The interior of the Palace of Cetriss had been scourged by the death throes of the flaming Emerald Lotus. Most of the light-globes had been torn from their niches in the walls and smashed by its pa.s.sing. Conan picked up one of the few surviving globes and used it to light their way. The cots in the Great Chamber were smashed into scorched kindling.

Ethram-Fal's laboratories and private rooms looked as if a fiery wind out of h.e.l.l had blown through them, crushing and charring everything into black wreckage. Nowhere did they see a human body. Silence lay thick on the smoke-tainted air.

They found the Emerald Lotus in its chamber, as if in death it had sought out the place of its birth. It had burnt down to its twisted core. The lotus was reduced to a clenched coil of blackened, th.o.r.n.y branches gripping a ghastly collection of contorted skeletons. The incinerated corpses of its victims were crushed together in its death embrace, wound and woven into its shrunken fabric so that Conan and Zelandra found it impossible to tell one body from another. All, human and animal, master and slave, were joined in death. The smoke and intense heat had seared and darkened the chamber, staining the walls as far as the pair could see. The high band of hieroglyphics that encircled the room was obscured by soot.

Conan took the sword that had been Ath's and struck at a curled limb of the lotus. Though it looked as solid as black stone, the burnt branch broke apart more easily than coal, crumbling into loose ash and releasing the skull it gripped to fall and rattle hollowly on the scarred stone floor.

Tearing free a shred of his tattered shirt, the barbarian distastefully wiped the dark ash from his blade. He noticed that Zelandra was staring emptily at the corpse of the Emerald Lotus. She stood still and silent, one arm crooked across her midsection. The sorceress breathed shallowly and did not seem to blink. Conan took her arm and led her away.

The palace's lowest levels seemed to have escaped the insensate fury of the dying lotus. In a crude series of rooms carved out below the desert floor, they found both the stables where the mercenaries kept their camels and ponies and a room full of supplies. There were sacks of provisions, grain for the beasts, and a large collection of tall ceramic jugs of water. They led the animals into the light, where Heng Shih and Neesa anxiously awaited their return.

The Stygian captives were astonished when Conan gave each water and a camel and told them to be gone. The taller of the two stared mutely at the Cimmerian, while the other bowed low, as though he stood before a king. They wasted no time in taking the barbarian's advice and departing down the narrow canyon.

While Conan, Heng Shih, and Neesa prepared to leave by bathing in the plentiful water and eating freely of the mercenaries' provisions, Zelandra quietly disappeared into the palace. When all was in readiness, the three looked about for her. They found Lady Zelandra in the pillar-flanked doorway, her face glimmering as pale as a mask of alabaster against the darkness of the portal. When Zelandra emerged into the morning light, they saw that her body was bent forward and that she used one arm to clutch her ribs. .

"Conan, Neesa," she called, and then more tenderly, "Heng Shih."

"Come along, milady," said Neesa, a faint quaver in her voice. "We've far to go."

"No," answered Zelandra. "I have scoured every inch of this ruin and can find none of the Emerald Lotus. The entire plant has been burnt to useless ash. You must leave me here; I would not burden you with my madness and my death. I have failed and, despite his doom, Ethram-Fal has triumphed."

"Nay," said Conan as he swung his long legs over his camel's back and dismounted. "I must be getting old if a little fighting makes me so forgetful." The Cimmerian bounded up the stone steps of the palace toward the Lady Zelandra, and drew his backpack from beneath a bronzed arm. "I s.n.a.t.c.hed this from the wizard's room of magics when Heng Shih and I hid from his guards."

A long, slender box of polished ebony emerged from the scruffy backpack and gleamed dully in the morning light. Conan twisted the golden clasp, lifted the lid, and held out the open box for Zelandra to see.

The sorceress could not restrain a gasp as she gazed upon a glittering drift of emerald dust.

"The Stygian's private stock, I'll warrant," grunted Conan. "I hope, lady, that this is enough to serve your need."

Zelandra took the box, closed it, and held it to her breast.

"Yes, barbarian, I will make it so."

Together they walked from the shadow of the Palace of Cetriss into the bright sun of Stygia. The Cimmerian lifted the weary sorceress to her camel's back, and the little group moved as one down the canyon that led to the west and away. Conan took the lead, the desert wind tossing his black mane. He did not look back.

Behind them, the Palace of Cetriss returned to the silence in which it had slept for thirty centuries. Its weathered pillars warmed in the rising sun and cooled with the coming of night. Deep within, alone in its high and vaulted temple, the faceless statue of black stone stared into the darkness that it knew so well.