For a moment she stood there, and all in the room seemed frozen where they stood. Then she sighed, sagged, and would have fallen had not Zula rushed to support her. Quickly the black woman pulled the girl’s robes up about her.
“It is done,” Bombatta said softly. “The Horn is in the hands of the One.”
“Conan,” Akiro said shakily, “there is something you must know.”
Abruptly there was a wind in the chamber, an icy gale of eerie howls that they felt to their bones, yet which did not so much as bend the flames of the torches. Then it was gone as suddenly as it had come, and the fires in that huge mouth were gone, as well, but the chill of the wind remained.
“Conan,” Akiro said again.
“Later,” Conan snapped. One too many pieces of sorcery had he seen for a single day, and this last had come at no one’s bidding that he could tell. “We leave now!” And barely waiting for Jehnna to gather the Heart of Ahriman, he hurried them from the chamber.
xix
It was a procession that Conan led back along the narrow corridor, and he did not care for the feeling of it. Jehnna carried the golden horn hugged tightly to her bosom, and Bombatta and Zula hovered protectively on either side of her, interspersing solicitous looks for the slender girl with cold stares at each other. Though glad beyond measure that she was unharmed, the Cimmerian was troubled by what Jehnna had experienced, and troubled as well by the artifact she carried so carefully.
Akiro tugged at Conan’s elbow. “I must talk with you,” he said quietly, glancing back at Bombatta. “In private. It is urgent.”
“Yes,” Conan agreed distractedly. He had come in contact with sorcery many times before in his young life, many more than he wished to remember. Betimes he found he could sense it, and what he sensed from the golden object the girl clutched to her breast was the odor of evil. Very much he wanted to be gone from that place, to be back in Shadizar with the thing done. “In private, Akiro,” he murmured. “Later.”
Malak ran before them, dancing in his eagerness to leave. “Hurry!” he called over his shoulder. “Thi
s place is ill! Mitra’s Bones! Hurry!” He darted from view ahead, and his words faded away.
“Fool,” Conan muttered. “This is no time to be separated.” Then he was into the chamber of gilded columns, and he fell silent as well.
Malak was there, rolling his eyes nervously. Also there were more than a score of warriors in black leather armor of archaic design, leaning on long spears. The smallest of the men was head and shoulders taller than Conan or Bombatta. They were as black as the obsidian statue before the temple, and Conan was relieved to see their chests rise and fall with breathing. They were men, not statues come to life. That had been his first thought.
Two of the warriors stepped forward. One had a crest of long white hair spilling down the back of his bronze helmet; the other wore no helmet, but rather a black leather skull-cap from which hung long fringes of red hair. He with the white crest spoke. To Jehnna.
“Long have we waited for you, for the One. We have slept, as our god sleeps, and we have awaited the day of your coming. The Night of Awakening approaches.”
Bombatta shifted uneasily, and Akiro’s breath whistled between his teeth.
“This girl has no part in your ways,” Conan said. “We crave pardon if we have disturbed your temple, but we have far to travel, and we must go.”
All the while he noted the disposition of the ebon warriors. He had no wish to fight if it could be avoided, but these men seemed to be saying that this was their temple, for all it looked not to have known a human tread in centuries. And men often grew violent when they thought strangers interfered with their religion.
“You may go,” the towering black warrior replied. “For bringing us the girl, the One, your lives are given to you. But she remains with us.”
Making every attempt to seem casual, Conan stepped between the tall warrior and Jehnna. “She is not the One you seek,” he said, but the ebon man ignored him and spoke again to Jehnna.
“For all the years we have slept, guarding the Horn of Dagoth, waiting for you, for the One who could touch the Horn. Now will the Sleeping God be awakened, and his vengeance will spread against those who betrayed—”
Conan caught a flicker of motion out of the corner of his eye as Bombatta’s arm whipped forward, and a dagger blossomed in the tall man’s throat. Blood poured from the black giant’s mouth as he fell, and pandemonium broke loose in the chamber.
“Back!” Conan shouted. There was no way forward except through huge men who were raising their spears and snarling with fury. “Back! Quickly!” The Cimmerian thrust his torch into one tall warrior’s face, beat aside another’s spear thrust, and ran a third through the middle.
A metallic racheting caught his ear. Sword dancing desperately to hold off an ever-increasing number of spears, he risked a quick glance over his shoulder. The great iron door was descending in jerks, and it did not have far to fall. With a roar he attacked, his blade a grim blur of razor steel before him, the sheer fury of him forcing his opponents back despite their greater numbers. With a suddenness that caught them all off-guard, he whirled and threw himself into a rolling dive toward the rapidly closing doorway. The bottom of the iron door scraped his shoulder, then he was through, and the slab settled against the floor with a heavy, grating thud.
Akiro, Malak and Zula stared down at him worriedly, but there was no time for their worry. “We must hurry,” he said as he scrambled to his feet. “’Tis likely they got a spear point or two under the edge of that trying to stab me, and if so they’ll lever it up soon enough.”
“I will see what I can do about that,” Akiro said. Delving in his pouch, he drew out materials and began drawing symbols on the metal of the door.
“You could have given me a little warning,” Conan muttered to Malak. “A shout that you were letting the door fall.”
“Bombatta caught us all by surprise,” Malak replied. “He grabbed Jehnna and darted in here before any of the rest of us could move. I guess he pulled that rod out as soon as he was past the door.”
“There,” Akiro said, stepping back from his labors. A string of faintly glowing symbols, each of which resisted efforts to focus the eye on it, stretched across the door from side to side. “That should hold them for a time.”