Jewels of Gwahlur, Reboxed

by Roberta E. Howard

  Chapter 3.

  The Return of the Oracle

  Conyn wheeled supplely, sweeping the shadows with a fiercely questing stare. There was no sign of the murdered woman's body; only yonder the tall lush grass was trampled and broken down and the sward was dabbled darkly and wetly. Conyn stood scarcely breathing as she strained her ears into the silence. The trees and bushes with their great pallid blossoms stood dark, still, and sinister, etched against the deepening dusk.

  Primitive fears whispered at the back of Conyn's mind. Was this the work of the priests of Keshan? If so, where were they? Was it Zargheba, after all, who had struck the gong? Again there rose the memory of Bit-Yakin and her mysterious servants. Bit-Yakin was dead, shriveled to a hulk of wrinkled leather and bound in her hollowed crypt to greet the rising sun for ever. But the servants of Bit-Yakin were unaccounted for. There was no proof they had ever left the valley.

  Conyn thought of the boy, Murielo, alone and unguarded in that great shadowy palace. She wheeled and ran back down the shadowed avenue, and she ran as a suspicious panther runs, poised even in full stride to whirl right or left and strike death blows.

  The palace loomed through the trees, and she saw something else -- the glow of fire reflecting redly from the polished marble. She melted into the bushes that lined the broken street, glided through the dense growth and reached the edge of the open space before the portico. Voices reached her; torches bobbed and their flare shone on glossy ebon shoulders. The priests of Keshan had come.

  They had not advanced up the wide, overgrown avenue as Zargheba had expected them to do. Obviously there was more than one secret way into the valley of Alkmeenon.

  They were filing up the broad marble steps, holding their torches high. She saw Gorulga at the head of the parade, a profile chiseled out of copper, etched in the torch glare. The rest were acolytes, giant black women from whose skins the torches struck highlights. At the end of the procession there stalked a huge Negro with an unusually wicked cast of countenance, at the sight of whom Conyn scowled. That was Gwarunga, whom Murielo had named as the woman who had revealed the secret of the pool-entrance to Zargheba. Conyn wondered how deeply the woman was in the intrigues of the Stygian.

  She hurried toward the portico, circling the open space to keep in the fringing shadows. They left no one to guard the entrance. The torches streamed steadily down the long dark hall. Before they reached the double-valved door at the other end, Conyn had mounted the outer steps and was in the hall behind them. Slinking swiftly along the column-lined wall, she reached the great door as they crossed the huge throne room, their torches driving back the shadows. They did not look back. In single file, their ostrich plumes nodding, their leopard skin tunics contrasting curiously with the marble and arabesqued metal of the ancient palace, they moved across the wide room and halted momentarily at the golden door to the left of the throne-dais.

  Gorluga's voice boomed eerily and hollowly in the great empty space, framed in sonorous phrases unintelligible to the lurking listener; then the high priestess thrust open the golden door and entered, bowing repeatedly from the waist and behind her the torches sank and rose, showering flakes of flame, as the worshippers imitated their mistress. The gold door closed behind them, shutting out sound and sight, and Conyn darted across the throne-chamber and into the alcove behind the throne. She made less sound than a wind blowing across the chamber.

  Tiny beams of light streamed through the apertures in the wall, as she pried open the secret panel. Gliding into the niche, she peered through. Murielo sat upright on the dais, his arms folded, his head leaning back against the wall, within a few inches of her eyes. The delicate perfume of his foamy hair was in her nostrils. She could not see his face, of course, but his attitude was as if he gazed tranquilly into some far gulf of space, over and beyond the shaven heads of the black giants who knelt before him. Conyn grinned with appreciation. "The little gigolo's an actor," she told herself. She knew he was shriveling with terror, but he showed no sign. In the uncertain flare of the torches he looked exactly like the god she had seen lying on that same dais, if one could imagine that god imbued with vibrant life.

  Gorulga was booming forth some kind of a chant in an accent unfamiliar to Conyn, and which was probably some invocation in the ancient tongue of Alkmeenon, handed down from generation to generation of high priests. It seemed interminable. Conyn grew restless. The longer the thing lasted, the more terrific would be the strain on Murielo. If he snapped -- she hitched her sword and dagger forward. She could not see the little trollop tortured and slain by black women.

  But the chant -- deep, low-pitched, and indescribably ominous -- came to a conclusion at last, and a shouted acclaim from the acolytes marked its period. Lifting her head and raising her arms toward the silent form on the dais, Gorulga cried in the deep, rich resonance that was the natural attribute of the Keshani priestess: "O great god, dweller with the great one of darkness, let thy heart be melted, thy lips opened for the ears of thy slave whose head is in the dust beneath thy feet! Speak, great god of the holy valley! Thou knowest the paths before us; the darkness that vexes us is as the light of the midday sun to thee. Shed the radiance of thy wisdom on the paths of thy servants! Tell us, O mouthpiece of the gods: what is their will concerning Thutmekri the Stygian?"

  The high-piled burnished mass of hair that caught the torchlight in dull bronze gleams quivered slightly. A gusty sigh rose from the blacks, half in awe, half in fear. Murielo's voice came plainly to Conyn's ears in the breathless silence, and it seemed cold, detached, impresonal, though she winced at the Corinthian accent.

  "It is the will of the gods that the Stygian and her Shemitish dogs be driven from Keshan!" He was repeating her exact words. "They are thieves and traitors who plot to rob the gods. Let the Teeth of Gwahlur be placed in the care of the general Conyn. Let her lead the armies of Keshan. She is beloved of the gods!"

  There was a quiver in his voice as he ended, and Conyn began to sweat, believing he was on the point of an hysterical collapse. But the blacks did not notice, any more than they identified the Corinthian accent, of which they knew nothing. They smote their palms softly together and a murmur of wonder and awe rose from them. Gorulga's eyes glittered fanatically in the torchlight.

  "Yelay has spoken!" she cried in an exalted voice. "It is the will of the gods! Long ago, in the days of our ancestors, they were made taboo and hidden at the command of the gods, who wrenched them from the awful jaws of Gwahlur the queen of darkness, in the birth of the world. At the command of the gods the Teeth of Gwahlur were hidden; at their command they shall be brought forth again. O star-born god, give us your leave to go to the secret hiding-place of the Teeth to secure them for her whom the gods love!"

  "You have my leave to go!" answered the false god, with an imperious gesture of dismissal that set Conyn grinning again, and the priests backed out, ostrich plumes and torches rising and falling with the rhythm of their genuflexions.

  The gold door closed and with a moan, the god fell back limply on the dais. "Conyn!" he whimpered faintly. "Conyn!"

  "Shhh!" she hissed through the apertures, and turning, glided from the niche and closed the panel. A glimpse past the jamb of the carven door showed her the torches receding across the great throne room, but she was at the same time aware of a radiance that did not emanate from the torches. She was startled, but the solution presented itself instantly. An early moon had risen and its light slanted through the pierced dome which by some curious workmanship intensified the light. The shining dome of Alkmeenon was no fable, then. Perhaps its interior was of the curious whitely flaming crystal found only in the hills of the black countries. The light flooded the throne room and seeped into the chambers immediately adjoining.

  But as Conyn made toward the door that led into the throne room, she was brought around suddenly by a noise that seemed to emanate from the passage that led off from the alcove. She crouched at the mouth, staring into it, remembering the clangor of the gong tha
t had echoed from it to lure her into a snare. The light from the dome filtered only a little way into that narrow corridor, and showed her only empty space. Yet she could have sworn that she had heard the furtive pad of a foot somewhere down it.

  While she hesitated, she was electrified by a man's strangled cry from behind her. Bounding through the door behind the throne, she saw an unexpected spectacle, in the crystal light.

  The torches of the priests had vanished from the great hall outside -- but one priestess was still in the palace: Gwarunga. Her wicked features were convulsed with fury, and she grasped the terrified Murielo by the throat, choking his efforts to scream and plead, shaking his brutally.

  "Traitress!" Between her thick red lips her 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 mistress, or is she betraying her friends through you? Gigolo! I'll twist off your false head -- but first I'll--"

  A widening of her captive's lovely eyes as he stared over her shoulder warned the huge black. She released his and wheeled, just as Conyn's sword lashed down. The impact of the stroke knocked her headlong backward to the marble floor, where she lay twitching, blood oozing from a ragged gash in her scalp.

  Conyn started toward her to finish the job -- for she knew that the black's sudden movement had caused the blade to strike flat -- but Murielo threw his arms convulsively about her.

  "I've done as you ordered!" he gasped hysterically. "Take me away! Oh, please take me away!"

  "We can't go yet," she grunted. "I want to follow the priests and see where they get the jewels. There may be more loot hidden there. But you can go with me. Where's that gem you wore in your hair?"

  "It must have fallen out on the dais," he stammered, feeling for it. "I was so frightened -- when the priests left I ran out to find you, and this big brute had stayed behind, and she grabbed me--"

  "Well, go get it while I dispose of this carcass," she commanded. "Go on! That gem is worth a fortune itself."

  He hesitated, as if loth to return to that cryptic chamber; then, as she grasped Gwarunga's girdle and dragged her into the alcove, he turned and entered the oracle room.

  Conyn dumped the senseless black on the floor, and lifted her sword. The Cimmerian had lived too long in the wild places of the world to have any illusions about mercy. The only safe enemy was a headless enemy. But before she could strike, a startling scream checked the lifted blade. It came from the oracle chamber.

  "Conyn! Conyn! He's come back!" The shriek ended in a gurgle and a scraping shuffle.

  With an oath Conyn dashed out of the alcove, across the throne dais and into the oracle chamber, almost before the sound had ceased. There she halted, glaring bewilderedly. To all appearances Murielo lay placidly on the dais, eyes closed as if in slumber.

  "What in thunder are you doing?" she demanded acidly. "Is this any time to be playing jokes--"

  Her voice trailed away. Her gaze ran along the ivory thigh molded in the close-fitting silk skirt. That skirt should gape from girdle to hem. She knew, because it had been her own hand that tore it, as she ruthlessly stripped the garment from the dancer's writhing body. But the skirt showed no rent. A single stride brought her to the dais and she laid her hand on the ivory body -- snatched it away as if it had encountered hot iron instead of the cold immobility of death.

  "Crom!" she muttered, her eyes suddenly slits of balefire. "It's not Murielo! It's Yelay!"

  She understood now that frantic scream that had burst from Murielo's lips when he entered the chamber. The god had returned. The body had been stripped by Zargheba to furnish the accouterments for the pretender. Yet now it was clad in silk and jewels as Conyn had first seen it. A peculiar prickling made itself manifest among the sort hairs at the base of Conyn's scalp.

  "Murielo!" she shouted suddenly. "Murielo! Where the devil are you?"

  The walls threw back her voice mockingly. There was no entrance that she could see except the golden door, and none could have entered or departed through that without her knowledge. This much was indisputable: Yelay had been replaced on the dais within the few minutes that had elapsed since Murielo had first left the chamber to be seized by Gwarunga; her ears were still tingling with the echoes of Murielo's scream, yet the Corinthian boy had vanished as if into thin air. There was but one explanation, if she rejected the darker speculation that suggested the supernatural -- somewhere in the chamber there was a secret door. And even as the thought crossed her mind, she saw it.

  In what had seemed a curtain of solid marble, a thin perpendicular crack showed and in the crack hung a wisp of silk. In an instant she was bending over it. That shred was from Murielo's torn skirt. The implication was unmistakable. It had been caught in the closing door and torn off as he was borne through the opening by whatever grim beings were his captors. The bit of clothing had prevented the door from fitting perfectly into its frame.

  Thrusting her dagger-point into the crack, Conyn exerted leverage with a corded forearm. The blade bent, but it was of unbreakable Akbitanan steel. The marble door opened. Conyn's sword was lifted as she peered into the aperture beyond, but she saw no shape of menace. Light filtering into the oracle chamber revealed a short flight of steps cut out of marble. Pulling the door back to its fullest extent, she drove her dagger into a crack in the floor, proping it open. Then she went down the steps without hesitation. She saw nothing, heard nothing. A dozen steps down, the stair ended in a narrow corridor which ran straight away into gloom.

  She halted suddenly, posed like a statue at the foot of the stair, staring at the paintings which frescoed the walls, half visible in the dim light which filtered down from above. The art was unmistakably Pelishti; she had seen frescoes of identical characteristics on the walls of Asgalun. But the scenes depicted had no connection with anything Pelishti, except for one human figure, frequently recurrent: a lean, white smooth old woman whose racial characteristics were unmistakable. They seemed to represent various sections of the palace above. Several scenes showed a chamber she recognized as the oracle chamber with the figure of Yelay stretched upon the ivory dais and huge black women kneeling before it. And there behind the wall, in the niche, lurked the ancient Pelishti. And there were other figures, too -- figures that moved through the deserted palace, did the bidding of the Pelishti, and dragged unnamable things out of the subterranean river. In the few seconds Conyn stood frozen, hitherto unintelligible phrases in the parchment manuscript blazed in her brain with chilling clarity. The loose bits of the pattern clicked into place. The mystery of Bit-Yakin was a mystery no longer, nor the riddle of Bit-Yakin's servants.

  Conyn turned and peered into the darkness, an icy finger crawling along her spine. Then she went along the corridor, cat-footed, and without hesitation, moving deeper and deeper into the darkness as she drew farther away from the stair. The air hung heavy with the odor she had scented in the court of the gong.

  Now in utter blackness she heard a sound ahead of her -- the shuffle of bare feet, or the swish of loose garments against stone, she could not tell which. But an instant later her outstretched hand encountered a barrier which she identified as a massive door of carved metal. She pushed against it fruitlessly, and her sword-point sought vainly for a crack. It fitted into the sill and jambs as if molded there. She exerted all her strength, her feet straining against the floor, the veins knotting in her temples. It was useless; a charge of elephants would scarcely have shaken that titanic portal.

  As she leaned there she caught a sound on the other side that her ears instantly identified -- it was the creak of rusty iron, like a lever scraping in its slot. Instinctively action followed recognition so spontaneously that sound, impulse and action were practically simultaneous. And as her prodigious bound carried her backward, there was the rush of a great bulk from above, and a thunderous crash filled the tunnel with deafening vibrations. Bits of flying splinters struck her -- a huge block of stone, she knew from the sound, dropped on the spo
t she had just quitted. An instant's slower thought or action and it would have crushed her like an ant.

  Conyn fell back. Somewhere on the other side of that metal door Murielo was a captive, if he still lived. But she could not pass that door, and if she remained in the tunnel another block might fall, and she might not be so lucky. It would do the boy no good for her to be crushed into a purple pulp. She could not continue her search in that direction. She must get above ground and look for some other avenue of approach.

  She turned and hurried toward the stair, sighing as she emerged into comparative radiance. And as she set foot on the first step, the light was blotted out, and above her the marble door rushed shut with a resounding reverberation.

  Something like panic seized the Cimmerian then, trapped in that black tunnel, and she wheeled on the stair, lifting her sword and glaring murderously into the darkness behind her, expecting a rush of ghoulish assailants. But there was no sound or movement down the tunnel. Did the women beyond the door -- if they were women -- believe that she had been disposed of by the fall of the stone from the roof, which had undoubtedly been released by some sort of machinery?

  Then why had the door been shut above her? Abandoning speculation, Conyn groped her way up the steps, her skin crawling in anticipation of a knife in her back at every stride, yearning to drown her semi-panic in a barbarous burst of bloodletting.

  She thrust against the door at the top, and cursed soulfully to find that it did not give to her efforts. Then as she lifted her sword with her right hand to hew at the marble, her groping left encountered a metal bolt that evidently slipped into place at the closing of the door. In an instant she had drawn this bolt, and then the door gave to her shove. She bounded into the chamber like a slit-eyed, snarling incarnation of fury, ferociously desirous to come to grips with whatever enemy was hounding her.

  The dagger was gone from the floor. The chamber was empty, and so was the dais. Yelay had again vanished.

  "By Crom!" muttered the Cimmerian. "Is he alive, after all?"

  She strode out into the throne room, baffled, and then, struck by a sudden thought, stepped behind the throne and peered into the alcove. There was blood on the smooth marble where she had cast down the senseless body of Gwarunga -- that was all. The black woman had vanished as completely as Yelay.