Red Nails
themselves with burning intensity on Valeria. She was tall and lithe, by
far the most beautiful woman in the room. She was clad more scantily
even than the others; for instead of a skirt she wore merely a broad
strip of gilt-worked purple cloth fastened to the middle of her girdle
which fell below her knees. Another strip at the back of her girdle
completed that part of her costume, which she wore with a cynical
indifference. Her breast-plates and the circlet about her temples were
adorned with gems. In her eyes alone of all the dark-skinned people
there lurked no brooding gleam of madness. She spoke no word after her
first exclamation; she stood tensely, her hands clenched, staring at
Valeria.
The man on the ivory seat had not risen.
"Prince Olmec," spoke Techotl, bowing low, with arms outspread and the
palms of his hands turned upward, "I bring allies from the world beyond
the forest. In the Chamber of Tezcoti the Burning Skull slew Chicmec, my
companion----"
"The Burning Skull!" It was a shuddering whisper of fear from the people
of Tecuhltli.
"Aye! Then came I, and found Chicmec lying with his throat cut. Before I
could flee, the Burning Skull came upon me, and when I looked upon it my
blood became as ice and the marrow of my bones melted. I could neither
fight nor run. I could only await the stroke. Then came this
white-skinned woman and struck him down with her sword; and lo, it was
only a dog of Xotalanc with white paint upon his skin and the living
skull of an ancient wizard upon his head! Now that skull lies in many
pieces, and the dog who wore it is a dead man!"
An indescribably fierce exultation edged the last sentence, and was
echoed in the low, savage exclamations from the crowding listeners.
"But wait!" exclaimed Techotl. "There is more! While I talked with the
woman, four Xotalancas came upon us! One I slew--there is the stab in my
thigh to prove how desperate was the fight. Two the woman killed. But we
were hard pressed when this man came into the fray and split the skull
of the fourth! Aye! Five crimson nails there are to be driven into the
pillar of vengeance!"
He pointed at a black column of ebony which stood behind the dais.
Hundreds of red dots scarred its polished surface--the bright scarlet
heads of heavy copper nails driven into the black wood.
"Five red nails for five Xotalanca lives!" exulted Techotl, and the
horrible exultation in the faces of the listeners made them inhuman.
"Who are these people?" asked Olmec, and his voice was like the low,
deep rumble of a distant bull. None of the people of Xuchotl spoke
loudly. It was as if they had absorbed into their souls the silence of
the empty halls and deserted chambers.
"I am Conan, a Cimmerian," answered the barbarian briefly. "This woman
is Valeria of the Red Brotherhood, an Aquilonian pirate. We are
deserters from an army on the Darfar border, far to the north, and are
trying to reach the coast."
The woman on the dais spoke loudly, her words tripping in her haste.
"You can never reach the coast! There is no escape from Xuchotl! You
will spend the rest of your lives in this city!"
"What do you mean?" growled Conan, clapping his hand to his hilt and
stepping about so as to face both the dais and the rest of the room.
"Are you telling us we're prisoners?"
"She did not mean that," interposed Olmec. "We are your friends. We
would not restrain you against your will. But I fear other circumstances
will make it impossible for you to leave Xuchotl."
His eyes flickered to Valeria, and he lowered them quickly.
"This woman is Tascela," he said. "She is a princess of Tecuhltli. But
let food and drink be brought our guests. Doubtless they are hungry, and
weary from their long travels."
He indicated an ivory table, and after an exchange of glances, the
adventurers seated themselves. The Cimmerian was suspicious. His fierce
blue eyes roved about the chamber, and he kept his sword close to his
hand. But an invitation to eat and drink never found him backward. His
eyes kept wandering to Tascela, but the princess had eyes only for his
white-skinned companion.
* * * * *
Techotl, who had bound a strip of silk about his wounded thigh, placed
himself at the table to attend to the wants of his friends, seeming to
consider it a privilege and honor to see after their needs. He inspected
the food and drink the others brought in gold vessels and dishes, and
tasted each before he placed it before his guests. While they ate, Olmec
sat in silence on his ivory seat, watching them from under his broad
black brows. Tascela sat beside him, chin cupped in her hands and her
elbows resting on her knees. Her dark, enigmatic eyes, burning with a
mysterious light, never left Valeria's supple figure. Behind her seat a
sullen handsome girl waved an ostrich-plume fan with a slow rhythm.
The food was fruit of an exotic kind unfamiliar to the wanderers, but
very palatable, and the drink was a light crimson wine that carried a
heady tang.
"You have come from afar," said Olmec at last. "I have read the books of
our fathers. Aquilonia lies beyond the lands of the Stygians and the
Shemites, beyond Argos and Zingara; and Cimmeria lies beyond Aquilonia."
"We have each a roving foot," answered Conan carelessly.
"How you won through the forest is a wonder to me," quoth Olmec. "In
bygone days a thousand fighting-men scarcely were able to carve a road
through its perils."
"We encountered a bench-legged monstrosity about the size of a
mastodon," said Conan casually, holding out his wine goblet which
Techotl filled with evident pleasure. "But when we'd killed it we had no
further trouble."
The wine vessel slipped from Techotl's hand to crash on the floor. His
dusky skin went ashy. Olmec started to his feet, an image of stunned
amazement, and a low gasp of awe or terror breathed up from the others.
Some slipped to their knees as if their legs would not support them.
Only Tascela seemed not to have heard. Conan glared about him
bewilderedly.
"What's the matter? What are you gaping about?"
"You--you slew the dragon-god?"
"God? I killed a dragon. Why not? It was trying to gobble us up."
"But dragons are immortal!" exclaimed Olmec. "They slay each other, but
no man ever killed a dragon! The thousand fighting-men of our ancestors
who fought their way to Xuchotl could not prevail against them! Their
swords broke like twigs against their scales!"
"If your ancestors had thought to dip their spears in the poisonous
juice of Derketa's Apples," quoth Conan, with his mouth full, "and jab
them in the eyes or mouth or somewhere like that, they'd have seen that
dragons are not more immortal than any other chunk of beef. The carcass
lies at the edge of the trees, just within the forest. If you don't
believe me, go and look for yourself."
Olmec shook his head, not in disbelief but in wonder.
"It was because of the dragons that our ancestors took refuge in
Xuchotl," said he. "They dared not pass through the plain and plunge
into the forest beyond. Scores of them were seized and devoured by the
monsters before they could reach the city."
"Then your ancestors didn't build Xuchotl?" asked Valeria.
"It was ancient when they first came into the land. How long it had
stood here, not even its degenerate inhabitants knew."
"Your people came from Lake Zuad?" questioned Conan.
"Aye. More than half a century ago a tribe of the Tlazitlans rebelled
against the Stygian king, and, being defeated in battle, fled southward.
For many weeks they wandered over grasslands, desert and hills, and at
last they came into the great forest, a thousand fighting-men with their
women and children.
"It was in the forest that the dragons fell upon them, and tore many to
pieces; so the people fled in a frenzy of fear before them, and at last
came into the plain and saw the city of Xuchotl in the midst of it.
"They camped before the city, not daring to leave the plain, for the
night was made hideous with the noise of the battling monsters
throughout the forest. They made war incessantly upon one another. Yet
they came not into the plain.
"The people of the city shut their gates and shot arrows at our people
from the walls. The Tlazitlans were imprisoned on the plain, as if the
ring of the forest had been a great wall; for to venture into the woods
would have been madness.
"That night there came secretly to their camp a slave from the city, one
of their own blood, who with a band of exploring soldiers had wandered
into the forest long before, when he was a young man. The dragons had
devoured all his companions, but he had been taken into the city to
dwell in servitude. His name was Tolkemec." A flame lighted the dark
eyes at mention of the name, and some of the people muttered obscenely
and spat. "He promised to open the gates to the warriors. He asked only
that all captives taken be delivered into his hands.
"At dawn he opened the gates. The warriors swarmed in and the halls of
Xuchotl ran red. Only a few hundred folk dwelt there, decaying remnants
of a once great race. Tolkemec said they came from the east, long ago,
from Old Kosala, when the ancestors of those who now dwell in Kosala
came up from the south and drove forth the original inhabitants of the
land. They wandered far westward and finally found this forest-girdled
plain, inhabited then by a tribe of black people.
"These they enslaved and set to building a city. From the hills to the
east they brought jade and marble and lapis lazuli, and gold, silver and
copper. Herds of elephants provided them with ivory. When their city was
completed, they slew all the black slaves. And their magicians made a
terrible magic to guard the city; for by their necromantic arts they
re-created the dragons which had once dwelt in this lost land, and whose
monstrous bones they found in the forest. Those bones they clothed in
flesh and life, and the living beasts walked the earth as they walked it
when Time was young. But the wizards wove a spell that kept them in the
forest and they came not into the plain.
* * * * *
"So for many centuries the people of Xuchotl dwelt in their city,
cultivating the fertile plain, until their wise men learned how to grow
fruit within the city--fruit which is not planted in soil, but obtains
its nourishment out of the air--and then they let the irrigation ditches
run dry, and dwelt more and more in luxurious sloth, until decay seized
them. They were a dying race when our ancestors broke through the forest
and came into the plain. Their wizards had died, and the people had
forgot their ancient necromancy. They could fight neither by sorcery nor
the sword.
"Well, our fathers slew the people of Xuchotl, all except a hundred
which were given living into the hands of Tolkemec, who had been their
slave; and for many days and nights the halls re-echoed to their screams
under the agony of his tortures.
"So the Tlazitlans dwelt here, for a while in peace, ruled by the
brothers Tecuhltli and Xotalanc, and by Tolkemec. Tolkemec took a girl
of the tribe to wife, and because he had opened the gates, and because
he knew many of the arts of the Xuchotlans, he shared the rule of the
tribe with the brothers who had led the rebellion and the flight.
"For a few years, then, they dwelt at peace within the city, doing
little but eating, drinking and making love, and raising children. There
was no necessity to till the plain, for Tolkemec taught them how to
cultivate the air-devouring fruits. Besides, the slaying of the
Xuchotlans broke the spell that held the dragons in the forest, and they
came nightly and bellowed about the gates of the city. The plain ran red