Part 3 (2/2)
”Gromel!” snapped Ascalante ”Break iant drew a deep breath and launched his roaned and bent at the i of bolts and a rending crash of wood, the door splintered and burst inward
”In!” roared Ascalante, on fire with the spirit of the deed
”In!” yelled Rinaldo ”Death to the tyrant!”
They stopped short Conan faced them, not a naked man roused mazed and unarmed out of deep sleep to be butchered like a sheep, but a barbarian wide-awake and at bay, partly ar sword in his hand
For an instant the tableau held the four rebel noblemen in the broken door, and the horde of wild hairy faces crowding behind the-eyed giant standing sword in hand in the hted chamber In that instant Ascalante beheld, on a small table near the royal couch, the silver scepter and the slender gold circlet which was the crown of Aquilonia, and the sight ues!” yelled the outlaw ”He is one to twenty and he has no helmet!”
True; there had been lack of time to don the heavy plumed casque, or to lace in place the side- plates of the cuirass, nor was there now tireat shi+eld from the wall Still, Conan was better protected than any of his foes except Vollared, puzzled as to their identity Ascalante he did not know; he could not see through the closed vizors of the armored conspirators, and Rinaldo had pulled his slouch cap down above his eyes But there was no ti to the roof, the killers flooded into the roo bull, head doord low for the diseerish strength went into the arreat blade flashed through the air and crashed on the Bossonian's helether and Groripping the broken hilt
”Gro in amazement, as the shattered helmet disclosed the shattered head; then the rest of the pack were upon hi his ribs between breastplate and backplate, a sword-edge flashed before his eyes He flung aside the dagger-wielder with his left arm, and smashed his broken hilt like a cestus into the swordsman's temple The man's brains spattered in his face
”Watch the door, five of you!” screa steel whirlpool, for he feared that Conan ues drew back momentarily, as their leader seized several and thrust thele door, and in that brief respite Conan leaped to the wall and tore therefro there for half a century
With his back to the wall he faced the closing ring for a flashi+ng instant, then leaped into the thick of thehter; even in the teeth of overwhel odds he always carried the war to the enemy Any other man would have already died there, and Conan himself did not hope to survive, but he did ferociously wish to inflict as e as he could before he fell His barbaric soul was ablaze, and the chants of old heroes were singing in his ears
As he sprang from the wall his ax dropped an outlaith a severed shoulder, and the terrible back-hand return crushed the skull of another Swords whined venoins The Cier a an ever- wheel of death about him32
For a brief space the assassins crowded hi blows blindly and haave back suddenly two corpses on the floor gave h Conan his
”Knaves!” screa off his feathered cap, his wild eyes glaring ”Do ye shrink from the combat? Shall the despot live? Out on it!”
He rushed in, hackinghim, shattered his sith a short terrific chop and with a powerful push of his open hand sent hi took Ascalante's point in his left aring backward froain the wolves swirled in and Conan's ax sang and crushed A hairy rascal stooped beneath its stroke and dived at the king's legs, but after wrestling for a brief instant at what seelanced up in ti, but not in time to avoid it In the interim one of his coh the king's left shoulder-plate, wounding the shoulder beneath
In an instant Conan's cuirass was full of blood
Vole ih and hackedducked deeply and the sword shaved off a lock of his black hair as it whistled above him Conan pivoted on his heel and struck in froh the steel cuirass and Volmana cruasped Conan breathlessly ”I'll know that dwarf in hell ”
He straightened to ed in wild and wide open, ar his ax
”Rinaldo!” his voice was strident with desperate urgency ”Back! I would not slay you ”
”Die, tyrant!” screa Conan delayed the bloas loth to deliver, until it was too late Only when he felt the bite of the steel in his unprotected side did he strike, in a frenzy of blind desperation
Rinaldo dropped with his skull shattered, and Conan reeled back against the wall, blood spurting froripped his wound
”In, now, and slay hiainst the wall and lifted his ax He stood like an is braced far apart, head thrust forward, one hand clutching the wall for support, the other gripping the ax on high, with the great corded es, and his features frozen in a death snarl of fury his eyes blazing terribly through the mist of blood which veiled theh they were, yet they caround; here was the barbarian the natural killer They shrank back the dying tiger could still deal death