"Zorelle!" Akeba shouted, and ran after her.

"Zandru's h.e.l.ls!" Conan shouted, and followed.

Of a sudden the black-robed man was before the girl. Gasping, she recoiled.

The strange figure's hand reached out, perhaps to brush against her face. Her words stopped on the instant, and she dropped as if her bones had melted.

"Zorelle!" The scream from Akeba held all the anguish that could be wrung from a man's throat.

Primitive instinct, primed now, reared again in Conan. Diving, he caught Akeba about the waist and pulled him to the ground. The air hummed as if a thousand hornets had been loosed. Arrows sliced through the s.p.a.ce where they had stood, toward the man in black. And before Conan's astounded gaze the man, hands darting like lightning, knocked two shafts aside, seized two more from the air, then seemed to slide between the rest and disappear.

Close behind their arrows came half-a-score Hyrkanians, waving short horn bows and curved yataghans as they ran. Two veered toward Conan and Akeba, but another shouted gutturally, "No! Leave them! 'Tis Baalsham we want!" The squat Hyrkanians ran on into the night.

Shaking his head, Conan got slowly to his feet. He had no notion what was happening, and was, in fact, not sure that he wanted to know. Best he got on about his business and left the rest to those already involved. Screams had been added to the shouts in the distance, and the pounding of hundreds of panic-stricken feet. Fire stained the sky as a building exploded in flame.

Akeba crawled on hands and knees to his daughter. Cradling her in his arms, he rocked back and forth, tears streaming down his flat cheeks. "She is dead, Cimmerian," he whispered. "He but touched her, yet she ..."

"Bring your daughter," Conan told him, "and let us go. We have no part in what else happens here this night."

The Turanian lowered Zorelle carefully, drew his tulwar and examined theblade. "I have blood to avenge, a man to kill." His voice was quiet, but hard.

"Revenge takes a cool head and a cold heart," Conan replied. "Yours are both filled with heat. Remain, and you will die, and likely never see the man who killed her."

Akeba twisted to face the Cimmerian, his black eyes coals in a furnace.

"I want blood, barbar," he said hoa.r.s.ely. "If need be, I will begin with yours."

"Will you leave Zorelle for the worms and the ravens, then?"

Akeba squeezed his eyes shut and sucked in a long, hissing breath.

Slowly he returned his blade to its sheath and, stooping, gathered his daughter in his arms. When he straightened his face and voice were without expression. "Let us be gone from this accursed place, Cimmerian."

A score of saffron-robed men and women appeared out of the dark and fled past as if terror driven. None glanced at the two men, one holding a girl's body in his arms.

Twice more as they headed for the wall they saw cl.u.s.ters of cult members, running mindlessly. Behind them the shouts and screams had become a solid wave of sound. Two fires now licked at the sky.

They ran into the bushes near where they had crossed the wall, and, like a covey of quail, cult members burst from hiding. Some fled shrieking; others tried to dash past the two men, almost trampling them.

Conan cuffed a pair of shaven-headed men aside and shouted, "Go Akeba!

Take her on!" He knocked another man sprawling, seized a woman to toss her aside... and stopped. It was Yasbet.

"You!" she shouted.

Without pausing, Conan threw her over his shoulder and scrambled on, scattering the few who remained to try to hinder him. Yasbet's feet fluttered in futile kicking, and her small fists pounded at his broad back.

"Let me down!" she screamed. "You have no right! Loose me!" They reached the wall; he let her down. She stared at him with the haughtiness of a dowager queen. "I will forget this if you go now. And for the kindness you did me earlier, I'll not tell -" She broke off with a shriek as he bent to cut a strip from her robe with his dagger. In a trice her hands were bound behind her, and before she could more than begin another protest he added a gag and a hobble between her ankles.

Akeba had taken care of the grapnels. Two ropes dangled from the top of the wall. "Who is she?" he asked, jerking his head toward Yasbet.

"Another wench who should not be left to this cult," Conan replied.

"Climb up. I'll attend to your daughter so you can draw her after you."

The Turanian hesitated, then said, "The live girl first. There may not be time for both." Without waiting for a reply he scrambled up one of the ropes.

Despite her struggles, Conan fastened the end of the rope about Yasbet beneath her arms. In moments her m.u.f.fled squeals were rising into the air.

Hurriedly he did the same to Zorelle's body with the other rope. As he was pulled up, he waited, watching and listening for Hyrkanians, for cult members, for almost anything, considering the madness of the night. He listened and waited. And waited. Akeba had to climb down on the outside, he knew, and free one of the girls before he could return atop the wall and lower a rope to Conan, but it seemed to be taking a very long time.

The rope end slapped the wall in front of his face, and he could not stop a sigh of relief. At the top of the wall he found himself face to face with Akeba. "For a time there," he said, "I almost thought you'd left me."

"For a time," Akeba replied flatly, "on the ground outside with my daughter, I almost did."

Conan nodded, and said only, "Let us go while we can."

Dropping to the ground they picked up the women - Conan Yasbet and Akeba Zorelle - and ran for Sharak and the horses. The cacophony of conflict still rose within the compound behind them.

VIII

The red glare of fire in the night glinted on Jhandar's face as he turned from the window. The shouts of initiates carrying water to fight the blazes rang through the compound, but one building, at least, was too far gone in flame to be saved.

"Well?" he demanded.

Che Fan and Suitai exchanged glances before the first-named spoke. "They were Hyrkanians, Great Lord."

The three men stood in the antechamber to Jhandar's apartments. The austerity of decoration that the necromancer invoked for his garb was continued here. Low, unadorned couches dotted the floor that was, if marble, at least plain and bare of rugs, as the walls were bare of tapestries and hangings.

"I know they were Hyrkanians!" Jhandar snarled. "I could hear them shouting, "Death to Baalsham!" Never did I think to hear that name again."

"No, Great Lord."

"How many were there?"

"Two score, Great Lord. Perhaps three."

"Three score," Jhandar whispered. "And how many yet live?"

"No more than a handful, Great Lord," Che Fan replied. "Well over a score perished."

"Then perhaps a score still live to haunt me," Jhandar said pensively.

"They must be found. There will be work for the two of you, then, you may be sure."

"Great Lord," Suitai said, "there were others in the compound tonight.

Not Hyrkanians. One wore the helmet of a Turanian soldier. The other was a tall man, pale of skin."

"A barbarian?" Jhandar asked sharply. "With blue eyes?"

"Blue eyes?" Suitai asked incredulously, then recovered himself. "It was dark. Great Lord, and with the fighting I could not draw near enough to see.

But they robbed the Tower of Contemplation, taking the necklace of thirteen rubies and slaying the thief you set there as guard." He hesitated. "And they killed one of the initiates. Great Lord. The girl Zorelle."

The necromancer made a dismissive gesture. He had marked the girl for his bed, in time, but her life or death was unimportant. But the necklace, now. The thief had come for that same bit of jewelry. There had to be a link there.

"Wait here," he snarled.

Carefully shutting doors behind him, he made his way to the column-lined outer hall, where waited half a score of the Chosen, Zephran among them. They thought they stood as his bodyguard, though either of the Khitan a.s.sa.s.sins could have killed all ten without effort. They bowed as he appeared. He motioned to Zephran, who approached, bowing again.

"Go to the Tower of Contemplation," Jhandar commanded. "There you will find the body of the one I set to guard that place. Bring the body to the Chamber of Summoning."

"At once, Great Lord." But Zephran did not move. He wished to ingratiate himself with the Great Lord Jhandar. "It was the Hyrkanians, Great Lord. Those I spoke to you about, I have no doubt."

Jhandar's cheek twitched, but otherwise his face was expressionless.

"You knew there were Hyrkanians in Aghrapur?" he said quietly.

"Yes, Great Lord." Sweat broke out on Zephran's forehead. Suddenly he was no longer certain it had been a good idea to speak. "Those... those I spoke to you of. Surely you remember, Great Lord?"

"Bring the body," Jhandar replied.

Zephran bowed low. When he straightened the necromancer was gone.In his antechamber Jhandar ma.s.saged his temples as he paced, momentarily ignoring the Khitans. The fool had known of the Hyrkanians and yet said nothing! Of course, he had set no watch for them, warned none of the Chosen to report their appearance. To guard against them was to expect them to come, and did he expect them to come, then they would. It was the way of such things.

The proof was in himself. He had not been able to destroy his own belief that they would appear. And they had come.

Carefully Jhandar gathered the powders and implements he would need.

Dawn was but a few hours distant, now, and in the light of the sun he had few abilities beyond those of other mortals. He could not call on the Power at all while the sun shone. He could not summon the spirit manifestations then, though commands previously given still held, of course. Perhaps he should summon them now, set them to find the Hyrkanians. No. What he intended would sap much of his strength, could it be done at all. He was not certain he would be physically able to perform both rituals, and what he intended was more important. He knew something of the Hyrkanians, nothing of the tall barbarian.

The unknown threat was always more dangerous than the known.

He motioned the Khitans to follow. A sliding stone panel in the wall let into a secret pa.s.sage, dim and narrow, that led down to the chamber containing the circle of barren earth. The Chamber of Summoning.

Quickly the corpse was brought to him there, as if Zephran thought to mitigate his transgressions with haste, and arranged by the Khitans under Jhandar's direction, spreadeagled in the center of the circle. At a word the Chosen withdrew, while the mage studied on what he was about. He had never done the like before, and he knew no rituals to guide him. There was no blood to manifest the spirit of the man; there had been no blood in that body since its first death. After that there had been a tenuous connection between that spirit and the body, a connection enforced by his magic, but the second death, at the tower, had severed even that. Still, what he intended must be attempted.

While the Khitans watched Jhandar chose three pillars, s.p.a.ced equidistantly around the circle. On the first he chalked the ideogram for death, and over it that for life. On the second, the ideogram for infinity covered that of nullity. And on the last, order covered chaos.

Spreading his arms, he began to chant, words with meanings lost in the mists of time ringing from the walls. Almost immediately he could feel the surge of Power, and the near uncontrollability of it. His choice of symbols formed a dissonance, and if inchoate Power could know fury, then there was fury in the Power that flowed through Jhandar's bones.

Silver-flecked blue mist coalesced within the circle, roiling, swirling away from the posts he had marked. He willed it not to be so, and felt the resistance ripping at his marrow. Agony most torturous and exquisite. It would be as he willed. It would be. Through a red haze of pain he chanted.

Slowly the mists shifted toward, rather than away from, those three truncated pillars, touching them, then rushing toward them. Suddenly there was a snap, as from a spark leaping from a fingertip on a cold morning, but ten thousand times louder, and bars of silver-blue light, as bright as the sun, linked the posts. Chaos, forced into a triangle, the perfect shape, three sides, three points - three, the perfect number of power. Perfect order forced on ultimate disorder. Anathema, and anathema redoubled. And from that anathema, from that perversion of Chaos, welled such Power that Jhandar felt at any moment he would rise and float in the air. Sweat rolled down his body, plastering his saffron robes to his back and chest.

"You who called yourself Emilio the Corinthian," Jhandar intoned. "I summon you back to this clay that was you. By the powers of Chaos enchained, and the powers of three, I summon you. I summon you. I summon you."

The triangle of light flared, and within the circle the head of Emilio's corpse rolled to one side. The mouth worked raggedly. "Noooo!" it moaned.

Jhandar smiled. "Speak, I command you! Speak, and speak true! You came to steal a necklace of rubies?""Yes." The word was a pain-filled hiss.

"Why?"

"For... Da-vin-ia."

"For a woman? Who is she?"

"Mis-tress ... of... Mun-da-ra... Khan."

The mage frowned. He had tried for some time to "obtain" one of General Mundara Khan's servants, so far without success. The man stood but a short distance from the throne. Could he be taking an interest in Jhandar, as the necromancer took in him? Impossible.

"Do you know a tall barbarian?" he demanded. "A man with pale skin and blue eyes who would also try to steal that necklace."

"Co-nan," came the moaned reply. The head of the corpse twitched and moved.

Jhandar felt excitement rising in him. "Where can I find this Conan?"

"Noooo!" The head rolled again, and one arm jerked.

"Speak, I command!" The triangle of chaotic light grew brighter, but no sound came from the body.

"Speak!" Brighter.

"Speak!" Brighter.

"Speak! I command you to speak!" Brighter, and brighter still.

"I... am... a maaan!"

As the wail came, the light suddenly flared, crackling like lightning and wildfire together. Jhandar staggered back, hands thrown up to shield his eyes. Then the light was gone, and the Power, and the body. Only a wisp of oily black smoke drifting toward the ceiling remained.

"Freeee ..." The lone, thin word dissipated with the smoke, and naught remained of Emilio the Corinthian.

Weariness rolled into Jhandar's bones as the Power left. Despite himself, he sagged and nearly fell. There would be no summoning of spirit manifestations this night. That meant a full day must pa.s.s before he could send those incorporeal minions searching for the Hyrkanians, and for the barbarian. Conan. A strange name. But there was the woman, Davinia. There could be use in her, both for finding the barbarian and beyond. General Mundara Khan's mistress.

With a tired hand he motioned the Khitans to help him to his chambers.

IX.

The palace of Mundara Khan was of gray marble and granite, relieved by ornate gardens from which rose towers of ivory and porphyry, while alabaster domes whitely threw back the sun. The guards who stood before its gates with drawn tulwars were more ceremonial than otherwise, for an attack on the residence of the great General Mundara Khan was as unlikely as one on the Royal Palace of King Yildiz. But the guards were numerous enough to cause trouble, especially if a handsome young man should announce that he had come to see the general's mistress.