Part 18 (1/2)

As if the voice roused a spark of life in the twisted breast Zorathus rolled his bloodshot eyes toward the speaker

'Only Valbroso will I tell,' he gasped in Zingaran 'Death is upon me Lean close to me, Valbroso!'

The count did so, his dark face lit with avarice; behind him his saturnine captain, Beloso, crowded closer

'Press the seven skulls on the riasped Zorathus 'Press then the head of the dragon that writhes across the lid Then press the sphere in the dragon's claws That will release the secret catch'

'Quick, the box!' cried Valbroso with an oath

Conan lifted it and set it on a dais, and Valbroso shouldered hi forward

Valbroso cursed hi in his black eyes

'None but me shall open it!' he cried

Conan, whose hand had instinctively gone to his hilt, glanced at Zorathus The lazed and bloodshot, but they were fixed on Valbroso with burning intensity; and was there the shadow of a gri iven up the secret Conan turned to watch Valbroso, even as the dyingthe ri branches of strange trees An inlaid dragon writhed its way across the top of the lid a haste, and as he jaon he swore sharply and snatched his hand away, shaking it in irritation

'A sharp point on the carvings,' he snarled 'I've pricked on's talons, and the lid flew abruptly open Their eyes were dazzled by a golden flame It seelowing fire that spilled over the ri flakes Beloso cried out and Valbroso sucked in his breath Conan stood speechless, his brain snared by the blaze

'Mitra, what a jewel!' Valbroso's hand dived into the chest, ca crilare Valbroso looked like a corpse And the dying hed wildly and suddenly

'Fool!' he screaive you death with it! The scratch on your thuon's head, Valbroso!'

They all wheeled, stared So, carved !' shrieked Zorathus 'Steeped in the venoian scorpion! Fool, fool to open the box of Zorathus with your naked hand! Death! You are a dead man now!'

And with bloody foa out 'Ah, Mitra, I burn!' he shrieked 'My veins race with liquid fire! My joints are bursting asunder! Death! Death!' And he reeled and crashed headlong There was an instant of awful convulsions, in which the limbs were twisted into hideous and unnatural positions, and then in that posture the htlessly upward, his lips drawn back fro to pick up the jehere it rolled on the floor fro pool of sunset fire

'Dead!' muttered Beloso, with ht off guard, his eyes dazzled, his brain dazed by the blaze of the great ge crashed with terrible force upon his hellow of the jeas splashed with redder flame, and he went to his knees under the blow

He heard a rush of feet, a bellow of ox-like agony He was stunned but not wholly senseless, and realized that Beloso had caught up the iron box and crashed it down on his head as he stooped Only his basinet had saved his skull He staggered up, drawing his sword, trying to shake the diaze But the door was open and fleet footsteps were dwindling down the winding stair On the floor the brutish torturer was gasping out his life with a great gash under his breast And the Heart of Ahrione

Conan reeled out of the cha down his face fro a clang of steel in the courtyard below, shouts, then the frantic dru into the bailey he saw theabout confusedly, while woate stood open and a soldier lay across his pike with his head split Horses, still bridled and saddled, ran neighing about the court, Conan's black stallion a her hands as she rushed brainlessly about 'He caht and left! Beloso's o?' roared Conan