Part 15 (1/2)
She shook her raven tresses and turned her dark, liquid eyes on the inscrutable face of the Cimmerian ”I kno that I need a consort
Rule Vendhya with me, Conan! Tomorroe'll announce our betrothal; within a month there will be nuptial feasts and ceremonies such as have not taken place in Vendhya for a hundred years! I love you,with her vigorous, sli his lips with kisses, until his senses swaently froth
”Cro offer,” he rumbled ”Feomen have I seen so beautiful as you, nor so wise Any e would count hio, when I was a wandering soldier of fortune, I would perhaps have accepted Now I cannot I have htiest realm in the world But ician in Khitai, and I have sworn an oath to get her back I should not be a man if I did not keep my vow Marry one of your own people They would rather be ruled by a king of their own blood Tomorrow I ride for the Himelians”
There waseyes of Yasive happiness only to snatch it away Mayhap that is as well, or life would be nothing but happiness, and we should lack the contrasts to knohat real happiness means”
Her eyes cleared, and a queer, half-whio tomorrow But there are several hours left until dawn Let us spend theain in a fierce elassy-eyed faces of the foiled assassins
7 The Demon of the Snows -------------------------
Thethe snow-covered trail His body was bent forward; his eyes scanned the ground, and his nostrils widened like those of a hound on the scent No man had ever before been where he now stalked; at least, none had been there and returned to tell about it
Mist-veiled and hty Hi alone when he happened upon the odd tracks in the snow Wide, splayed footprints were pressed deeply down at distances of at least four feet denoting the size of the creature thatlike theends told in the thatched huts of the hill villages by white-bearded old ed off the glis of fear True, he was alone and several days' journey from home But was he not the foremost hunter of the Waht reassurance as he clutched it with his eyes searching He moved cat-footed on the trail
It was no ht that made him stop The white slopes stretched upward before hies could be seen far off in jagged silhouette No sign of life showed anywhere But an icy, creeping feeling suddenly filled hisarisen fros from dark borderlands He wheeled in a flash, his brown hand whipping out his heavy Zhaibar knife
His blood froze in his veins His eyes opened in awful terror at the sight of the giant white shape that glided toward him over the snow No features could be discerned in the white face of the horribly ht to its petrified victi his blade Then the icy e white arain in the vast white reaches
”By thunder, it is good to be a on the rough wooden table with a half-gnawed beef bone A score of ulis: chiefs frouli tribe Wild and fierce they were Clothed in sturdy hille fur coats worn against the cold of the upper ranges, displaying the barbaric splendor of Bakhariot belts and ivory-and-gold tulwar hilts
The coure was, however, none of these fierce mountaineers
Conan the Cimmerian, in the place of honor, was the center of their attention Long and varied was the tale he had told, for it was over a decade since his feet had last trod the winding paths of the His
”Yes, I think you will be little bothered by Turanians henceforth”
Flashes coruscated in the blue depths of Conan's eyes as he told his recent experiences ”I slew Yezdigerd on the deck of his flagshi+p, as the blood of his ushed round my ankles His vast ehas, as there is no successor to the throne”
The gray-bearded chief sighed ”We have seen little of the Turanians since the day you with your Afghulis and the Devi Yasmina with her Kshatriyas defeated their host in Femesh Valley Nor have the riders of Vendhya bothered us; we keep a silent agree their caverns and outposts I al for the old days of battle, e rained stones upon their spired helmets and ambushed their mailed lancers from every cranny”
Conan shts dwelt on his recent visit to Vendhya It was hard to push the picture of a slim, black-haired, tear-eyed wo on the palace wall, waving her silken veil as he thundered away toward the hazy mountains
A portly, bearded chief cleared his throat ”We understand that you are on a pressing errand, Conan,” he said ”But take our advice and go around the Talaks happen there, and it is whispered that the snow deain”
”What are these snow demons, that they send fear into the stout hearts of the men of Ghulistan?”
The chief bent lower and answered with a quaver in his voice ”Devils out of the nighted gulfs of the black abyss haunt the snowy reaches of Talakled by soth and ferocity But theof all is that every corpse, no ers and limbs are so brittle that they break of like icicles!”