Part 25 (2/2)

'Co lithely out of his embrace, she seized his hand and led hiovernor does not exchange those seven Afghulis for the Devi'

He moved like a man in a daze, until they had descended a ladder and she paused in the chamber below Kerim Shah lay on a couch h to shi+eld his sleeping eyes froht of a brass laesture across her own throat Kheed and he dreay

'I have eaten his salt,' he muttered 'Besides, he can not interfere with us'

He led the girl through a door that opened on a winding stair After their soft tread had faded into silence, the man on the couch sat up Kerim Shah wiped the sweat from his face A knife-thrust he did not dread, but he feared Khemsa as a man fears a poisonous reptile

'People who plot on roofs should remember to lower their voices,' he ainst his masters, and as he was er Fro to his feet he went quickly to a table, drew pen and parchirdle and scribbled a few succinct lines

'To Khosru Khan, governor of Secunderam: the Cies of the Afghulis It is an opportunity to get the Devi into our hands, as the king has so long desired Send three thousand horsemen at once I will uides'

And he signed it with a name that was not in the least like Kerie he drew forth a carrier pigeon, to whose leg he made fast the parchold wire Then he went quickly to a caseht It wavered on fluttering wings, balanced, and was gone like a flitting shadow Catching up helmet, sword and cloak, Keri stair

The prison quarters of Peshkhauri were separated from the rest of the city by a le iron-bound door under an arch Over the arch burned a lurid red cresset, and beside the door squatted a warrior with spear and shi+eld

This warrior, leaning on his spear, and yawning froht he had dozed, but abefore him, a man he had not heard approach The reen turban In the flickering light of the cresset his features were shadowy, but a pair of lalow

'Who co his spear 'Who are you?'

The stranger did not seeh the spear-point touched his bosoe intensity

'What are you obliged to do?' he asked, strangely

'To guard the gate!' The warrior spoke thickly and lazing

'You lie! You are obliged to obey er your own Open that door!'

Stiffly, with the wooden features of an iirdle, turned it in theopen the door Then he stood at attention, his unseeing stare straight ahead of hier hand on the mesmerist's arm

'Bid him fetch us horses, Khemsa,' she whispered

'No need of that,' answered the Rakhsha Lifting his voice slightly he spoke to the guardsman 'I have no more use for you Kill yourself!'

Like a ainst the base of the wall, and placed the keen head against his body, just below the ribs Then slowly, stolidly, he leaned against it with all his weight, so that it transfixed his body and ca down the shaft he lay still, the spear jutting above hi out of his back

The girl stared down at him in morbid fascination, until Khehted a narrow space between the outer wall and a lower inner one, in which were arched doors at regular intervals A warrior paced this enclosure, and when the gate opened he cae of the prison's strength that he was not suspicious until Kheed from the archway Then it was too late The Rakhsha did not waste tiirl The guard lowered his spear threateningly, opening hisout of the guardrooms at either end of the alleyway Kheht flick a straw, and his right flashed out and back, see And the guard pitched on his face without a sound, his head lolling on a broken neck

Kheht to one of the arched doors and placed his open hand against the heavy bronze lock With a rending shudder the portal buckled inward As the girl followed hi in splinters, the bronze bolts were bent and twisted froes broken and disjointed A thousand-pound battering-ra it could have shattered the barrier no more completely Khelorying in his iant exercises his theith unnecessary vigor in the exultant pride of his prowess

The broken door let them into a small courtyard, lit by a cresset Opposite the door was a wide grille of iron bars A hairy hand was visible, gripping one of these bars, and in the darkness behind thelimmered the whites of eyes

Khe into the shadows fro intensity Then his hand went into his robe and ca feather of sparkling dust sifted to the flags Instantly a flare of green fire lighted the enclosure In the brief glare the for motionless behind the bars, were liarments They did not speak, but in their eyes blazed the fear of death, and their hairy fingers gripped the bars

The fire died out but the glow rereen that pulsed and shi+aze of the tribesated; it turned into a lu upward It twisted and writhed like a great shadowy serpent, then broadened and billowed out in shi+ning folds and whirls It grew to a cloud rille Thewith dilated eyes; the bars quivered with the grip of their desperate fingers Bearded lips parted but no sound careen cloud rolled on the bars and blotted therille and hid the asp, as of a ed suddenly under the surface of water That was all

Kheirl's arm, as she stood with parted lips and dilated eyes Mechanically she turned aith hi back over her shoulder Already the ; close to the bars she saw a pair of sandalled feet, the toes turned upward - she glimpsed the indistinct outlines of seven still, prostrate shapes

'And now for a steed swifter than the fastest horse ever bred in a hulistan before dawn'

4 AN ENCOUNTER IN THE Pass

Yasmina Devi could never clearly remember the details of her abduction The unexpectedness and violence stunned her; she had only a confused irip of aeyes of her abductor, and his hot breath burning on her flesh The leap through theto the parapet, thefroze her, the reckless descent of a rope bound to a merlon - he went down almost at a run, his captive folded lile in the Devi'sfleetly into the shadows of the trees, carrying her like a child, and vaulting into the saddle of a fierce Bhalkhana stallion which reared and snortedTRen there was a sensation of flying, and the racing hoofs were striking sparks of fire from the flinty road as the stallion swept up the slopes

As the girl's e and shadoms south of the Himelians were considered little short of divine; and she was the Devi of Vendhya! Fright was subgling She, Yasmina, to be carried on the saddle-bow of a hill chief, like a common wench of the htly against her writhings, and for the first time in her life she experienced the coercion of superior physical strength His arlanced down at her and grinned hugely His teeth gliht The reins lay loose on the stallion's flowing reat beast strained as he hurtled along the boulder-strewn trail But Conan sat easily, al like a centaur

'You hill-bred dog!' she panted, quivering with the ier, and the realization of helplessness 'You dare -you dare] Your life shall pay for this! Wheje are you taking hulistan,' he answered, casting a glance over his shoulder

Behind the on the walls of the fortress, and he gliate had been opened And he laughed, a deep-throated booovernor has sent his riders after us,' he laughed 'By Crom, ill lead him a merry chase! What do you think, Devi - will they pay seven lives for a Kshatriya princess?'

'They will send an ar you and your spawn of devils,' she proustily and shi+fted her to a more comfortable position in his are, and renewed her vain struggle, until she saw that her efforts were only a on the wind, were being outrageously disarranged by her struggles She concluded that a scornful subnity, and lapsed into a s subed by awe as they entered thelike a black well mouth in the blacker walls that rose like colossal raantic knife had cut the Zhaibar out of walls of solid rock On either hand sheer slopes pitched up for thousands of feet, and the mouth of the Pass was dark as hate Even Conan could not see with any accuracy, but he knew the road, even by night And knowing that arht after hireat brute was not yet showing fatigue He thundered along the road that followed the valley bed, labored up a slope, swept along a low ridge where treacherous shale on either hand lurked for the unwary, and came upon a trail that followed the lap of the left-hand wall

Not even Conan could spy, in that darkness, an ambush set by Zhaibar tribese that opened into the Pass, a javelin swished through the air and thudded horeat beast let out his life in a shuddering sob and stunized the flight and stroke of the javelin, and he acted with spring-steel quickness

As the horse fell he leaped clear, holding the girl aloft to guard her fro boulders He lit on his feet like a cat, thrust her into a cleft of rock, and wheeled toward the outer darkness, drawing his knife

Yasmina, confused by the rapidity of events, not quite sure just what had happened, saw a vague shape rush out of the darkness, bare feet slapping softly on the rock, ragged garli crack of stroke, parry and counter-stroke, and the crunch of bone as Conan's long knife split the other's skull

Conan sprang back, crouching in the shelter of the rocks Out in the night s! Do you flinch? In, curseou, and take them!' Conan started, peered into the darkness and lifted his voice 'Yar Afzal! Is it you?'

There sounded a startled imprecation, and the voice called warily

'Conan? Is it you, Conan?'

'Aye!' the Ci I've slain one of your ht flared di toward hirew out of the darkness The h, thrust forward, and craned his neck to peer areat curved tulwar Conan stepped forward, sheathing his knife, and the other roared a greeting 'Aye, it is Conan! Cos! It is Conan!' Others pressed into the wavering circle of light - wild, ragged, beardedblades in their fists They did not see Yasmina, for she was hidden by Conan'sfroht These s