Part 20 (2/2)
Swords began to clash in the courtyard, and women screamed And in the h the postern gate and thundered down the hill The wide plain spread before him, and beyond the hill the caravan road divided: one branch ran south, the other east And on the eastern road he saw another rider, bending low and spurring hard The plain swaht was a thick red haze and he reeled in his saddle, grasping the flowing rian to pour out of the castle on the hill where the count's body lay forgotten and unheeded beside that of his prisoner The sun was setting; against a lurid red sky the two black figures fled
The stallion was not fresh, but neither was the horse ridden by Beloso
But the great beast respondedon deep reservoirs of reserve vitality Why the Zingaran fled frouess Perhaps unreasoning panic rode Beloso, born of the one; the white road was a diloo hard The country was changing, in the gathering dusk Bare plains gave way to clumps of oaks and alders Low hills an to blink out The stallion gasped and reeled in his course But ahead rose a dense wood that stretched to the hills on the horizon, and between it and hied on the distressed stallion, for he saw that he was overtaking his prey, yard by yard
Above the pound of the hoofs a strange cry rose froave heed
As they swept in under the branches that overhung the road, they were almost side by side A fierce cry rose from Conan's lips as his sent up; a pale oval of a face was turned toward hileamed in a half-seen hand, and Beloso echoed the cry--and then the weary stallion, with a lurch and a groan,in the shadows and went heels over head, hurling his dazed rider froainst a stone, and the stars were blotted out in a thicker night
How long Conan lay senseless he never knew His first sensation of returning consciousness was that of being dragged by one arh dense underbrush Then he was thrown carelessly down, and perhaps the jolt brought back his senses
His helone, his head ached abominably, he felt a qual his black locks But with the vitality of a wild thing life and consciousness surged back into his
A broad red h the trees, by which he knew that it was long after h to have recovered from that terrible blow Beloso had dealt him, as well as the fall which had rendered hi thatbeside the white road, he noticed with a start of surprise, as his surroundings began to record theht He lay on the grassy earth, in a sled branches His face and hands were scratched and lacerated as if he had been dragged through bra his body he looked about hi was squatting over hiht it was but a fige,that squatted on its haunches and stared down at hi soulless eyes
Conan lay and stared, half expecting it to vanish like a figure of a drea his spine
Half-forgotten risly tales whispered of the shapes that haunted these uninhabited forests at the foot of the hills that ossean border Ghouls, men called them, eaters of hus of a lost and forgotten race with the demons of the underworld Somewhere in these primitive forests were the ruins of an ancient, accursed city, ray, anthropoly
He lay staring at the malformed head that rose dimly above him, and cautiously he extended a hand toward the sword at his hip With a horrible cry that the man involuntarily echoed, the ht ar the mail links into the hard flesh The misshapen yet man-like hands clutched for his throat, but he evaded them with a heave and roll of his whole body, at the saer with his left hand
They tu The y and hard as steel wires, exceeding the strength of a man But Conan's theere iron too, and hisclaws long enough for hiain The horrible vitality of the se's skin crawled at the feel of that slick, clae revulsion behind the plunging blade, and suddenly the monster heaved up convulsively beneath hirisly heart, and then lay still
Conan rose, shaken with nausea He stood in the center of the glade uncertainly, sword in one hand and dagger in the other He had not lost his instinctive sense of direction, as far as the points of the compass were concerned, but he did not knohich direction the road lay He had no way of knowing in which direction the ghoul had dragged hilared at the silent, black, ed him, and felt cold moisture bead his flesh He ithout a horse and lost in these haunted woods, and that staring defor at his feet was a mute evidence of the horrors that lurked in the forest He stood al his ears for sorass
When a sound did coht air broke the scream of a terrified horse His stallion! There were panthers in the wood--or--ghouls ate beasts as well as h the brush in the direction of the sound, whistling shrilly as he ran, his fear drowned in berserk rage If his horse was killed, there went his last chance of following Beloso and recovering the jewel Again the stallion screamed with fear and fury, so heels, and soave way
Conan burst out into the hite road without warning, and saw the stallion plunging and rearing in thewickedly He lashed out with his heels at a slinking shadow that ducked and bobbed about hiray, furtive shadows that closed in on all sides
A hideous charnel-house scent reeked up in the night air
With a curse the king hewed right and left with his broadsword, thrust and ripped with his dagger Dripping fangs flashed in the ht at hiht the rein, leaped into the saddle His sword rose and fell, a frosty arc in theblood as it splitbodies The stallion reared, biting and kicking
They burst through and thundered down the road On either hand, for a short space, flitted gray abhorrent shadows Then these fell behind, and Conan, topping a wooded crest, saw a vast expanse of bare slopes sweeping up and away before him