The Hand of Nergal
------------------

Conan has enjoyed his taste of Hyborian intrigue. It is clear to him
that there is no essential difference between the motives of the palace
and those of the Rats' Den, whereas the pickings are better in higher
places. With his own horse under him and a grubstake from the
gratefuland thoughtfulMurilo, the Cimmerian sets out to look over the
civilized world, with an eye to making it his oyster.

The Road of Kings, which winds through the Hyborian kingdoms, at last
leads him eastward into Turan, where he takes service in the armies of
King Yildiz. He does not at first find military services congenial,
being too self-willed and hot-tempered to submit easily to discipline.
Moreover, being at this time an indifferent horseman and archer, in a
force of which the mounted bowman is the mainstay, he is relegated to a
low-paid, irregular unit. Soon, however, a chance arises to show his
true mettle.

1. Black Shadows

"Crom!"

The oath was torn from the young warrior's grim-set lips. He threw back
his head, sending his tousled shock of black hair flying, and lifted
his smouldering blue eyes skyward. They widened in sheer astonishment.
An eery thrill of superstitious awe ran through his tall,
powerfully-built body, which was burnt brown by fierce wasteland suns,
broad-shouldered and deep-chested, lean of waist, long of leg, and
naked save for a rag of cloth about his loins and high-strapped
sandals.

He had entered the battle mounted, as one of a troop of irregular
cavalry. But his horse, given him by the nobleman Murilo in Corinthia,
had fallen to the foemen's arrows at the first onset and the youth had
fought on afoot. His shield had been smashed by the enemy's blows: he
had cast it aside and battled with sword alone.

Above, from the sunset-smouldering sky of this bleak, wind-swept
Turanian steppe, where two great armies were locked in a fury of
desperate battle, came horror.

The field was drenched in sunset fires and bathed in human blood. Here
the mighty host of Yildiz, king of Turan, in whose army the youth
served as a mercenary, had fought for five long hours against the
iron-shod legions of Munthassem Khan, rebellious satrap of the Zamorian
Marches of northern Turan. Now, circling slowly downwards from the
crimson sky, came nameless things whose like the barbarian had never
seen or heard of before in all his travels. They were black, shadowy
monsters, hovering on broad, arch-ribbed wings like enormous bats.

The two armies fought on, unseeing. Only Conan, here on this low hill,
ringed about with the bodies of men his sword had slain, saw them
descending through the sunset sky.

Leaning on his dripping blade and resting his sinewy arms for a moment,
he stared at the weird shadow-things. For they seemed to be more shadow
than substancetranslucent to the sight, like wisps of noisome black
vapor or the shadowy ghosts of gigantic vampire bats. Evil, slitted
eyes of green flame glared through their smoky forms.

And even as he watched, nape-hairs prickling with a barbarian's dread
of the supernatural, they fell upon the battle like vultures on a field
of bloodfell and slew.

Screams of pain and fear rose from the host of King Yildiz, as the
black shadows hurtled amongst their ranks. Wherever the shadow-devils
swooped, they left a bloody corpse. By the hundred they came, and the
weary ranks of the Turanian army fell back, stumbling, tossing away
their weapons in panic.

"Fight, you dogs! Stand and fight!" Thundering angry commands in a
stern voice, a tall, commanding figure on a great black mare sought to
hold the crumbling line. Conan glimpsed the sparkles of silver-gilt
chain mail under a rich blue cloak, and a hawk-nosed, black-bearded
face, kingly and harsh under a spired steel helm that caught the
crimson sun like a polished mirror. He knew the man for King Yildiz'
general, Bakra of Akif.

With a ringing oath, the proud commander drew his tulwar and laid about
him with the flat of the blade. Perhaps he could have rallied the
ranks, but one of the devil-shadows swooped on him from behind. It
folded vaporous, filming wings about him in a grisly embrace and he
stiffened. Conan could see his face, suddenly pale with staring, frozen
eyes of fearand he saw the features through the enveloping wings, like
a white mask behind a veil of thin, black lace.

The general's horse went mad and bolted in terror. But the
phantom-thing plucked the general from his saddle. For a moment it bore
him in mid-air on slowly beating wings, then let him fall, a torn and
bloody thing in dripping rags. The face, which had stared at Conan
through shadowy wings with eyes of glazing terror, was a red ruin. Thus
ended the career of Bakra of Akif.

And thus ended his battle, as well.

With its commander gone, the army went mad. Conan saw seasoned
veterans, with a score of campaigns under their belts, run shrieking
from the field like raw recruits. He saw proud nobles fly screaming
like craven serfs. And behind them, untouched by the flying phantoms,
grinning with victory, the hosts of the rebel satrap pressed their
weirdly-won advantage. The day was lostunless one strong man should
stand firm and rally the broken host by his example.

Before the foremost of the fleeing soldiers rose suddenly a figure so
grim and savage that it checked their headlong, panic-stricken flight.

"Stand, you fatherless curs, or by Crom I'll fill your craven bellies
with a foot of steel!"

It was the Cimmerian mercenary, his dark face like a grim mask of
stone, cold as death. Fierce eyes under black, scowling brows, blazed
with volcanic rage. Naked, splattered from head to heel with reeking
gore, he held a mighty longsword in one great, scarred fist. His voice
was like the deep growl of thunder.

"Back, if you set any value on your sniveling lives, you white-livered
dogsbackor I'll spill your cowardly guts at your feet! Lift that
scimitar against me, you Hyrkanian pig, and I'll tear out your heart
with my bare hands and make you eat it before you die. What! Are you
women, to fly from shadows? But a moment ago, you were menaye,
fighting-men of Turan! You stood against foes armed with naked steel
and fought them face to face. Now you turn and ran like children from
night-shadows, faugh! It makes me proud to be a barbarianto see you
city-bred weaklings cringe before a flight of bats!"

For a moment he held thembut for a moment only. A black-winged
nightmare swooped upon him, and heeven hestepped back from its grim,
shadowy wings and the stench of its fetid breath.

The soldiers fled, leaving Conan to fight the thing alone. And fight he
did. Setting his feet squarely, he swung the great sword, pivoting on
slim hips, with the full strength of back, shoulders, and mighty arms
behind the blow.

The sword flashed in a whistling arc of steel, cleaving the phantom in
two. But it was, as he had guessed, a thing without substance, for his
sword encountered no more resistance than the empty air. The force of
the blow swung him off balance, and he fell sprawling on the stony
plain.

Above him, the shadowy thing hovered. His sword had torn a great rent
through it, as a man's hand breaks a thread of rising smoke. But, even
as he watched, the vapory body reformed. Eyes like sparks of green
hell-fire blazed down at him, alive with a horrible mirth and an
inhuman hunger.

"Crom! Conan gasped. It may have been a curse, but it sounded almost
like a prayer.

He sought to lift the sword again, but it fell from nerveless hands.
The instant the sword had slashed through the black shadow, it had gone
cold, with an aching, stony, bone-deep chill like the interstellar
gulfs that yawn blackly beyond the farthest stars.

The shadow-bat hovered on slowly beating wings, as if gloating over its
fallen victim or savoring his superstitious fear.

With strengthless hands, Conan fumbled at his waist, where a strip of
rawhide bound his loincloth to his middle. There a thin dagger hung
beside a pouch. His fumbling fingers found the pouch, not the dagger
hilt, and touched something smooth and warm within the leathern bag.

Suddenly, Conan jerked his hand away as a tingling electric warmth tore
through his nerves. His fingers had brushed against that curious amulet
he had found yesterday, when they lay encamped at Bahari. And, in
touching the smooth stone, a strange force had been released.

The bat-thing veered suddenly away from him. A moment before, it had
hovered so close that his flesh had crawled beneath the unearthly chill
that seemed to radiate from its ghostly form. Now it tore madly away
from him, wings beating in a frenzy.

Conan dragged himself to his knees, fighting the weakness that pervaded
his limbs. First, the ghastly cold of the shadow's touchthen the
tingling warmth that had seethed through his naked body. Between these
two conflicting forces, he felt his strength draining away. His vision
blurred; his mind wavered on the brink of darkness. Fiercely, he shook
his head to clear his wits and gazed about him.

"Mitra! Crom and Mitra! Has the whole world gone mad?"

The grisly host of flying terrors had driven the army of General Bakra
from the field, or slain those that did not flee fast enough. But the
grinning host of Munthassem Khan they had not touchedhad ignored,
almost as if the soldiers of Yaralet and the shadowy nightmare-things
had been partners in some unholy alliance of black sorcery.

But now it was the warriors of Yaralet who fled screaming before the
shadowy vampires. Both armies broken and fledhad the world indeed gone
mad, Conan wildly asked of the sunset sky?

As for the Cimmerian, strength and consciousness drained from him
suddenly. He fell forward into black oblivion.

2. Field of Blood

The sun flamed like a crimson coal on the horizon. It glowered across
the silent battlefield like the one red eye that blazes madly in a
Cyclops's misshapen brow. Silent as death, strewn with the wreckage of
war, the battlefield stretched grim and still in the lurid rays. Here
and there amidst the sprawled, unmoving bodies, scarlet pools of
congealing gore lay like calm lakes reflecting the red-streamered sky.

Dark, furtive figures moved in the tall grasses, snuffling and whining
at the heaped and scattered corpses. Their humped shoulders and ugly,
doglike snouts marked them as hyenas from the steppes. For them, the
battlefield would be a banquet table.

Down from the flaming sky flapped ungainly, black-winged vultures, come
to feast on the slain. The grisly birds of prey dropped upon the
mangled bodies with a rustle of dusky wings. But for these
carrion-eaters, nothing moved on the silent, bloody field. It was still
as death itself. No rumble of chariot wheels or peal of brazen trumpets
broken the unearthly silence. The stillness of the dead followed fast
on the thunder of battle.

Like eery harbingers of Fate, a wavering line of herons flapped slowly
away down the sky toward the reed-grown banks of the river Nezvaya,
whose turgid flood glinted dully crimson in the last light. Beyond the
further shore, the black, walled bulk of the city of Yaralet loomed
like a mountain of ebony into the dusk.

Yet one figure moved through that wide-strewn field of ruin, pygmylike
against the glowing coals of sunset. It was the young Cimmerian giant
with the wild black mane and the smouldering blue eyes. The black wings
of interstellar cold had brushed him but lightly; life had stirred and
consciousness returned. He wandered to and fro across the black field,
limping slightly, for there was a ghastly wound in his thigh, taken in
the fury of battle and only noticed and crudely bandaged as he had
recovered consciousness and moved to arise.

Carefully yet impatiently he moved among the dead, bloody as were they.
He was splashed with gore from head to foot, and the great sword he
trailed in his right hand was stained crimson to the hilt. Bone-weary
was Conan, and his gullet was desert-dry. He ached from a score of
woundsmere cuts and scratches, save for the great slash on his
thighand he lusted for a skin of wine and a platter of beef.

As he prowled among the bodies, limping from corpse to corpse, he
growled like a hungry wolf, swearing wrathfully. He had come into this
Turanian war as a mercenary, owning naught but his horsenow slainand
the great sword in his hand. Now that the battle was lost, the war was
ended, and he was marooned alone in the midst of the enemy land, he had
at least hoped to loot the fallen of some choice pieces of gear they
would no longer need. A gemmed dagger, a gold bracelet, a silver
breastplatea few such baubles and he could bribe his way out of the
reach of Munthassem Khan and return to Zamora with a grubstake.

Others had been here before him, either thieves slinking from the
shadowy city or soldiers who crept back to the field from which they
had fled. For the field was stripped; there was nothing left but broken
swords, splintered javelins, dented helms and shields. Conan glared out
across the littered plain, cursing sulphurously. He had lain in his
swoon too long; even the looters had left. He was like the wolf who
lingers so late at his blood-letting that jackals have stripped the
prey; in this case, human jackals.

Straightening up from his fruitless quest, he gave over the search with
the fatalism of the true barbarian. Time now to think of a plan. Brows
knotted, scowling in thought, he glanced uncertainly afar off across
the darkening plain. The square, flat-roofed towers of Yaralet stood
black and solid against the dying gleam of sunset. No hope of refuge
there, for one who had fought under the banners of King Yildiz! Yet no
city, friend or enemy, lay nearer. And Yildiz's capital of Aghrapur was
hundreds of leagues south

Lost in his thoughts, he did not notice the approach of the great black
figure until a faint, shuddering neigh reached his ears. He turned
swiftly, favoring his injured leg, lifting the longsword
threateninglythen relaxed, grinning.

"Crom! You startled me. So I am not the only survivor, eh?" Conan
chuckled.

The tall black mare stood trembling, gazing at the naked giant with
wide, frightened eyes. It was the same mount that General Bakra had
riddenhe who lay somewhere on the field, sprawled in a puddle of
blood.

The mare whinnied, grateful for the sound of a friendly human voice.
Although not a horseman, Conan could see that she was in sad condition.
Her sides heaved, lathered with the sweat of fear, and her long legs
trembled with exhaustion. The devil-bats had struck terror into her
heart, too, Conan thought grimly. He spoke soothingly, calming her, and
stepped gingerly nearer until he could reach out and stroke the panting
beast, gentling her into submission.

In his far northern homeland, horses were rare. To the penniless
barbarians of the Cimmerian tribes from whose loins he was sprung, only
the chief of great wealth owned a fine steed, or the bold warrior who
had taken one in battle. But despite his ignorance of the fine points
of horsemanship, Conan quieted the great black mare and vaulted into
the saddle. He sat astride the horse, fumbling with the reins, and rode
slowly off the field, now a swamp of inky blackness in the darkness of
night. He felt better. There were provisions in the saddlebags, and
with a strong mare between his thighs he had a good chance of making it
alone across the bleak and barren tundras to the borders of Zamora.

3. Hildico

A low, tortured moan reached his ears.

Conan jerked the reins, drawing the black mare to a halt, and peered
about him suspiciously in the deep gloom. His scalp prickled in
superstitious dread at the eery sound. Then he shrugged and spat an
oath. No night-phanton, no hunting ghoul of the wastes; that was a cry
of pain. This meant that still a third survivor of the doomed battle
yet drew breath. And a living man might be presumed to be unlooted.

He swung from the saddle, wrapping the reins about the spokes of a
broken chariot wheel. The cry had come from the left; here at the very
edge of the battlefield, a wounded survivor might well have escaped the
cunning eye of looters. Conan might ride into Zamora with a pouchful of
gems yet.

The Cimmerian limped toward the source of the quavering moan, which
came from the margin of the plain. He parted the straggling reeds that
grew in shaggy clumps along the banks of the slow river and glared down
at a pale figure, which writhed feebly at his very feet. It was a girl.

She lay there, half-naked, her white limbs cut and bruised. Blood was
clotting in the foaming curls of her long, black hair, like a chain of
rubies. There was unseeing agony in her lustrous dark eyes, and she
moaned in delirium.

The Cimmerian stood looking down at her, noting almost absently the
lithe beauty of her limbs and the rounded, lush young breasts. He was
puzzledwhat was a girl like this, a mere child, doing on a
battlefield? She had not the sullen, flamboyant, sullied look of a camp
trull about her. Her slim and graceful body denoted breeding, even
nobility. Baffled, he shook his head, black mane swinging against
brawny shoulders. At his feet, the girl stirred.

"The Heartthe Heart of Tammuz  O Master!" she cried softly, her dark
head turning restlessly from side to side, babbling as one in a fever.

Conan shrugged, and his eyes clouded momentarily by what, in another
man, would have been an expression of pity. Wounded to the death, he
thought grimly, and he lifted his sword to put the wench out of her
misery.

As the blade hovered above her white breast, she whimpered again like a
child in pain. The great sword halted in mid-air, and the Cimmerian
stood for an instant, motionless as a bronze statue.

Then, in sudden decision, he slammed the sword back in its sheath and
bent, lifting the girl effortlessly in his mighty arms. She struggled
blindly, weakly, moaning in half-conscious protest.

Carrying her with careful tenderness, he limped toward the reed-masked
riverbank and lay her down gently on the dry, cushioning reeds. Filling
his cupped palms with river water, the barbarian bathed her white face
and cleansed her cuts as gently as a mother might tend her child.

Her wounds proved superficial, mere bruises, save for the cut on her
brow. And even that, although it had bled heavily, was far from mortal.
Conan grunted with relief and bathed the girl's face and brow with
cold, clear water. Then, awkwardly pillowing her head against his
chest, he dribbled some of the water between her half-parted lips. She
gasped, choked a little, and came awakestaring up at him from eyes
like dark stars, clouded with bewilderment and the shadows of fear.

"Whowhatthe bats!"

"They are gone now, girl," he said gruffly. "You have naught to fear.
Came you hither from Yaralet?"

"Yesyesbut who are you?"

"Conan, a Cimmerian. What is a lass like you doing on a battlefield?"
he demanded.

But she seemed not to hear. Her brow frowned a little, as one in
thought, and half under her breath she repeated his name.

"ConanConanyes, that was the name!" Wonderingly she lifted her gaze
to his scarred, brown face. "It was you I was sent to seek. How strange
that you should find me!"

"And who sent you to seek me, wench?" he rumbled suspiciously.

"I am Hildico, a Brythunian, slave to the House of Atalis the
Far-seeing, who dwells yonder in Yaralet. My master sent me in secret
to move among the warriors of King Yildiz, to seek one Conan, a
mercenary of Cimmeria, and to bring him by a private way to his house
within the city. You are the man I seek!"

"Aye? And what does your master want with me?"

The girl shook her dark head. "That I know not! But he said to tell you
that he means no harm, and that much gold can be yours, if you will
come."

"Gold, eh?" he mused, speculatively, helping her to her feet and
steadying her with a brawny arm about her slim white shoulders as she
staggered weakly.

"Yes. But I came not to the field in time to seek you before the
battle. So I hid in the reeds along the river's edge to avoid the
warriors. And thenthe bats! Suddenly they were everywhere, swooping
upon the fallen, killing and one horseman fled from them into the
reeds, trampling me under his hooves unawares"

"What of this horseman?"

"Dead," she shuddered. "A bat tore him from the saddle and let his
corpse fall into the river. I swooned, for in its panic, the horse
struck me" She lifted one small hand to her gashed brow.

"Lucky you were not slain," he growled. "Well, lass, we shall visit
this master of yours, to learn what he wants of Conanand how he knows
my name!"

"You will come?" she asked breathlessly. He laughed and, vaulting
astride the black mare, lifted her to the saddlebow before him with
powerful arms.

"Aye! I am alone, amid enemies, in an alien land. My employment ended
when Bakra's army was destroyed. Why should I scruple to meet a man who
has picked me from ten thousand warriors, and who offers gold?"

They rode across the shallow ford of the river and across the
gloom-drenched plain towards Yaralet, stronghold of Munthassem Khan.
And Conan's heart, which never beat more joyously than when thrilled
with the promise of excitement and adventure, sang.

4. The House of Atalis

A strange conclave was taking place in the small, velvet-hung,
taper-lit chamber of Atalis, whom some men called a philosopher, others
a seer, and others a rogue.

This figure of mystery was a slender man of medium height, with a
splendid head and the ascetic features of a dedicated scholar, yet in
his smooth face and keen eyes was something of the shrewd merchant. He
was clad in a plain robe of rich fabric, and his head was shaven to
denote devotion to study and the arts. As he talked in low tones with
his companion, a third viewerhad any been presentmight have observed
something strange and curious about him. For Atalis, as he conversed,
gestured with his left hand only. His right arm lay stretched across
his lap at an unnatural angle. And from time to time his calm, clever
features were hideously contorted with a sudden spasm of intense pain,
at which time his right foot, hidden under his long robes, would twist
back excruciatingly upon his ankle.

His companion was one whom the city of Yaralet knew and praised as
Prince Than, scion of an ancient and noble house of Turan. The prince
was a tall, lithe man, young and undeniably handsome. The firm, clean
outline of his soldierly limbs and the steely quality of his cool gray
eyes belied the foppishness of his curled and scented black locks and
jewelled cloak.

Beside Atalis, who sat in a high-backed chair of dark wood carven by
intricate skill with leering gargoyles and grinning faces, stood a
small table of ebony inlaid with yellow ivory. Upon this rested a huge
fragment of green crystal, as large as a human head. It flickered with
a weird inward glow, and from time to time the philosopher would break
off his low conversation to peer deeply within the glitterinp stone.

"Will she find him? And will he come?" Prince Than said, despairingly.

"He will come."

"But every moment that passes increases our danger. Even now Munthassem
Khan may be watching, and it is dangerous for us to be together"

"Munthassem Khan lies drugged with the dream lotus, for the Shadows of
Nergal were abroad in the hour of sunset," said the philosopher. "And
some danger we must risk, if ever the city is to be freed of this
bloody-handed scourge!" His features knotted sickeningly in an
involuntary grimace of intolerable pain, and then smoothed out again.
He said grimly, "And you know, O Prince, how little time is left to us.
Desperate measures for desperate men!"

Suddenly the prince's handsome face contorted with panic and he turned
upon Atalis with eyes suddenly gone dead as cold marble. Almost as
swiftly, light and animation returned to his gaze, and he sank back in
his chair, pale and sweating.

"Verylittletime!" he gasped.

A hidden gong rang softly, somewhere within the dark and silent house
of Atalis the Far-seeing. The philosopher raised his left hand to check
the prince's involuntary start.

A moment later, one of the velvet wall-hangings drew aside, revealing a
hidden door. And within the door, like a bloody apparition, stood the
giant form of Conan with the half-fainting girl leaning on his arm.

With a little cry, the philosopher sprang to his feet and went toward
the grim Cimmerian. "Welcomethrice welcome, Conan! Come, enter. Here
is winefood"

He gestured to a tabouret against the further wall and took the
fainting girl from Conan. The Cimmerian's nostrils widened like those
of some famished wolf at the scent of the food; but also, like a wolf,
suspicious, wary of a trap, his smouldering blue eyes raked the smiling
philosopher and the pale prince, and pried into every corner of the
small chamber.

"See to the wench. She was trampled by a horse but brought me your
message," he growled, and without ceremony he swaggered across the
room, and poured and drained a goblet of strong red wine. Tearing a
plump leg from a platter of roast fowl, he chewed hungrily. Atalis
tugged a bell-rope and gave the girl into the keeping of a silent
slave, who appeared from behind another hanging as if by magic.

"Now, what is this all about?" the Cimmerian demanded, seating himself
on a low bench and wincing from the pain of his gashed thigh. "Who are
you? How do you know my name? And what do you want of me?"

"We have time for talk, but later," Atalis replied. "Eat, drink, and
rest You are wounded"

"Crom take all this delay! We shall talk now."

"Very well. But you must let me cleanse and bind your wound while we
talk!"

The Cimmerian shrugged impatiently and yielded with poor grace to the
philosopher's swift ministrations. As Atalis sponged his gashed thigh,
smeared the gaping wound with a scented salve, and bound it with a
strip of clean cloth, Conan appeased his hunger by wolfing down the
cold spiced meat and drinking deeply of the red wine.

"I know you, although we have never met," Atalis began in a smooth,
soft voice, "because of my crystalthere, on yonder stand by the chair.
Within its depths I can see and hear for a hundred leagues."

"Sorcery?" Conan spat sourly, having the warrior's contempt for all
such magical mummery.

"If you like," Atalis smiled ingratiatingly. "But I am no sorcereronly
a seeker after knowledge. A philosopher, some men call me" His smile
twisted into a terrible grin of agony, and with prickling scalp Conan
watched the philosopher stagger as his foot bent horribly.

"Crom! Are you sick, man?"

Gasping from the pain, Atalis sank into his high-backed chair. "Not
sickcursed. By this fiend who rules us with a dread sceptre of
hell-born magic"

"Munthassem Khan?"

Atalis nodded wearily. "That I am no sorcerer has spared my lifethus
far. For the satrap slew all wizards in Yaralet; I, being but a humble
philosopher, he let live. Yet he suspects that I know something of the
Black Arts and has cursed me with this deadly scourge. It withers up my
body and tortures my nerves, and will end in a convulsion of death, ere
long!" He gestured at the unnaturally twisted limb that lay lifeless
across his lap.

Prince Than gazed with wild eyes at Conan. "I, too, have been cursed by
this hell-spawn, for that I am next to Munthassem Khan in rank and he
thinks I may desire his throne. Me he has tortured in another way: a
sickness of the brainspasms of blindness that come and gowhich will
end by devouring my brain and leaving me a mindless, sightless, mewling
thing!"

"Crom!" Conan swore softly. The philosopher gestured.

"You are our only hope! You alone can save our city from this
black-hearted devil that torments and plagues us!"

Conan stared at him blankly. "I? But I am no wizard, man! What a
warrior can do with cold steel, I can do; but how can I combat this
devil's magic?"

"Listen, Conan of Cimmeria. I will tell you a strange and awful tale"

5. The Hand of Nergal

In the city of Yaralet (said Atalis) when night falls, the people bar
their windows, bolt their doors, and sit shuddering behind these
barriers, praying in terror with candles burning before their household
gods till the clean, wholesome light of dawn etches the squat towers of
the city with living fire against the paling skies.

No archers guard the gates. No watchmen stride the lonely streets. No
thief steals nimbly through the winding alleys, nor do painted sluts
simper and beckon from the dark shadows. For in Yaralet, rogues and
honest folk alike shun the night-shadows: thief, beggar, assassin, and
bedizened wench seek haven in foul-smelling dens or dim-lit taverns.
From dusk to dawn, Yaralet is a city of silence, her black ways empty
and desolate.

It was not always thus. Once this was a bright and prosperous city,
bustling with commerce, with shops and bazaars, filled with happy
people who lived under the strong hand of a wise and gentle
satrapMunthassem Khan. He taxed them lightly, ruling with justice and
mercy, busy with his private collection of antiquities and in the study
of these ancient objects which absorbed his keen, questing mind. The
caravans of slow-pacing camels that wound from the Desert Gate bore
always with them, amongst the merchants, his agents seeking for rare
and curious oddities to purchase for their master's private museum.

Then he changed, and a terrible shadow fell over Yaralet. The satrap
was like one under a powerful and evil spell. Where he had been kind,
he became cruel. Where generous, greedy. Where just and merciful,
secretive, tyrannical, and savage.

Suddenly, the city guard seized mennobles, wealthy merchants, priests,
magicianswho vanished into the pits beneath the satrap's palace, never
to be seen again.

Some whispered that a caravan from the far south had brought to him
something from the depths of demon-haunted Stygia. Few had glimpsed it,
and of those one said shudderingly that the thing was carven with
strange, uncouth hieroglyphs like those seen on the dusty Stygian
tombs. It seemed to cast an evil spell over the satrap, and it lent him
amazing powers of black sorcery. Weird forces shielded him from those
despairing patriots who sought to slay him. Strange crimson lights
blazed in the windows of a tall tower of his palace, where men
whispered that he had converted an empty suite into a grim temple to
some dark and bloody god.

And terror walked the streets of nighted Yaralet, as if summoned from
the realm of death by some awesome, devil-purchased lore.

Exactly what they feared at night, the people did not know. But it was
no vain dream against which they soon came to bolt their doors. Men
hinted at slinking, batlike forms glimpsed from barred windowsof
hovering, shadowy horrors alien to human knowledge, deadly to human
sanity. Tales spread of doorways splintered in the night, of sudden
unearthly cries and shrieks torn from human throatsfollowed by
significant, and utter, silence. And they dared to tell of the rising
sun illuminating broken doors that swung in houses suddenly and
unaccountably empty

The thing from Stygia was the Hand of Nergal.

"It looks," said Atalis softly, "like a clawed hand carven of old
ivory, worked all over with weird glyphs in a forgotten tongue. The
claws clasp a sphere of shadowy, dim crystal. I know that the satrap
has it: I have seen it here" he gestured"in my crystal. For, although
no enchanter, I have learned some of the Dark Arts."

Conan stirred restlessly. "And you know of this thing?"

Atalis smiled faintly. "Know of it? Aye! Old books speak of it and
whisper the dark legend of its bloody history. The blind seer who
penned the Book of Skelos knew it well Nergal's Hand they name it,
shudderingly. They say it fell from the stars into the sunset isles of
the uttermost west, ages upon ages before King Kull rose to bring the
Seven Empires beneath his single standard. Centuries and ages beyond
thought have rolled across the world since first bearded Pictish
fishermen drew it dripping from the deep and stared wonderingly into
its shadowy fires! They bartered it to greedy Atlantean merchants, and
it passed east across the world. The withered, hoary-bearded mages of
elder Thule and dark Grondar probed its mysteries in their towers of
purple and silver. The serpent men of shadow-haunted Valusia peered
into its glimmering depths. With it, Kom-Yazoth whelmed the Thirty
Kings until the Hand turned upon and slew him. For the Book of Skelos
says the Hand brings two gifts unto its possessorfirst, power beyond
all limitthen, death beyond all despair."

Only the calm voice of the philosopher droned through the hushed room,
but the black-headed warrior thought he could hear, as in a dream, the
faint echo of thundering chariots, the clash of steel, the cry of
tormented kings drowned in the clangor of collapsing empires

"When all of the elder world was broken in the Cataclysm and the green
sea rolled in restless fathoms above the shattered spires of lost
Atlantis, and the nations sank one by one in red ruin, the Hand passed
from the knowledge of men. For three thousand years the Hand slept, but
when the young kingdoms of Koth and Ophir awoke and slowly emerged from
the murk of barbarism, the talisman was found. The dark wizard-kings of
grim Acheron plumbed its secrets, and when the lusty Hyborians broke
that cruel kingdom beneath their heel, it passed southwards into dusty
Stygia, where the bloody priests of that black land set it to terrible
purposes in rites of which I dare not speak. It fell, when some swarthy
sorceror was slain, and was buried with him, sleeping away the
centuries but now tomb robbers have roused the Hand of Nergal again,
and it has come into the possession of Munthassem Khan. The temptation
of ultimate and absolute power, which it holds out to all, has
corrupted him, as countless others have been corrupted, who fell
beneath its insidious spell. I fear me, Cimmerian, for all these lands,
now that the Demon's Hand wakes and dark forces walk the earth again"

Atalis' voice died away in whispering silence, and Conan growled
uneasily, bristling.

"Well Crom, man, what have I to do with such matters?" he rumbled.

"You alone can destroy the influence of the talisman over the satrap's
mind!"

The smouldering blue eyes widened. "How?"

"You alone possess the counter-talisman."

"I? You are madI hold no truck with amulets and suchlike magical
trash!"

Atalis stilled him with a lifted palm. "Did you not find a curious
golden object before the battle?" he queried, softly. Conan started.

"Aye, that I didat Bahari, yestereve, as we lay in camp" He plunged
one hand into his pocket-pouch and drew out the smooth, glowing stone.
The philosopher and the prince stared at it, drawing in their breaths.

"The Heart of Tammuz! Yes, the counter-talisman in very truth!"
Heart-shaped it was, and large as a child's fist, worked in golden
amber or perhaps rare yellow jade. It lay there in the Cimmerian's
hand, glowing with soft fires, and he remembered with a prickling of
awe how the healing, tingling warmth of it had driven from his body the
supernatural chill of the bat-winged shadows.

"Come, Conan! We shall accompany you. There is a secret passageway from
this my chamber into the satrap's hallan underground tunnel like that
by which my slave, Hildico, led you under the city streets into my
house. You, armed with the protection of the Heart, shall slay
Munthassem Khan, or destroy the Hand of Nergal. There is no danger, for
he lies deep in a magical slumber, which comes upon him whenever he has
need to summon forth the Shadows of Nergal, as he has already done this
night to overwhelm the Turanian army of King Yildiz. Come!"

Conan strode to the table and drained the last of the wine. Then,
shrugging, muttering an oath to Crom, he followed the limping seer and
the slim prince into a dark opening behind an arras.

In a moment they were gone, and the chamber lay empty and silent as a
grave. The only motion came from flickering lights within the green,
jagged crystal beside the chair. Within its depths one could see the
small figure of Munthassem Khan, lying in a drugged sleep within his
mighty hall.

6. The Heart of Tammuz

They strode through endless darkness. Water dripped from the roof of
the rock-hewn tunnel, and now and then the red eyes of rats gleamed at
them from the tunnel's floor, gleamed and were gone with squeaks of
rage as the small scavengers fled before the footsteps of the strange
beings who invaded their subterranean domain.

Atalis went first, trailing his one good hand along the wet, uneven
cavern wall.

"I would not set this task on you, my young friend," he was saying in a
low whisper. "But it was into your hands the Heart of Tammuz fell, and
I sense a purposea destinyin its choice. There is an affinity between
opposed forces, such as the Dark Power we symbolize as 'Nergal' and the
Power of Light we call Tammuz.' The Heart awoke and, in some manner
beyond knowledge, caused itself to be found; for the Hand was also
awake and working its dread purpose. Thus I commend you to this task,
for the Powers seem to have singled you for this deed hush! We are
beneath the palace now. We are almost there" He drew ahead and stroked
one delicate hand over the rough surface of rock that closed off the
passage. A mass of rock swung silently aside on secret counterweights.
Light burst upon them.

They stood at one end of a vast, shadow-filled hall whose high, vaulted
roof was lost in darkness overhead. In the center of the hall, which
was otherwise empty save for rows of mighty columns, stood a square
dais, and upon the dais, a massive throne of black marble, and upon the
throneMunthassem Khan.

He was of middle years, but thin and wasted, gaunt to the point of
emaciation. Paper-white, unhealthy flesh and shrunken upon his
skull-like face, and dark circles shadowed his hollow eyes. Clasped
across his chest as he lay sprawled in the throne, he held an ivory
rod, like a sceptre. Its end was worked into a demon's claw, grasping a
smoky crystal that pulsed like a living heart with slow fires. Beside
the throne, a dish of brass smoked with a narcotic incense: the dream
lotus whose fumes empowered the sorcerer to release the shadow-demons
of Nergal. Atalis tugged at Conan's arm.

"Seehe still sleeps! The Heart will protect you. Seize the ivory Hand
from him, and all his power will be gone!" Conan growled reluctant
consent, and started forward, his naked sword in one hand. There was
something about this that he did not like. It was too easy

"Ah, gentlemen. I have been expecting you."

On the dais, Munthassem Khan smiled down at them as they froze in
astonishment. His tones were gentle, but a fury of mad rage flamed in
his sick eyes. He lifted the ivory sceptre of power, he gestured

The lights flickered eerily. And suddenly, shockingly, the limping seer
screamed. His muscles contorted in a spasm of unendurable agony. He
fell forward on the marble flags, writhing in pain.

"Crom!"

Prince Than plucked at his rapier, but a gesture of the magic Hand
stayed him. His eyes went blank and dead. Icy sweat started from his
paling brow. He shrieked and sank to his knees, clawing frantically at
his brow as pangs of blinding pain tore through his brain.

"And you, my young barbarian!"

Conan sprang. He moved like a striking panther, burly limbs a blur of
speed. He was upon the first step of the dais before Munthassem Khan
could move. His sword flashed up, wavered, and fell from strengthless
hands. A wave of arctic cold numbed his limbs. It radiated from the
cloudy gem within the ivory claw. He gasped for breath.

The burning eyes of Munthassem Khan blazed into his. The skull-like
face chuckled with a ghastly imitation of mirth.

"The Heart protects, in very truthbut only him who knows how to invoke
its power!" the satrap gloated, chuckling as the Cimmerian strove to
summon strength into his iron limbs again. Conan set his jaw and fought
grimly, savagely against the tide of chill and fetid darkness that
poured in black rays from the demonic crystal and slowly blurred his
mind. Strength drained from his limbs as wine from a slashed wineskin;
he sank to his knees, then slumped at the foot of the dais. He felt his
consciousness shrink to a tiny, lone point of light lost in a vast
abyss of roaring darkness; the last spark of will wavered like a
candle-flame in a gale. Hopeless, yet with the fierce, indominable
determination of his savage breed, he fought on

7. Heart and Hand

A woman screamed. Startled, Munthassem Khan jerked at the unexpected
sound. His attention flickered away from Conanhis focus brokeand in
that brief instant the slim white form of a nude girl with dark
flashing eyes and a black torrent of foaming curls ran on swift feet
across the pave from the shadow of a column to the side of the helpless
Cimmerian.

Through the roaring haze, Conan gaped at her. Hildico?

Swift as thought, she knelt by his side. One white hand dipped into his
pouch and emerged, clutching the Heart of Tammuz. She sprang lithely to
her feet and hurled the counter-talisman at Munthassem Khan.

It caught him full between the eyes with an audible thud. Eyes filming,
he sank bonelessly into the cushioned embrace of his black throne. The
Hand of Nergal slid from nerveless fingers to clank against the marble
step.

In the instant the talisman fell from the satrap's grip, the spell that
bound Atalis and Prince Than in webs of scarlet agony snapped. Pale,
shaken, exhausted, they were whole. And Conan's mighty strength poured
back into his sprawled body. Cursing, he leapt to his feet. One hand
caught Hildico's rounded shoulder and spun her away, out of danger,
while with his other he snatched up his sword from the marble pave.
Poised, he was ready to strike.

But he stopped, blinking with astonishment. At either side of the
satrap's body lay the two talismans. And from both arose weird shapes
of force.

From the Hand of Nergal, a darkly shimmering web of evil radiance
spreada glow of darkness, like the sheen of polished ebony. The foetor
of the Pit was its unholy breath, and the bone-deep chill of
interstellar space was its blighting touch. Before its subtle advance,
the orange glare of the torches faded. It grew larger, fringed with
writhing tentacles of radiant blackness.

But a nimbus of golden glory strengthened about the Heart of Tammuz and
rose, forming a cloud of dazzling amber fire. The warmth of a thousand
honey-hearted springs flowed from it, negating the arctic chill, and
shafts of rich gold light cleaved the inky web of Nergal. The two
cosmic forces met and fought. From this battle of the gods, Conan
retreated with reluctant steps, joining his shaken comrades. He stood
with them, staring with awe at the unimaginable conflict. Trembling,
the nude form of Hildico shrank into the shelter of his arm.

"How did you get here, girl?" he demanded. She smiled wanly, with
frightened eyes.

"I awoke, recovering from my swoon, and came into the Master's chamber,
Ending it empty. But within the Master's crystal of seership I saw your
simulacra enter the satrap's hall and watched as he awoke and faced
you. I, I followedand finding you in his power, chanced all on a try
for the Heart"

"Lucky for all that you did," Conan acknowledged grimly. Atalis
clutched his arm.

"Look!

The golden fog of Tammuz was now a giant, flashing figure of
intolerable light, dimly manlike in configuration but huge as those
Colossi hewn from the stone cliffs of Shem by age-forgotten hands.

The dark shape of Nergal, too, had swelled into giant proportions. It
was now a vast, ebon thing, brutal, hulking, misshapen, more like to
some stupendous ape than manlike. In the foggy hump that was its
brutlelike head, slitted eyes of malignant fire blazed like emerald
stars.

The two forces came together with a thunderous, shattering roar like
colliding worlds. The very walls shook at the fury of their meeting.
Some half-forgotten sense within their flesh told the four that titanic
cosmic forces strove and fought. The air was filled with the bitter
stench of ozone. Foot-long sparks of electric fire crackled and snapped
through the roiling fury as the golden god and the shadowy demon came
together.

Shafts of unendurable brilliance tore through the clotted, struggling
shadow-form. Bolts of blazing glory ripped it into shreds of drifting
darkness. For a moment the dark web enshrouded, and dimmed, the golden
flashing shape but for a moment, only. Another roar of
earth-shattering thunder, and the black one dissolved before the
embrace of intolerable brightness. Then it was gone. And for a moment
the figure of light towered above the dais, consuming it like a funeral
pyrethen it, too, was gone.

Silence reigned in the thunder-riven hall of Munthassem Khan. Upon the
blasted dais, both talismans had vanished whether reduced to atoms by
the fury of the cosmic forces that had been released here, or
transported to some far place to await the next awakening of the beings
they symbolized and contained, none could say.

And the body upon the dais? Naught of it was left, save for a handful
of ashes.

"The heart is always stronger than the hand," Atalis said softly, in
the ringing silence.

Conan reined the great black steed with a rough but masterly hand. It
trembled, eager to be off, hooves ringing on the cobbles. He grinned,
his barbaric blood thrilling to the might of the superb mare. A vast
cloak of crimson silk belled from his broad shoulders, and his coat of
silvered iron mesh mail glittered in the morning light.

"You are determined, then, to leave us, Conan?" asked Prince Than,
resplendent in his robes as new satrap of Yaralet

"Aye! The Satrap's Guard is a tame place, and I hunger for this new war
King Yildiz is mounting against the hill tribes. A week of inaction,
and I've had a bellyfull of peace! So fare you well, Than, Atalis!"

He tugged sharply on the reins, drawing the black mare about, and
cantered out of the courtyard of the seer's house, while Atalis and the
prince watched benignly.

"Odd that a mercenary like Conan would accept less in payment than he
could get," the new satrap commented. "I offered him a chest full of
goldenough to support him for life. But he would take only one small
sack, together with the horse he found on the battlefield and his pick
of arms and garments. Too much gold, he said, would only slow him
down."

Atalis shruggedthen smiled, pointing to the far end of the courtyard.
A slim Brythunian girl with long mane of black curls appeared in a
doorway. She came up to Conan, who drew the mare to a halt; he bent to
speak with her. They exchanged a few words; then he reached down and
caught her supple waist and swung her up before him onto the saddle.
She sat sideways, clinging with both arms to his burly neck, her face
buried in his breast.

He swung about, flung up one brawny arm, grinned back at them in
farewell, and rode off with the lithe girl clasped before him.

Atalis chuckled. "Some men fight for things other than gold," he
observed.

