"Id Nyarlathotep," it whined.

"Holy Set!" Ethram-Fal was amazed. "It speaks!"

The soldiers at the doors stirred, murmuring to one another. The creature flinched at this, drawing back toward the statue that loomed behind it, as if seeking protection. It spoke again, and though it sounded much as though a python or some other great reptile were attempting human speech, Ethram-Fal found that he understood the words.

It was speaking an archaic version of his own tongue. It was speaking in Old Stygian.

"You die for Nyarlathotep." Needle talons stroked the air and its eyes burned brighter.

Ethram-Fal spoke haltingly in Old Stygian. "You make sacrifice?" It bobbed its head, bird-like.

"Yes. Yes. Antelope. Scorpion. Man. Man best. You die for Nyarlathotep."

"Die for that?" The sorcerer gestured at the silent statue. The creature looked back and bobbed its head again, pressing long hands reverently to its ridged and reptilian breast.

"Yes! Id NyarlathotepV It took a hesitant, shuffling step toward Ethram-Fal, who seemed to pay it no heed.

"Why?"

"Live!" its thin voice rose. "So I live! So Cetriss lives! You die for Nyarlathotep!" Quivering, it lunged toward the sorcerer, claws reaching for his breast and the heart that beat within. A cry arose from the ma.s.sed mercenaries and they started forward, but Ethram-Fal halted the creature by merely raising a hand. It lurched to a stop not two paces away from the wizard, who held one palm out toward the thing. He crooked his fingers as if gripping something transparent in the air before him. The creature writhed in invisible bonds, held in place by sorcery.

"This is your immortality?" cried Ethram-Fal. "O Cetriss, mighty necromancer, did you abandon all your powers to live forever as a beast enslaved to a statue?" The sorcerer's face twisted in transcendent rage and his fingers clenched in a loose fist. The desert ghoul that was the mage Cetriss snarled mindlessly as it was lifted, writhing, off the floor.

"I followed you! I thought you a hero! You are a disgrace! You die for Nyarlathotep!" Cetriss's body lifted farther into the air and moved slowly backward until it hovered above the altar that lay waiting between its G.o.d's paws.

"Tribute!" screamed Ethram-Fal. "Sacrifice!" He clenched his fist and crushed Cetriss. The bones of the last survivor of Old Stygia broke like dry kindling and his blood spilled down upon the altar in a dark rain. Ethram-Fal gave his fist a last convulsive shake and let the broken body fall. It lay, twisted in upon itself, a discarded bit of offal that had once been one of the world's mightiest sorcerers. For the briefest instant the Stygian thought that he saw a ghostly tendril, a stream of pallid vapor, rising from the body of Cetriss and funneling into the black face of his G.o.d. He blinked. It was nothing.

The Stygian turned away from the corpse in disgust and saw that his soldiers were standing uncertainly about the doorways and regarding him with a mixture of astonishment and fear. This pleased the sorcerer.

"Ath," he called, bringing the captain jogging forward out of the cl.u.s.ter of men in the east door.

"Most impressive, milord," said Ath when he stood before his master.

The sorcerer pulled the blue velvet sack of kaokao leaves from his belt and tossed it to Ath, who caught it neatly in one hand.

"Excellent work, Ath. Distribute these among the men. Every man should get one. You may keep all that remain." The tall captain nodded in grateful enthusiasm as Ethram-Fal raised his hands above his head and addressed the rest of his mercenaries.

"I am most pleased with your efficiency. Captain Ath has a reward for each of you. However, I wish to encourage the sentries to even greater vigilance as I suspect that we may soon encounter other, more human, foes. I have reason to suspect that a sorceress may essay an attack on our palace. Capture her alive for me and I shall be greatly pleased."

The soldiers clapped naked swords against their shields and cheered in loyalty and antic.i.p.ation of their reward of kaokao leaves. When Ethram-Fal turned away, they came forward and gathered swiftly around Ath, hands extended for their bounty. Ath, grinning widely, pa.s.sed out the leaves as quickly as he could.

As the sorcerer reached the north doorway, a spontaneous cheer rose behind him. When he turned to acknowledge it, the cheer swelled twice more. He lifted a hand in a languid wave, smiling beneficently upon his men as he basked in their approval. The men were his. The Emerald Lotus was his. And now the mantle of Cetriss was his. How could anything stop him now?

A shout cut through the dwindling applause. A single soldier had run into the temple and now stood waving his arms and yelling for attention. Ethram-Fal frowned.

"Silence! Hear me!" The soldier's hands dropped to his sides as the gathering went silent and all eyes fell upon him.

"And where have you been, Phandoros? came a voice from among the milling mercenaries.

"Captain Ath sent me to sentry duty when the beast was cornered," began the man defensively. "I come to tell the master that I saw a column of smoke to the southwest. There are intruders in the canyons."

Chapter Thirty-One.

When Heng Shih emerged into the clearing, he saw that Conan was already atop the hill. The Khitan broke into a sprint, his heavy-set form shooting over the ground with surprising speed. Chest heaving, he reached the little grouping of tents just in time to see the Cimmerian kicking dirt over a small fire. Zelandra stood to one side, clutching her teapot and scowling at Conan with exaggerated disgust. Neesa squatted in front of one of the tents, rubbing at her brow in a gesture at once weary and frustrated.

Conan finished burying the fire and commenced packing the soil down upon it with the heel of his boot.

"I trust that you're satisfied now?" Zelandra's voice was so strange that both Heng Shih and Neesa looked at her in surprise. It was thin and rasped in her throat like a file.

"You may have given away our position for a cup of tea," said Conan without expression.

"I need my strength," said Zelandra loudly. "I need the tea to help me rest." She brandished the teapot to emphasize her point. Her left arm was held rigidly across her stomach, gripping her ribs.

Conan looked up into the freshly dark evening sky. The air was strangely still, the sky pellucid and speckled with stars except where the swelling clouds ma.s.sed to the west.

"We should move the camp," he turned to Heng Shih. "Those guards seemed inattentive, but the smoke would have been easily seen had they but looked around."

"Guards?" Zelandra looked from the Cimmerian to the Khitan and back again. "You found Ethram-Fal's hiding place?"

"Yes, my lady. It is less than two leagues distant. If your smoke was spotted, they could have an armed party here any time now."

"Heng Shih! Was it a palace?" The voice of the sorceress quavered with desperate energy. Her bodyguard's hands pa.s.sed through a number of signs. The movements were concise and measured, his face betraying no emotion.

"Yes!" cried Zelandra exultantly. "Just as the legends would have it!

We attack first thing tomorrow morning. I'll teach that withered fool to trifle with me. I'll walk into his parlor and tear his b.l.o.o.d.y heart out!"

"This is madness," said Conan flatly. "We must move the camp. We could be set upon.at any time."

"Be silent, barbarian. The fire lasted only a moment. I must rest now.

Keep watch yourself if you are worried." Zelandra stepped forward and set her teapot down neatly in the center of the smothered fire, as though it might still be warmed thereon. "Awaken me if we are attacked, and I shall smite the fools with sorcery." With that she turned about and ducked into her tent. The flap swung shut behind her.

Conan looked to Neesa, who nodded, came to her feet and strode quickly across the camp. She followed Zelandra into her tent and immediately muted voices rose from it.

The Cimmerian strode to the hill's leading edge, looking down to the canyon that led to the Palace of Cetriss and Ethram-Fal. Heng Shih followed, watching the barbarian as he scanned the clearing below.

"Nothing yet," grumbled Conan. "We must find the swiftest route of escape." He turned and loped back through the camp and on to the hill's far side, where it fell away in a long, gravel slope that ended sharply, far below, in a cliff's edge. The barbarian made his way easily down the loose incline. Heng Shih followed more carefully. Night had fallen and the slope was even more treacherous than it appeared.

Sand and gravel seemed to grease the hillside as it grew ever more steep. Heng Shih staggered, his boots losing purchase as his footing gave way. He caught himself, but not before kicking up a cloud of acrid dust.

The slope finally petered out into a short expanse of level, gravel-strewn stone that was sheared off a few paces away by the sharp edge of the cliff. Conan reached the rim and peered over. There was an almost vertical drop of thirty feet ending in a dry, sandy runoff cluttered with rounded boulders, gleaming as pale as scattered bones in the light of the rising moon.

"Morrigan and Macha," cursed the Cimmerian. "This is no good. We'll be best off if we head back along the canyon that brought us here.

Listen." He turned abruptly and put a hand on Heng Shih's shoulder. "I know little about wizardry and wish that I knew even less, but your mistress seems in poor condition to engage Ethram-Fal in any kind of combat, sorcerous or otherwise. You must convince her to attack by stealth. A frontal attack would be suicide. Tomorrow I can scout along the top of the canyon walls and try to find a way to approach the Stygian's palace from above. If I can find a path, we might be able to lower ourselves down through the open windows of the upper floor and take our enemies by surprise. What do you think?"

Heng Shih lifted his hands as if to sign, then dropped them to his sides with a sigh. He nodded.

"And can you get Zelandra to agree to move the camp?" asked the barbarian. "Her madness could bring death to us all."

The Khitan bristled, his hands becoming fists. He shook his head violently from side to side, scowling darkly.