Part 35 (2/2)

”You'll lead them nowhere unless Her Mightiness pardons the whole tribe,” Thyrin said. ”It's out of dishonor that I lead them, not into Eloikas's service.” Then he was running toward the brawling warriors before Conan could think of any more advice, let alone give it.

Raihna cursed Thyrin as she and the Cimmerian began their climb to rejoin their comrades. Conan said nothing. He knew more than she did of what Thyrin might think he owed his tribe, for all that they had wandered down many dark paths lit only by the false light of sorcery.

They were less than halfway up the dam when the witch-thunder rolled across the valley. Confined between the rock walls, it might have been the world cracking apart. Raihna clapped her hands over her ears, and Conan felt as if hot needles were being thrust into his ears.

They reached the top of the dam, however, just as the witch-thunder sounded again. This time it found an echo. From the water beyond the dam there began a long, low hissing.

It went on as Conan and Raihna ran along the top of the dam, which was three hundred paces long; their comrades were barely halfway across.

As they overtook the others, the hiss turned into a scream. The scream turned into a roar, and the lake seemed to catch fire, spewing out shades of crimson and sapphire, emerald and topaz. Its surface heaved and bubbled, then began to steam like a boiling cauldron.

Marr was playing his pipes through all of this, as Conan saw. But his music would have been as a child's cry against the shouting of an army when matched with the roaring of the beast.

Unheard though it might be, the piping seemed to be fulfilling some of its promise. The beast was awake, aware, and furious. That the lake was turning into a cauldron proved that.

Yet the tentacles-indeed, as long as a s.h.i.+p and as thick as a man's body-came nowhere near the people scurrying across the top of the dam.

They reached high enough into the air to have plucked men from the top of pine trees or temple towers. They could easily have swept Conan and his little band into death in any eyeblink.

They did not, and Conan began to feel almost at ease with the presence of Marr and his spells. It was not a feeling that he expected to last.

No doubt the piper would turn against them in the end, or be turned against them by his magic. Also, Conan would feel still more at ease when they were safe away from the beast, for all that the piper's magic had mastered it for now.

Conan and Raihna overtook the others fifty paces from the end of the dam. Wylla stared at them.

”Where is my father?”

”He hoped to win the Pougoi away from Count Syzambry,” Conan said.

Wylla crammed one fist into her mouth to stifle a cry and struck Conan in the chest with the other. Aybas put an arm around her shoulders.

”He saw his duty and we see ours,” he said. ”Both see clearly, even if not alike.”

Seen from close at hand, the piper appeared to be on the verge of collapse. Oyzhik looked like a walking corpse. Only the princess was bearing up well, she and her still-sleeping babe. Conan had to lay a hand across the babe's chest to be sure that he was still breathing.

Then, beneath them, the dam shuddered. Conan felt more than heard stones moving, and saw nothing at all. He had been in too many earthquakes, however, to ignore the sensation.

”Run!” he shouted, loud enough to pierce even the outcry of the beast.

”Run for your lives! The dam is breaking!”

He did not need to repeat the warning. The next shuddering joined his words to give wings to everyone's feet. Even Oyzhik reached the far end of the dam at a stumbling run, and the princess might have been racing for a purse of gold.

The path up the cliff lay before them. It was indeed as easy as promised. A child of six could have found a way up it.

So could any number of Pougoi warriors if Thyrin could not keep them off of his friends' trail. Conan studied the cliff, seeking a place where he and Raihna could make a stand against greater numbers. With bows, they could even make their stand beyond reach of the beast's tentacles... at least until their quivers were empty, or until the Star Brothers' spells overcame the piper's and sent the beast climbing up the cliff, as it did on the nights of sacrifice-

The dam shuddered for a third time, and this time the shuddering did not end. Conan not only felt but saw rocks moving, and some the size of a man tore entirely loose and crashed down the face of the dam. Dust poured up from long cracks forming amid the stones.

”What keeps you, Conan?” a voice shrieked. ”Are you going to spit the beast and roast it for trail rations?”

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