Part 28 (1/2)
The other meditated for a space
”Suppose with their aid we destroy Xotalanc,” he said ”What then, Xatmec?”
”Why,” returned Xatmec, ”ill drive red nails for them all The captives ill burn and flay and quarter”
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”But afterward?” pursued the other ”After we have slain theht? All ht and hated the Xotalancas With the feud ended, what is left?”
Xatone beyond the destruction of their foes They could not go beyond that
Suddenly both men stiffened at a noise outside the door
”To the door, Xath the Eye ”
Xat his ear to hear through the metal His mate looked into the mirror He started convulsively Men were clustered thickly outside the door; griripped in their teeth and their fingers thrust into their ears One ore a feathered head-dress had a set of pipes which he set to his lips, and even as the Tecuhltli started to shout a warning, the pipes began to skirl
The cry died in the guard's throat as the thin, weird piping penetrated the ainst the door, as if paralyzed in that position His face was that of a wooden iuard, farther removed from the source of the sound, yet sensed the horror of as taking place, the grisly threat that lay in that de like unseen fingers at the tissues of his brain, filling him with alien e effort he broke the spell, and shrieked a warning in a voice he did not recognize as his own
But even as he cried out, thethat was like a knife in the ear-druony, and all the sanity went out of his face like a flame blown out in a wind Like a madman he ripped loose the chain, tore open the door and rushed out into the hall, sword lifted before his mate could stop hiled body the Xotalancas surged into the guardroo- drawn, blood-
His brain reeling frouard leaped tospear The horror of the sorcery he had just witnessed was sub realization that the eneh a dark- skinned belly he knew nosword crushed his skull, even as wild-eyed warriors cauardroo of steel that brought Conan bounding from his 242
couch, wide awake and broadsword in hand In an instant he had reached the door and flung it open, and was glaring out into the corridor just as Techotl rushed up it, eyes blazing madly
”The Xotalancas!” he screamed, in a voice hardly human ”They are within the door!”
Conan ran down the corridor, even as Valeria eed from her chamber
”What the devil is it?” she called
”Techotl says the Xotalancas are in,” he answered hurriedly ”That racket sounds like it”
WITH the Tecuhltli on their heels they burst into the throneroom and were confronted by a scene beyond the most frantic dream of blood and fury Twenty , and the white skulls glea on their breasts, were locked in combat with the people of Tecuhltli The woht as madly as the men, and already the room and the hall beyond were streith corpses
Ol before his throne, and as the adventurers entered, Tascela ran from an inner chamber with a sword in her hand
Xatmec and his mate were dead, so there was none to tell the Tecuhltli how their foes had found their way into their citadel Nor was there any to say what had prompted that reater, their positionof their scaly ally, the destruction of the Burning Skull, and the news, gasped by a dying man, that mysterious white-skin allies had joined their enemies, had driven them to the frenzy of desperation and the wild deter death to their ancient foes
The Tecuhltli, recovering fro shock of the surprize that had swept them back into the thronerooht back with an equally desperate fury, while the door-guards fro to hurl theht of rabid wolves, blind, panting, ed, fro into flesh, blood spurting, feet sta Ivory tables crashed over, seats were splintered, velvet hangings torn doere stained red It was the bloody climax of a bloody half-century, and every man there sensed it
But the conclusion was inevitable The Tecuhltli outnumbered the invaders almost two to one, and they were heartened by that fact and by the entrance into the ht-skinned allies
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These crashed into the fray with the devastating effect of a hurricane plowing through a grove of saplings In sheer strength no three Tlazitlans were a ht he was quicker on his feet than any of the ray wolf amidst a pack of alley curs, and he strode over a wake of cruht beside hier than the average man, and far quicker andin her hand Where Conan beat down opposition by the sheer weight and power of his blows, breaking spears, splitting skulls and cleaving bosoht into action a finesse of sword-play that dazzled and bewildered her antagonists before it slew theh his heavy blade, found her point in his jugular before he could strike Conan, towering above the field, strode through the welter sht and left, but Valeria , and thrusting and slashi+ng as she shi+fted Swords ain as the wielders flailed the empty air and died with her point in their hearts or throats, and her hter in their ears
Neither sex nor condition was considered by the maddened combatants The five women of the Xotalancas were doith their throats cut before Conan and Valeria entered the fray, and when afeet, there was always a knife ready for the helpless throat, or a sandaled foot eager to crush the prostrate skull
From wall to wall, fro over into adjoining chambers And presently only Tecuhltli and their white-skinned allies stood upright in the great throne-room The survivors stared bleakly and blankly at each other, like survivors after Judgs wide-braced, hands gripping notched and dripping swords, blood trickling down their arled corpses of friends and foes They had no breath left to shout, but a bestialrose from their lips It was not a hu of a rabid wolf-pack stalking aht Valeria's arot a stab in the calf of your leg,” he growled
She glanced down, for the first ti er with his last effort
”You look like a butcher yourself,” she laughed
He shook a red shower from his hands
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”Notto bother about But that calf ought to be bandaged”
OLMEC cahoul with his naked massive shoulders splashed with blood, and his black beard dabbled in crimson His eyes were red, like the reflection of flame on black water
”We have won!” he croaked dazedly ”The feud is ended! The dogs of Xotalanc lie dead! Oh, for a captive to flay alive! Yet it is good to look upon their dead faces Twenty dead dogs!
Twenty red nails for the black colurunted Conan, turning away fro”
”Wait astill burned brightly in her soul ”Hoe know these are all of theht have come on a raid of their own”
”They would not split the clan on a foray like this,” said Ol soence Without his purple robe the man seemed less like a prince than some repellent beast of prey ”I will stake my head upon it that we have slain them all There were less of them than I dreamed, and they must have been desperate But how ca her sword on her naked thigh, and holding in her other hand an object she had taken from the body of the feathered leader of the Xotalancas
”The pipes of madness,” she said ”A warrior tells me that Xatmec opened the door to the Xotalancas and was cut down as they storuardroom from the inner hall just in time to see it happen and to hear the last of a weird strain of music which froze his very soul Tolkemec used to talk of these pipes, which the Xuchotlans sere hidden somewhere in the catacombs with the bones of the ancient wizard who used thes of Xotalanc found theo to Xotalanc and see if any reuide lanced at the remnants of his people There were only twenty left alive, and of these several lay groaning on the floor Tascela was the only one of the Tecuhltli who had escaped without a wound The princess was untouched, though she had fought as savagely as any
”Who will go with Conan to Xotalanc?” asked Olmec
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