“This you call facing me?” Conan sneered. “Well, come then.”
The huge shape stripped back its hood, and as Conan started in spite of himself, hundred-fold laughter rolled from the mirrors. An ape’s head glared at him from atop the scarlet robes, as black as pitch and with gleaming white fangs made for the ripping of flesh. Its eyes held malevolent ebon fire. A tiger’s claws tipped its thick, hairy fingers. Slowly it shredded the robes, revealing a massive, ebon-haired body and heavy, bowed legs. No sound came from it, not even that of breathing.
A creation of sorcery it most certainly was, Conan thought, but perhaps it still could bleed. With a roar he bounded the length of the chamber, his broadsword a razor-edged windmill. Like a leopard the creature danced away from him, moving faster than he would have believed anything of that bulk could possibly move. And even in its dodging it struck—almost casually, it seemed—opening four crimson-welling slashes across his chest.
Grimly Conan followed. Three more times he struck at the great beast. Three more times, with silent snarls, it avoided his steel like quicksilver, and blood now dripped from his thigh, his shoulder, and his forehead. Full-throated laughter flowed from the mirrors in counterpoint to the frustrated curses the Cimmerian muttered under his breath. The creature’s every move was lightning, exhibiting none of the clumsiness of its shape. He had not so much as touched it yet.
Abruptly the monstrous sable ape charged, seized him in an instant, lifted him toward that slathering fanged mouth. He was too close to hack or stab with his sword, yet he slashed his blade sideways across the snarling face, slicing a gash through eye and nose and mouth. Claws dug into his ribs as green ichor rose in the wound, and the one remaining bulged in agony. With a heave of its massive arms Conan was sent hurtling across the chamber.
It could be hurt, flashed through the Cimmerian’s mind, and then he slammed into the wall, all the air leaving his lungs, and slid to the floor. Desperately he struggled to breathe, fought to regain his feet before the beast could reach him. He staggered to his feet … and stared in amazement.
The huge ape had sunk to all fours, and its mouth hung open as if it would moan if it were not mute. Yet that agonized sound was supplied a hundred times over by the images of the mage. In every mirror the form of the necromancer sagged a
nd groaned in pain.
Not in every mirror, Conan realized suddenly. The mirror he had struck in his flight was crossed by a web of cracks and showed only shattered reflections, including, now, his own once more. He swung his blade against the next mirror. As the silvery surface fragmented beneath the blow, the figure of Amon-Rama within vanished, and the groans of the others became cries.
“I have you, sorcerer!” Conan shouted above the shrill ululations.
Along the wall he ran as fast as he could, pausing only to smash at each mirror as he passed. Image after image of the thaumaturge disappeared to the splintering of glass, to cries becoming howls, then shrieks.
The skittering of claws on the crystal floor warned the Cimmerian, and he threw himself into a roll just as the ape-creature lunged at him. His broadsword flashed as he came to his feet. A gash ran down the beast’s ribs, while he had gained another along his own ribs. It was slower, he thought; no faster, now, than a fast man. Still, he ran across the chamber, ignoring the monstrous form. Defeating the creature was no part of defeating Amon-Rama.
At the far wall Conan stabbed his sword viciously at the image of the necromancer in mirror after mirror. The screams now spoke of pain beyond knowing, and of desperation, as well. From the corner of his eye, Conan saw the huge ape scrambling toward him again, its lone black eye burning with a frantic light. Yet even in its haste, he noted, it circled wide around the glowing red gem.
Abruptly, with a splashing sound as if he had stabbed into water, Conan’s sword pierced the surface of a mirror. He could only stare. His blade went into the mirror, and into, as well, the image of Amon-Rama within. Silence was thick in the chamber, broken only by an occasional tinkling as a bit of broken mirror fell to the crystal floor. All of the unbroken mirrors save the one his sword transfixed now showed only normal reflections. The ape-beast was gone as if it had never been, though the burning of his gashes told him it most assuredly had been real.
Beneath the scarlet hood in the mirror a hawknosed face was painted with disbelief, and raven eyes shone hatred at the big youth. A ball of light suddenly oozed from the place where the blade entered the mage’s robes, flowed down the sword and exploded, hurling Conan away like a flung stone. Shaking his head, the Cimmerian got dazedly to his feet just as Amon-Rama stepped out of the mirror, its surface first bulging around him, then suddenly vanishing into vapor.
The necromancer did not look at Conan. Once he touched the sword that thrust from his chest as if to convince himself of its actuality. With staggering steps he moved toward the crimson gem atop its slim pelucid column.
“Cannot be,” the Stygian muttered. “All power would have been mine. All power … .”
His hand closed about the glowing stone, and the wail that ripped from him then, going on as if it would never end, made all the other sounds he had uttered pale to whispers. Scarlet light glared from between his fingers, brighter and brighter, until it seemed that his hand itself had taken on the color.
“Crom!” Conan whispered as he realized the hand had become crimson.
And the redness spread, up the sorcerer’s arm and through him, till he was as a statue of congealed blood, yet keening still. Abruptly the form collapsed into a sanguinary pool that boiled and bubbled, vermilion steam rising till naught was left save his broadsword lying on the crystal floor. And the gem, hanging unsupported in the air.
Carefully, with more than one hesitant glance at the crimson stone floating above his blade, Conan retrieved his weapon. The leather-wrapped hilt was hot in his hand, but the sword seemed unharmed. Swiftly he backed away from the sorcerous stone, and his skin crawled. Almost had he touched the accursed thing, before Amon-Rama began his fatal game.
With a deafening crash another of the mirrors burst, and Conan’s companions poured into the chamber.
“ … and I told you it would work,” Akiro was saying. “It took only the death of the sorcerer, releasing his hold on his majicks.”
“Ravana’s Weeping Eyes,” Malak said scornfully. “You said he was lucky. There was no luck. This Stygian should have known better than to oppose Malak and Conan.”
Akiro turned his attention to the Cimmerian. “You were lucky. One day your luck will run out like the sands from a glass, and what then?”
“You saw?” Conan asked, now that he could get a word in edgewise.
Akiro nodded, and Zula shivered. “That ape,” she murmured, looking about as if she suspected it might only be hiding.
“It is gone,” Conan said. “Let us find Jehnna and this Mitra-accursed key, and be gone as well.”
As though her name had summoned her Jehnna appeared, stepping through the gap left by the mirror from which Amon-Rama had come. Behind her was blackness made darker by the glittering crystal and mirrors in the chamber. She did not look at any of them, but walked slowly, surely, to the radiant red gem, hanging still where the Stygian sorcerer had left it.
“No!” Conan and Bombatta shouted together, but before either man could move she plucked the stone from the air.