Red Nails

by Robert E. Howard

  _4. Scent of Black Lotus_

  Valeria unbuckled her sword-belt and laid it with the sheathed weapon onthe couch where she meant to sleep. She noted that the doors weresupplied with bolts, and asked where they led.

  "Those lead into adjoining chambers," answered the woman, indicating thedoors on right and left. "That one"--pointing to a copper-bound dooropposite that which opened into the corridor--"leads to a corridor whichruns to a stair that descends into the catacombs. Do not fear; naughtcan harm you here."

  "Who spoke of fear?" snapped Valeria. "I just like to know what sort ofharbor I'm dropping anchor in. No, I don't want you to sleep at the footof my couch. I'm not accustomed to being waited on--not by women,anyway. You have my leave to go."

  Alone in the room, the pirate shot the bolts on all the doors, kickedoff her boots and stretched luxuriously out on the couch. She imaginedConan similarly situated across the corridor, but her feminine vanityprompted her to visualize him as scowling and muttering with chagrin ashe cast himself on his solitary couch, and she grinned with gleefulmalice as she prepared herself for slumber.

  Outside, night had fallen. In the halls of Xuchotl the green fire-jewelsblazed like the eyes of prehistoric cats. Somewhere among the darktowers a night wind moaned like a restless spirit. Through the dimpassages stealthy figures began stealing, like disembodied shadows.

  Valeria awoke suddenly on her couch. In the dusky emerald glow of thefire-gems she saw a shadowy figure bending over her. For a bemusedinstant the apparition seemed part of the dream she had been dreaming.She had seemed to lie on the couch in the chamber as she was actuallylying, while over her pulsed and throbbed a gigantic black blossom soenormous that it hid the ceiling. Its exotic perfume pervaded her being,inducing a delicious, sensuous languor that was something more and lessthan sleep. She was sinking into scented billows of insensible bliss,when something touched her face. So supersensitive were her druggedsenses, that the light touch was like a dislocating impact, jolting herrudely into full wakefulness. Then it was that she saw, not a gargantuanblossom, but a dark-skinned woman standing above her.

  With the realization came anger and instant action. The woman turnedlithely, but before she could run Valeria was on her feet and had caughther arm. She fought like a wildcat for an instant, and then subsided asshe felt herself crushed by the superior strength of her captor. Thepirate wrenched the woman around to face her, caught her chin with herfree hand and forced her captive to meet her gaze. It was the sullenYasala, Tascela's maid.

  "What the devil were you doing bending over me? What's that in yourhand?"

  The woman made no reply, but sought to cast away the object. Valeriatwisted her arm around in front of her, and the thing fell to thefloor--a great black exotic blossom on a jade-green stem, large as awoman's head, to be sure, but tiny beside the exaggerated vision she hadseen.

  "The black lotus!" said Valeria between her teeth. "The blossom whosescent brings deep sleep. You were trying to drug me! If you hadn'taccidentally touched my face with the petals, you'd have--why did you doit? What's your game?"

  Yasala maintained a sulky silence, and with an oath Valeria whirled heraround, forced her to her knees and twisted her arm up behind her back.

  "Tell me, or I'll tear your arm out of its socket!"

  Yasala squirmed in anguish as her arm was forced excruciatingly upbetween her shoulder-blades, but a violent shaking of her head was theonly answer she made.

  "Slut!" Valeria cast her from her to sprawl on the floor. The pirateglared at the prostrate figure with blazing eyes. Fear and the memory ofTascela's burning eyes stirred in her, rousing all her tigerishinstincts of self-preservation. These people were decadent; any sort ofperversity might be expected to be encountered among them. But Valeriasensed here something that moved behind the scenes, some secret terrorfouler than common degeneracy. Fear and revulsion of this weird cityswept her. These people were neither sane nor normal; she began to doubtif they were even human. Madness smoldered in the eyes of them all--allexcept the cruel, cryptic eyes of Tascela, which held secrets andmysteries more abysmal than madness.

  She lifted her head and listened intently. The halls of Xuchotl were assilent as if it were in reality a dead city. The green jewels bathed thechamber in a nightmare glow, in which the eyes of the woman on the floorglittered eerily up at her. A thrill of panic throbbed through Valeria,driving the last vestige of mercy from her fierce soul.

  "Why did you try to drug me?" she muttered, grasping the woman's blackhair, and forcing her head back to glare into her sullen, long-lashedeyes. "Did Tascela send you?"

  No answer. Valeria cursed venomously and slapped the woman first on onecheek and then the other. The blows resounded through the room, butYasala made no outcry.

  "Why don't you scream?" demanded Valeria savagely. "Do you fear someonewill hear you? Whom do you fear? Tascela? Olmec? Conan?"

  * * * * *

  Yasala made no reply. She crouched, watching her captor with eyesbaleful as those of a basilisk. Stubborn silence always fans anger.Valeria turned and tore a handful of cords from a near-by hanging.

  "You sulky slut!" she said between her teeth. "I'm going to strip youstark naked and tie you across that couch and whip you until you tell mewhat you were doing here, and who sent you!"

  Yasala made no verbal protest, nor did she offer any resistance, asValeria carried out the first part of her threat with a fury that hercaptive's obstinacy only sharpened. Then for a space there was no soundin the chamber except the whistle and crackle of hard-woven silken cordson naked flesh. Yasala could not move her fast-bound hands or feet. Herbody writhed and quivered under the chastisement, her head swayed fromside to side in rhythm with the blows. Her teeth were sunk into herlower lip and a trickle of blood began as the punishment continued. Butshe did not cry out.

  The pliant cords made no great sound as they encountered the quiveringbody of the captive; only a sharp crackling snap, but each cord left ared streak across Yasala's dark flesh. Valeria inflicted the punishmentwith all the strength of her war-hardened arm, with all themercilessness acquired during a life where pain and torment were dailyhappenings, and with all the cynical ingenuity which only a womandisplays toward a woman. Yasala suffered more, physically and mentally,than she would have suffered under a lash wielded by a man, howeverstrong.

  It was the application of this feminine cynicism which at last tamedYasala.

  A low whimper escaped from her lips, and Valeria paused, arm lifted, andraked back a damp yellow lock. "Well, are you going to talk?" shedemanded. "I can keep this up all night, if necessary!"

  "Mercy!" whispered the woman. "I will tell."

  Valeria cut the cords from her wrists and ankles, and pulled her to herfeet. Yasala sank down on the couch, half reclining on one bare hip,supporting herself on her arm, and writhing at the contact of hersmarting flesh with the couch. She was trembling in every limb.

  "Wine!" she begged, dry-lipped, indicating with a quivering hand a goldvessel on an ivory table. "Let me drink. I am weak with pain. Then Iwill tell you all."

  Valeria picked up the vessel, and Yasala rose unsteadily to receive it.She took it, raised it toward her lips--then dashed the contents fullinto the Aquilonian's face. Valeria reeled backward, shaking and clawingthe stinging liquid out of her eyes. Through a smarting mist she sawYasala dart across the room, fling back a bolt, throw open thecopper-bound door and run down the hall. The pirate was after herinstantly, sword out and murder in her heart.

  But Yasala had the start, and she ran with the nervous agility of awoman who has just been whipped to the point of hysterical frenzy. Sherounded a corner in the corridor, yards ahead of Valeria, and when thepirate turned it, she saw only an empty hall, and at the other end adoor that gaped blackly. A damp moldy scent reeked up from it, andValeria shivered. That must be the door that led to the catacombs.Yasala had taken refuge among the dead.

  Valeria advanced to the door and looked down a flight of
stone stepsthat vanished quickly into utter blackness. Evidently it was a shaftthat led straight to the pits below the city, without opening upon anyof the lower floors. She shivered slightly at the thought of thethousands of corpses lying in their stone crypts down there, wrapped intheir moldering cloths. She had no intention of groping her way downthose stone steps. Yasala doubtless knew every turn and twist of thesubterranean tunnels.

  She was turning back, baffled and furious, when a sobbing cry welled upfrom the blackness. It seemed to come from a great depth, but humanwords were faintly distinguishable, and the voice was that of a woman."Oh, help! Help, in Set's name! Ahhh!" It trailed away, and Valeriathought she caught the echo of a ghostly tittering.

  Valeria felt her skin crawl. What had happened to Yasala down there inthe thick blackness? There was no doubt that it had been she who hadcried out. But what peril could have befallen her? Was a Xotalancalurking down there? Olmec had assured them that the catacombs belowTecuhltli were walled off from the rest, too securely for their enemiesto break through. Besides, that tittering had not sounded like a humanbeing at all.

  Valeria hurried back down the corridor, not stopping to close the doorthat opened on the stair. Regaining her chamber, she closed the door andshot the bolt behind her. She pulled on her boots and buckled hersword-belt about her. She was determined to make her way to Conan's roomand urge him, if he still lived, to join her in an attempt to fighttheir way out of that city of devils.

  But even as she reached the door that opened into the corridor, along-drawn scream of agony rang through the halls, followed by the stampof running feet and the loud clangor of swords.