thought of the girl, Muriela, alone and unguarded in that greatshadowy palace. He wheeled and ran back down the shadowed avenue, and heran as a suspicious panther runs, poised even in full stride to whirlright or left and strike death blows.
The palace loomed through the trees, and he saw something else--the glowof fire reflecting redly from the polished marble. He melted into thebushes that lined the broken street, glided through the dense growth andreached the edge of the open space before the portico. Voices reachedhim; torches bobbed and their flare shone on glossy ebon shoulders. Thepriests of Keshan had come.
They had not advanced up the wide, overgrown avenue as Zargheba hadexpected them to do. Obviously there was more than one secret way intothe 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 ofcopper, etched in the torch glare. The rest were acolytes, giant blackmen from whose skins the torches struck highlights. At the end of theprocession there stalked a huge negro with an unusually wicked cast ofcountenance, at the sight of whom Conan scowled. That was Gwarunga, whomMuriela had named as the man who had revealed the secret of thepool-entrance to Zargheba. Conan wondered how deeply the man was in theintrigues of the Stygian.
He hurried toward the portico, circling the open space to keep in thefringing shadows. They left no one to guard the entrance. The torchesstreamed steadily down the long dark hall. Before they reached thedouble-valved door at the other end, Conan had mounted the other stepsand was in the hall behind them. Slinking swiftly along the column-linedwall, he reached the great door as they crossed the huge throne-room,their torches driving back the shadows. They did not look back. Insingle file, their ostrich plumes nodding, their leopard-skin tunicscontrasting curiously with the marble and arabesqued metal of theancient palace, they moved across the wide room and halted momentarilyat 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; thenthe high priest thrust open the golden door and entered, bowingrepeatedly from his waist, and behind him the torches sank and rose,showering flakes of flame, as the worshippers imitated their master. Thegold door closed behind them, shutting out sound and sight, and Conandarted 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 hepried open the secret panel. Gliding into the niche, he peered through.Muriela sat upright on the dais, her arms folded, her head leaning backagainst the wall, within a few inches of his eyes. The delicate perfumeof her foamy hair was in his nostrils. He could not see her face, ofcourse, but her attitude was as if she gazed tranquilly into some fargulf of space, over and beyond the shaven heads of the black giants whoknelt before her. Conan grinned with appreciation. 'The little slut's anactress,' he told himself. He knew she was shriveling with terror, butshe showed no sign. In the uncertain flare of the torches she lookedexactly like the goddess he had seen lying on that same dais, if onecould imagine that goddess imbued with vibrant life.
Gorulga was booming forth some kind of a chant in an accent unfamiliarto Conan, and which was probably some invocation in the ancient tongueof Alkmeenon, handed down from generation to generation of high priests.It seemed interminable. Conan grew restless. The longer the thinglasted, the more terrific would be the strain on Muriela. If shesnapped--he hitched his sword and dagger forward. He could not see thelittle trollop tortured and slain by these men.
But the chant--deep, low-pitched and indescribably ominous--came to aconclusion at last, and a shouted acclaim from the acolytes marked itsperiod. Lifting his head and raising his arms toward the silent form onthe dais, Gorulga cried in the deep, rich resonance that was the naturalattribute of the Keshani priest: 'Oh, great goddess, dweller with thegreat one of darkness, let thy heart be melted, thy lips opened for theears 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; thedarkness that vexes us is as the light of the midday sun to thee. Shedthe radiance of thy wisdom on the paths of thy servants! Tell us, ohmouthpiece of the gods: what is their will concerning Thutmekri theStygian?'
The high-piled burnished mass of hair that caught the torchlight in dullbronze gleams quivered slightly. A gusty sigh rose from the blacks, halfin awe, half in fear. Muriela's voice came plainly to Conan's ears inthe 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 bedriven from Keshan!' She was repeating his exact words. 'They arethieves and traitors who plot to rob the gods. Let the Teeth of Gwahlurbe placed in the care of the general Conan. Let him lead the armies ofKeshan. 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 blacksdid not notice, any more than they identified the Corinthian accent, ofwhich they knew nothing. They smote their palms softly together and amurmur of wonder and awe rose from them. Gorulga's eyes glitteredfanatically in the torchlight.
'Yelaya has spoken!' he cried in an exalted voice. 'It is the will ofthe gods! Long ago, in the days of our ancestors, they were made tabooand hidden at the command of the gods, who wrenched them from the awfuljaws of Gwahlur the king of darkness, in the birth of the world. At thecommand of the gods the teeth of Gwahlur were hidden; at their commandthey shall be brought forth again. Oh star-born goddess, give us yourleave to go to the secret hiding-place of the Teeth to secure them forhim whom the gods love!'
'You have my leave to go!' answered the false goddess, with an imperiousgesture of dismissal that set Conan grinning again, and the priestsbacked out, ostrich plumes and torches rising and falling with therhythm of their genuflexions.
The gold door closed and with a moan, the goddess fell back limply onthe dais. 'Conan!' she whimpered faintly. 'Conan!'
'Shhh!' he hissed through the apertures, and turning, glided from theniche and closed the panel. A glimpse past the jamb of the carven doorshowed him the torches receding across the great throne-room, but he wasat the same time aware of a radiance that did not emanate from thetorches. He was startled, but the solution presented itself instantly.An early moon had risen and its light slanted through the pierced domewhich by some curious workmanship intensified the light. The shiningdome of Alkmeenon was no fable, then. Perhaps its interior was of thecurious whitely flaming crystal found only in the hills of the blackcountries. The light flooded the throne-room and seeped into thechambers immediately adjoining.
But as Conan made toward the door that led into the throne-room, he wasbrought around suddenly by a noise that seemed to emanate from thepassage that led off from the alcove. He crouched at the mouth, staringinto it, remembering the clangor of the gong that had echoed from it tolure him into a snare. The light from the dome filtered only a littleway into that narrow corridor, and showed him
only empty space. Yet hecould have sworn that he had heard the furtive pad of a foot somewheredown it.
While he hesitated, he was electrified by a woman's strangled cry frombehind him. Bounding through the door behind the throne, he saw anunexpected spectacle in the crystal light.
The torches of the priests had vanished from the great hall outside--butone priest was still in the palace: Gwarunga. His wicked features wereconvulsed 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 hisfriends through you? Slut! I'll twist off your false head--but firstI'll--'
A widening of his captive's lovely eyes as she stared
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