Part 34 (2/2)

Hordo put his back against the wall, teeth bared in a snarl. Haranides crouched, ready to spring in any direction, so far as his chains would let him. Conan did not move.

”You, captain?” Ort said. He feinted toward Haranides, who tensed. ”Ort likes burning officers. Or you, one-eye?” Giggling, he waggled the glowing iron at Hordo. ”Ort could give you another scar, burn out your other eye. And you, strong one,” he said, turning his peg-eyed gaze on Conan, ”think you to sit unconcerned?”

Suddenly Ort darted at the Cimmerian, red-hot iron flas.h.i.+ng, and danced back. A long blister stood on Conan's shoulder. Awkwardly he raised one arm to cover his head, and huddled against the wall, half turning his back on the man with the burning iron. The other three men all stared at the big youth incredulously.

”Fight him!” Haranides shouted, and had to throw himself back to avoid a vicious slash of the iron that would have taken him across the face.

”Face him like a man, Conan,” Hordo urged.

Cautiously Ort dashed again to strike and retreat, curiously agile on his feet. Conan groaned as a second blister grew across his shoulders, and pressed himself tighter to the stone.

”Why he is no man at all,” Ort giggled. The nearly round jailor swaggered closer, to stand over Conan raising his blazing weapon.

A roar of battle rage broke from Conan's throat, and his mighty thews pushed him from his crouch. One hand seized Ort's bulk, pulling him closer; the other looped its chain about the jailor's neck, catching at the same time a desperately flung hand. Biceps bulging, he jerked the heavy iron chain tight, fat flesh bulging through the links. Ort's tiny eyes, too, bulged from that fat face, and his feet scrabbled desperately at the bare stone floor. The jailor had but one weapon, and he used it, stabbing again and again with the burning iron at the Cimmerian's broad back.

The stench of burning flesh rose as the fiery rod seared Conan's muscles, but he locked the pain from his mind. It did not exist. Only the man before him existed. Only the man whose eyes were staring from his fat face. Only the man he must kill. Ort's mouth opened in a futile attempt to breathe, or perhaps to scream. His tongue protruded through yellowed teeth. The chain had almost disappeared into the fat of his neck. The iron dropped, and breath rattled in Ort's throat and was silent. Conan put all his strength into one last heave, and there was the crack of a breaking neck.

Slowly he unwound the chain, freeing it with some difficulty, and let the heavy body fall.

”Mitra!” Haranides breathed. ”Your back, Conan! I could not have stood it a tenth so long.”

Wincing, Conan bent to pick up the iron. He ignored the dead man. To his mind all torturers should be treated so. ”The means of our escape,”

he said, holding Ort's weapon up. Its metal was yet hot enough to burn, but the glow had faded.

Carefully Conan fit the length of the iron through a link of the chain a handsbreadth from the manacle on one wrist. He took a deep breath, then twisted, the iron one way, his wrist the other. The manacle cut into the just healed wounds left from his being staked out by the bandits, and blood trickled over his hand. The other two men held their breath. With a sharp snap the chain broke.

Laughing, Conan held up his free wrist, the manacle still dangling a few inches of chain, and the iron. ”I'd hoped the heat hadn't destroyed the temper of the metal. It would have broken instead of the chain, otherwise.”

”You hoped,” Hordo wheezed. ”You hoped!” The bandit threw back his s.h.a.ggy head and laughed. ”You bet our freedom on a hope, Cimmerian, and you won.”

As quickly as he could Conan broke the rest of his chains, and those of the other men. As soon as Hordo was free, the bearded man leaped to his feet. Conan seized his arm to stop him from rus.h.i.+ng out.

”Hold hard,” the Cimmerian said.

”The time is gone for holding hard,” Hordo replied. ”I go to see to the Red Hawk's safety.”

”To see to her safety?” Conan asked. ”Or to die by her side?”

”I seek the one, Cimmerian, but I'll settle for the other.”

Conan growled deep in his throat. ”I'll not settle for death on S'tarra pikes, and if you will you're useless to me. And to Karela. Haranides, how many of your men do you think still live? And will they fight?”

”Perhaps a score,” the captain replied. ”And to get out of these cells they'll fight Ahriman and Erlik both.”

”Then take you the jailor's keys, and free them. If you can take and hold the barbican, we may live yet.”

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