Shadows in the Moonlight

by Robert E. Howard

from a broken neckthat instant. His left hand darted out to clamp on the beast's squatthroat, his left knee was jammed hard against the brute's hairy belly.Then began a terrific struggle, which lasted only seconds, but whichseemed like ages to the paralyzed girl.

  The ape maintained his grasp in Conan's hair, dragging him toward thetusks that glistened in the moonlight. The Cimmerian resisted thiseffort, with his left arm rigid as iron, while the sword in his righthand, wielded like a butcher-knife, sank again and again into the groin,breast and belly of his captor. The beast took its punishment in awfulsilence, apparently unweakened by the blood that gushed from its ghastlywounds. Swiftly the terrible strength of the anthropoid overcame theleverage of braced arm and knee. Inexorably Conan's arm bent under thestrain; nearer and nearer he was drawn to the slavering jaws that gapedfor his life. Now the blazing eyes of the barbarian glared into thebloodshot eyes of the ape. But as Conan tugged vainly at his sword,wedged deep in the hairy body, the frothing jaws snapped spasmodicallyshut, an inch from the Cimmerian's face, and he was hurled to the swardby the dying convulsions of the monster.

  Olivia, half fainting, saw the ape heaving, thrashing and writhing,gripping, man-like, the hilt that jutted from its body. A sickeninginstant of this, then the great bulk quivered and lay still.

  Conan rose and limped over to the corpse. The Cimmerian breathedheavily, and walked like a man whose joints and muscles have beenwrenched and twisted almost to their limit of endurance. He felt hisbloody scalp and swore at the sight of the long black red-stainedstrands still grasped in the monster's shaggy hand.

  'Crom!' he panted. 'I feel as if I'd been racked! I'd rather fight adozen men. Another instant and he'd have bitten off my head. Blast him,he's torn a handful of my hair out by the roots.'

  Gripping his hilt with both hands he tugged and worked it free. Oliviastole close to clasp his arm and stare down wide-eyed at the sprawlingmonster.

  'What--what is it?' she whispered.

  'A gray man-ape,' he grunted. 'Dumb, and man-eating. They dwell in thehills that border the eastern shore of this sea. How this one got tothis island, I can't say. Maybe he floated here on driftwood, blown outfrom the mainland in a storm.'

  'And it was he that threw the stone?'

  'Yes; I suspected what it was when we stood in the thicket and I saw theboughs bending over our heads. These creatures always lurk in thedeepest woods they can find, and seldom emerge. What brought him intothe open, I can't say, but it was lucky for us; I'd have had no chancewith him among the trees.'

  'It followed me,' she shivered. 'I saw it climbing the cliffs.'

  'And following his instinct, he lurked in the shadow of the cliff,instead of following you out across the plateau. His kind are creaturesof darkness and the silent places, haters of sun and moon.'

  'Do you suppose there are others?'

  'No, else the pirates had been attacked when they went through thewoods. The gray ape is wary, for all his strength, as shown by hishesitancy in falling upon us in the thicket. His lust for you must havebeen great, to have driven him to attack us finally in the open. What--'

  He started and wheeled back toward the way they had come. The night hadbeen split by an awful scream. It came from the ruins.

  Instantly there followed a mad medley of yells, shrieks and cries ofblasphemous agony. Though accompanied by a ringing of steel, the soundswere of massacre rather than battle.

  Conan stood frozen, the girl clinging to him in a frenzy of terror. Theclamor rose to a crescendo of madness, and then the Cimmerian turned andwent swiftly toward the rim of the plateau, with its fringe ofmoon-limned trees. Olivia's legs were trembling so that she could notwalk; so he carried her, and her heart calmed its frantic pounding asshe nestled into his cradling arms.

  They passed under the shadowy forest, but the clusters of blackness heldno terrors, the rifts of silver discovered no grisly shape. Night-birdsmurmured slumberously. The yells of slaughter dwindled behind them,masked in the distance to a confused jumble of sound. Somewhere a parrotcalled, like an eery echo: '_Yagkoolan yok tha, xuthalla!_' So they cameto the tree-fringed water's edge and saw the galley lying at anchor,her sail shining white in the moonlight. Already the stars were palingfor dawn.

  4

  In the ghastly whiteness of dawn a handful of tattered, blood-stainedfigures staggered through the trees and out on to the narrow beach.There were forty-four of them, and they were a cowed and demoralizedband. With panting haste they plunged into the water and began to wadetoward the galley, when a stern challenge brought them up standing.

  Etched against the whitening sky they saw Conan the Cimmerian standingin the bows, sword in hand, his black mane tossing in the dawn wind.

  'Stand!' he ordered. 'Come no nearer. What would you have, dogs?'

  'Let us come aboard!' croaked a hairy rogue fingering a bloody stump ofear. 'We'd be gone from this devil's island.'

  'The first man who tries to climb over the side, I'll split his skull,'promised Conan.

  They were forty-four to one, but he held the whip-hand. The fight hadbeen hammered out of them.

  'Let us come aboard, good Conan,' whined a red-sashed Zamorian, glancingfearfully over his shoulder at the silent woods. 'We have been somauled, bitten, scratched and rended, and are so weary from fighting andrunning, that not one of us can lift a sword.'

  'Where is that dog Aratus?' demanded Conan.

  'Dead, with the others! It was devils fell upon us! They were rending usto pieces before we could awake--a dozen good rovers died in theirsleep. The ruins were full of flame-eyed shadows, with tearing fangs andsharp talons.'

  'Aye!' put in another corsair. 'They were the demons of the isle, whichtook the forms of molten images, to befool us. Ishtar! We lay down tosleep among them. We are no cowards. We fought them as long as mortalman may strive against the powers of darkness. Then we broke away andleft them tearing at the corpses like jackals. But surely they'll pursueus.'

  'Aye, let us come aboard!' clamored a lean Shemite. 'Let us come inpeace, or we must come sword in hand, and though we be so weary you willdoubtless slay many of us, yet you can not prevail against us many.'

  'Then I'll knock a hole in the planks and sink her,' answered Conangrimly. A frantic chorus of expostulation rose, which Conan silencedwith a lion-like roar.

  'Dogs! Must I aid my enemies? Shall I let you come aboard and cut out myheart?'

  'Nay, nay!' they cried eagerly. 'Friends--friends, Conan. We are thycomrades! We be all lusty rogues together. We hate the king of Turan,not each other.'

  Their gaze hung on his brown, frowning face.

  'Then if I am one of the Brotherhood,' he grunted, 'the laws of theTrade apply to me; and since I killed your chief in fair fight, then Iam your captain!'

  There was no dissent. The pirates were too cowed and battered to haveany thought except a desire to get away from that island of fear.Conan's gaze sought out the blood-stained figure of the Corinthian.

  'How, Ivanos!' he challenged. 'You took my part, once. Will you upholdmy claims again?'

  'Aye, by Mitra!' The pirate, sensing the trend of feeling, was eager toingratiate himself with the Cimmerian. 'He is right, lads; he is ourlawful captain!'

  A medley of acquiescence rose, lacking enthusiasm perhaps, but withsincerity accentuated by the feel of the silent woods behind them whichmight mask creeping ebony devils with red eyes and dripping talons.

  'Swear by the hilt,' Conan demanded.

  Forty-four sword-hilts were lifted toward him, and forty-four voicesblended in the corsair's oath of allegiance.

  Conan grinned and sheathed his sword. 'Come aboard, my boldswashbucklers, and take the oars.'

  He turned and lifted Olivia to her feet, from where she had crouchedshielded by the gunwales.

  'And what of me, sir?' she asked.

  'What would you?' he countered, watching her narrowly.

  'To go with you, wherever your path may lie!' she cried, throwing herwhite arms about his bronzed neck.
/>   The pirates, clambering over the rail, gasped in amazement.

  'To sail a road of blood and slaughter?' he questioned. 'This keel willstain the blue waves crimson wherever it plows.'

  'Aye, to sail with you on blue seas or red,' she answered passionately.'You are a barbarian, and I am an outcast, denied by my people. We areboth pariahs, wanderers of earth. Oh, take me with you!'

  With a gusty laugh he lifted her to his fierce lips.

  'I'll make you Queen of the Blue Sea! Cast off there, dogs! We'll scorchKing Yildiz's pantaloons yet, by Crom!'