`Nabonidus! The Red Priest!’ ejaculated Murilo, his brain a dizzy vortex of whirling amazement. `Then who – what-?’
The priest groaned and stirred. With cat-like quickness Conan bent over him, poniard poised above his heart. Murilo caught his wrist.
`Wait! Don’t kill him yet-‘
`Why not?’ demanded the Cimmerian. `He has cast off his were-guise, and sleeps. Will you awaken him to tear us to pieces?’
`No, wait!’ urged Murilo, trying to collect his jumbled wits. `Look! He is not sleeping – see that great blue welt on his shaven temple? He has been knocked senseless. He may have been lying here for hours.’
`I thought you swore you saw him in beastly shape in the
house above,’ said Conan. _
`I did! Or else – he’s coming to! Keep back your blade, Conan; there is a mystery here even darker than I thought. I must have words with this priest, before we kill him.’
Nabonidus lifted a hand vaguely to his bruised temple, mumbled, and opened his eyes. For an instant they were blank and empty of intelligence; then life came back to them with a jerk, and he sat up, staring at the companions. Whatever terrific jolt had temporarily addled his razor-keen brain, it was functioning with its accustomed vigor again. His eyes shot swiftly about him, then came back to rest on Murilo’s face.
`You honor my poor house, young sir,’ he laughed coolly, glancing at the great figure that loomed behind the young nobleman’s shoulder. `You have brought a bravo, I see. Was your sword not sufficient to sever the life of my humble self?’
`Enough of this,’ impatiently returned Murilo. `How long have you lain here?’
`A peculiar question to put to a man recovering consciousness,’ answered the priest. `I do not know what time it now is. But it lacked an hour or so of midnight when I was set upon.’
`Then who is it that masquerades in your own gown in the house above?’ demanded Murilo.
`That will be Thak,’ answered Nabonidus, ruefully fingering his bruises. `Yes, that will be Thak. And in my gown? The dog!’
Conan, who comprehended none of this, stirred restlessly, and growled something in his own tongue. Nabonidus glanced at him whimsically.
`Your bully’s knife yearns for my heart, Murilo,’ he said. `I thought you might be wise enough to take my warning and leave the city.’
`How was I to know that was to be granted me?’ returned Murilo. `At any rate, my interests are here.’
`You are in good company with that cutthroat,’ murmured Nabonidus. `I had suspected you for some time. That was why I caused that pallid court secretary to disappear. Before he died he told me many things, among others the name of the young nobleman who bribed him to filch state secrets, which the nobleman in turn sold to rival powers. Are you not ashamed of yourself, Murilo, you white-handed thief?’
`I have no more cause for shame than you, you vulture-hearted plunderer,’ answered Murilo promptly. `You exploit a whole kingdom for your personal greed, and under the guise of disinterested statesmanship, you swindle the king, beggar the rich, oppress the poor, and sacrifice the whole future of the nation for your ruthless ambition. You are no more than a fat hog with his snout in the trough. You are a greater thief than I am. This Cimmerian is the most honest man of the three of us, because he steals and murders openly.’
`Well, then, we are all rogues together,’ agreed Nabonidus equably. `And what now? My life?’
`When I saw the ear of the secretary that had disappeared, I knew I was doomed,’ said Murilo abruptly, `and I believed you would invoke the authority of the king. Was I right?’
`Quite so,’ answered the priest. `A court secretary is easy to do away with, but you are a bit too prominent. I had intended telling the king a jest about you in the morning.’
`A jest that would have cost me my head,’ muttered Murilo. `Then the king is unaware of my foreign enterprises?’
`As yet,’ sighed Nabonidus. `And now, since I see your companion has his knife, I fear that jest will never be told.’
`You should know how to get out of these rat-dens,’ said Murilo. `Suppose I agree to spare your life. Will you help us to escape, and swear to keep silent about my thievery?’
`When did a priest keep an oath?’ complained Conan, comprehending the trend of the conversation. `Let me cut his throat; I want to see what color his blood is. They say in The Maze that his heart is black, so his blood must be black too-‘
`Be quiet,’ whispered Murilo. `If he does not show us the way out of these pits, we may rot here. Well, Nabonidus, what do you say?’
`What does a wolf with his leg in the trap say?’ laughed the priest. `I am in your power and if we are to escape, we must aid one another. I swear, if we survive this adventure, to forget all your shifty dealings. I swear by the soul of Mitra!’
`I am satisfied,’ muttered Murilo. `Even the Red Priest would not break that oath. Now to get out of here. My friend here entered by way of the tunnel, but a grille fell behind him and blocked the way. Can you cause it to be lifted?’
`Not from these pits,’ answered the priest. `The control lever is in the chamber above the tunnel. There is only one other way out of these pits, which I will show you. But tell me, how did you come here?’
Murilo told him in a few words, and Nabonidus nodded, rising stiffly. He limped down the corridor, which here widened into a sort of vast chamber, and approached the distant silver disk. As they advanced the light increased, though it never became anything but a dim shadowy radiance. Near the disk they saw a narrow stair leading upward.
`That is the other exit,’ said Nabonidus. `And I strongly doubt if the door at the head is bolted. But I have an idea that he who would go through that door had better cut his own throat first. Look into the disk.’
What had seemed a silver plate was in reality a great mirror set in the wall. A confusing system of copper-like tubes jutted out from the wall about it, bending down toward it at right angles. Glancing into these tubes, Murilo saw a bewildering array of smaller mirrors. He turned his attention to the larger mirror in the wall, and ejaculated in amazement. Peering over his shoulder, Conan grunted.
They seemed to be looking through a broad window into a well-lighted chamber. There were broad mirrors on the walls, with velvet hangings between; there were silken couches, chairs of ebony and ivory, and curtained doorways leading off from the chamber. And before one doorway which was not curtained, sat a bulky black object that contrasted grotesquely with the richness of the chamber.
Murilo felt his blood freeze again as he looked at the horror which seemed to be staring directly into his eyes. Involuntarily he recoiled from the mirror, while Conan thrust his head truculently forward, till his jaws almost touched the surface, growling some threat or defiance in his own barbaric tongue.
`In Mitra’s name, Nabonidus,’ gasped Murilo, shaken, `what is it?’
`That is Thak,’ answered the priest, caressing his temple. `Some would call him an ape, but he is almost as different from a real ape as he is different from a real man. His people dwell far to the east, in the mountains that fringe the eastern frontiers of Zamora. There are not many of them, but if they are not exterminated, I believe they will become human beings, in perhaps a hundred thousand years. They are in the formative stage; they are neither apes, as their remote ancestors were, nor men, as their remote descendants may be. They dwell in the high crags of well-nigh inaccessible mountains, knowing nothing of fire or the making of shelter or garments, or the use of weapons. Yet they have a language of a sort, consisting mainly of grunts and clicks.
`I took Thak when he was a cub, and he learned what I taught him much more swiftly and thoroughly than any true animal could have done. He was at once bodyguard and servant. But I forgot that being partly a man, he could not be submerged into a mere shadow of myself, like a true animal. Apparently his semi-brain retained impressions of hate, resentment, and some sort of bestial ambition of its own.
`At any rate, he struck when I least expected it. Last night he appeared to go suddenly mad. His actions had all the appearance of bestial insanity, yet I know that they must have been the result of long and careful planning.
`I heard a sound of fighting in the garden, and going to investigate – for I believed it was yourself, being dragged down by my watch-dog – I saw Thak emerge from the shrubbery dripping with blood. Before I was aware of his intention, he sprang at me with an awful scream and struck me senseless. I remember no more, but can only surmise that, following some whim of his semi-human brain, he stripped me of my gown and cast me still living into the pit – for which reason, only the gods can guess. He must have killed the dog when he came from the garden, and after he struck me down, he evidently killed Joka, as you saw the man lying dead in the house. Joka would have come to my aid, even against Thak, whom he always hated.’