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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/77605-h/77605-h.htm b/77605-h/77605-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3e19afc --- /dev/null +++ b/77605-h/77605-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,2335 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> +<head> + <meta charset="UTF-8"> + <title> + The Moon of Skulls | Project Gutenberg + </title> + <link rel="icon" href="images/cover.jpg" type="image/x-cover"> + <style> + +body { + margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; +} + + h1,h2 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; +} + +p { + margin-top: .51em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .49em; +} + +hr { + width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: 33.5%; + margin-right: 33.5%; + clear: both; +} + +hr.tb {width: 45%; margin-left: 27.5%; margin-right: 27.5%;} +hr.chap {width: 65%; margin-left: 17.5%; margin-right: 17.5%;} +@media print { hr.chap {display: none; visibility: hidden;} } +hr.full {width: 95%; margin-left: 2.5%; margin-right: 2.5%;} +div.chapter {page-break-before: always;} + +x-ebookmaker-drop {display: none;} + +.center {text-align: center;} + +.right {text-align: right;} + +/* Images */ +.figcenter { + margin: auto; + text-align: center; + page-break-inside: avoid; + max-width: 100%; +} + +.caption p +{ + text-align: center; + text-indent: 0; + margin: 0.25em 0; + font-weight: bold; +} + +div.titlepage { + text-align: center; + page-break-before: always; + page-break-after: always; +} + +div.titlepage p { + text-align: center; + text-indent: 0em; + font-weight: bold; + line-height: 1.5; + margin-top: 3em; +} + +/* Poetry */ +.poetry-container {display: flex; justify-content: center;} +.poetry-container {text-align: center;} +.poetry {text-align: left; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 5%;} +.poetry .stanza {margin: 1em auto;} +.poetry .verse {text-indent: -3em; padding-left: 3em;} +.poetry .indent0 {text-indent: -3em;} +.poetry .indent2 {text-indent: -2em;} +.poetry .indent6 {text-indent: 6em;} + +.ph1 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; } +.ph1 { font-size: x-large; margin: .83em auto; } + +.ph2 { text-align: center; text-indent: 0em; } +.ph2 { font-size: medium; margin: .83em auto; } + + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div style='text-align:center'>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77605 ***</div> + +<div class="figcenter x-ebookmaker-drop"> + <img src="images/illusc.jpg" alt="cover"> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="titlepage"> + +<h1>The Moon of Skulls</h1> + +<p class="ph1">By ROBERT E HOWARD</p> + +<p>[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from<br> +Weird Tales June and July 1930.]</p> + +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="figcenter"> + <img src="images/illus1.jpg" alt=""> + <div class="caption"> + <p>"The giant's roar of triumph had scarcely died on his +lips before the two were falling into darkness."</p> + </div> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p class="ph2"><i>1. A Man Comes Seeking</i></p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"The wise men know what wicked things</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Are written on the sky;</div> + <div class="verse indent0">They trim sad lamps, they touch sad strings</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Hearing the heavy purple wings,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Where the forgotten Seraph kings</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Still plot how God shall die."</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent6">—Chesterton.</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + + +<p>A great black shadow lay across the land, cleaving the red flame of +the sunset. To the man who toiled up the jungle trail it loomed like +a symbol of death and horror, a menace brooding and terrible, like the +shadow of a stealthy assassin flung upon some candle-lit wall.</p> + +<p>Yet it was only the shadow of the great crag which reared up in front +of him, the first outpost of the grim foothills which were his goal. +He halted a moment at its foot, staring upward where it rose blackly +limned against the dying sun. He could have sworn that he caught the +hint of a movement at the top, as he stared, hand shielding his eyes, +but the fading glare dazzled him and he could not be sure. Was it a man +who darted to cover? A man, or——?</p> + +<p>He shrugged his shoulders and fell to examining the rough trail which +led up and over the brow of the crag. At first glance it seemed that +only a mountain goat could scale it, but closer investigation showed +numbers of fingerholds drilled into the solid rock. It would be a task +to try his powers to the utmost but he had not come a thousand miles to +turn back now.</p> + +<p>He dropped the large pouch he wore at his shoulder, and laid down the +clumsy musket, retaining only his long rapier, dagger, and one of his +pistols. These he strapped behind him, and without a backward glance +over the darkening trail he had come, he started the long ascent. He +was a tall man, long-armed and iron-muscled, yet again and again he was +forced to halt in his upward climb and rest for a moment, clinging like +an ant to the precipitous face of the cliff. Night fell swiftly and +the crag above him was a shadowy blur in which he was forced to feel +with his fingers, blindly, for the holes which served him as precarious +ladder. Below him, the night noises of the tropical jungle broke forth, +yet it appeared to him that even these sounds were subdued and hushed +as though the great black hills looming above threw a spell of silence +and fear even over the jungle creatures.</p> + +<p>On up he struggled, and now to make his way harder, the cliff bulged +outward near its summit and the strain on nerve and muscle became +heart-breaking. Time and again a hold slipped and he escaped falling +by a hair's breadth. But every fiber in his lean hard body was +perfectly co-ordinated, and his fingers were like steel talons with +the grip of a vise. His progress grew slower and slower but on he went +until at last he saw the cliff's brow splitting the stars a scant +twenty feet above him.</p> + +<p>And even as he looked, a vague bulk heaved into view, toppled on the +edge and hurtled down toward him with a great rush of air about it. +Flesh crawling, he flattened himself against the cliff's face and felt +a heavy blow against his shoulder, only a glancing blow, but even so it +nearly tore him from his hold, and as he fought desperately to right +himself, he heard a reverberating crash among the rocks far below. +Cold sweat beading his brow, he looked up. Who—or what—had shoved +that boulder over the cliff edge? He was brave, as the bones on many +a battlefield could testify, but the thought of dying like a sheep, +helpless and with no chance of resistance, turned his blood cold.</p> + +<p>Then a wave of fury supplanted his fear and he renewed his climb with +reckless speed. The expected second boulder did not come, however, and +no living thing met his sight as he clambered up over the edge and +leaped erect, sword flashing from its scabbard.</p> + +<p>He stood upon a sort of plateau which debouched into a very broken +hilly country some half mile to the west. The crag he had just mounted +jutted out from the rest of the heights like a sullen promontory, +looming above the sea of waving foliage below, now dark and mysterious +in the tropic night.</p> + +<p>Silence ruled here in absolute sovereignty. No breeze stirred the +somber depths below, and no footfall rustled amid the stunted bushes +which cloaked the plateau, yet that boulder which had almost hurled the +climber to his death had not fallen by chance. What beings moved among +these grim hills? The tropical darkness fell about the lone wanderer +like a heavy veil through which the yellow stars blinked evilly. The +steams of the rotting jungle vegetation floated up to him as tangible +as a thick fog, and making a wry face he strode away from the cliff, +heading boldly across the plateau, sword in one hand and pistol in the +other.</p> + +<p>There was an uncomfortable feeling of being watched in the very air. +The silence remained unbroken save for the soft swishing that marked +the stranger's cat-like tread through the tall upland grass, yet the +man sensed that living things glided before and behind him and on each +side. Whether man or beast trailed him he knew not, nor did he care +over-much, for he was prepared to fight human or devil who barred his +way. Occasionally he halted and glanced challengingly about him, but +nothing met his eye except the shrubs which crouched like short dark +ghosts about his trail, blended and blurred in the thick hot darkness +through which the very stars seemed to struggle, redly.</p> + +<p>At last he came to the place where the plateau broke into the higher +slopes and there he saw a clump of trees blocked out solidly in the +lesser shadows. He approached warily, then halted as his gaze, growing +somewhat accustomed to the darkness, made out a vague form among the +somber trunks which was not a part of them. He hesitated. The figure +neither advanced nor fled. A dim form of silent menace, it lurked as if +in wait. A brooding horror hung over that still cluster of trees.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>The stranger advanced warily, blade extended. Closer. Straining his +eyes for some hint of threatening motion. He decided that the figure +was human but he was puzzled at its lack of movement. Then the reason +became apparent—it was the corpse of a black man that stood among +those trees, held erect by spears through his body, nailing him to the +boles. One arm was extended in front of him, held in place along a +great branch by a dagger through the wrist, the index finger straight +as if the corpse pointed stiffly—back along the way the stranger had +come.</p> + +<p>The meaning was obvious; that mute grim signpost could have but one +significance—death lay beyond. The man who stood gazing upon that +grisly warning rarely laughed, but now he allowed himself the luxury +of a sardonic smile. A thousand miles of land and sea—ocean travel +and jungle travel—and now they expected to turn him back with such +mummery—whoever they were.</p> + +<p>He resisted the temptation to salute the corpse, as an action wanting +in decorum, and pushed on boldly through the grove, half expecting an +attack from the rear or an ambush.</p> + +<p>Nothing of the sort occurred, however, and emerging from the trees, he +found himself at the foot of a rugged incline, the first of a series of +slopes. He strode stolidly upward in the night, nor did he even pause +to reflect how unusual his actions must have appeared to a sensible +man. The average man would have camped at the foot of the crag and +waited for morning before even attempting to scale the cliffs. But this +was no ordinary man. Once his objective was in sight, he followed the +straightest line to it, without a thought of obstacles, whether day or +night. What was to be done, must be done. He had reached the outposts +of the kingdom of fear at dusk, and invading its inmost recesses by +night seemed to follow as a matter of course.</p> + +<p>As he went up the boulder-strewn slopes the moon rose, lending its air +of illusion, and in its light the broken hills ahead loomed up like +the black spires of wizards' castles. He kept his eyes fixed on the +dim trail he was following, for he knew not when another boulder might +come hurtling down the inclines. He expected an attack of any sort and, +naturally, it was the unexpected which really happened.</p> + +<p>Suddenly from behind a great rock stepped a black man; an ebony giant +in the pale moonlight, a long spear blade gleaming silver in hand, his +headpiece of ostrich plumes floating above him like a white cloud. He +lifted the spear in a ponderous salute, and spoke in the dialect of the +river-tribes:</p> + +<p>"This is not the white man's land. Who is my white brother in his own +kraal and why does he come into the Land of Skulls?"</p> + +<p>"My name is Solomon Kane," the white man answered in the same language. +"I seek the vampire queen of Negari."</p> + +<p>"Few seek. Fewer find. None return," answered the other cryptically.</p> + +<p>"Will you lead me to her?"</p> + +<p>"You bear a long dagger in your right hand. There are no lions here."</p> + +<p>"A serpent dislodged a boulder. I thought to find snakes in the bushes."</p> + +<p>The giant acknowledged this interchange of subtleties with a grim smile +and a brief silence fell.</p> + +<p>"Your life," said the black presently, "is in my hand."</p> + +<p>Kane smiled thinly. "I carry the lives of many warriors in <i>my</i> hand."</p> + +<p>The negro's gaze traveled uncertainly up and down the shimmery length +of the Englishman's sword. Then he shrugged his mighty shoulders and +let his spear point sink to the earth.</p> + +<p>"You bear no gifts," said he; "but follow me and I will lead you to the +Terrible One, the Mistress of Doom, the Red Woman, Nakari, who rules +the land of Negari."</p> + +<p>He stepped aside and motioned Kane to precede him, but the Englishman, +his mind on a spear-thrust in the back, shook his head.</p> + +<p>"Who am I that I should walk in front of my brother? We be two +chiefs—let us walk side by side."</p> + +<p>In his heart Kane railed that he should be forced to use such unsavory +diplomacy with a black savage, but he showed no sign. The giant +bowed with a certain barbaric majesty and together they went up the +hill trail, unspeaking. Kane was aware that men were stepping from +hiding-places and falling in behind them, and a surreptitious glance +over his shoulder showed him some two score black warriors trailing out +behind them in two wedge-shaped lines. The moonlight glittered on sleek +black bodies, on waving head-gears and long cruel spear blades.</p> + +<p>"My brothers are like leopards," said Kane courteously; "they lie in +the low bushes and no eyes see them; they steal through the high grass +and no man hears their coming."</p> + +<p>The black chief acknowledged the compliment with a courtly inclination +of his lion-like head, that set the plumes whispering.</p> + +<p>"The mountain leopard is our brother, oh chieftain. Our feet are like +drifting smoke but our arms are like iron. When they strike, blood +drips red and men die."</p> + +<p>Kane sensed an undercurrent of menace in the tone. There was no actual +hint of threat on which he might base his suspicions, but the sinister +minor note was there. He said no more for a space and the strange +band moved silently upward in the moonlight like a cavalcade of black +specters led by a white ghost. The trail grew steeper and more rocky, +winding in and out among crags and gigantic boulders. Suddenly a great +chasm opened before them, spanned by a natural bridge of rock, at the +foot of which the leader halted.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Kane stared at the abyss curiously. It was some forty feet wide, +and looking down, his gaze was swallowed by impenetrable blackness, +hundreds of feet deep, he knew. On the other side rose crags dark and +forbidding.</p> + +<p>"Here," said the black chief, "begin the true borders of Nakari's +realm."</p> + +<p>Kane was aware that the warriors were casually closing in on him. His +fingers instinctively tightened about the hilt of the rapier which he +had not sheathed. The air was suddenly supercharged with tension.</p> + +<p>"Here, too," the black man said, "they who bring no gifts to +Nakari—<i>die!</i>"</p> + +<p>The last word was a shriek, as if the thought had transformed the +speaker into a maniac, and as he screamed it, the great black arm went +back and then forward with a ripple of mighty muscles, and the long +spear leaped at Kane's breast.</p> + +<p>Only a born fighter could have avoided that thrust. Kane's instinctive +action saved his life—the great blade grazed his ribs as he swayed +aside and returned the blow with a flashing thrust that killed a +warrior who jostled between him and the chief at that instant.</p> + +<p>Spears flashed in the moonlight and Kane, parrying one and bending +under the thrust of another, sprang out upon the narrow bridge where +only one could come at him at a time.</p> + +<p>None cared to be first. They stood upon the brink and thrust at him, +crowding forward when he retreated, giving back when he pressed them. +Their spears were longer than his rapier but he more than made up for +the difference and the great odds by his scintillant skill and the cold +ferocity of his attack.</p> + +<p>They wavered back and forth and then suddenly a black giant leaped +from among his fellows and charged out upon the bridge like a wild +buffalo, shoulders hunched, spear held low, eyes gleaming with a look +not wholly sane. Kane leaped back before the onslaught, leaped back +again, striving to avoid that stabbing spear and to find an opening +for his point. He sprang to one side and found himself reeling on the +edge of the bridge with eternity gaping beneath him. The blacks yelled +in savage exultation as he swayed and fought for his balance, and the +giant on the bridge roared and plunged at the rocking white man.</p> + +<p>Kane parried with all his strength—a feat few swordsman could have +accomplished, off balance as he was—saw the cruel spear blade flash by +his cheek—felt himself falling backward into the abyss. A desperate +effort, and he gripped the spear shaft, righted himself and ran the +spearman through the body. The black's great red cavern of a mouth +spouted blood and with a dying effort he hurled himself blindly against +his foe. Kane, with his heels over the bridge's edge, was unable to +avoid him and they toppled over together, to disappear silently into +the depths below.</p> + +<p>So swiftly had it all happened that the warriors stood stunned. The +giant's roar of triumph had scarcely died on his lips before the two +were falling into the darkness. Now the rest of the negroes came out on +the bridge to peer down curiously, but no sound came up from the dark +void.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p class="ph2"><i>2. The People of the Stalking Death</i></p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"Their gods were sadder than the sea,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Gods of a wandering will,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">Who cried for blood like beasts at night</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Sadly, from hill to hill."</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent6">—<i>Chesterton.</i></div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + + +<p>As Kane fell he followed his fighting instinct, twisting in midair so +that when he struck, were it ten or a thousand feet below, he would +land on top of the man who fell with him.</p> + +<p>The end came suddenly—much more suddenly than the Englishman had +thought for. He lay half stunned for an instant, then looking up, saw +dimly the narrow bridge banding the sky above him, and the forms of +the warriors, limned in the moonlight and grotesquely foreshortened as +they leaned over the edge. He lay still, knowing that the beams of the +moon did not pierce the deeps in which he was hidden, and that to those +watchers he was invisible. Then when they vanished from view he began +to review his present plight. The black man was dead, and only for the +fact that his corpse had cushioned the fall, Kane would have been dead +likewise, for they had fallen a considerable distance. As it was, the +white man was stiff and bruised.</p> + +<p>He drew his sword from the negro's body, thankful that it had not been +broken, and began to grope about in the darkness. His hand encountered +the edge of what seemed a cliff. He had thought that he was on the +bottom of the chasm and that its impression of great depth had been a +delusion, but now he decided that he had fallen on a ledge, part of the +way down. He dropped a small stone over the side, and after what seemed +a very long time he heard the faint sound of its striking far below.</p> + +<p>Somewhat at a loss as to how to proceed, he drew flint and steel from +his belt and struck them to some tinder, warily shielding the light +with his hands. The faint illumination showed a large ledge jutting out +from the side of the cliff, that is, the side next the hills, to which +he had been attempting to cross. He had fallen close to the edge and it +was only by the narrowest margin that he had escaped sliding off it, +not knowing his position.</p> + +<p>Crouching there, his eyes seeking to accustom themselves to the abysmal +gloom, he made out what seemed to be a darker shadow in the shadows +of the wall. On closer examination he found it to be an opening large +enough to admit his body standing erect. A cavern, he assumed, and +though its appearance was dark and forbidding in the extreme, he +entered, groping his way when the tinder burned out.</p> + +<p>Where it led to, he naturally had no idea, but any action was +preferable to sitting still until the mountain vultures plucked his +bones. For a long way the cave floor tilted upward—solid rock beneath +his feet—and Kane made his way with some difficulty up the rather +steep slant, slipping and sliding now and then. The cavern seemed a +large one, for at no time after entering it could he touch the roof, +nor could he, with a hand on one wall, reach the other.</p> + +<p>At last the floor became level and Kane sensed that the cave was much +larger there. The air seemed better, though the darkness was just as +impenetrable. Suddenly he stopped dead in his tracks. From somewhere +in front of him there came a strange indescribable rustling. Without +warning something smote him in the face and slashed wildly. All about +him sounded the eery murmurings of many small wings and suddenly Kane +smiled crookedly, amused, relieved and chagrined. Bats, of course. +The cave was swarming with them. Still it was a shaky experience, and +as he went on and the wings whispered through the vasty emptiness +of the great cavern, Kane's Puritan mind found space to dally with +a bizarre thought—had he wandered into Hell by some strange means, +and were these in truth bats, or were they lost souls winging through +everlasting night?</p> + +<p>Then, thought Solomon Kane, I will soon confront Satan himself—and +even as he thought this, his nostrils were assailed by a horrid scent +fetid and repellent. The scent grew as he went slowly on, and Kane +swore softly, though he was not a profane man. He sensed that the +smell betokened some hidden threat, some unseen malevolence, inhuman +and deathly, and his somber mind sprang at supernatural conclusions. +However, he felt perfect confidence in his ability to cope with any +fiend or demon, armored as he was in unshakable faith of creed and the +knowledge of the rightness of his cause.</p> + +<p>What followed happened suddenly. He was groping his way along when in +front of him two narrow yellow eyes leaped up in the darkness—eyes +that were cold and expressionless, too hideously close-set for human +eyes and too high for any four-legged beast. What horror had thus +reared itself up in front of him?</p> + +<p>This is Satan, thought Kane as the eyes swayed above him, and the next +instant he was battling for his life with the darkness that seemed to +have taken tangible form and thrown itself about his body and limbs +in great slimy coils. Those coils lapped his sword arm and rendered +it useless; with the other hand he groped for dagger or pistol, flesh +crawling as his fingers slipped from slick scales, while the hissing of +the monster filled the cavern with a cold pæan of terror.</p> + +<p>There in the black dark to the accompaniment of the bats' leathery +rustlings, Kane fought like a rat in the grip of a mouse-snake, and he +could feel his ribs giving and his breath going before his frantic left +hand closed on his dagger hilt.</p> + +<p>Then with a volcanic twist and wrench of his steel-thewed body he tore +his left arm partly free and plunged the keen blade again and again to +the hilt in the sinuous writhing terror which enveloped him, feeling at +last the quivering coils loosen and slide from his limbs to lie about +his feet like huge cables.</p> + +<p>The mighty serpent lashed wildly in its death struggles, and Kane, +avoiding its bone-shattering blows, reeled away in the darkness, +laboring for breath. If his antagonist had not been Satan himself, it +had been Satan's nearest earthly satellite, thought Solomon, hoping +devoutly that he would not be called upon to battle another in the +darkness there.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>It seemed to him that he had been walking through the blackness for +ages and he began to wonder if there were any end to the cave when a +glimmer of light pierced the darkness. He thought it to be an outer +entrance a great way off, and started forward swiftly, but to his +astonishment, he brought up short against a blank wall after taking a +few strides. Then he perceived that the light came through a narrow +crack in the wall, and feeling over this wall he found it to be of +different material from the rest of the cave, consisting, apparently, +of regular blocks of stone joined together with mortar of some sort—an +indubitably man-built wall.</p> + +<p>The light streamed between two of these stones, where the mortar had +crumbled away. Kane ran his hands over the surface with an interest +beyond his present needs. The work seemed very old and very much +superior to what might be expected of a tribe of ignorant negroes.</p> + +<p>He felt the thrill of the explorer and discoverer. Certainly no white +man had ever seen this place and lived to tell of it, for when he had +landed on the dank West Coast some months before, preparing to plunge +into the interior, he had had no hint of such a country as this. The +few white men who knew anything at all of Africa with whom he had +talked, had never even mentioned the Land of Skulls or the she-fiend +who ruled it.</p> + +<p>Kane thrust against the wall cautiously. The structure seemed weakened +from age—a vigorous shove and it gave perceptibly. He hurled himself +against it with all his weight and a whole section of wall gave way +with a crash, precipitating him into a dimly lighted corridor amid a +heap of stone, dust and mortar.</p> + +<p>He sprang up and looked about, expecting the noise to bring a horde +of wild spearmen. Utter silence reigned. The corridor in which he now +stood was much like a long narrow cave itself, save that it was the +work of man. It was several feet wide and the roof was many feet above +his head. Dust lay ankle-deep on the floor as if no foot had trod there +for countless centuries, and the dim light, Kane decided, filtered in +somehow through the roof or ceiling, for nowhere did he see any doors +or windows. At last he decided the source was the ceiling itself, which +was of a peculiar phosphorescent quality.</p> + +<p>He set off down the corridor, feeling uncomfortably like a gray ghost +moving along the gray halls of death and decay. The evident antiquity +of his surroundings depressed him, making him sense vaguely the +fleeting and futile existence of mankind. That he was now on top of the +earth he believed, since light of a sort came in, but where, he could +not even offer a conjecture. This was a land of enchantment—a land of +horror and fearful mysteries, the jungle and river natives had said, +and he had gotten whispered hints of its terrors ever since he had set +his back to the Slave Coast and ventured into the hinterlands alone.</p> + +<p>Now and then he caught a low indistinct murmur which seemed to come +through one of the walls, and he at last came to the conclusion that he +had stumbled onto a secret passage in some castle or house. The natives +who had dared speak to him of Negari, had whispered of a ju-ju city +built of stone, set high amid the grim black crags of the fetish hills.</p> + +<p>Then, thought Kane, it may be that I have blundered upon the very thing +I sought and am in the midst of that city of terror. He halted, and +choosing a place at random, began to loosen the mortar with his dagger. +As he worked he again heard that low murmur, increasing in volume as +he bored through the wall, and presently the point pierced through, +and looking through the aperture it had made, he saw a strange and +fantastic scene.</p> + +<p>He was looking into a great chamber, whose walls and floors were of +stone, and whose mighty roof was upheld by gigantic stone columns, +strangely carved. Ranks of feathered black warriors lined the walls +and a double column of them stood like statues before a throne set +between two stone dragons which were larger than elephants. These +men he recognized, by their bearing and general appearance, to be +tribesmen of the warriors he had fought at the chasm. But his gaze +was drawn irresistibly to the great, grotesquely ornamented throne. +There, dwarfed by the ponderous splendor about her, a woman reclined. A +black woman she was, young and of a tigerish comeliness. She was naked +except for a beplumed helmet, armbands, anklets and a girdle of colored +ostrich feathers and she sprawled upon the silken cushions with her +limbs thrown about in voluptuous abandon.</p> + +<p>Even at that distance Kane could make out that her features were regal +yet barbaric, haughty and imperious, yet sensual, and with a touch of +ruthless cruelty about the curl of her full red lips. Kane felt his +pulse quicken. This could be no other than she whose crimes had become +almost mythical—Nakari of Negari, demon queen of a demon city, whose +monstrous lust for blood had set half a continent shivering. At least +she seemed human enough; the tales of the fearful river tribes had lent +her a supernatural aspect. Kane had half expected to see a loathsome +semi-human monster out of some past and demoniacal age.</p> + +<p>The Englishman gazed, fascinated though repelled. Not even in the +courts of Europe had he seen such grandeur. The chamber and all +its accouterments, from the carven serpents twined about the +bases of the pillars to the dimly seen dragons on the shadowy +ceiling, were fashioned on a gigantic scale. The splendor was +awesome—elephantine—inhumanly oversized, and almost numbing to the +mind which sought to measure and conceive the magnitude thereof. To +Kane it seemed that these things must have been the work of gods rather +than men, for this chamber alone would dwarf most of the castles he had +known in Europe.</p> + +<p>The black people who thronged that mighty room seemed grotesquely +incongruous. They no more suited their surroundings than a band +of monkeys would have seemed at home in the council chambers of +the English king. As Kane realized this the sinister importance of +Queen Nakari dwindled. Sprawled on that august throne in the midst +of the terrific glory of another age, she seemed to assume her +true proportions—a spoiled, petulant child engaged in a game of +make-believe and using for her sport a toy discarded by her elders. And +at the same time a thought entered Kane's mind—who were these elders?</p> + +<p>Still the child could become deadly in her game, as the Englishman soon +saw.</p> + +<p>A tall massive black came through the ranks fronting the throne, +and after prostrating himself four times before it, remained on his +knees, evidently waiting permission to speak. The queen's air of lazy +indifference fell from her and she straightened with a quick lithe +motion that reminded Kane of a leopardess springing erect. She spoke, +and the words came faintly to him as he strained his faculties to hear. +She spoke in a language very similar to that of the river tribes.</p> + +<p>"Speak!"</p> + +<p>"Great and Terrible One," said the kneeling warrior, and Kane +recognized him as the chief who had first accosted him on the +plateau—the chief of the guards on the cliffs, "let not the fire of +your fury consume your slave."</p> + +<p>The young woman's eyes narrowed viciously.</p> + +<p>"You know why you were summoned, son of a vulture?"</p> + +<p>"Fire of Beauty, the stranger brought no gifts."</p> + +<p>"No gifts?" she spat out the words. "What have I to do with gifts? I +bade you slay all black men who came empty-handed—did I tell you to +slay white men?"</p> + +<p>"Gazelle of Negari, he came climbing the crags in the night like an +assassin, with a dagger as long as a man's arm in his hand. The boulder +we hurled down missed him, and we met him upon the plateau and took +him to the Bridge-Across-the-Sky, where, as is the custom, we thought +to slay him; for it was your word that you were weary of men who came +wooing you."</p> + +<p>"Black men, fool," she snarled; "black men!"</p> + +<p>"Your slave did not know, Queen of Beauty. The white man fought like a +mountain leopard. Two men he slew and fell with the last one into the +chasm, and so he perished, Star of Negari."</p> + +<p>"Aye," the queen's tone was venomous, "the first white man who ever +came to Negari! One who might have—rise, fool!"</p> + +<p>The man got to his feet.</p> + +<p>"Mighty Lioness, might not this one have come seeking——"</p> + +<p>The sentence was never completed. Even as he straightened, Nakari made +a swift gesture with her hand. Two warriors plunged from the silent +ranks and two spears crossed in the chief's body before he could turn. +A gurgling scream burst from his lips, blood spurted high in the air +and the corpse fell flatly at the foot of the great throne.</p> + +<p>The ranks never wavered, but Kane caught the sidelong flash of +strangely red eyes and the involuntary wetting of thick lips. Nakari +had half risen as the spears flashed, and now she sank back, an +expression of cruel satisfaction on her beautiful face and a strange +brooding gleam in her scintillant eyes.</p> + +<p>An indifferent wave of her hand and the corpse was dragged away by the +heels, the dead arms trailing limply in the wide smear of blood left +by the passage of the body. Kane could see other wide stains crossing +the stone floor, some almost indistinct, others less dim. How many wild +scenes of blood and cruel frenzy had the great stone throne-dragons +looked upon with their carven eyes?</p> + +<p>He did not doubt, now, the tales told him by the river tribes. These +people were bred in rapine and horror. Their prowess had burst their +brains. They lived, like some terrible beast, only to destroy. There +were strange gleams behind their eyes which at times lit those eyes +with up-leaping flames and shadows of Hell. What had the river tribes +said of these mountain people who had ravaged them for countless +centuries? <i>That they were henchmen of death, who stalked among them, +and whom they worshipped.</i></p> + +<p>Still the thought hovered in Kane's mind as he watched—who built this +place, and why were negroes evidently in possession? He knew this was +the work of a higher race. No black tribe had ever reached such a stage +of culture as evidenced by these carvings. Yet the river tribes had +spoken of no other men than those upon which he now looked.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>The Englishman tore himself away from the fascination of the barbaric +scene with an effort. He had no time to waste; as long as they thought +him dead, he had more chance of eluding possible guards and seeking +what he had come to find. He turned and set off down the dim corridor. +No plan of action offered itself to his mind and one direction was +as good as another. The passage did not run straight; it turned and +twisted, following the line of the walls, Kane supposed, and found time +to wonder at the evident enormous thickness of those walls. He expected +at any moment to meet some guard or slave, but as the corridors +continued to stretch empty before him, with the dusty floors unmarked +by any footprint, he decided that either the passages were unknown to +the people of Negari or else for some reason were never used.</p> + +<p>He kept a close lookout for secret doors, and at last found one, made +fast on the inner side with a rusty bolt set in a groove of the wall. +This he manipulated cautiously, and presently with a creaking which +seemed terrifically loud in the stillness the door swung inward. +Looking out he saw no one, and stepping warily through the opening, +he drew the door to behind him, noting that it assumed the part of +a fantastic picture painted on the wall. He scraped a mark with his +dagger at the point where he believed the hidden spring to be on the +outer side, for he knew not when he might need to use the passage again.</p> + +<p>He was in a great hall, through which ran a maze of giant pillars much +like those of the throne chamber. Among them he felt like a child in +some great forest, yet they gave him some slight sense of security +since he believed that, gliding among them like a ghost through a +jungle, he could elude the black people in spite of their craft.</p> + +<p>He set off, choosing his direction at random and going carefully. Once +he heard a mutter of voices, and leaping upon the base of a column, +clung there while two black women passed directly beneath him, but +besides these he encountered no one. It was an uncanny sensation, +passing through this vast hall which seemed empty of human life, but in +some other part of which Kane knew there might be throngs of people, +hidden from sight by the pillars.</p> + +<p>At last, after what seemed an eternity of following these monstrous +mazes, he came upon a huge wall which seemed to be either a side of the +hall, or a partition, and continuing along this, he saw in front of him +a doorway before which two spearmen stood like black statues.</p> + +<p>Kane, peering about the corner of a column base made out two windows +high in the wall, one on each side of the door, and noting the ornate +carvings which covered the walls, determined on a desperate plan. He +felt it imperative that he should see what lay within that room. The +fact that it was guarded suggested that the room beyond the door was +either a treasure chamber or a dungeon, and he felt sure that his +ultimate goal would prove to be a dungeon.</p> + +<p>He retreated to a point out of sight of the blacks and began to scale +the wall, using the deep carvings for hand and foot holds. It proved +even easier than he had hoped, and having climbed to a point level with +the windows, he crawled cautiously along a horizontal line, feeling +like an ant on a wall.</p> + +<p>The guards far below him never looked up, and finally he reached +the nearer window and drew himself up over the sill. He looked down +into a large room, empty of life, but equipped in a manner sensuous +and barbaric. Silken couches and velvet cushions dotted the floor in +profusion and tapestries heavy with gold work hung upon the walls. The +ceiling too was worked in gold.</p> + +<p>Strangely incongruous, crude trinkets of ivory and ironwood, +unmistakably negroid in workmanship, littered the place, symbolic +enough of this strange kingdom where signs of barbarism vied with a +strange culture. The outer door was shut and in the wall opposite was +another door, also closed.</p> + +<p>Kane descended from the window, sliding down the edge of a tapestry +as a sailor slides down a sail-rope, and crossed the room, his feet +sinking noiselessly into the deep fabric of the rug which covered the +floor, and which, like all the other furnishings, seemed ancient to the +point of decay.</p> + +<p>At the door he hesitated. To step into the next room might be a +desperately hazardous thing to do; should it prove to be filled with +black men, his escape was cut off by the spearmen outside the other +door. Still, he was used to taking all sorts of wild chances, and now, +sword in hand, he flung the door open with a suddenness intended to +numb with surprize for an instant any foe who might be on the other +side.</p> + +<p>Kane took a swift step within, ready for anything—then halted +suddenly, struck speechless and motionless for a second. He had come +thousands of miles in search of something and there before him lay the +object of his search.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p class="ph2"><i>3. Lilith</i></p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"Lady of mystery, what is thy history?"</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent6">—Viereck.</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + + +<p>A couch stood in the middle of the room and on its silken surface lay +a woman—a woman whose skin was white and whose reddish gold hair +fell about her bare shoulders. She now sprang erect, fright flooding +her fine gray eyes, lips parted to utter a cry which she as suddenly +checked.</p> + +<p>"You!" she exclaimed. "How did you——?"</p> + +<p>Solomon Kane closed the door behind him and came toward her, a rare +smile on his dark face.</p> + +<p>"You remember me, do you not, Marylin?"</p> + +<p>The fear had already faded from her eyes even before he spoke, to be +replaced by a look of incredible wonder and dazed bewilderment.</p> + +<p>"Captain Kane! I can not understand—it seemed no one would ever +come——"</p> + +<p>She drew a small hand wearily across her white brow, swaying suddenly.</p> + +<p>Kane caught her in his arms—she was only a girl, little more than a +child—and laid her gently on the couch. There, chafing her wrists +gently, he talked in a low hurried monotone, keeping an eye on the door +all the time—which door, by the way, seemed to be the only entrance +or egress from the room. While he talked he mechanically took in the +chamber, noting that it was almost a duplicate of the outer room, as +regards hangings and general furnishings.</p> + +<p>"First," said he, "before we go into any other matters, tell me, are +you closely guarded?"</p> + +<p>"Very closely, sir," she murmured hopelessly; "I know not how you came +here, but we can never escape."</p> + +<p>"Let me tell you swiftly how I came to be here, and mayhap you will be +more hopeful when I tell you of the difficulties already overcome. Lie +still now, Marylin, and I will tell you how I came to seek an English +heiress in the devil city of Negari.</p> + +<p>"I killed Sir John Taferal in a duel. As to the reason, 'tis neither +here nor there, but slander and a black lie lay behind it. Ere he died +he confessed that he had committed a foul crime some years agone. You +remember, of course, the affection cherished for you by your cousin, +old Lord Hildred Taferal, Sir John's uncle. Sir John feared that the +old lord, dying without issue, might leave the great Taferal estates to +you.</p> + +<p>"Years ago you disappeared and Sir John spread the rumor that you had +drowned. Yet when he lay dying with my rapier through his body, he +gasped out that he had kidnapped you and sold you to a Barbary rover, +whom he named—a bloody pirate whose name has not been unknown on +England's coasts aforetime. So I came seeking you, and a long weary +trail it has been, stretching into long leagues and bitter years.</p> + +<p>"First I sailed the seas searching El Gar, the Barbary corsair named +by Sir John. I found him in the crash and roar of an ocean battle; +he died, but even as he lay dying he told me that he had sold you in +turn to a merchant out of Stamboul. So to the Levant I went and there +by chance came upon a Greek sailor whom the Moors had crucified on the +shore for piracy. I cut him down and asked him the question I asked +all men—if he had in his wanderings seen a captive English girl-child +with yellow curls. I learned that he had been one of the crew of the +Stamboul merchants, and that she had, on her homeward voyage, been set +upon by a Portuguese slaver and sunk—this renegade Greek and the child +being among the few who were taken aboard the slaver.</p> + +<p>"This slaver then, cruising south for black ivory, had been ambushed +in a small bay on the African West Coast, and of your further fate +the Greek knew nothing, for he had escaped the general massacre, and +taking to sea in an open boat, had been taken up by a ship of Genoese +freebooters.</p> + +<p>"To the West Coast, then, I came, on the slim chance that you still +lived, and there heard among the natives that some years ago a white +child had been taken from a ship whose crew had been slain, and sent +inland as a part of the tribute the shore tribes paid to the upper +river chiefs.</p> + +<p>"Then all traces ceased. For months I wandered without a clue as to +your whereabouts, nay, without a hint that you even lived. Then I +chanced to hear among the river tribes of the demon city of Negari and +the black queen who kept a white woman for a slave. I came here."</p> + +<p>Kane's matter-of-fact tone, his unfurbished narration, gave no hint +of the full meaning of that tale—of what lay behind those calm +and measured words—the sea-fights and the land fights—the years +of privation and heart-breaking toil, the ceaseless danger, the +everlasting wandering through hostile and unknown lands, the tedious +and deadening labor of ferreting out the information he wished from +ignorant, sullen and unfriendly savages, black and white.</p> + +<p>"I came here" said Kane simply, but what a world of courage and effort +was symbolized by that phrase! A long red trail, black shadows and +crimson shadows weaving a devil's dance—marked by flashing swords and +the smoke of battle—by faltering words falling like drops of blood +from the lips of dying men.</p> + +<p>Not a consciously dramatic man, certainly, was Solomon Kane. He +told his tale in the same manner in which he had overcome terrific +obstacles—coldly, briefly and without heroics.</p> + +<p>"You see, Marylin," he concluded gently, "I have not come this far and +done this much, to now meet with defeat. Take heart, child. We will +find a way out of this fearful place."</p> + +<p>"Sir John took me on his saddle-bow," the girl said dazedly, and +speaking slowly as if her native language came strangely to her from +years of unuse, as she framed in halting words an English evening of +long ago: "He carried me to the sea-shore where a galley's boat waited, +filled with fierce men, dark and mustached and having simitars, and +great rings to the fingers. The captain, a Moslem with a face like a +hawk, took me, I a-weeping with fear, and bore me to his galley. Yet he +was kind to me in his way, I being little more than a baby, and at last +sold me to a Turkish merchant, as he told you. This merchant he met off +the southern coast of France, after many days of sea travel.</p> + +<p>"This man did not use me badly, yet I feared him, for he was a man of +cruel countenance and made me understand that I was to be sold to a +black sultan of the Moors. However, in the Gates of Hercules his ship +was set upon by a Cadiz slaver and things came about as you have said.</p> + +<p>"The captain of the slaver believed me to be the child of some wealthy +English family and intended holding me for ransom, but in a grim +darksome bay on the African coast he perished with all his men except +the Greek you have mentioned, and I was taken captive by a black +chieftain.</p> + +<p>"I was terribly afraid and thought he would slay me, but he did me no +harm and sent me up-country with an escort, who also bore much loot +taken from the ship. This loot, together with myself, was, as you know, +intended for a powerful king of the river peoples. But it never reached +him, for a roving band of Negari fell upon the beach warriors and slew +them all. Then I was taken to this city, and have since remained, slave +to Queen Nakari.</p> + +<p>"How I have lived through all those terrible scenes of battle and +cruelty and murder, I know not."</p> + +<p>"A providence has watched over you, child," said Kane, "the power which +doth care for weak women and helpless children; which led me to you in +spite of all hindrances, and which shall yet lead us forth from this +place, God willing."</p> + +<p>"My people!" she exclaimed suddenly like one awaking from a dream; +"what of them?"</p> + +<p>"All in good health and fortune, child, save that they have sorrowed +for you through the long years. Nay, old Sir Hildred hath the gout and +doth so swear thereat that I fear for his soul at times. Yet methinks +that the sight of you, little Marylin, would mend him."</p> + +<p>"Still, Captain Kane," said the girl, "I can not understand why you +came alone."</p> + +<p>"Your brothers would have come with me, child, but it was not sure that +you lived, and I was loth that any other Taferal should die in a land +far from good English soil. I rid the country of an evil Taferal—'twas +but just I should restore in his place a good Taferal, if so be she +still lived—I, and I alone."</p> + +<p>This explanation Kane himself believed. He never sought to analyze his +motives and he never wavered, once his mind was made up. Though he +always acted on impulse, he firmly believed that all his actions were +governed by cold and logical reasonings. He was a man born out of his +time—a strange blending of Puritan and Cavalier, with a touch of the +ancient philosopher, and more than a touch of the pagan, though the +last assertion would have shocked him unspeakably. An atavist of the +days of blind chivalry he was, a knight errant in the somber clothes of +a fanatic. A hunger in his soul drove him on and on, an urge to right +all wrongs, protect all weaker things, avenge all crimes against right +and justice. Wayward and restless as the wind, he was consistent in +only one respect—he was true to his ideals of justice and right. Such +was Solomon Kane.</p> + +<p>"Marylin," he now said kindly, taking her small hands in his +sword-calloused fingers, "methinks you have changed greatly in the +years. You were a rosy and chubby little maid when I used to dandle +you on my knee in old England. Now you seem drawn and pale of face, +though you are beautiful as the nymphs of the heathen books. There are +haunting ghosts in your eyes, child—do they misuse you here?"</p> + +<p>She lay back on the couch and the blood drained slowly from her already +pallid features until she was deathly white. Kane bent over her, +startled. Her voice came in a whisper.</p> + +<p>"Ask me not. There are deeds better hidden in the darkness of night and +forgetfulness. There are sights which blast the eyes and leave their +burning mark forever on the brain. The walls of ancient cities, recked +not of by men, have looked upon scenes not to be spoken of, even in +whispers."</p> + +<p>Her eyes closed wearily and Kane's troubled, somber eyes unconsciously +traced the thin blue lines of her veins, prominent against the +unnatural whiteness of her skin.</p> + +<p>"Here is some demoniacal thing," he muttered, "A mystery——"</p> + +<p>"Aye," murmured the girl, "a mystery that was old when Egypt was young! +And nameless evil more ancient than dark Babylon—that spawned in +terrible black cities when the world was young and strange."</p> + +<p>Kane frowned, troubled. At the girl's strange words he felt an eery +crawling fear at the back of his brain, as if dim racial memories +stirred in the eon-deep gulfs, conjuring up grim chaotic visions, +illusive and nightmarish.</p> + +<p>Suddenly Marylin sat erect, her eyes flaring wide with fright. Kane +heard a door open somewhere.</p> + +<p>"Nakari!" whispered the girl urgently. "Swift! She must not find you +here! Hide quickly, and"—as Kane turned—"keep silent, whatever may +chance!"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>She lay back on the couch, feigning slumber as Kane crossed the room +and concealed himself behind some tapestries which, hanging upon the +wall, hid a niche that might have once held a statue of some sort.</p> + +<p>He had scarcely done so when the single door of the room opened and a +strange barbaric figure stood framed in it. Nakari, queen of Negari, +had come to her slave.</p> + +<p>The black woman was clad as she had been when he had seen her on the +throne, and the colored armlets and anklets clanked as she closed +the door behind her and came into the room. She moved with the easy +sinuousness of a she-leopard and in spite of himself the watcher was +struck with admiration for her lithe beauty. Yet at the same time a +shudder of repulsion shook him, for her eyes gleamed with vibrant and +magnetic evil, older than the world.</p> + +<p>"Lilith!" thought Kane. "She is beautiful and terrible as Purgatory. +She is Lilith—that foul, lovely woman of ancient legend."</p> + +<p>Nakari halted by the couch, stood looking down upon her captive for +a moment, then with an enigmatic smile, bent and shook her. Marylin +opened her eyes, sat up, then slipped from her couch and knelt before +her black mistress—an act which caused Kane to curse beneath his +breath. The queen laughed and seating herself upon the couch, motioned +the girl to rise, and then put an arm about her waist and drew her +upon her lap. Kane watched, puzzled, while Nakari caressed the white +girl in a lazy, amused manner. This might be affection, but to Kane it +seemed more like a sated leopard teasing its victim. There was an air +of mockery and studied cruelty about the whole affair.</p> + +<p>"You are very soft and pretty, Mara," Nakari murmured lazily, "much +prettier than the black girls who serve me. The time approaches, little +one, for your nuptial. And a fairer bride has never been borne up the +Black Stairs."</p> + +<p>Marylin began to tremble and Kane thought she was going to faint. +Nakari's eyes gleamed strangely beneath her long-lashed drooping lids, +and her full red lips curved in a faint tantalizing smile. Her every +action seemed fraught with some sinister meaning. Kane began to sweat +profusely.</p> + +<p>"Mara," said the black queen, "you are honored above all other girls, +yet you are not content. Think how the girls of Negari will envy you, +Mara, when the priests sing the nuptial song and the Moon of Skulls +looks over the black crest of the Tower of Death. Think, little +bride-of-the-Master, how many girls have given their lives to be his +bride!"</p> + +<p>And Nakari laughed in her hateful musical way, as at a rare jest. And +then suddenly she stopped short. Her eyes narrowed to slits as they +swept the room, and her whole body tensed. Her hand went to her girdle +and came away with a long thin dagger. Kane sighted along the barrel +of his pistol, finger against the trigger. Only a natural hesitancy +against shooting a woman kept him from sending death into the black +heart of Nakari, for he believed that she was about to murder the girl.</p> + +<p>Then with a lithe cat-like motion she thrust the girl from her knees +and bounded back across the room, her eyes fixed with blazing intensity +on the tapestry behind which Kane stood. Had those keen eyes discovered +him? He quickly learned.</p> + +<p>"Who is there?" she rapped out fiercely. "Who hides behind those +hangings? I do not see you nor hear you, but I know someone is there!"</p> + +<p>Kane remained silent. Nakari's wild beast instinct had betrayed him and +he was uncertain as to what course to follow. His next actions depended +on the queen.</p> + +<p>"Mara!" Nakari's voice slashed like a whip, "who is behind those +hangings? Answer me! Shall I give you a taste of the whip again?"</p> + +<p>The girl seemed incapable of speech. She cowered where she had fallen, +her beautiful eyes full of terror. Nakari, her blazing gaze never +wavering, reached behind her with her free hand and gripped a cord +hanging from the wall. She jerked viciously. Kane felt the tapestries +whip back on either side of him and he stood revealed.</p> + +<p>For a moment the strange tableau held—the gaunt white man in his +blood-stained, tattered garments, the long pistol gripped in his right +hand—across the room the black queen in her savage finery, one arm +still lifted to the cord, the other hand holding the dagger in front of +her—the white girl cowering on the floor.</p> + +<p>Then Kane spoke: "Keep silent, Nakari, or you die!"</p> + +<p>The queen seemed numbed and struck speechless by the sudden apparition. +Kane stepped from among the tapestries and slowly approached her.</p> + +<p>"You!" she found her voice at last. "You must be he of whom the +guardsmen spake! There are not two other white men in Negari! They said +you fell to your death! How then——"</p> + +<p>"Silence!" Kane's voice cut in harshly on her amazed babblings; he knew +that the pistol meant nothing to her, but she sensed the threat of the +long blade in his left hand. "Marylin," still unconsciously speaking +in the river-tribes' language, "take cords from the hangings and bind +her——"</p> + +<p>He was about the middle of the chamber now. Nakari's face had lost much +of its helpless bewilderment and into her blazing eyes stole a crafty +gleam. She deliberately let her dagger fall as in token of surrender, +then suddenly her hands shot high above her head and gripped another +thick cord. Kane heard Marylin scream but before he could take another +step, before he could pull the trigger or even think, the floor fell +beneath his feet and he shot down into abysmal blackness. He did not +fall far and he landed on his feet; but the force of the fall sent +him to his knees and even as he went down, sensing a presence in the +darkness beside him, something crashed against his skull and he dropped +into a yet blacker abyss of unconsciousness.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p class="ph2"><i>4. Dreams of Empire</i></p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"For Rome was given to rule the world</div> + <div class="verse indent2">And gat of it little joy—</div> + <div class="verse indent0">But we, we shall enjoy the world,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">The whole huge world a toy."</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent6">—Chesterton.</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + + +<p>Slowly Kane drifted back from the dim realms where the unseen +assailant's bludgeon had hurled him. Something hindered the motion of +his hands and there was a metallic clanking when he sought to raise +them to his aching, throbbing head.</p> + +<p>He lay in utter darkness but he could not determine whether this was +absence of light, or whether he was still blinded by the blow. He +dazedly collected his scattered faculties and realized that he was +lying on a damp stone floor, shackled by wrist and ankle with heavy +iron chains which were rough and rusty to the touch.</p> + +<p>How long he lay there, he never knew. The silence was broken only +by the drumming pulse in his own aching head and the scamper and +chattering of rats. At last a red glow sprang up in the darkness and +grew before his eyes. Framed in the grisly radiance rose the sinister +and sardonic face of Nakari. Kane shook his head, striving to rid +himself of the illusion. But the light grew and as his eyes accustomed +themselves to it, he saw that it emanated from a torch borne in the +hand of the queen.</p> + +<p>In the illumination he now saw that he lay in a small dank cell whose +walls, ceiling and floor were of stone. The heavy chains which held him +captive were made fast to metal rings set deep in the wall. There was +but one door, which was apparently of bronze.</p> + +<p>Nakari set the torch in a niche near the door, and coming forward, +stood over her captive, gazing down at him in a manner rather +speculating than mocking.</p> + +<p>"You are he who fought the men on the cliff." The remark was an +assertion rather than a question. "They said you fell into the +abyss—did they lie? Did you bribe them to lie? Or how did you escape? +Are you a magician and did you fly to the bottom of the chasm and then +fly to my palace? Speak!"</p> + +<p>Kane remained silent. Nakari cursed.</p> + +<p>"Speak or I will have your eyes torn out! I will cut your fingers off +and burn your feet!"</p> + +<p>She kicked him viciously, but Kane lay silent, his deep somber eyes +boring up into her face, until the feral gleam faded from her eyes to +be replaced by an avid interest and wonder.</p> + +<p>She seated herself on a stone bench, resting her elbows on her knees +and her chin on her hands.</p> + +<p>"I never saw a white man before," she said, "Are all white men like +you? Bah! That can not be! Most men are fools, black or white. I know +most black men are fools, and white men are not gods, as the river +tribes say—they are only men. I, who know all the ancient mysteries, +say they are only men.</p> + +<p>"But white men have strange mysteries too, they tell me—the wanderers +of the river tribes, and Mara. They have war clubs that make a noise +like thunder and kill afar off—that thing which you held in your right +hand, was that one of those clubs?"</p> + +<p>Kane permitted himself a grim smile.</p> + +<p>"Nakari, if you know all mysteries, how can I tell you aught that you +know not already?"</p> + +<p>"How deep and cold and strange your eyes are!" the queen said as if he +had not spoken. "How strange your whole appearance is—and you have the +bearing of a king! You do not fear me—I never met a man who neither +loved nor feared me. You would never fear me, but you could learn to +love me. Look at me, white man—am I not beautiful?"</p> + +<p>"You are beautiful," answered Kane.</p> + +<p>Nakari smiled and then frowned. "The way you say that, it is no +compliment. You hate me, do you not?"</p> + +<p>"As a man hates a serpent," Kane replied bluntly.</p> + +<p>Nakari's eyes blazed with almost insane fury. Her hands clenched until +the long nails sank into the palms; then as quickly as her anger had +arisen, it ebbed away.</p> + +<p>"You have the heart of a king," she said calmly, "else you would fear +me. Are you a king in your land?"</p> + +<p>"I am only a landless wanderer."</p> + +<p>"You might be a king here," Nakari said slowly.</p> + +<p>Kane laughed grimly. "Do you offer me my life?"</p> + +<p>"I offer you more than that!" Kane's eyes narrowed as the queen leaned +toward him, vibrant with suppressed excitement. "White man, what is it +that you want more than anything else in the world?"</p> + +<p>"To take the white girl you call Mara, and go."</p> + +<p>Nakari sank back with an impatient exclamation.</p> + +<p>"You can not have her; she is the promised bride of the Master. Even +I could not save her, even if I wished. Forget her. I will help you +forget her. Listen, white man, listen to the words of Nakari, queen of +Negari! You say you are a landless man—I will make you a king! I will +give you the world for a toy!</p> + +<p>"No, no! Keep silent until I have finished," she rushed on, her words +tumbling over each other in her eagerness. Her eyes blazed, her whole +body quivered with dynamic intensity. "I have talked to travelers, to +captives and slaves, men from far countries. I know that this land of +mountains and rivers and jungle is not all the world. There are far-off +nations and cities, and kings and queens to be crushed and broken.</p> + +<p>"Negari is fading, her might is crumbling, but a strong man beside her +queen might build it up again—might restore all her vanishing glory. +Listen, white man! Sit by me on the throne of Negari! Send afar to +your people for the thunder-clubs to arm my warriors! My nation is +still lord of central Africa; together we will band the conquered +tribes—call back the days when the realm of ancient Negari spanned the +land from sea to sea! We will subjugate all the tribes of the river, +the plain and the sea-shore, and instead of slaying them all, we will +make one mighty army of them! And then, when all Africa is under our +heel, we will sweep forth upon the world like a hungry lion to rend and +tear and destroy!"</p> + +<p>Solomon's brain reeled. Perhaps it was the woman's fierce magnetic +personality, the dynamic power she instilled in her fiery words, but at +the moment her wild plan seemed not at all wild and impossible. Lurid +and chaotic visions flamed through the Puritan's brain—Europe torn by +civil and religious strife, divided against herself, betrayed by her +rulers, tottering—aye, Europe was in desperate straits now, and might +prove an easy victim for some strong savage race of conquerors. What +man can say truthfully that in his heart there lurks not a yearning +for power and conquest? For a moment the Devil sorely tempted Solomon +Kane; then before his mind's eye rose the wistful sad face of Marylin +Taferal, and Solomon cursed.</p> + +<p>"Out on ye, daughter of Satan! Avaunt! Am I a beast of the forest to +lead your black devils against mine own race? Nay, no beast ever did +so. Begone! If you wish my friendship, set me free and let me go with +the girl."</p> + +<p>Nakari leaped like a tiger-cat to her feet, her eyes flaming now with +passionate fury. A dagger gleamed in her hand and she raised it high +above Kane's breast with a feline scream of hate. A moment she hovered +like a shadow of death above him; then her arm sank and she laughed.</p> + +<p>"Freedom? She will find her freedom when the Moon of Skulls leers down +on the black altar. As for you, you shall rot in this dungeon. You are +a fool; Africa's greatest queen has offered you her love and the empire +of the world—and you revile her! You love the white girl, perhaps? +Until the Moon of Skulls she is mine and I leave you to think about +this: that she shall be punished as I have punished her before—hung up +by her wrists, naked, and whipped until she swoons!"</p> + +<p>Nakari laughed as Kane tore savagely at his shackles. She crossed to +the door, opened it, then hesitated and turned back for another word.</p> + +<p>"This is a foul place, white man, and maybe you hate me the more for +chaining you here. Maybe in Nakari's beautiful throneroom, with wealth +and luxury spread before you, you will look upon her with more favor. +Very soon I shall send for you, but first I will leave you here awhile +to reflect. Remember—love Nakari and the kingdom of the world is +yours; hate her—this cell is your realm."</p> + +<p>The bronze door clanged sullenly, but more hateful to the imprisoned +Englishman was the venomous, silvery laugh of Nakari.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Time passed slowly in the darkness. After what seemed a long time the +door opened again, this time to admit a huge black who brought food and +a sort of thin wine. Kane ate and drank ravenously and afterward slept. +The strain of the last few days had worn him greatly, mentally and +physically, but when he awoke he felt fresh and strong.</p> + +<p>Again the door opened and two great black warriors entered. In the +light of the torches they bore, Kane saw that they were giants, clad +in loin-cloths and ostrich plume headgear, and bearing long spears in +their hands.</p> + +<p>"Nakari wishes you to come to her, white man," was all they said, as +they took off his shackles. He arose, exultant in even brief freedom, +his keen brain working fiercely for a way of escape.</p> + +<p>Evidently the fame of his prowess had spread, for the two warriors +showed great respect for him. They motioned him to precede them, and +walked carefully behind him, the points of their spears boring into +his back. Though they were two to one, and he was unarmed, they were +taking no chances. The gazes they directed at him were full of awe and +suspicion, and Kane decided that Nakari had told the truth when she had +said that he was the first white man to come to Negari.</p> + +<p>Down a long dark corridor they went, his captors guiding him with +light prods of their spears, up a narrow winding stair, down another +passageway, up another stair, and then they emerged into the vast maze +of gigantic pillars into which Kane had first come. As they started +down this huge hall, Kane's eyes suddenly fell on a strange and +fantastic picture painted on the wall ahead of him. His heart gave a +sudden leap as he recognized it. It was some distance in front of him +and he edged imperceptibly toward the wall until he and his guards +were walking along very close to it. Now he was almost abreast of the +picture and could even make out the mark his dagger had made upon it.</p> + +<p>The warriors following Kane were amazed to hear him gasp suddenly like +a man struck by a spear. He wavered in his stride and began clutching +at the air for support. They eyed each other doubtfully and prodded +him, but he cried out like a dying man, and slowly crumpled to the +floor, where he lay in a strange unnatural position, one leg doubled +back under him and one arm half supporting his lolling body. The +blacks looked at him fearfully. To all appearances he was dying, but +there was no wound upon him. They threatened him with their spears but +he paid no heed. Then they lowered their weapons uncertainly and one of +them bent over him.</p> + +<p>Then it happened. The instant the black stooped forward, Kane came +up like a steel spring released. His right fist following his motion +curved up from his hip in a whistling half-circle and crashed against +the black giant's jaw. Delivered with all the power of arm and +shoulder, propelled by the upthrust of the powerful legs as Kane +straightened, the blow was like that of a slung-shot. The negro slumped +to the floor, unconscious before his knees gave way.</p> + +<p>The other warrior plunged forward with a bellow, but even as his victim +fell, Kane twisted aside and his frantic hand found the secret spring +in the painting and pressed. All happened in the breath of a second. +Quick as the warrior was, Kane was quicker, for he moved with the +dynamic speed of a famished wolf. For an instant the falling body of +the senseless black hindered the other warrior's thrust, and in that +instant Kane felt the hidden door give way. From the corner of his eye +he saw a long gleam of steel shooting for his heart. He twisted about +and hurled himself against the door, vanishing through it even as the +stabbing spear slit the skin on his shoulder.</p> + +<p>To the dazed and bewildered warrior, who stood with weapon upraised +for another thrust, it seemed as if the white man had simply vanished +through a solid wall, for only a fantastic picture met his gaze and +this did not give to his efforts.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="figcenter"> + <img src="images/cover2.jpg" alt=""> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<div class="figcenter"> + <img src="images/illus2.jpg" alt=""> + <div class="caption"> + <p>"The dynamic quickness of Solomon Kane was such as few +men could match."</p> + </div> +</div> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p class="ph2"><i>5. "For a Thousand Years——"</i></p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"The blind gods roar and rave and dream</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Of all cities under the sea."</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent6">—Chesterton.</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + + +<p>Kane slammed the hidden door shut behind him, jammed down the spring +and for a moment leaned against it, every muscle tensed, expecting to +hold it against the efforts of a horde of spearmen. But nothing of the +sort materialized. He heard the black warrior fumbling outside for a +time; then that sound, too, ceased. It seemed impossible that these +people should have lived in this palace as long as they had without +discovering the secret doors and passages, but it was a conclusion +which forced itself upon Kane's mind.</p> + +<p>At last he decided that he was safe from pursuit for the time being, +and turning, started down the long, narrow corridor with its eon-old +dust and its dim gray light. He felt baffled and furious, though he +was free from Nakari's shackles. He had no idea how long he had been +in the palace; it seemed ages. It must be day now, for it was light +in the outer halls, and he had seen no torches after they had left +the subterranean dungeons. He wondered if Nakari had carried out her +threat of vengeance on the helpless girl, and swore passionately. Free +for the time being, yes; but unarmed and hunted through this infernal +palace like a rat. How could he aid either himself or Marylin? But +his confidence never faltered. He was in the right and some way would +present itself.</p> + +<p>Suddenly a narrow stairway branched off the main passageway, and up +this he went, the light growing stronger and stronger until he stood in +the full glare of the African sunlight. The stair terminated in a sort +of small landing directly in front of which was a tiny window, heavily +barred. Through this he saw the blue sky, tinted gold with the blazing +sunlight. The sight was like wine to him and he drew in deep breaths of +fresh, untainted air, breathing deep as if to rid his lungs of the aura +of dust and decayed grandeur through which he had been passing.</p> + +<p>He was looking out over a weird and bizarre landscape. Far to the right +and the left loomed up great black crags and beneath them there reared +castles and towers of stone, of strange architecture—it was as if +giants from some other planet had thrown them up in a wild and chaotic +debauch of creation. These buildings were backed solidly against the +cliffs, and Kane knew that Nakari's palace also must be built into +the wall of the crag behind it. He seemed to be in the front of that +palace in a sort of minaret built on the outer wall. But there was only +one window in it and his view was limited. Far below him through the +winding and narrow streets of that strange city, swarms of black people +went to and fro, seeming like black ants to the watcher above. East, +north and south, the cliffs formed a natural bulwark; only to the west +was a built wall.</p> + +<p>The sun was sinking west. Kane turned reluctantly from the barred +window and went down the stairs again. Again he paced down the narrow +gray corridor, aimlessly and planlessly, for what seemed miles and +miles. He descended lower and lower into passages that lay below +passages. The light grew dimmer, and a dank slime appeared on the +walls. Then Kane halted, a faint sound from beyond the wall arresting +him. What was that? A faint rattle—the rattle of chains.</p> + +<p>Kane leaned close to the wall, and in the semi-darkness his hand +encountered a rusty spring. He worked at it cautiously and presently +felt the hidden door it betokened swing inward. He gazed out warily.</p> + +<p>He was looking into a cell, the counterpart of the one in which he had +been confined. A smoldering torch was thrust into a niche on the wall, +and by its lurid and flickering light he made out a form on the floor, +shackled wrist and ankle as he had been shackled. A man; at first Kane +thought him to be a negro but a second glance made him doubt. The hair +was too straight, the features too regular. Negroid, yes, but some +alien blood in his veins had sharpened those features and given the +man that high magnificent forehead, and those hard vibrant eyes which +stared at Kane so intensely. The skin was dark, but not black.</p> + +<p>The man spoke in an unfamiliar dialect, one which was strangely +distinct and clear-cut in contrast to the guttural jargon of the black +people with whom Kane was familiar. The Englishman spoke in English, +and then in the language of the river tribes.</p> + +<p>"You who come through the ancient door," said the other, in the latter +dialect, "who are you? You are no black man—at first I thought you one +of the Old Race, but now I see you are not as they. Whence come you?"</p> + +<p>"I am Solomon Kane," said the Puritan, "a prisoner in this devil-city. +I come from far across the blue salt sea."</p> + +<p>The man's eyes lighted at the word.</p> + +<p>"The sea! The ancient and everlasting! The sea which I never saw but +which cradled the glory of my ancestors! Tell me, stranger, have you, +like they, sailed across the breast of the great blue monster, and have +your eyes looked on the golden spires of Atlantis and the crimson walls +of Mu?"</p> + +<p>"Truly," answered Solomon uncertainly, "I have sailed the seas, even to +Hindostan and Cathay, but of the countries you mention I know nothing."</p> + +<p>"Nay," the other sighed, "I dream—I dream. Already the shadow of the +great night falls across my brain and my words wander. Stranger, there +have been times when these cold walls and floor have seemed to melt +into green surging deeps and my soul was filled with the deep booming +of the everlasting sea. I who have never seen the sea!"</p> + +<p>Kane shuddered involuntarily. Surely this man was insane. Suddenly the +other shot out a withered claw-like hand and gripped his arm, despite +the hampering chain.</p> + +<p>"You whose skin is so strangely white! Have you seen Nakari, the +she-fiend who rules this crumbling city?"</p> + +<p>"I have seen her," said Kane grimly, "and now I flee like a hunted rat +from her murderers."</p> + +<p>"You hate her!" the other cried. "Ha, I know! You seek Mara, the white +girl who is her slave?"</p> + +<p>"Aye."</p> + +<p>"Listen, white man," the shackled one spoke with strange solemnity; "I +am dying. Nakari's rack has done its work. I die and with me dies the +shadow of the glory that was my nation's. For I am the last of my race. +In all the world there is none like me. Hark now, to the voice of a +dying race."</p> + +<p>And Kane leaning there in the flickering semi-darkness of the cell +heard the strangest tale to which man has ever listened, brought out +of the mist of the dim dawn ages by the lips of delirium. Clear and +distinct the words fell from the dying man and Kane alternately burned +and froze as vista after gigantic vista of time and space swept up +before him.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"Long eons ago—ages, ages ago—the empire of my race rose proudly +above the waves. So long ago was it that no man remembers an ancestor +who remembered it. In a great land to the west our cities rose. Our +golden spires split the stars; our purple-prowed galleys broke the +waves around the world, looting the sunset for its treasure and the +sunrise for its wealth. Our legions swept forth to the north and to the +south, to the west and the east, and none could stand before them. Our +cities banded the world; we sent our colonies to all lands to subdue +all savages, red, white or black, and enslave them. They toiled for us +in the mines and at the galley's oars. All over the world the brown +people of Atlantis reigned supreme. We were a sea-people and we delved +the deeps of all the oceans. The mysteries were known to us, and the +secret things of land and sea and sky. We read the stars and were wise. +Sons of the sea, we exalted him above all others.</p> + +<p>"We worshipped Valka and Hotah, Honen and Golgor. Many virgins, many +strong youths, died on their altars and the smoke of the shrines +blotted out the sun. Then the sea rose and shook himself. He thundered +from his abyss and the thrones of the world fell before him! New +lands rose from the deep and Atlantis and Mu were swallowed up by the +gulf. The green sea roared through the fanes and the castles, and the +sea-weed encrusted the golden spires and the topaz towers. The empire +of Atlantis vanished and was forgotten, passing into the everlasting +gulf of time and oblivion. Likewise the colony cities in barbaric +lands, cut off from their mother kingdom, perished. The black savages +and the white savages rose and burned and destroyed until in all the +world only the colony city of Negari remained as a symbol of the lost +empire.</p> + +<p>"Here my ancestors ruled as kings, and the ancestors of Nakari—the +she-cat!—bent the knee of slavery to them. Years passed, stretching +into centuries. The empire of Negari dwindled. Tribe after tribe rose +and flung off the chains, pressing the lines back from the sea, until +at last the sons of Atlantis gave way entirely and retreated into the +city itself—the last stronghold of the race. Conquerors no longer, +hemmed in by ferocious tribes, yet they held those tribes at bay for +a thousand years. Negari was invincible from without; her walls held +firm; but within evil influences were at work.</p> + +<p>"The sons of Atlantis had brought their black slaves into the city with +them. The rulers were warriors, scholars, priests, artizans; they did +no menial work. For that they depended upon the slaves. There were more +of these slaves than there were masters. And they increased while the +brown people dwindled.</p> + +<p>"They mixed with each other more and more as the race degenerated until +at last only the priestcraft was free of the taint of black blood. +Rulers sat on the throne of Negari who were nearly pure negro, and +these allowed more and more wild tribesmen to enter the city in the +guise of servants, mercenaries and friends.</p> + +<p>"Then came a day when these fierce slaves revolted and slew all who +bore a trace of brown blood, except the priests and their families. +These they imprisoned as 'fetish people.' For a thousand years black +men have ruled in Negari, their kings guided by the captive brown +priests, who though prisoners, were yet the masters of kings."</p> + +<p>Kane listened enthralled. To his imaginative mind, the tale burned and +lived with strange fire from cosmic time and space.</p> + +<p>"After all the sons of Atlantis, save the priests, were dead, there +rose a great black king on the defiled throne of ancient Negari. He was +a tiger and his warriors were like leopards. They called themselves +Negari, ravishing even the name of their former masters, and none could +stand before them. They swept the land from sea to sea, and the smoke +of destruction put out the stars. The great river ran red and the black +lords of Negari strode above the corpses of their black foes. Then +the great king died and the black empire crumbled, even as the brown +kingdom of Negari had crumbled. They were skilled in war—the dead sons +of Atlantis, their masters, had trained them in the ways of battle, and +against the wild tribesmen they were invincible. But only the ways of +war had they learned, and the empire was torn with civil strife. Murder +and intrigue stalked red-handed through the palaces and the streets, +and the boundaries of the empire dwindled and dwindled. All the while +black kings with red, frenzied brains sat on the throne, and behind +the curtains, unseen but greatly feared, the brown priests guided the +nation, holding it together, keeping it from absolute destruction.</p> + +<p>"Prisoners in the city were we, for there was nowhere else in the +world to go, but we moved like ghosts through the secret passages in +the walls and under the earth, spying on intrigue and doing secret +magic. We upheld the cause of the royal family—the descendants of that +tiger-like king of long ago—against all plotting chiefs, and grim are +the tales which these silent walls could tell. For these black people +are not as other negroes. A latent insanity lurks in the brains of +every one. They have tasted so deeply and so long of slaughter and +victory that they are as human leopards, for ever thirsting for blood. +On their myriad wretched slaves they have sated all lusts and desires +until they have become foul and terrible beasts, for ever seeking some +new sensation, for ever quenching their fearful thirsts in blood.</p> + +<p>"Like a lion have they lurked in these crags for a thousand years, +to rush forth and ravage the jungle and river people, enslaving and +destroying. They are still invincible from without, though their +possessions have dwindled to the very walls of this city, and their +former great conquests and invasions have dwindled to raids for slaves.</p> + +<p>"But as they faded, so too faded their masters, the brown priests. One +by one they died, until only I remained. In the last century they too +mixed with their rulers and slaves, and now—oh, black the shame upon +me!—I, the last son of Atlantis, bear in my veins the taint of negro +blood. They died; I remained, doing magic and guiding the black kings, +I the last brown man of Negari. Then the she-fiend, Nakari, arose."</p> + +<p>Kane leaned forward with quickened interest. New life surged into the +tale as it touched upon his own time.</p> + +<p>"Nakari!" the name was spat as a snake hisses; "slave and the daughter +of a slave! Yet she prevailed when her hour came and all the royal +family died.</p> + +<p>"And me, the last son of Atlantis, me she prisoned and chained. She +feared not the silent brown priests, for she was the daughter of a +Satellite—one of the lesser priests, black men who did the menial work +of the brown masters—performing the lesser sacrifices, divining from +the livers of fowls and serpents and keeping the holy fires for ever +burning. Much she knew of us and our ways, and evil ambition burned in +her.</p> + +<p>"As a child she danced in the March of the New Moon, and as a young +girl she was one of the Star-maidens. Much of the lesser mysteries was +known to her, and more she learned, spying upon the secret rites of +the priests who enacted hidden rituals that were old when the earth +was young. For the remnants of Atlantis secretly kept alive the old +worships of Valka and Hotah, Honen and Golgor, long forgotten and not +to be understood by these black people whose ancestors died screaming +on their altars. Alone of all the black Negari she feared us not and +she not only overthrew the king and set herself on the throne, but she +dominated the priests—the black Satellites and the few brown masters +who were left. All these last, save me, died beneath the daggers of +her assassins or on her racks. She alone of all the myriad black +thousands who have lived and died between these walls guessed at the +hidden passages and subterranean corridors, secrets which we of the +priestcraft had guarded jealously from the people for a thousand years.</p> + +<p>"Ha! Ha! Blind, black fools! To pass an ageless age in this city, +yet never to learn of the secrets thereof! Black apes—fools! Not +even the lesser black priests know of the long gray corridors, lit by +phosphorescent ceilings, through which in bygone ages strange forms +have glided silently. For our ancestors built Negari as they built +Atlantis—on a mighty scale and with an unknown art. Not for men alone +did we build, but for the gods who moved unseen among us. And deep the +secrets these ancient walls hold!</p> + +<p>"Torture could not wring these secrets from our lips, but shackled in +her dungeons, we trod our hidden corridors no more. For years the dust +has gathered there, untouched by human foot, while we, and finally I +alone, lay chained in these foul cells. And among the temples and the +dark, mysterious shrines of old, move vile black Satellites, elevated +by Nakari to glories that were once mine—for I am the last Atlantean +high priest. Black be their doom, and red their ruin! Valka and +Golgor, gods lost and forgotten, whose memory shall die with me, strike +down their walls and humble them unto the dust! Break the altars of +their blind pagan gods——"</p> + +<p>Kane realized that the man was wandering in his mind. The keen brain +had begun to crumble at last.</p> + +<p>"Tell me," said he; "you mentioned the white girl, Mara. What do you +know of her?"</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>"She was brought to Negari years ago by raiders," the other answered, +"only a few years after the rise of the black queen, whose slave she +is. Little of her I know, for shortly after her arrival, Nakari turned +on me—and the years that lie between have been grim black years, shot +red with torture and agony. Here I have lain, hampered by my chains +from escape which lay in that door through which you entered—and for +the knowledge of which Nakari has torn me on racks and suspended me +over slow fires."</p> + +<p>Kane shuddered. "You know not if they have so misused the white girl? +Her eyes are haunted and she has wasted away."</p> + +<p>"She has danced with the Star-maidens at Nakari's command, and has +looked on the bloody and terrible rites of the Black Temple. She has +lived for years among a people with whom blood is cheaper than water, +who delight in slaughter and foul torture, and such sights as she has +looked upon would blast the eyes and wither the flesh of strong men. +She has seen the victims of Nakura die amid horrid torments, and the +sight is burned for ever in the brain of the beholder. The rites of +the Atlanteans the blacks took whereby to honor their crude gods, and +though the essence of those rites is lost in the wasting years, yet +even as Nakari's black apes perform them, they are not such as men can +look on, unshaken."</p> + +<p>Kane was thinking: "A fair day for the world when this Atlantis sank, +for most certainly it bred a race of strange and unknown evil." Aloud +he said: "Who is this Master of whom Nakari spake, and what meant she +by calling Mara his bride?"</p> + +<p>"Nakura—Nakura. The skull of evil, the symbol of Death that they +worship. What know these savages of the gods of sea-girt Atlantis? What +know they of the dread and unseen gods whom their masters worshipped +with majestic and mysterious rites? They understand not of the unseen +essence, the invisible deity that reigns in the air and the elements; +they must worship a material object, endowed with human shape. Nakura +was the last great wizard of Atlantean Negari. A brown renegade he +was, who conspired against his own people and aided the revolt of the +black beasts. In life they followed him and in death they deified him. +High in the Tower of Death his fleshless skull is set, and on that +skull hinge the brains of all the people of Negari. Nay, we of Atlantis +worshipped Death, but we likewise worshipped Life. These people worship +only Death and call themselves Sons of Death. And the skull of Nakura +has been to them for a thousand years the symbol of their power, the +evidence of their greatness."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean," Kane broke in impatiently on these ramblings, "that they +will sacrifice the girl to their god?"</p> + +<p>"In the Moon of Skulls she will die on the Black Altar."</p> + +<p>"What in God's name is this Moon of Skulls?" Kane cried passionately.</p> + +<p>"The full moon. At the full of each moon, which we name the Moon of +Skulls, a virgin dies on the Black Altar before the Tower of Death, +where centuries ago, virgins died in honor of Golgor, the god of +Atlantis. Now from the face of the tower that once housed the glory of +Golgor, leers down the skull of the renegade wizard, and the people +believe that his brain still lives therein to guide the star of the +city. For look ye, stranger, when the full moon gleams over the rim +of the tower and the chant of the priests falls silent, then from the +skull of Nakura thunders a great voice, raised in an ancient Atlantean +chant, and the black people fall on their faces before it.</p> + +<p>"But hark, there is a secret way, a stair leading up to a hidden niche +behind the skull, and there a priest lurks and chants. In days gone by +one of the sons of Atlantis had this office, and by all rights of men +and gods it should be mine this day. For though we sons of Atlantis +worshipped our ancient gods in secret, the black people would have none +of them and to hold our power we were devotees to their foul gods and +we sang and sacrificed to him whose memory we cursed.</p> + +<p>"But Nakari discovered the secret, known before only to the brown +priests, and now one of her black Satellites mounts the hidden +stair and yammers forth the strange and terrible chant which is but +meaningless gibberish to him, as to those who hear it. I, and only I, +know its grim and fearful meaning."</p> + +<p>Kane's brain whirled in his efforts to formulate some plan of action. +For the first time during the whole search for the girl, he felt +himself against a blank wall. This palace was a labyrinth, a maze +in which he could decide no direction. The corridors seemed to run +without plan or purpose, and how could he find Marylin, prisoned as +she doubtless was in one of the myriad chambers or cells? Or had she +already passed over the borderline of life, or succumbed to the brutal +torture-lust of Nakari?</p> + +<p>He scarcely heard the ravings and mutterings of the dying man.</p> + +<p>"Stranger, do you indeed live or are you but one of the ghosts which +have haunted me of late, stealing through the darkness of my cell? +Nay, you are flesh and blood—but you are a white savage, as Nakari's +race are black savages—eons ago when your ancestors were defending +their caves against the tiger and the mammoth, with crude spears of +flint, the gold spires of my people split the stars! They are gone and +forgotten, and the world is a waste of barbarians, white and black. Let +me, too, pass as a dream that is forgotten in the mists of the ages——"</p> + +<p>Kane rose and paced the cell. His fingers closed like steel talons as +on a sword hilt and a blind red wave of fury surged through his brain. +Oh God! to get his foes before the keen blade that had been taken from +him—to face the whole city, one man against them all——</p> + +<p>Kane pressed his hands against his temples.</p> + +<p>"The moon was nearly full when last I saw it. But I know not how long +ago that was. I know not how long I have been in this accursed palace, +or how long I lay in that dungeon where Nakari threw me. The time of +full moon may be past, and—oh merciful God!—Marylin may be dead +already."</p> + +<p>"Tonight is the Moon of Skulls," muttered the other; "I heard one of my +jailers speak of it."</p> + +<p>Kane gripped the dying man's shoulder with unconscious force.</p> + +<p>"If you hate Nakari or love mankind, in God's name tell me how to save +the child."</p> + +<p>"Love mankind?" the priest laughed insanely. "What has a son of +Atlantis and a priest of forgotten Golgor to do with love? What are +mortals but food for the jaws of the black gods? Softer girls than +your Mara have died screaming beneath these hands and my heart was as +iron to their cries. Yet hate"—the strange eyes flamed with fearful +light—"for hate I will tell you what you wish to know!</p> + +<p>"Go to the Tower of Death when the moon is risen. Slay the black priest +who lurks behind the skull of Nakura, and then when the chanting of the +worshippers below ceases, and the masked slayer beside the Black Altar +raises the sacrificial dagger, speak in a loud voice that the people +can understand, bidding them set free the victim and offer up instead, +Nakari, queen of Negari!</p> + +<p>"As for the rest, afterward you must rely on your own craft and prowess +if you come free."</p> + +<p>Kane shook him.</p> + +<p>"Swift! Tell me how I am to reach this tower!"</p> + +<p>"Go back through the door whence you came." The man was sinking fast, +his words dropped to whispers. "Turn to the left and go a hundred +paces. Mount the stair you come to, as high as it goes. In the corridor +where it ceases go straight for another hundred paces, and when +you come to what seems a blank wall, feel over it until you find a +projecting spring. Press this and enter the door which will open. You +will then be out of the palace and in the cliffs against which it is +built, and in the only one of the secret corridors known to the people +of Negari. Turn to your right and go straight down the passage for five +hundred paces. There you will come to a stair which leads up to the +niche behind the skull. The Tower of Death is built into the cliff and +projects above it. There are two stairs——"</p> + +<p>Suddenly the voice trailed out. Kane leaned forward and shook the man +but he suddenly rose up with a great effort. His eyes blazed with a +wild and unearthly light and he flung his shackled arms wide.</p> + +<p>"The sea!" he cried in a great voice. "The golden spires of Atlantis +and the sun on the deep blue waters! I come!"</p> + +<p>And as Kane reached to lay him down again, he slumped back, dead.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p class="ph2"><i>6. The Shattering of the Skull</i></p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"By thought a crawling ruin,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">By life a leaping mire,</div> + <div class="verse indent0">By a broken heart in the breast of the world,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">And the end of the world's desire."</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent6">—Chesterton.</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + +<p>Kane wiped the cold sweat from his pale brow as he hurried down the +shadowy passage. Outside this horrible palace it must be night. Even +now the full moon—the grim Moon of Skulls—might be rising above the +horizon. He paced off a hundred paces and came upon the stair the dying +priest had mentioned. This he mounted, and coming into the corridor +above, he measured off another hundred paces and brought up short +against what appeared to be a doorless wall. It seemed an age before +his frantic fingers found a piece of projecting metal. There was a +creak of rusty hinges as the hidden door swung open and Kane looked +into a passageway darker than the one in which he stood.</p> + +<p>He entered, and when the door shut behind him he turned to his right +and groped his way along for five hundred paces. There the corridor was +lighter; light sifted in from without, and Kane discerned a stairway. +Up this he went for several steps, then halted, baffled. At a sort of +landing the stairway became two, one leading away to the left, the +other to the right. Kane cursed. He felt that he could not afford to +make a mistake—time was too precious—but how was he to know which +would lead him to the niche where the priest hid?</p> + +<p>The Atlantean had been about to tell him of these stairs when struck by +the delirium which precedes death, and Kane wished fervently that he +had lived only a few moments longer.</p> + +<p>At any rate, he had no time to waste; right or wrong, he must chance +it. He chose the right hand stair and ran swiftly up it. No time for +caution now. He felt instinctively that the time of the sacrifice +was close at hand. He came into another passage and discerned by the +change in masonry that he was out of the cliffs again and in some +building—presumably the Tower of Death. He expected any moment to come +upon another stair, and suddenly his expectations were realized—but +instead of up, it led down. From somewhere in front of him Kane +heard a vague, rhythmic murmur and a cold hand gripped his heart. The +chanting of the worshippers before the Black Altar!</p> + +<p>He raced forward recklessly, rounded a turn in the corridor, brought +up short against a door and looked through a tiny aperture. His heart +sank. He had chosen the wrong stair and had wandered into some other +building adjoining the Tower of Death.</p> + +<p>He looked upon a grim and terrible scene. In a wide open space before +a great black tower whose spire rose above the crags behind it, two +long lines of black dancers swayed and writhed. Their voices rose in +a strange meaningless chant, and they did not move from their tracks. +From their knees upward their bodies swayed in fantastic rhythmical +motions, and in their hands torches tossed and whirled, shedding a +lurid shifting red light over the scene. Behind them were ranged a vast +concourse of people who stood silent. The dancing torchlight gleamed on +a sea of glittering eyes and black faces. In front of the dancers rose +the Tower of Death, gigantically tall, black and horrific. No door or +window opened in its face, but high on the wall in a sort of ornamented +frame there leered a grim symbol of death and decay. The skull of +Nakura! A faint eery glow surrounded it, lit somehow from within the +tower, Kane knew, and wondered by what strange art the priests had kept +the skull from decay and dissolution so long.</p> + +<p>But it was neither the skull nor the tower which gripped the Puritan's +horrified gaze and held it. Between the converging lines of yelling, +swaying worshippers there rose a great black altar. On this altar lay a +slim white shape.</p> + +<p>"Marylin!" the word burst from Kane's lips in a great sob.</p> + +<p>For a moment he stood frozen, helpless, struck blind. No time now to +retrace his steps and find the niche where the skull priest lurked. +Even now a faint glow was apparent behind the spire of the tower, +etching that spire blackly against the sky. The moon had risen. The +chant of the dancers soared up to a frenzy of sound and from the +silent watchers behind them began a sinister low rumble of drums. To +Kane's dazed mind it seemed that he looked on some red debauch of a +lower Hell. What ghastly worship of past eons did these perverted and +degenerate rites symbolize? Kane knew that these black people aped the +rituals of their former masters in their crude way, and even in his +despair he found time to shudder at the thought of what those original +rites must have been.</p> + +<p>Now a fearful shape rose up beside the altar where lay the silent girl. +A tall black man, entirely naked save for a hideous painted mask on his +face and a great head-dress of waving plumes. The drone of the chant +sank low for an instant, then rose up again to wilder heights. Was it +the vibrations of their song that made the floor quiver beneath Kane's +feet?</p> + +<p>Kane with shaking fingers began to unbar the door. Naught to do now +but to rush out barehanded and die beside the girl he could not save. +Then his gaze was blocked by a giant form which shouldered in front of +the door. A huge black man, a chief by his bearing and apparel, leaned +idly against the wall as he watched the proceedings. Kane's heart gave +a great leap. This was too good to be true! Thrust in the black man's +girdle was the pistol he himself had carried! He knew that his weapons +must have been divided among his captors. This pistol meant nothing +to the chief, but he must have been taken by its strange shape and +was carrying it as savages will wear useless trinkets, or perhaps he +thought it a sort of war-club. At any rate, there it was. And again +floor and building seemed to tremble.</p> + +<p>Kane pulled the door silently inward and crouched in the shadows behind +his victim like a great brooding tiger. His brain worked swiftly and +formulated his plan of action. There was a dagger in the girdle beside +the pistol; the black man's back was turned squarely to him and he must +strike from the left to reach the heart and silence him quickly. All +this passed through Solomon's brain in a flash as he crouched.</p> + +<p>The black man was not aware of his foe's presence until Kane's lean +right hand shot across his shoulder and clamped on his mouth, jerking +him backward. At the same instant the Puritan's left hand tore the +dagger from the girdle and with one desperate plunge sank the keen +blade home. The black crumpled without a sound and in an instant Kane's +pistol was in its owner's hand. A second's investigation showed that it +was still loaded and the flint still in place.</p> + +<p>No one had seen the swift murder. Those few who stood near the doorway +were all facing the Black Altar, enwrapped in the drama which was there +unfolding. As Kane stepped across the corpse, the chanting of the +dancers ceased abruptly. In the instant of silence which followed, Kane +heard, above the pounding of his own pulse, the nightwind rustle the +death-like plumes of the masked horror beside the altar. A rim of the +moon glowed above the spire.</p> + +<p>Then from high up on the face of the Tower of Death a deep voice boomed +out in a strange chant. Mayhap the black priest who spoke behind the +skull knew not what his words meant, but Kane believed that he at least +mimicked the very intonation of those long-dead brown acolytes. Deep, +mystic, resonant the voice sounded out, like the endless flowing of +long tides on the broad white beaches.</p> + +<p>The masked one beside the altar drew himself up to his great height and +raised a long glimmering blade. Kane recognized his own sword, even as +he leveled his pistol and fired—not at the masked priest but full at +the skull which gleamed in the face of the tower! For in one blinding +flash of intuition he remembered the dying Atlantean's words: "Their +brains hinge on the skull of Nakura!"</p> + +<p>Simultaneously with the crack of the pistol came a shattering crash; +the dry skull flew into a thousand pieces and vanished, and behind +it the chant broke off short in a death shriek. The rapier fell from +the hand of the masked priest and many of the dancers crumpled to +the earth, the others halting short, spellbound. Through the deathly +silence which reigned for an instant, Kane rushed toward the altar; +then all Hell broke loose.</p> + +<p>A babel of bestial screams rose to the shuddering stars. For +centuries only their faith in the dead Nakura had held together the +blood-drenched brains of the black Negari. Now their symbol had +vanished, had been blasted into nothing before their eyes. It was to +them as if the skies had split, the moon fallen and the world ended. +All the red visions which lurked at the backs of their corroded brains +leaped into fearful life, all the latent insanity which was their +heritage rose to claim its own, and Kane looked upon a whole nation +turned to bellowing maniacs.</p> + +<p>Screaming and roaring they turned on each other, men and women, tearing +with frenzied fingernails, stabbing with spears and daggers, beating +each other with the flaming torches, while over all rose the roar of +frantic human beasts. With clubbed pistol Kane battered his way through +the surging, writhing ocean of flesh, to the foot of the altar stairs. +Nails raked him, knives slashed at him, torches scorched his garments +but he paid no heed.</p> + +<p>Then as he reached the altar, a terrible figure broke from the +struggling mass and charged him. Nakari, queen of Negari, crazed as any +of her subjects, rushed upon the white man with dagger bared and eyes +horribly aflame.</p> + +<p>"You shall not escape this time, white man!" she was screaming, but +before she reached him a great black giant, dripping blood and blind +from a gash across his eyes, reeled across her path and lurched into +her. She screamed like a wounded cat and struck her dagger into him, +and then the groping hands closed on her. The blind giant whirled her +on high with one dying effort, and her last scream knifed the din of +battle as Nakari, last queen of Negari, crashed against the stones of +the altar and fell shattered and dead at Kane's feet.</p> + +<hr class="tb"> + +<p>Kane sprang up the black steps, worn deep by the feet of myriad priests +and victims, and as he came, the masked figure, who had stood like one +turned to stone, came suddenly to life. He bent swiftly, caught up the +sword he had dropped and thrust savagely at the charging white man. But +the dynamic quickness of Solomon Kane was such as few men could match. +A twist and sway of his steely body and he was inside the thrust, and +as the blade slid harmlessly between arm and chest, he brought down the +heavy pistol barrel among the waving plumes, crashing head-dress, mask +and skull with one blow.</p> + +<p>Then ere he turned to the fainting girl who lay bound on the altar, he +flung aside the shattered pistol and snatched his stolen sword from +the nerveless hand which still grasped it, feeling a fierce thrill of +renewed confidence at the familiar feel of the hilt.</p> + +<p>Marylin lay white and silent, her death-like face turned blindly to the +light of the moon which shone calmly down on the frenzied scene. At +first Kane thought her to be dead, but his searching fingers detected a +faint flutter of pulse. He cut her bonds and lifted her tenderly—only +to drop her again and whirl as a hideous blood-stained figure of +insanity came leaping and gibbering up the steps. Full upon Kane's +out-thrust blade the creature ran, and toppled back into the red swirl +below, clawing beast-like at its mortal wound.</p> + +<p>Then beneath Kane's feet the altar rocked; a sudden tremor hurled him +to his knees and his horrified eyes beheld the Tower of Death sway to +and fro. Some horror of Nature was taking place and this fact pierced +the crumbling brains of the fiends who fought and screamed below. A +new element entered into their shrieking, and then the Tower of Death +swayed far out with a terrible and awesome majesty—broke from the +rocking crags and gave way with a thunder of crashing worlds. Great +stones and shards of masonry came raining down, bringing death and +destruction to hundreds of screaming humans below. One of these stones +crashed to pieces on the altar beside Kane, showering him with dust.</p> + +<p>"Earthquake!" he gasped, and smitten by this new terror he caught up +the senseless girl and plunged recklessly down the cracking steps, +hacking and stabbing a way through the crimson whirlpools of bestial +humanity that still tore and ravened.</p> + +<p>The rest was a red nightmare, in which Kane's dazed brain refused to +record all its horrors. It seemed that for screaming crimson centuries +he reeled through narrow winding streets where bellowing, screeching +black demons battled and died, among titanic walls and black columns +that rocked against the sky and crashed to ruin about him, while the +earth heaved and trembled beneath his staggering feet and the thunder +of crashing towers filled the world.</p> + +<p>Gibbering fiends in human shape clutched and clawed at him, to fade +before his flailing sword, and falling stones bruised and battered him. +He crouched as he reeled along, covering the girl with his body as best +he could, sheltering her alike from blind stone and blinder human. And +at last, when it seemed mortal endurance had reached its limit, he saw +the great black outer wall of the city loom before him, rent from earth +to parapet and tottering for its fall. He dashed through a crevice, and +gathering his efforts, made one last sprint. And scarce was he out of +reach than the wall crashed, falling inward like a great black wave.</p> + +<p>The night wind was in his face and behind him rose the clamor of the +doomed city as Kane staggered down the hill path that trembled beneath +his feet.</p> + +<hr class="chap"> + +<p class="ph2"><i>7. The Faith of Solomon</i></p> + +<div class="poetry-container"> +<div class="poetry"> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent0">"The last lost giant, even God,</div> + <div class="verse indent2">Is risen against the world."</div> + </div> + <div class="stanza"> + <div class="verse indent6">—Chesterton.</div> + </div> +</div> +</div> + + +<p>Dawn lay like a cool white hand on the brow of Solomon Kane. The +nightmares faded from his soul as he breathed deep of the morning wind +which blew up from the jungle far below his feet—a wind laden with +the musk of decaying vegetation; yet it was like the breath of life to +him, for the scents were those of the clean natural disintegration of +outdoor things, not the loathsome aura of decadent antiquity that lurks +in the walls of eon-old cities—Kane shuddered involuntarily.</p> + +<p>He bent over the sleeping girl who lay at his feet, arranged as +comfortably as possible with the few soft tree branches he had +been able to find for her bed. Now she opened her eyes and stared +about wildly for an instant; then as her gaze met the face of +Solomon, lighted by one of his rare smiles, she gave a little sob of +thankfulness and clung to him.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Captain Kane! Have we in truth escaped from yon fearful city? Now +it seems all like a dream—after you fell through the secret door in my +chamber Nakari later went to your dungeon—as she told me—and returned +in vile humor. She said you were a fool, for she had offered you the +kingdom of the world and you had but insulted her. She screamed and +raved and cursed like one insane and swore that she would yet, alone, +build a great empire of Negari. Then she turned on me and reviled me, +saying that you held me—a slave—in more esteem than a queen and all +her glory. And in spite of my pleas she took me across her knees and +whipped me until I swooned.</p> + +<p>"Afterward I lay half senseless for a long time, and was only dimly +aware that men came to Nakari and said that you had escaped; they said +you were a sorcerer, for you faded through a solid wall like a ghost. +But Nakari killed the men who had brought you from the cell, and for +hours she was like a wild beast.</p> + +<p>"How long I lay thus I know not. In those terrible rooms and corridors +where no natural sunlight ever entered, one lost all track of time. +But from the time you were captured by Nakari and the time that I was +placed on the altar, at least a day and a night and another day must +have passed. It was only a few hours before the sacrifice that word +came you had escaped.</p> + +<p>"Nakari and her Star-maidens came to prepare me for the rite." At the +bare memory of that fearful ordeal she whimpered and hid her face in +her hands. "I must have been drugged—I only know that they clothed me +in the white robe of the sacrifice and carried me into a great black +chamber filled with horrid statues. There I lay for a space like one in +a trance while the women performed various strange and shameful rites +according to their grim religion. Then I fell into a swoon, and when I +emerged I was lying bound on the Black Altar—the torches were tossing +and the devotees chanting—behind the Tower of Death the rising moon +was beginning to glow—all this I knew faintly, as in a deep dream. And +as in a dream I saw the glowing skull high on the tower—and the gaunt +black naked priest holding a sword above my heart; then I knew no more. +What happened?"</p> + +<p>"At about that moment," Kane answered, "I emerged from a building +wherein I had wandered by mistake, and blasted their hellish skull to +atoms with a pistol ball. Whereupon, all these people, being cursed +from birth by demons, and being likewise possessed of devils, fall +to slaying one another, and in the midst of the tumult an earthquake +cometh to pass which shakes the walls down. Then I snatch you up, and +running at random, come upon a rent in the outer wall and thereby +escape, carrying you, who seem in a swoon.</p> + +<p>"Once only you awoke, after I had crossed the Bridge-Across-the-Sky, +as the black people called it, which was crumbling beneath our feet by +reason of the earthquake. After I had come to these cliffs, but dared +not descend them in the darkness, the moon being nigh to setting by +that time, you awoke and screamed and clung to me, whereupon I soothed +you as best I might, and after a time you fell into a natural sleep."</p> + +<p>"And now what?" asked the girl.</p> + +<p>"England!" Kane's deep eyes lighted at the word. "I find it hard to +remain in the land of my birth for more than a month at a time; yet +though I am cursed with the wanderlust, 'tis a name which ever rouses a +glow in my bosom. And how of you, child?"</p> + +<p>"Oh heaven!" she cried, clasping her small hands. "Home! Something of +which to be dreamed—never attained, I fear. Oh Captain Kane, how shall +we gain through all the vast leagues of jungle which lie between this +place and the coast?"</p> + +<p>"Marylin," said Kane gently, stroking her curly hair, "methinks you +lack somewhat in faith, both in Providence and in me. Nay, alone I am +a weak creature, having no strength or might in me; yet in times past +hath God made me a great vessel of wrath and a sword of deliverance. +And, I trust, shall do so again.</p> + +<p>"Look you, little Marylin: in the last few hours as it were, we have +seen the passing of an evil race and the fall of a foul black empire. +Men died by thousands about us, and the earth rose beneath our feet, +hurling down towers that broke the heavens; yea, death fell about us +in a red rain, yet we escaped unscathed.</p> + +<p>"Therein is more than the hand of man! Nay, a Power—the mightiest +Power! That which guided me across the world, straight to that demon +city—which led me to your chamber—which aided me to escape again and +led me to the one man in all the city who would give the information I +must have, the strange, evil priest of an elder race who lay dying in +a subterranean cell—and which guided me to the outer wall, as I ran +blindly and at random—for should I have come under the cliffs which +formed the rest of the wall, we had surely perished. That same Power +brought us safely out of the dying city, and safe across the rocking +bridge—which shattered and thundered down into the chasm just as my +feet touched solid earth!</p> + +<p>"Think you that having led me this far, and accomplished such wonders, +the Power will strike us down now? Nay! Evil flourishes and rules in +the cities of men and the waste places of the world, but anon the great +giant that is God rises and smites for the righteous, and they lay +faith on him.</p> + +<p>"I say this: this cliff shall we descend in safety, and yon dank jungle +traverse in safety, and it is as sure that in old Devon your people +shall clasp you again to their bosom, as that you stand here."</p> + +<p>And now for the first time Marylin smiled, with the quick eagerness +of a normal young girl, and Kane sighed in relief. Already the ghosts +were fading from her haunted eyes, and Kane looked to the day when her +horrible experiences should be as a dimming dream. One glance he flung +behind him, where beyond the scowling hills the lost city of Negari lay +shattered and silent, amid the ruins of her own walls and the fallen +crags which had kept her invincible so long, but which had at last +betrayed her to her doom. A momentary pang smote him as he thought +of the myriad of crushed, still forms lying amid those ruins; then +the blasting memory of their evil crimes surged over him and his eyes +hardened.</p> + +<p>"And it shall come to pass, that he who fleeth from the noise of the +fear shall fall into the pit; and he that cometh up out of the midst of +the pit shall be taken in the snare; for the windows from on high are +open, and the foundations of the earth do shake.</p> + +<p>"For Thou hast made of a city an heap; of a defended city a ruin; a +palace of strangers to be no city; it shall never be built.</p> + +<p>"Moreover, the multitude of Thy strangers shall be like small dust +and the multitude of the terrible ones shall be as chaff that passeth +suddenly away; yea, it shall be at an instant suddenly.</p> + +<p>"Stay yourselves and wonder; cry ye out and cry; they are drunken but +not with wine; they stagger but not with strong drink.</p> + +<p>"Verily, Marylin," said Kane with a sigh, "with mine own eyes have I +seen the prophecies of Isaiah come to pass. They were drunken but not +with wine! Nay, blood was their drink and in that red flood they dipped +deep and terribly."</p> + +<p>Then taking the girl by the hand he started toward the edge of the +cliff. At this very point had he ascended, in the night—how long ago +it seemed.</p> + +<p>Kane's clothing hung in tatters about him. He was torn, scratched and +bruised. But in his eyes shone the clear calm light of serenity as the +sun came up, flooding cliffs and jungle with a golden light that was +like a promise of joy and happiness.</p> + + +<p class="ph2">THE END</p> + +<div style='text-align:center'>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77605 ***</div> +</body> +</html> diff --git a/77605-h/images/cover.jpg b/77605-h/images/cover.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..30ecea5 --- /dev/null +++ b/77605-h/images/cover.jpg diff --git a/77605-h/images/cover2.jpg b/77605-h/images/cover2.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..63b3975 --- /dev/null +++ b/77605-h/images/cover2.jpg diff --git a/77605-h/images/illus1.jpg b/77605-h/images/illus1.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..48eb103 --- /dev/null +++ b/77605-h/images/illus1.jpg diff --git a/77605-h/images/illus2.jpg b/77605-h/images/illus2.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..8c2ca99 --- /dev/null +++ b/77605-h/images/illus2.jpg diff --git a/77605-h/images/illusc.jpg b/77605-h/images/illusc.jpg Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..a696730 --- /dev/null +++ b/77605-h/images/illusc.jpg diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6c72794 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This book, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..972865b --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for eBook #77605 +(https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/77605) diff --git a/skulls_txt.txt b/skulls_txt.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..409b983 --- /dev/null +++ b/skulls_txt.txt @@ -0,0 +1,2175 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77605 *** + + + + +The Moon of Skulls + +By ROBERT E HOWARD + +[Transcriber's Note: This etext was produced from +Weird Tales June and July 1930.] + + + + +[Illustration: "The giant's roar of triumph had scarcely died on his +lips before the two were falling into darkness."] + + + "The wise men know what wicked things + Are written on the sky; + They trim sad lamps, they touch sad strings + Hearing the heavy purple wings, + Where the forgotten Seraph kings + Still plot how God shall die." + + --Chesterton. + + + + +_1. A Man Comes Seeking_ + + +A great black shadow lay across the land, cleaving the red flame of +the sunset. To the man who toiled up the jungle trail it loomed like +a symbol of death and horror, a menace brooding and terrible, like the +shadow of a stealthy assassin flung upon some candle-lit wall. + +Yet it was only the shadow of the great crag which reared up in front +of him, the first outpost of the grim foothills which were his goal. +He halted a moment at its foot, staring upward where it rose blackly +limned against the dying sun. He could have sworn that he caught the +hint of a movement at the top, as he stared, hand shielding his eyes, +but the fading glare dazzled him and he could not be sure. Was it a man +who darted to cover? A man, or----? + +He shrugged his shoulders and fell to examining the rough trail which +led up and over the brow of the crag. At first glance it seemed that +only a mountain goat could scale it, but closer investigation showed +numbers of fingerholds drilled into the solid rock. It would be a task +to try his powers to the utmost but he had not come a thousand miles to +turn back now. + +He dropped the large pouch he wore at his shoulder, and laid down the +clumsy musket, retaining only his long rapier, dagger, and one of his +pistols. These he strapped behind him, and without a backward glance +over the darkening trail he had come, he started the long ascent. He +was a tall man, long-armed and iron-muscled, yet again and again he was +forced to halt in his upward climb and rest for a moment, clinging like +an ant to the precipitous face of the cliff. Night fell swiftly and +the crag above him was a shadowy blur in which he was forced to feel +with his fingers, blindly, for the holes which served him as precarious +ladder. Below him, the night noises of the tropical jungle broke forth, +yet it appeared to him that even these sounds were subdued and hushed +as though the great black hills looming above threw a spell of silence +and fear even over the jungle creatures. + +On up he struggled, and now to make his way harder, the cliff bulged +outward near its summit and the strain on nerve and muscle became +heart-breaking. Time and again a hold slipped and he escaped falling +by a hair's breadth. But every fiber in his lean hard body was +perfectly co-ordinated, and his fingers were like steel talons with +the grip of a vise. His progress grew slower and slower but on he went +until at last he saw the cliff's brow splitting the stars a scant +twenty feet above him. + +And even as he looked, a vague bulk heaved into view, toppled on the +edge and hurtled down toward him with a great rush of air about it. +Flesh crawling, he flattened himself against the cliff's face and felt +a heavy blow against his shoulder, only a glancing blow, but even so it +nearly tore him from his hold, and as he fought desperately to right +himself, he heard a reverberating crash among the rocks far below. +Cold sweat beading his brow, he looked up. Who--or what--had shoved +that boulder over the cliff edge? He was brave, as the bones on many +a battlefield could testify, but the thought of dying like a sheep, +helpless and with no chance of resistance, turned his blood cold. + +Then a wave of fury supplanted his fear and he renewed his climb with +reckless speed. The expected second boulder did not come, however, and +no living thing met his sight as he clambered up over the edge and +leaped erect, sword flashing from its scabbard. + +He stood upon a sort of plateau which debouched into a very broken +hilly country some half mile to the west. The crag he had just mounted +jutted out from the rest of the heights like a sullen promontory, +looming above the sea of waving foliage below, now dark and mysterious +in the tropic night. + +Silence ruled here in absolute sovereignty. No breeze stirred the +somber depths below, and no footfall rustled amid the stunted bushes +which cloaked the plateau, yet that boulder which had almost hurled the +climber to his death had not fallen by chance. What beings moved among +these grim hills? The tropical darkness fell about the lone wanderer +like a heavy veil through which the yellow stars blinked evilly. The +steams of the rotting jungle vegetation floated up to him as tangible +as a thick fog, and making a wry face he strode away from the cliff, +heading boldly across the plateau, sword in one hand and pistol in the +other. + +There was an uncomfortable feeling of being watched in the very air. +The silence remained unbroken save for the soft swishing that marked +the stranger's cat-like tread through the tall upland grass, yet the +man sensed that living things glided before and behind him and on each +side. Whether man or beast trailed him he knew not, nor did he care +over-much, for he was prepared to fight human or devil who barred his +way. Occasionally he halted and glanced challengingly about him, but +nothing met his eye except the shrubs which crouched like short dark +ghosts about his trail, blended and blurred in the thick hot darkness +through which the very stars seemed to struggle, redly. + +At last he came to the place where the plateau broke into the higher +slopes and there he saw a clump of trees blocked out solidly in the +lesser shadows. He approached warily, then halted as his gaze, growing +somewhat accustomed to the darkness, made out a vague form among the +somber trunks which was not a part of them. He hesitated. The figure +neither advanced nor fled. A dim form of silent menace, it lurked as if +in wait. A brooding horror hung over that still cluster of trees. + + * * * * * + +The stranger advanced warily, blade extended. Closer. Straining his +eyes for some hint of threatening motion. He decided that the figure +was human but he was puzzled at its lack of movement. Then the reason +became apparent--it was the corpse of a black man that stood among +those trees, held erect by spears through his body, nailing him to the +boles. One arm was extended in front of him, held in place along a +great branch by a dagger through the wrist, the index finger straight +as if the corpse pointed stiffly--back along the way the stranger had +come. + +The meaning was obvious; that mute grim signpost could have but one +significance--death lay beyond. The man who stood gazing upon that +grisly warning rarely laughed, but now he allowed himself the luxury +of a sardonic smile. A thousand miles of land and sea--ocean travel +and jungle travel--and now they expected to turn him back with such +mummery--whoever they were. + +He resisted the temptation to salute the corpse, as an action wanting +in decorum, and pushed on boldly through the grove, half expecting an +attack from the rear or an ambush. + +Nothing of the sort occurred, however, and emerging from the trees, he +found himself at the foot of a rugged incline, the first of a series of +slopes. He strode stolidly upward in the night, nor did he even pause +to reflect how unusual his actions must have appeared to a sensible +man. The average man would have camped at the foot of the crag and +waited for morning before even attempting to scale the cliffs. But this +was no ordinary man. Once his objective was in sight, he followed the +straightest line to it, without a thought of obstacles, whether day or +night. What was to be done, must be done. He had reached the outposts +of the kingdom of fear at dusk, and invading its inmost recesses by +night seemed to follow as a matter of course. + +As he went up the boulder-strewn slopes the moon rose, lending its air +of illusion, and in its light the broken hills ahead loomed up like +the black spires of wizards' castles. He kept his eyes fixed on the +dim trail he was following, for he knew not when another boulder might +come hurtling down the inclines. He expected an attack of any sort and, +naturally, it was the unexpected which really happened. + +Suddenly from behind a great rock stepped a black man; an ebony giant +in the pale moonlight, a long spear blade gleaming silver in hand, his +headpiece of ostrich plumes floating above him like a white cloud. He +lifted the spear in a ponderous salute, and spoke in the dialect of the +river-tribes: + +"This is not the white man's land. Who is my white brother in his own +kraal and why does he come into the Land of Skulls?" + +"My name is Solomon Kane," the white man answered in the same language. +"I seek the vampire queen of Negari." + +"Few seek. Fewer find. None return," answered the other cryptically. + +"Will you lead me to her?" + +"You bear a long dagger in your right hand. There are no lions here." + +"A serpent dislodged a boulder. I thought to find snakes in the bushes." + +The giant acknowledged this interchange of subtleties with a grim smile +and a brief silence fell. + +"Your life," said the black presently, "is in my hand." + +Kane smiled thinly. "I carry the lives of many warriors in _my_ hand." + +The negro's gaze traveled uncertainly up and down the shimmery length +of the Englishman's sword. Then he shrugged his mighty shoulders and +let his spear point sink to the earth. + +"You bear no gifts," said he; "but follow me and I will lead you to the +Terrible One, the Mistress of Doom, the Red Woman, Nakari, who rules +the land of Negari." + +He stepped aside and motioned Kane to precede him, but the Englishman, +his mind on a spear-thrust in the back, shook his head. + +"Who am I that I should walk in front of my brother? We be two +chiefs--let us walk side by side." + +In his heart Kane railed that he should be forced to use such unsavory +diplomacy with a black savage, but he showed no sign. The giant +bowed with a certain barbaric majesty and together they went up the +hill trail, unspeaking. Kane was aware that men were stepping from +hiding-places and falling in behind them, and a surreptitious glance +over his shoulder showed him some two score black warriors trailing out +behind them in two wedge-shaped lines. The moonlight glittered on sleek +black bodies, on waving head-gears and long cruel spear blades. + +"My brothers are like leopards," said Kane courteously; "they lie in +the low bushes and no eyes see them; they steal through the high grass +and no man hears their coming." + +The black chief acknowledged the compliment with a courtly inclination +of his lion-like head, that set the plumes whispering. + +"The mountain leopard is our brother, oh chieftain. Our feet are like +drifting smoke but our arms are like iron. When they strike, blood +drips red and men die." + +Kane sensed an undercurrent of menace in the tone. There was no actual +hint of threat on which he might base his suspicions, but the sinister +minor note was there. He said no more for a space and the strange +band moved silently upward in the moonlight like a cavalcade of black +specters led by a white ghost. The trail grew steeper and more rocky, +winding in and out among crags and gigantic boulders. Suddenly a great +chasm opened before them, spanned by a natural bridge of rock, at the +foot of which the leader halted. + + * * * * * + +Kane stared at the abyss curiously. It was some forty feet wide, +and looking down, his gaze was swallowed by impenetrable blackness, +hundreds of feet deep, he knew. On the other side rose crags dark and +forbidding. + +"Here," said the black chief, "begin the true borders of Nakari's +realm." + +Kane was aware that the warriors were casually closing in on him. His +fingers instinctively tightened about the hilt of the rapier which he +had not sheathed. The air was suddenly supercharged with tension. + +"Here, too," the black man said, "they who bring no gifts to +Nakari--_die!_" + +The last word was a shriek, as if the thought had transformed the +speaker into a maniac, and as he screamed it, the great black arm went +back and then forward with a ripple of mighty muscles, and the long +spear leaped at Kane's breast. + +Only a born fighter could have avoided that thrust. Kane's instinctive +action saved his life--the great blade grazed his ribs as he swayed +aside and returned the blow with a flashing thrust that killed a +warrior who jostled between him and the chief at that instant. + +Spears flashed in the moonlight and Kane, parrying one and bending +under the thrust of another, sprang out upon the narrow bridge where +only one could come at him at a time. + +None cared to be first. They stood upon the brink and thrust at him, +crowding forward when he retreated, giving back when he pressed them. +Their spears were longer than his rapier but he more than made up for +the difference and the great odds by his scintillant skill and the cold +ferocity of his attack. + +They wavered back and forth and then suddenly a black giant leaped +from among his fellows and charged out upon the bridge like a wild +buffalo, shoulders hunched, spear held low, eyes gleaming with a look +not wholly sane. Kane leaped back before the onslaught, leaped back +again, striving to avoid that stabbing spear and to find an opening +for his point. He sprang to one side and found himself reeling on the +edge of the bridge with eternity gaping beneath him. The blacks yelled +in savage exultation as he swayed and fought for his balance, and the +giant on the bridge roared and plunged at the rocking white man. + +Kane parried with all his strength--a feat few swordsman could have +accomplished, off balance as he was--saw the cruel spear blade flash by +his cheek--felt himself falling backward into the abyss. A desperate +effort, and he gripped the spear shaft, righted himself and ran the +spearman through the body. The black's great red cavern of a mouth +spouted blood and with a dying effort he hurled himself blindly against +his foe. Kane, with his heels over the bridge's edge, was unable to +avoid him and they toppled over together, to disappear silently into +the depths below. + +So swiftly had it all happened that the warriors stood stunned. The +giant's roar of triumph had scarcely died on his lips before the two +were falling into the darkness. Now the rest of the negroes came out on +the bridge to peer down curiously, but no sound came up from the dark +void. + + + + + _2. The People of the Stalking Death_ + + + "Their gods were sadder than the sea, + Gods of a wandering will, + Who cried for blood like beasts at night + Sadly, from hill to hill." + + --_Chesterton._ + + +As Kane fell he followed his fighting instinct, twisting in midair so +that when he struck, were it ten or a thousand feet below, he would +land on top of the man who fell with him. + +The end came suddenly--much more suddenly than the Englishman had +thought for. He lay half stunned for an instant, then looking up, saw +dimly the narrow bridge banding the sky above him, and the forms of +the warriors, limned in the moonlight and grotesquely foreshortened as +they leaned over the edge. He lay still, knowing that the beams of the +moon did not pierce the deeps in which he was hidden, and that to those +watchers he was invisible. Then when they vanished from view he began +to review his present plight. The black man was dead, and only for the +fact that his corpse had cushioned the fall, Kane would have been dead +likewise, for they had fallen a considerable distance. As it was, the +white man was stiff and bruised. + +He drew his sword from the negro's body, thankful that it had not been +broken, and began to grope about in the darkness. His hand encountered +the edge of what seemed a cliff. He had thought that he was on the +bottom of the chasm and that its impression of great depth had been a +delusion, but now he decided that he had fallen on a ledge, part of the +way down. He dropped a small stone over the side, and after what seemed +a very long time he heard the faint sound of its striking far below. + +Somewhat at a loss as to how to proceed, he drew flint and steel from +his belt and struck them to some tinder, warily shielding the light +with his hands. The faint illumination showed a large ledge jutting out +from the side of the cliff, that is, the side next the hills, to which +he had been attempting to cross. He had fallen close to the edge and it +was only by the narrowest margin that he had escaped sliding off it, +not knowing his position. + +Crouching there, his eyes seeking to accustom themselves to the abysmal +gloom, he made out what seemed to be a darker shadow in the shadows +of the wall. On closer examination he found it to be an opening large +enough to admit his body standing erect. A cavern, he assumed, and +though its appearance was dark and forbidding in the extreme, he +entered, groping his way when the tinder burned out. + +Where it led to, he naturally had no idea, but any action was +preferable to sitting still until the mountain vultures plucked his +bones. For a long way the cave floor tilted upward--solid rock beneath +his feet--and Kane made his way with some difficulty up the rather +steep slant, slipping and sliding now and then. The cavern seemed a +large one, for at no time after entering it could he touch the roof, +nor could he, with a hand on one wall, reach the other. + +At last the floor became level and Kane sensed that the cave was much +larger there. The air seemed better, though the darkness was just as +impenetrable. Suddenly he stopped dead in his tracks. From somewhere +in front of him there came a strange indescribable rustling. Without +warning something smote him in the face and slashed wildly. All about +him sounded the eery murmurings of many small wings and suddenly Kane +smiled crookedly, amused, relieved and chagrined. Bats, of course. +The cave was swarming with them. Still it was a shaky experience, and +as he went on and the wings whispered through the vasty emptiness +of the great cavern, Kane's Puritan mind found space to dally with +a bizarre thought--had he wandered into Hell by some strange means, +and were these in truth bats, or were they lost souls winging through +everlasting night? + +Then, thought Solomon Kane, I will soon confront Satan himself--and +even as he thought this, his nostrils were assailed by a horrid scent +fetid and repellent. The scent grew as he went slowly on, and Kane +swore softly, though he was not a profane man. He sensed that the +smell betokened some hidden threat, some unseen malevolence, inhuman +and deathly, and his somber mind sprang at supernatural conclusions. +However, he felt perfect confidence in his ability to cope with any +fiend or demon, armored as he was in unshakable faith of creed and the +knowledge of the rightness of his cause. + +What followed happened suddenly. He was groping his way along when in +front of him two narrow yellow eyes leaped up in the darkness--eyes +that were cold and expressionless, too hideously close-set for human +eyes and too high for any four-legged beast. What horror had thus +reared itself up in front of him? + +This is Satan, thought Kane as the eyes swayed above him, and the next +instant he was battling for his life with the darkness that seemed to +have taken tangible form and thrown itself about his body and limbs +in great slimy coils. Those coils lapped his sword arm and rendered +it useless; with the other hand he groped for dagger or pistol, flesh +crawling as his fingers slipped from slick scales, while the hissing of +the monster filled the cavern with a cold pæan of terror. + +There in the black dark to the accompaniment of the bats' leathery +rustlings, Kane fought like a rat in the grip of a mouse-snake, and he +could feel his ribs giving and his breath going before his frantic left +hand closed on his dagger hilt. + +Then with a volcanic twist and wrench of his steel-thewed body he tore +his left arm partly free and plunged the keen blade again and again to +the hilt in the sinuous writhing terror which enveloped him, feeling at +last the quivering coils loosen and slide from his limbs to lie about +his feet like huge cables. + +The mighty serpent lashed wildly in its death struggles, and Kane, +avoiding its bone-shattering blows, reeled away in the darkness, +laboring for breath. If his antagonist had not been Satan himself, it +had been Satan's nearest earthly satellite, thought Solomon, hoping +devoutly that he would not be called upon to battle another in the +darkness there. + + * * * * * + +It seemed to him that he had been walking through the blackness for +ages and he began to wonder if there were any end to the cave when a +glimmer of light pierced the darkness. He thought it to be an outer +entrance a great way off, and started forward swiftly, but to his +astonishment, he brought up short against a blank wall after taking a +few strides. Then he perceived that the light came through a narrow +crack in the wall, and feeling over this wall he found it to be of +different material from the rest of the cave, consisting, apparently, +of regular blocks of stone joined together with mortar of some sort--an +indubitably man-built wall. + +The light streamed between two of these stones, where the mortar had +crumbled away. Kane ran his hands over the surface with an interest +beyond his present needs. The work seemed very old and very much +superior to what might be expected of a tribe of ignorant negroes. + +He felt the thrill of the explorer and discoverer. Certainly no white +man had ever seen this place and lived to tell of it, for when he had +landed on the dank West Coast some months before, preparing to plunge +into the interior, he had had no hint of such a country as this. The +few white men who knew anything at all of Africa with whom he had +talked, had never even mentioned the Land of Skulls or the she-fiend +who ruled it. + +Kane thrust against the wall cautiously. The structure seemed weakened +from age--a vigorous shove and it gave perceptibly. He hurled himself +against it with all his weight and a whole section of wall gave way +with a crash, precipitating him into a dimly lighted corridor amid a +heap of stone, dust and mortar. + +He sprang up and looked about, expecting the noise to bring a horde +of wild spearmen. Utter silence reigned. The corridor in which he now +stood was much like a long narrow cave itself, save that it was the +work of man. It was several feet wide and the roof was many feet above +his head. Dust lay ankle-deep on the floor as if no foot had trod there +for countless centuries, and the dim light, Kane decided, filtered in +somehow through the roof or ceiling, for nowhere did he see any doors +or windows. At last he decided the source was the ceiling itself, which +was of a peculiar phosphorescent quality. + +He set off down the corridor, feeling uncomfortably like a gray ghost +moving along the gray halls of death and decay. The evident antiquity +of his surroundings depressed him, making him sense vaguely the +fleeting and futile existence of mankind. That he was now on top of the +earth he believed, since light of a sort came in, but where, he could +not even offer a conjecture. This was a land of enchantment--a land of +horror and fearful mysteries, the jungle and river natives had said, +and he had gotten whispered hints of its terrors ever since he had set +his back to the Slave Coast and ventured into the hinterlands alone. + +Now and then he caught a low indistinct murmur which seemed to come +through one of the walls, and he at last came to the conclusion that he +had stumbled onto a secret passage in some castle or house. The natives +who had dared speak to him of Negari, had whispered of a ju-ju city +built of stone, set high amid the grim black crags of the fetish hills. + +Then, thought Kane, it may be that I have blundered upon the very thing +I sought and am in the midst of that city of terror. He halted, and +choosing a place at random, began to loosen the mortar with his dagger. +As he worked he again heard that low murmur, increasing in volume as +he bored through the wall, and presently the point pierced through, +and looking through the aperture it had made, he saw a strange and +fantastic scene. + +He was looking into a great chamber, whose walls and floors were of +stone, and whose mighty roof was upheld by gigantic stone columns, +strangely carved. Ranks of feathered black warriors lined the walls +and a double column of them stood like statues before a throne set +between two stone dragons which were larger than elephants. These +men he recognized, by their bearing and general appearance, to be +tribesmen of the warriors he had fought at the chasm. But his gaze +was drawn irresistibly to the great, grotesquely ornamented throne. +There, dwarfed by the ponderous splendor about her, a woman reclined. A +black woman she was, young and of a tigerish comeliness. She was naked +except for a beplumed helmet, armbands, anklets and a girdle of colored +ostrich feathers and she sprawled upon the silken cushions with her +limbs thrown about in voluptuous abandon. + +Even at that distance Kane could make out that her features were regal +yet barbaric, haughty and imperious, yet sensual, and with a touch of +ruthless cruelty about the curl of her full red lips. Kane felt his +pulse quicken. This could be no other than she whose crimes had become +almost mythical--Nakari of Negari, demon queen of a demon city, whose +monstrous lust for blood had set half a continent shivering. At least +she seemed human enough; the tales of the fearful river tribes had lent +her a supernatural aspect. Kane had half expected to see a loathsome +semi-human monster out of some past and demoniacal age. + +The Englishman gazed, fascinated though repelled. Not even in the +courts of Europe had he seen such grandeur. The chamber and all +its accouterments, from the carven serpents twined about the +bases of the pillars to the dimly seen dragons on the shadowy +ceiling, were fashioned on a gigantic scale. The splendor was +awesome--elephantine--inhumanly oversized, and almost numbing to the +mind which sought to measure and conceive the magnitude thereof. To +Kane it seemed that these things must have been the work of gods rather +than men, for this chamber alone would dwarf most of the castles he had +known in Europe. + +The black people who thronged that mighty room seemed grotesquely +incongruous. They no more suited their surroundings than a band +of monkeys would have seemed at home in the council chambers of +the English king. As Kane realized this the sinister importance of +Queen Nakari dwindled. Sprawled on that august throne in the midst +of the terrific glory of another age, she seemed to assume her +true proportions--a spoiled, petulant child engaged in a game of +make-believe and using for her sport a toy discarded by her elders. And +at the same time a thought entered Kane's mind--who were these elders? + +Still the child could become deadly in her game, as the Englishman soon +saw. + +A tall massive black came through the ranks fronting the throne, +and after prostrating himself four times before it, remained on his +knees, evidently waiting permission to speak. The queen's air of lazy +indifference fell from her and she straightened with a quick lithe +motion that reminded Kane of a leopardess springing erect. She spoke, +and the words came faintly to him as he strained his faculties to hear. +She spoke in a language very similar to that of the river tribes. + +"Speak!" + +"Great and Terrible One," said the kneeling warrior, and Kane +recognized him as the chief who had first accosted him on the +plateau--the chief of the guards on the cliffs, "let not the fire of +your fury consume your slave." + +The young woman's eyes narrowed viciously. + +"You know why you were summoned, son of a vulture?" + +"Fire of Beauty, the stranger brought no gifts." + +"No gifts?" she spat out the words. "What have I to do with gifts? I +bade you slay all black men who came empty-handed--did I tell you to +slay white men?" + +"Gazelle of Negari, he came climbing the crags in the night like an +assassin, with a dagger as long as a man's arm in his hand. The boulder +we hurled down missed him, and we met him upon the plateau and took +him to the Bridge-Across-the-Sky, where, as is the custom, we thought +to slay him; for it was your word that you were weary of men who came +wooing you." + +"Black men, fool," she snarled; "black men!" + +"Your slave did not know, Queen of Beauty. The white man fought like a +mountain leopard. Two men he slew and fell with the last one into the +chasm, and so he perished, Star of Negari." + +"Aye," the queen's tone was venomous, "the first white man who ever +came to Negari! One who might have--rise, fool!" + +The man got to his feet. + +"Mighty Lioness, might not this one have come seeking----" + +The sentence was never completed. Even as he straightened, Nakari made +a swift gesture with her hand. Two warriors plunged from the silent +ranks and two spears crossed in the chief's body before he could turn. +A gurgling scream burst from his lips, blood spurted high in the air +and the corpse fell flatly at the foot of the great throne. + +The ranks never wavered, but Kane caught the sidelong flash of +strangely red eyes and the involuntary wetting of thick lips. Nakari +had half risen as the spears flashed, and now she sank back, an +expression of cruel satisfaction on her beautiful face and a strange +brooding gleam in her scintillant eyes. + +An indifferent wave of her hand and the corpse was dragged away by the +heels, the dead arms trailing limply in the wide smear of blood left +by the passage of the body. Kane could see other wide stains crossing +the stone floor, some almost indistinct, others less dim. How many wild +scenes of blood and cruel frenzy had the great stone throne-dragons +looked upon with their carven eyes? + +He did not doubt, now, the tales told him by the river tribes. These +people were bred in rapine and horror. Their prowess had burst their +brains. They lived, like some terrible beast, only to destroy. There +were strange gleams behind their eyes which at times lit those eyes +with up-leaping flames and shadows of Hell. What had the river tribes +said of these mountain people who had ravaged them for countless +centuries? _That they were henchmen of death, who stalked among them, +and whom they worshipped._ + +Still the thought hovered in Kane's mind as he watched--who built this +place, and why were negroes evidently in possession? He knew this was +the work of a higher race. No black tribe had ever reached such a stage +of culture as evidenced by these carvings. Yet the river tribes had +spoken of no other men than those upon which he now looked. + + * * * * * + +The Englishman tore himself away from the fascination of the barbaric +scene with an effort. He had no time to waste; as long as they thought +him dead, he had more chance of eluding possible guards and seeking +what he had come to find. He turned and set off down the dim corridor. +No plan of action offered itself to his mind and one direction was +as good as another. The passage did not run straight; it turned and +twisted, following the line of the walls, Kane supposed, and found time +to wonder at the evident enormous thickness of those walls. He expected +at any moment to meet some guard or slave, but as the corridors +continued to stretch empty before him, with the dusty floors unmarked +by any footprint, he decided that either the passages were unknown to +the people of Negari or else for some reason were never used. + +He kept a close lookout for secret doors, and at last found one, made +fast on the inner side with a rusty bolt set in a groove of the wall. +This he manipulated cautiously, and presently with a creaking which +seemed terrifically loud in the stillness the door swung inward. +Looking out he saw no one, and stepping warily through the opening, +he drew the door to behind him, noting that it assumed the part of +a fantastic picture painted on the wall. He scraped a mark with his +dagger at the point where he believed the hidden spring to be on the +outer side, for he knew not when he might need to use the passage again. + +He was in a great hall, through which ran a maze of giant pillars much +like those of the throne chamber. Among them he felt like a child in +some great forest, yet they gave him some slight sense of security +since he believed that, gliding among them like a ghost through a +jungle, he could elude the black people in spite of their craft. + +He set off, choosing his direction at random and going carefully. Once +he heard a mutter of voices, and leaping upon the base of a column, +clung there while two black women passed directly beneath him, but +besides these he encountered no one. It was an uncanny sensation, +passing through this vast hall which seemed empty of human life, but in +some other part of which Kane knew there might be throngs of people, +hidden from sight by the pillars. + +At last, after what seemed an eternity of following these monstrous +mazes, he came upon a huge wall which seemed to be either a side of the +hall, or a partition, and continuing along this, he saw in front of him +a doorway before which two spearmen stood like black statues. + +Kane, peering about the corner of a column base made out two windows +high in the wall, one on each side of the door, and noting the ornate +carvings which covered the walls, determined on a desperate plan. He +felt it imperative that he should see what lay within that room. The +fact that it was guarded suggested that the room beyond the door was +either a treasure chamber or a dungeon, and he felt sure that his +ultimate goal would prove to be a dungeon. + +He retreated to a point out of sight of the blacks and began to scale +the wall, using the deep carvings for hand and foot holds. It proved +even easier than he had hoped, and having climbed to a point level with +the windows, he crawled cautiously along a horizontal line, feeling +like an ant on a wall. + +The guards far below him never looked up, and finally he reached +the nearer window and drew himself up over the sill. He looked down +into a large room, empty of life, but equipped in a manner sensuous +and barbaric. Silken couches and velvet cushions dotted the floor in +profusion and tapestries heavy with gold work hung upon the walls. The +ceiling too was worked in gold. + +Strangely incongruous, crude trinkets of ivory and ironwood, +unmistakably negroid in workmanship, littered the place, symbolic +enough of this strange kingdom where signs of barbarism vied with a +strange culture. The outer door was shut and in the wall opposite was +another door, also closed. + +Kane descended from the window, sliding down the edge of a tapestry +as a sailor slides down a sail-rope, and crossed the room, his feet +sinking noiselessly into the deep fabric of the rug which covered the +floor, and which, like all the other furnishings, seemed ancient to the +point of decay. + +At the door he hesitated. To step into the next room might be a +desperately hazardous thing to do; should it prove to be filled with +black men, his escape was cut off by the spearmen outside the other +door. Still, he was used to taking all sorts of wild chances, and now, +sword in hand, he flung the door open with a suddenness intended to +numb with surprize for an instant any foe who might be on the other +side. + +Kane took a swift step within, ready for anything--then halted +suddenly, struck speechless and motionless for a second. He had come +thousands of miles in search of something and there before him lay the +object of his search. + + + + + _3. Lilith_ + + + "Lady of mystery, what is thy history?" + + --Viereck. + + +A couch stood in the middle of the room and on its silken surface lay +a woman--a woman whose skin was white and whose reddish gold hair +fell about her bare shoulders. She now sprang erect, fright flooding +her fine gray eyes, lips parted to utter a cry which she as suddenly +checked. + +"You!" she exclaimed. "How did you----?" + +Solomon Kane closed the door behind him and came toward her, a rare +smile on his dark face. + +"You remember me, do you not, Marylin?" + +The fear had already faded from her eyes even before he spoke, to be +replaced by a look of incredible wonder and dazed bewilderment. + +"Captain Kane! I can not understand--it seemed no one would ever +come----" + +She drew a small hand wearily across her white brow, swaying suddenly. + +Kane caught her in his arms--she was only a girl, little more than a +child--and laid her gently on the couch. There, chafing her wrists +gently, he talked in a low hurried monotone, keeping an eye on the door +all the time--which door, by the way, seemed to be the only entrance +or egress from the room. While he talked he mechanically took in the +chamber, noting that it was almost a duplicate of the outer room, as +regards hangings and general furnishings. + +"First," said he, "before we go into any other matters, tell me, are +you closely guarded?" + +"Very closely, sir," she murmured hopelessly; "I know not how you came +here, but we can never escape." + +"Let me tell you swiftly how I came to be here, and mayhap you will be +more hopeful when I tell you of the difficulties already overcome. Lie +still now, Marylin, and I will tell you how I came to seek an English +heiress in the devil city of Negari. + +"I killed Sir John Taferal in a duel. As to the reason, 'tis neither +here nor there, but slander and a black lie lay behind it. Ere he died +he confessed that he had committed a foul crime some years agone. You +remember, of course, the affection cherished for you by your cousin, +old Lord Hildred Taferal, Sir John's uncle. Sir John feared that the +old lord, dying without issue, might leave the great Taferal estates to +you. + +"Years ago you disappeared and Sir John spread the rumor that you had +drowned. Yet when he lay dying with my rapier through his body, he +gasped out that he had kidnapped you and sold you to a Barbary rover, +whom he named--a bloody pirate whose name has not been unknown on +England's coasts aforetime. So I came seeking you, and a long weary +trail it has been, stretching into long leagues and bitter years. + +"First I sailed the seas searching El Gar, the Barbary corsair named +by Sir John. I found him in the crash and roar of an ocean battle; +he died, but even as he lay dying he told me that he had sold you in +turn to a merchant out of Stamboul. So to the Levant I went and there +by chance came upon a Greek sailor whom the Moors had crucified on the +shore for piracy. I cut him down and asked him the question I asked +all men--if he had in his wanderings seen a captive English girl-child +with yellow curls. I learned that he had been one of the crew of the +Stamboul merchants, and that she had, on her homeward voyage, been set +upon by a Portuguese slaver and sunk--this renegade Greek and the child +being among the few who were taken aboard the slaver. + +"This slaver then, cruising south for black ivory, had been ambushed +in a small bay on the African West Coast, and of your further fate +the Greek knew nothing, for he had escaped the general massacre, and +taking to sea in an open boat, had been taken up by a ship of Genoese +freebooters. + +"To the West Coast, then, I came, on the slim chance that you still +lived, and there heard among the natives that some years ago a white +child had been taken from a ship whose crew had been slain, and sent +inland as a part of the tribute the shore tribes paid to the upper +river chiefs. + +"Then all traces ceased. For months I wandered without a clue as to +your whereabouts, nay, without a hint that you even lived. Then I +chanced to hear among the river tribes of the demon city of Negari and +the black queen who kept a white woman for a slave. I came here." + +Kane's matter-of-fact tone, his unfurbished narration, gave no hint +of the full meaning of that tale--of what lay behind those calm +and measured words--the sea-fights and the land fights--the years +of privation and heart-breaking toil, the ceaseless danger, the +everlasting wandering through hostile and unknown lands, the tedious +and deadening labor of ferreting out the information he wished from +ignorant, sullen and unfriendly savages, black and white. + +"I came here" said Kane simply, but what a world of courage and effort +was symbolized by that phrase! A long red trail, black shadows and +crimson shadows weaving a devil's dance--marked by flashing swords and +the smoke of battle--by faltering words falling like drops of blood +from the lips of dying men. + +Not a consciously dramatic man, certainly, was Solomon Kane. He +told his tale in the same manner in which he had overcome terrific +obstacles--coldly, briefly and without heroics. + +"You see, Marylin," he concluded gently, "I have not come this far and +done this much, to now meet with defeat. Take heart, child. We will +find a way out of this fearful place." + +"Sir John took me on his saddle-bow," the girl said dazedly, and +speaking slowly as if her native language came strangely to her from +years of unuse, as she framed in halting words an English evening of +long ago: "He carried me to the sea-shore where a galley's boat waited, +filled with fierce men, dark and mustached and having simitars, and +great rings to the fingers. The captain, a Moslem with a face like a +hawk, took me, I a-weeping with fear, and bore me to his galley. Yet he +was kind to me in his way, I being little more than a baby, and at last +sold me to a Turkish merchant, as he told you. This merchant he met off +the southern coast of France, after many days of sea travel. + +"This man did not use me badly, yet I feared him, for he was a man of +cruel countenance and made me understand that I was to be sold to a +black sultan of the Moors. However, in the Gates of Hercules his ship +was set upon by a Cadiz slaver and things came about as you have said. + +"The captain of the slaver believed me to be the child of some wealthy +English family and intended holding me for ransom, but in a grim +darksome bay on the African coast he perished with all his men except +the Greek you have mentioned, and I was taken captive by a black +chieftain. + +"I was terribly afraid and thought he would slay me, but he did me no +harm and sent me up-country with an escort, who also bore much loot +taken from the ship. This loot, together with myself, was, as you know, +intended for a powerful king of the river peoples. But it never reached +him, for a roving band of Negari fell upon the beach warriors and slew +them all. Then I was taken to this city, and have since remained, slave +to Queen Nakari. + +"How I have lived through all those terrible scenes of battle and +cruelty and murder, I know not." + +"A providence has watched over you, child," said Kane, "the power which +doth care for weak women and helpless children; which led me to you in +spite of all hindrances, and which shall yet lead us forth from this +place, God willing." + +"My people!" she exclaimed suddenly like one awaking from a dream; +"what of them?" + +"All in good health and fortune, child, save that they have sorrowed +for you through the long years. Nay, old Sir Hildred hath the gout and +doth so swear thereat that I fear for his soul at times. Yet methinks +that the sight of you, little Marylin, would mend him." + +"Still, Captain Kane," said the girl, "I can not understand why you +came alone." + +"Your brothers would have come with me, child, but it was not sure that +you lived, and I was loth that any other Taferal should die in a land +far from good English soil. I rid the country of an evil Taferal--'twas +but just I should restore in his place a good Taferal, if so be she +still lived--I, and I alone." + +This explanation Kane himself believed. He never sought to analyze his +motives and he never wavered, once his mind was made up. Though he +always acted on impulse, he firmly believed that all his actions were +governed by cold and logical reasonings. He was a man born out of his +time--a strange blending of Puritan and Cavalier, with a touch of the +ancient philosopher, and more than a touch of the pagan, though the +last assertion would have shocked him unspeakably. An atavist of the +days of blind chivalry he was, a knight errant in the somber clothes of +a fanatic. A hunger in his soul drove him on and on, an urge to right +all wrongs, protect all weaker things, avenge all crimes against right +and justice. Wayward and restless as the wind, he was consistent in +only one respect--he was true to his ideals of justice and right. Such +was Solomon Kane. + +"Marylin," he now said kindly, taking her small hands in his +sword-calloused fingers, "methinks you have changed greatly in the +years. You were a rosy and chubby little maid when I used to dandle +you on my knee in old England. Now you seem drawn and pale of face, +though you are beautiful as the nymphs of the heathen books. There are +haunting ghosts in your eyes, child--do they misuse you here?" + +She lay back on the couch and the blood drained slowly from her already +pallid features until she was deathly white. Kane bent over her, +startled. Her voice came in a whisper. + +"Ask me not. There are deeds better hidden in the darkness of night and +forgetfulness. There are sights which blast the eyes and leave their +burning mark forever on the brain. The walls of ancient cities, recked +not of by men, have looked upon scenes not to be spoken of, even in +whispers." + +Her eyes closed wearily and Kane's troubled, somber eyes unconsciously +traced the thin blue lines of her veins, prominent against the +unnatural whiteness of her skin. + +"Here is some demoniacal thing," he muttered, "A mystery----" + +"Aye," murmured the girl, "a mystery that was old when Egypt was young! +And nameless evil more ancient than dark Babylon--that spawned in +terrible black cities when the world was young and strange." + +Kane frowned, troubled. At the girl's strange words he felt an eery +crawling fear at the back of his brain, as if dim racial memories +stirred in the eon-deep gulfs, conjuring up grim chaotic visions, +illusive and nightmarish. + +Suddenly Marylin sat erect, her eyes flaring wide with fright. Kane +heard a door open somewhere. + +"Nakari!" whispered the girl urgently. "Swift! She must not find you +here! Hide quickly, and"--as Kane turned--"keep silent, whatever may +chance!" + + * * * * * + +She lay back on the couch, feigning slumber as Kane crossed the room +and concealed himself behind some tapestries which, hanging upon the +wall, hid a niche that might have once held a statue of some sort. + +He had scarcely done so when the single door of the room opened and a +strange barbaric figure stood framed in it. Nakari, queen of Negari, +had come to her slave. + +The black woman was clad as she had been when he had seen her on the +throne, and the colored armlets and anklets clanked as she closed +the door behind her and came into the room. She moved with the easy +sinuousness of a she-leopard and in spite of himself the watcher was +struck with admiration for her lithe beauty. Yet at the same time a +shudder of repulsion shook him, for her eyes gleamed with vibrant and +magnetic evil, older than the world. + +"Lilith!" thought Kane. "She is beautiful and terrible as Purgatory. +She is Lilith--that foul, lovely woman of ancient legend." + +Nakari halted by the couch, stood looking down upon her captive for +a moment, then with an enigmatic smile, bent and shook her. Marylin +opened her eyes, sat up, then slipped from her couch and knelt before +her black mistress--an act which caused Kane to curse beneath his +breath. The queen laughed and seating herself upon the couch, motioned +the girl to rise, and then put an arm about her waist and drew her +upon her lap. Kane watched, puzzled, while Nakari caressed the white +girl in a lazy, amused manner. This might be affection, but to Kane it +seemed more like a sated leopard teasing its victim. There was an air +of mockery and studied cruelty about the whole affair. + +"You are very soft and pretty, Mara," Nakari murmured lazily, "much +prettier than the black girls who serve me. The time approaches, little +one, for your nuptial. And a fairer bride has never been borne up the +Black Stairs." + +Marylin began to tremble and Kane thought she was going to faint. +Nakari's eyes gleamed strangely beneath her long-lashed drooping lids, +and her full red lips curved in a faint tantalizing smile. Her every +action seemed fraught with some sinister meaning. Kane began to sweat +profusely. + +"Mara," said the black queen, "you are honored above all other girls, +yet you are not content. Think how the girls of Negari will envy you, +Mara, when the priests sing the nuptial song and the Moon of Skulls +looks over the black crest of the Tower of Death. Think, little +bride-of-the-Master, how many girls have given their lives to be his +bride!" + +And Nakari laughed in her hateful musical way, as at a rare jest. And +then suddenly she stopped short. Her eyes narrowed to slits as they +swept the room, and her whole body tensed. Her hand went to her girdle +and came away with a long thin dagger. Kane sighted along the barrel +of his pistol, finger against the trigger. Only a natural hesitancy +against shooting a woman kept him from sending death into the black +heart of Nakari, for he believed that she was about to murder the girl. + +Then with a lithe cat-like motion she thrust the girl from her knees +and bounded back across the room, her eyes fixed with blazing intensity +on the tapestry behind which Kane stood. Had those keen eyes discovered +him? He quickly learned. + +"Who is there?" she rapped out fiercely. "Who hides behind those +hangings? I do not see you nor hear you, but I know someone is there!" + +Kane remained silent. Nakari's wild beast instinct had betrayed him and +he was uncertain as to what course to follow. His next actions depended +on the queen. + +"Mara!" Nakari's voice slashed like a whip, "who is behind those +hangings? Answer me! Shall I give you a taste of the whip again?" + +The girl seemed incapable of speech. She cowered where she had fallen, +her beautiful eyes full of terror. Nakari, her blazing gaze never +wavering, reached behind her with her free hand and gripped a cord +hanging from the wall. She jerked viciously. Kane felt the tapestries +whip back on either side of him and he stood revealed. + +For a moment the strange tableau held--the gaunt white man in his +blood-stained, tattered garments, the long pistol gripped in his right +hand--across the room the black queen in her savage finery, one arm +still lifted to the cord, the other hand holding the dagger in front of +her--the white girl cowering on the floor. + +Then Kane spoke: "Keep silent, Nakari, or you die!" + +The queen seemed numbed and struck speechless by the sudden apparition. +Kane stepped from among the tapestries and slowly approached her. + +"You!" she found her voice at last. "You must be he of whom the +guardsmen spake! There are not two other white men in Negari! They said +you fell to your death! How then----" + +"Silence!" Kane's voice cut in harshly on her amazed babblings; he knew +that the pistol meant nothing to her, but she sensed the threat of the +long blade in his left hand. "Marylin," still unconsciously speaking +in the river-tribes' language, "take cords from the hangings and bind +her----" + +He was about the middle of the chamber now. Nakari's face had lost much +of its helpless bewilderment and into her blazing eyes stole a crafty +gleam. She deliberately let her dagger fall as in token of surrender, +then suddenly her hands shot high above her head and gripped another +thick cord. Kane heard Marylin scream but before he could take another +step, before he could pull the trigger or even think, the floor fell +beneath his feet and he shot down into abysmal blackness. He did not +fall far and he landed on his feet; but the force of the fall sent +him to his knees and even as he went down, sensing a presence in the +darkness beside him, something crashed against his skull and he dropped +into a yet blacker abyss of unconsciousness. + + + + + _4. Dreams of Empire_ + + "For Rome was given to rule the world + And gat of it little joy-- + But we, we shall enjoy the world, + The whole huge world a toy." + + --Chesterton. + + +Slowly Kane drifted back from the dim realms where the unseen +assailant's bludgeon had hurled him. Something hindered the motion of +his hands and there was a metallic clanking when he sought to raise +them to his aching, throbbing head. + +He lay in utter darkness but he could not determine whether this was +absence of light, or whether he was still blinded by the blow. He +dazedly collected his scattered faculties and realized that he was +lying on a damp stone floor, shackled by wrist and ankle with heavy +iron chains which were rough and rusty to the touch. + +How long he lay there, he never knew. The silence was broken only +by the drumming pulse in his own aching head and the scamper and +chattering of rats. At last a red glow sprang up in the darkness and +grew before his eyes. Framed in the grisly radiance rose the sinister +and sardonic face of Nakari. Kane shook his head, striving to rid +himself of the illusion. But the light grew and as his eyes accustomed +themselves to it, he saw that it emanated from a torch borne in the +hand of the queen. + +In the illumination he now saw that he lay in a small dank cell whose +walls, ceiling and floor were of stone. The heavy chains which held him +captive were made fast to metal rings set deep in the wall. There was +but one door, which was apparently of bronze. + +Nakari set the torch in a niche near the door, and coming forward, +stood over her captive, gazing down at him in a manner rather +speculating than mocking. + +"You are he who fought the men on the cliff." The remark was an +assertion rather than a question. "They said you fell into the +abyss--did they lie? Did you bribe them to lie? Or how did you escape? +Are you a magician and did you fly to the bottom of the chasm and then +fly to my palace? Speak!" + +Kane remained silent. Nakari cursed. + +"Speak or I will have your eyes torn out! I will cut your fingers off +and burn your feet!" + +She kicked him viciously, but Kane lay silent, his deep somber eyes +boring up into her face, until the feral gleam faded from her eyes to +be replaced by an avid interest and wonder. + +She seated herself on a stone bench, resting her elbows on her knees +and her chin on her hands. + +"I never saw a white man before," she said, "Are all white men like +you? Bah! That can not be! Most men are fools, black or white. I know +most black men are fools, and white men are not gods, as the river +tribes say--they are only men. I, who know all the ancient mysteries, +say they are only men. + +"But white men have strange mysteries too, they tell me--the wanderers +of the river tribes, and Mara. They have war clubs that make a noise +like thunder and kill afar off--that thing which you held in your right +hand, was that one of those clubs?" + +Kane permitted himself a grim smile. + +"Nakari, if you know all mysteries, how can I tell you aught that you +know not already?" + +"How deep and cold and strange your eyes are!" the queen said as if he +had not spoken. "How strange your whole appearance is--and you have the +bearing of a king! You do not fear me--I never met a man who neither +loved nor feared me. You would never fear me, but you could learn to +love me. Look at me, white man--am I not beautiful?" + +"You are beautiful," answered Kane. + +Nakari smiled and then frowned. "The way you say that, it is no +compliment. You hate me, do you not?" + +"As a man hates a serpent," Kane replied bluntly. + +Nakari's eyes blazed with almost insane fury. Her hands clenched until +the long nails sank into the palms; then as quickly as her anger had +arisen, it ebbed away. + +"You have the heart of a king," she said calmly, "else you would fear +me. Are you a king in your land?" + +"I am only a landless wanderer." + +"You might be a king here," Nakari said slowly. + +Kane laughed grimly. "Do you offer me my life?" + +"I offer you more than that!" Kane's eyes narrowed as the queen leaned +toward him, vibrant with suppressed excitement. "White man, what is it +that you want more than anything else in the world?" + +"To take the white girl you call Mara, and go." + +Nakari sank back with an impatient exclamation. + +"You can not have her; she is the promised bride of the Master. Even +I could not save her, even if I wished. Forget her. I will help you +forget her. Listen, white man, listen to the words of Nakari, queen of +Negari! You say you are a landless man--I will make you a king! I will +give you the world for a toy! + +"No, no! Keep silent until I have finished," she rushed on, her words +tumbling over each other in her eagerness. Her eyes blazed, her whole +body quivered with dynamic intensity. "I have talked to travelers, to +captives and slaves, men from far countries. I know that this land of +mountains and rivers and jungle is not all the world. There are far-off +nations and cities, and kings and queens to be crushed and broken. + +"Negari is fading, her might is crumbling, but a strong man beside her +queen might build it up again--might restore all her vanishing glory. +Listen, white man! Sit by me on the throne of Negari! Send afar to +your people for the thunder-clubs to arm my warriors! My nation is +still lord of central Africa; together we will band the conquered +tribes--call back the days when the realm of ancient Negari spanned the +land from sea to sea! We will subjugate all the tribes of the river, +the plain and the sea-shore, and instead of slaying them all, we will +make one mighty army of them! And then, when all Africa is under our +heel, we will sweep forth upon the world like a hungry lion to rend and +tear and destroy!" + +Solomon's brain reeled. Perhaps it was the woman's fierce magnetic +personality, the dynamic power she instilled in her fiery words, but at +the moment her wild plan seemed not at all wild and impossible. Lurid +and chaotic visions flamed through the Puritan's brain--Europe torn by +civil and religious strife, divided against herself, betrayed by her +rulers, tottering--aye, Europe was in desperate straits now, and might +prove an easy victim for some strong savage race of conquerors. What +man can say truthfully that in his heart there lurks not a yearning +for power and conquest? For a moment the Devil sorely tempted Solomon +Kane; then before his mind's eye rose the wistful sad face of Marylin +Taferal, and Solomon cursed. + +"Out on ye, daughter of Satan! Avaunt! Am I a beast of the forest to +lead your black devils against mine own race? Nay, no beast ever did +so. Begone! If you wish my friendship, set me free and let me go with +the girl." + +Nakari leaped like a tiger-cat to her feet, her eyes flaming now with +passionate fury. A dagger gleamed in her hand and she raised it high +above Kane's breast with a feline scream of hate. A moment she hovered +like a shadow of death above him; then her arm sank and she laughed. + +"Freedom? She will find her freedom when the Moon of Skulls leers down +on the black altar. As for you, you shall rot in this dungeon. You are +a fool; Africa's greatest queen has offered you her love and the empire +of the world--and you revile her! You love the white girl, perhaps? +Until the Moon of Skulls she is mine and I leave you to think about +this: that she shall be punished as I have punished her before--hung up +by her wrists, naked, and whipped until she swoons!" + +Nakari laughed as Kane tore savagely at his shackles. She crossed to +the door, opened it, then hesitated and turned back for another word. + +"This is a foul place, white man, and maybe you hate me the more for +chaining you here. Maybe in Nakari's beautiful throneroom, with wealth +and luxury spread before you, you will look upon her with more favor. +Very soon I shall send for you, but first I will leave you here awhile +to reflect. Remember--love Nakari and the kingdom of the world is +yours; hate her--this cell is your realm." + +The bronze door clanged sullenly, but more hateful to the imprisoned +Englishman was the venomous, silvery laugh of Nakari. + + * * * * * + +Time passed slowly in the darkness. After what seemed a long time the +door opened again, this time to admit a huge black who brought food and +a sort of thin wine. Kane ate and drank ravenously and afterward slept. +The strain of the last few days had worn him greatly, mentally and +physically, but when he awoke he felt fresh and strong. + +Again the door opened and two great black warriors entered. In the +light of the torches they bore, Kane saw that they were giants, clad +in loin-cloths and ostrich plume headgear, and bearing long spears in +their hands. + +"Nakari wishes you to come to her, white man," was all they said, as +they took off his shackles. He arose, exultant in even brief freedom, +his keen brain working fiercely for a way of escape. + +Evidently the fame of his prowess had spread, for the two warriors +showed great respect for him. They motioned him to precede them, and +walked carefully behind him, the points of their spears boring into +his back. Though they were two to one, and he was unarmed, they were +taking no chances. The gazes they directed at him were full of awe and +suspicion, and Kane decided that Nakari had told the truth when she had +said that he was the first white man to come to Negari. + +Down a long dark corridor they went, his captors guiding him with +light prods of their spears, up a narrow winding stair, down another +passageway, up another stair, and then they emerged into the vast maze +of gigantic pillars into which Kane had first come. As they started +down this huge hall, Kane's eyes suddenly fell on a strange and +fantastic picture painted on the wall ahead of him. His heart gave a +sudden leap as he recognized it. It was some distance in front of him +and he edged imperceptibly toward the wall until he and his guards +were walking along very close to it. Now he was almost abreast of the +picture and could even make out the mark his dagger had made upon it. + +The warriors following Kane were amazed to hear him gasp suddenly like +a man struck by a spear. He wavered in his stride and began clutching +at the air for support. They eyed each other doubtfully and prodded +him, but he cried out like a dying man, and slowly crumpled to the +floor, where he lay in a strange unnatural position, one leg doubled +back under him and one arm half supporting his lolling body. The +blacks looked at him fearfully. To all appearances he was dying, but +there was no wound upon him. They threatened him with their spears but +he paid no heed. Then they lowered their weapons uncertainly and one of +them bent over him. + +Then it happened. The instant the black stooped forward, Kane came +up like a steel spring released. His right fist following his motion +curved up from his hip in a whistling half-circle and crashed against +the black giant's jaw. Delivered with all the power of arm and +shoulder, propelled by the upthrust of the powerful legs as Kane +straightened, the blow was like that of a slung-shot. The negro slumped +to the floor, unconscious before his knees gave way. + +The other warrior plunged forward with a bellow, but even as his victim +fell, Kane twisted aside and his frantic hand found the secret spring +in the painting and pressed. All happened in the breath of a second. +Quick as the warrior was, Kane was quicker, for he moved with the +dynamic speed of a famished wolf. For an instant the falling body of +the senseless black hindered the other warrior's thrust, and in that +instant Kane felt the hidden door give way. From the corner of his eye +he saw a long gleam of steel shooting for his heart. He twisted about +and hurled himself against the door, vanishing through it even as the +stabbing spear slit the skin on his shoulder. + +To the dazed and bewildered warrior, who stood with weapon upraised +for another thrust, it seemed as if the white man had simply vanished +through a solid wall, for only a fantastic picture met his gaze and +this did not give to his efforts. + +[Illustration: "The dynamic quickness of Solomon Kane was such as few +men could match."] + + + + + _5. "For a Thousand Years----"_ + + "The blind gods roar and rave and dream + Of all cities under the sea." + + --Chesterton. + + +Kane slammed the hidden door shut behind him, jammed down the spring +and for a moment leaned against it, every muscle tensed, expecting to +hold it against the efforts of a horde of spearmen. But nothing of the +sort materialized. He heard the black warrior fumbling outside for a +time; then that sound, too, ceased. It seemed impossible that these +people should have lived in this palace as long as they had without +discovering the secret doors and passages, but it was a conclusion +which forced itself upon Kane's mind. + +At last he decided that he was safe from pursuit for the time being, +and turning, started down the long, narrow corridor with its eon-old +dust and its dim gray light. He felt baffled and furious, though he +was free from Nakari's shackles. He had no idea how long he had been +in the palace; it seemed ages. It must be day now, for it was light +in the outer halls, and he had seen no torches after they had left +the subterranean dungeons. He wondered if Nakari had carried out her +threat of vengeance on the helpless girl, and swore passionately. Free +for the time being, yes; but unarmed and hunted through this infernal +palace like a rat. How could he aid either himself or Marylin? But +his confidence never faltered. He was in the right and some way would +present itself. + +Suddenly a narrow stairway branched off the main passageway, and up +this he went, the light growing stronger and stronger until he stood in +the full glare of the African sunlight. The stair terminated in a sort +of small landing directly in front of which was a tiny window, heavily +barred. Through this he saw the blue sky, tinted gold with the blazing +sunlight. The sight was like wine to him and he drew in deep breaths of +fresh, untainted air, breathing deep as if to rid his lungs of the aura +of dust and decayed grandeur through which he had been passing. + +He was looking out over a weird and bizarre landscape. Far to the right +and the left loomed up great black crags and beneath them there reared +castles and towers of stone, of strange architecture--it was as if +giants from some other planet had thrown them up in a wild and chaotic +debauch of creation. These buildings were backed solidly against the +cliffs, and Kane knew that Nakari's palace also must be built into +the wall of the crag behind it. He seemed to be in the front of that +palace in a sort of minaret built on the outer wall. But there was only +one window in it and his view was limited. Far below him through the +winding and narrow streets of that strange city, swarms of black people +went to and fro, seeming like black ants to the watcher above. East, +north and south, the cliffs formed a natural bulwark; only to the west +was a built wall. + +The sun was sinking west. Kane turned reluctantly from the barred +window and went down the stairs again. Again he paced down the narrow +gray corridor, aimlessly and planlessly, for what seemed miles and +miles. He descended lower and lower into passages that lay below +passages. The light grew dimmer, and a dank slime appeared on the +walls. Then Kane halted, a faint sound from beyond the wall arresting +him. What was that? A faint rattle--the rattle of chains. + +Kane leaned close to the wall, and in the semi-darkness his hand +encountered a rusty spring. He worked at it cautiously and presently +felt the hidden door it betokened swing inward. He gazed out warily. + +He was looking into a cell, the counterpart of the one in which he had +been confined. A smoldering torch was thrust into a niche on the wall, +and by its lurid and flickering light he made out a form on the floor, +shackled wrist and ankle as he had been shackled. A man; at first Kane +thought him to be a negro but a second glance made him doubt. The hair +was too straight, the features too regular. Negroid, yes, but some +alien blood in his veins had sharpened those features and given the +man that high magnificent forehead, and those hard vibrant eyes which +stared at Kane so intensely. The skin was dark, but not black. + +The man spoke in an unfamiliar dialect, one which was strangely +distinct and clear-cut in contrast to the guttural jargon of the black +people with whom Kane was familiar. The Englishman spoke in English, +and then in the language of the river tribes. + +"You who come through the ancient door," said the other, in the latter +dialect, "who are you? You are no black man--at first I thought you one +of the Old Race, but now I see you are not as they. Whence come you?" + +"I am Solomon Kane," said the Puritan, "a prisoner in this devil-city. +I come from far across the blue salt sea." + +The man's eyes lighted at the word. + +"The sea! The ancient and everlasting! The sea which I never saw but +which cradled the glory of my ancestors! Tell me, stranger, have you, +like they, sailed across the breast of the great blue monster, and have +your eyes looked on the golden spires of Atlantis and the crimson walls +of Mu?" + +"Truly," answered Solomon uncertainly, "I have sailed the seas, even to +Hindostan and Cathay, but of the countries you mention I know nothing." + +"Nay," the other sighed, "I dream--I dream. Already the shadow of the +great night falls across my brain and my words wander. Stranger, there +have been times when these cold walls and floor have seemed to melt +into green surging deeps and my soul was filled with the deep booming +of the everlasting sea. I who have never seen the sea!" + +Kane shuddered involuntarily. Surely this man was insane. Suddenly the +other shot out a withered claw-like hand and gripped his arm, despite +the hampering chain. + +"You whose skin is so strangely white! Have you seen Nakari, the +she-fiend who rules this crumbling city?" + +"I have seen her," said Kane grimly, "and now I flee like a hunted rat +from her murderers." + +"You hate her!" the other cried. "Ha, I know! You seek Mara, the white +girl who is her slave?" + +"Aye." + +"Listen, white man," the shackled one spoke with strange solemnity; "I +am dying. Nakari's rack has done its work. I die and with me dies the +shadow of the glory that was my nation's. For I am the last of my race. +In all the world there is none like me. Hark now, to the voice of a +dying race." + +And Kane leaning there in the flickering semi-darkness of the cell +heard the strangest tale to which man has ever listened, brought out +of the mist of the dim dawn ages by the lips of delirium. Clear and +distinct the words fell from the dying man and Kane alternately burned +and froze as vista after gigantic vista of time and space swept up +before him. + + * * * * * + +"Long eons ago--ages, ages ago--the empire of my race rose proudly +above the waves. So long ago was it that no man remembers an ancestor +who remembered it. In a great land to the west our cities rose. Our +golden spires split the stars; our purple-prowed galleys broke the +waves around the world, looting the sunset for its treasure and the +sunrise for its wealth. Our legions swept forth to the north and to the +south, to the west and the east, and none could stand before them. Our +cities banded the world; we sent our colonies to all lands to subdue +all savages, red, white or black, and enslave them. They toiled for us +in the mines and at the galley's oars. All over the world the brown +people of Atlantis reigned supreme. We were a sea-people and we delved +the deeps of all the oceans. The mysteries were known to us, and the +secret things of land and sea and sky. We read the stars and were wise. +Sons of the sea, we exalted him above all others. + +"We worshipped Valka and Hotah, Honen and Golgor. Many virgins, many +strong youths, died on their altars and the smoke of the shrines +blotted out the sun. Then the sea rose and shook himself. He thundered +from his abyss and the thrones of the world fell before him! New +lands rose from the deep and Atlantis and Mu were swallowed up by the +gulf. The green sea roared through the fanes and the castles, and the +sea-weed encrusted the golden spires and the topaz towers. The empire +of Atlantis vanished and was forgotten, passing into the everlasting +gulf of time and oblivion. Likewise the colony cities in barbaric +lands, cut off from their mother kingdom, perished. The black savages +and the white savages rose and burned and destroyed until in all the +world only the colony city of Negari remained as a symbol of the lost +empire. + +"Here my ancestors ruled as kings, and the ancestors of Nakari--the +she-cat!--bent the knee of slavery to them. Years passed, stretching +into centuries. The empire of Negari dwindled. Tribe after tribe rose +and flung off the chains, pressing the lines back from the sea, until +at last the sons of Atlantis gave way entirely and retreated into the +city itself--the last stronghold of the race. Conquerors no longer, +hemmed in by ferocious tribes, yet they held those tribes at bay for +a thousand years. Negari was invincible from without; her walls held +firm; but within evil influences were at work. + +"The sons of Atlantis had brought their black slaves into the city with +them. The rulers were warriors, scholars, priests, artizans; they did +no menial work. For that they depended upon the slaves. There were more +of these slaves than there were masters. And they increased while the +brown people dwindled. + +"They mixed with each other more and more as the race degenerated until +at last only the priestcraft was free of the taint of black blood. +Rulers sat on the throne of Negari who were nearly pure negro, and +these allowed more and more wild tribesmen to enter the city in the +guise of servants, mercenaries and friends. + +"Then came a day when these fierce slaves revolted and slew all who +bore a trace of brown blood, except the priests and their families. +These they imprisoned as 'fetish people.' For a thousand years black +men have ruled in Negari, their kings guided by the captive brown +priests, who though prisoners, were yet the masters of kings." + +Kane listened enthralled. To his imaginative mind, the tale burned and +lived with strange fire from cosmic time and space. + +"After all the sons of Atlantis, save the priests, were dead, there +rose a great black king on the defiled throne of ancient Negari. He was +a tiger and his warriors were like leopards. They called themselves +Negari, ravishing even the name of their former masters, and none could +stand before them. They swept the land from sea to sea, and the smoke +of destruction put out the stars. The great river ran red and the black +lords of Negari strode above the corpses of their black foes. Then +the great king died and the black empire crumbled, even as the brown +kingdom of Negari had crumbled. They were skilled in war--the dead sons +of Atlantis, their masters, had trained them in the ways of battle, and +against the wild tribesmen they were invincible. But only the ways of +war had they learned, and the empire was torn with civil strife. Murder +and intrigue stalked red-handed through the palaces and the streets, +and the boundaries of the empire dwindled and dwindled. All the while +black kings with red, frenzied brains sat on the throne, and behind +the curtains, unseen but greatly feared, the brown priests guided the +nation, holding it together, keeping it from absolute destruction. + +"Prisoners in the city were we, for there was nowhere else in the +world to go, but we moved like ghosts through the secret passages in +the walls and under the earth, spying on intrigue and doing secret +magic. We upheld the cause of the royal family--the descendants of that +tiger-like king of long ago--against all plotting chiefs, and grim are +the tales which these silent walls could tell. For these black people +are not as other negroes. A latent insanity lurks in the brains of +every one. They have tasted so deeply and so long of slaughter and +victory that they are as human leopards, for ever thirsting for blood. +On their myriad wretched slaves they have sated all lusts and desires +until they have become foul and terrible beasts, for ever seeking some +new sensation, for ever quenching their fearful thirsts in blood. + +"Like a lion have they lurked in these crags for a thousand years, +to rush forth and ravage the jungle and river people, enslaving and +destroying. They are still invincible from without, though their +possessions have dwindled to the very walls of this city, and their +former great conquests and invasions have dwindled to raids for slaves. + +"But as they faded, so too faded their masters, the brown priests. One +by one they died, until only I remained. In the last century they too +mixed with their rulers and slaves, and now--oh, black the shame upon +me!--I, the last son of Atlantis, bear in my veins the taint of negro +blood. They died; I remained, doing magic and guiding the black kings, +I the last brown man of Negari. Then the she-fiend, Nakari, arose." + +Kane leaned forward with quickened interest. New life surged into the +tale as it touched upon his own time. + +"Nakari!" the name was spat as a snake hisses; "slave and the daughter +of a slave! Yet she prevailed when her hour came and all the royal +family died. + +"And me, the last son of Atlantis, me she prisoned and chained. She +feared not the silent brown priests, for she was the daughter of a +Satellite--one of the lesser priests, black men who did the menial work +of the brown masters--performing the lesser sacrifices, divining from +the livers of fowls and serpents and keeping the holy fires for ever +burning. Much she knew of us and our ways, and evil ambition burned in +her. + +"As a child she danced in the March of the New Moon, and as a young +girl she was one of the Star-maidens. Much of the lesser mysteries was +known to her, and more she learned, spying upon the secret rites of +the priests who enacted hidden rituals that were old when the earth +was young. For the remnants of Atlantis secretly kept alive the old +worships of Valka and Hotah, Honen and Golgor, long forgotten and not +to be understood by these black people whose ancestors died screaming +on their altars. Alone of all the black Negari she feared us not and +she not only overthrew the king and set herself on the throne, but she +dominated the priests--the black Satellites and the few brown masters +who were left. All these last, save me, died beneath the daggers of +her assassins or on her racks. She alone of all the myriad black +thousands who have lived and died between these walls guessed at the +hidden passages and subterranean corridors, secrets which we of the +priestcraft had guarded jealously from the people for a thousand years. + +"Ha! Ha! Blind, black fools! To pass an ageless age in this city, +yet never to learn of the secrets thereof! Black apes--fools! Not +even the lesser black priests know of the long gray corridors, lit by +phosphorescent ceilings, through which in bygone ages strange forms +have glided silently. For our ancestors built Negari as they built +Atlantis--on a mighty scale and with an unknown art. Not for men alone +did we build, but for the gods who moved unseen among us. And deep the +secrets these ancient walls hold! + +"Torture could not wring these secrets from our lips, but shackled in +her dungeons, we trod our hidden corridors no more. For years the dust +has gathered there, untouched by human foot, while we, and finally I +alone, lay chained in these foul cells. And among the temples and the +dark, mysterious shrines of old, move vile black Satellites, elevated +by Nakari to glories that were once mine--for I am the last Atlantean +high priest. Black be their doom, and red their ruin! Valka and +Golgor, gods lost and forgotten, whose memory shall die with me, strike +down their walls and humble them unto the dust! Break the altars of +their blind pagan gods----" + +Kane realized that the man was wandering in his mind. The keen brain +had begun to crumble at last. + +"Tell me," said he; "you mentioned the white girl, Mara. What do you +know of her?" + + * * * * * + +"She was brought to Negari years ago by raiders," the other answered, +"only a few years after the rise of the black queen, whose slave she +is. Little of her I know, for shortly after her arrival, Nakari turned +on me--and the years that lie between have been grim black years, shot +red with torture and agony. Here I have lain, hampered by my chains +from escape which lay in that door through which you entered--and for +the knowledge of which Nakari has torn me on racks and suspended me +over slow fires." + +Kane shuddered. "You know not if they have so misused the white girl? +Her eyes are haunted and she has wasted away." + +"She has danced with the Star-maidens at Nakari's command, and has +looked on the bloody and terrible rites of the Black Temple. She has +lived for years among a people with whom blood is cheaper than water, +who delight in slaughter and foul torture, and such sights as she has +looked upon would blast the eyes and wither the flesh of strong men. +She has seen the victims of Nakura die amid horrid torments, and the +sight is burned for ever in the brain of the beholder. The rites of +the Atlanteans the blacks took whereby to honor their crude gods, and +though the essence of those rites is lost in the wasting years, yet +even as Nakari's black apes perform them, they are not such as men can +look on, unshaken." + +Kane was thinking: "A fair day for the world when this Atlantis sank, +for most certainly it bred a race of strange and unknown evil." Aloud +he said: "Who is this Master of whom Nakari spake, and what meant she +by calling Mara his bride?" + +"Nakura--Nakura. The skull of evil, the symbol of Death that they +worship. What know these savages of the gods of sea-girt Atlantis? What +know they of the dread and unseen gods whom their masters worshipped +with majestic and mysterious rites? They understand not of the unseen +essence, the invisible deity that reigns in the air and the elements; +they must worship a material object, endowed with human shape. Nakura +was the last great wizard of Atlantean Negari. A brown renegade he +was, who conspired against his own people and aided the revolt of the +black beasts. In life they followed him and in death they deified him. +High in the Tower of Death his fleshless skull is set, and on that +skull hinge the brains of all the people of Negari. Nay, we of Atlantis +worshipped Death, but we likewise worshipped Life. These people worship +only Death and call themselves Sons of Death. And the skull of Nakura +has been to them for a thousand years the symbol of their power, the +evidence of their greatness." + +"Do you mean," Kane broke in impatiently on these ramblings, "that they +will sacrifice the girl to their god?" + +"In the Moon of Skulls she will die on the Black Altar." + +"What in God's name is this Moon of Skulls?" Kane cried passionately. + +"The full moon. At the full of each moon, which we name the Moon of +Skulls, a virgin dies on the Black Altar before the Tower of Death, +where centuries ago, virgins died in honor of Golgor, the god of +Atlantis. Now from the face of the tower that once housed the glory of +Golgor, leers down the skull of the renegade wizard, and the people +believe that his brain still lives therein to guide the star of the +city. For look ye, stranger, when the full moon gleams over the rim +of the tower and the chant of the priests falls silent, then from the +skull of Nakura thunders a great voice, raised in an ancient Atlantean +chant, and the black people fall on their faces before it. + +"But hark, there is a secret way, a stair leading up to a hidden niche +behind the skull, and there a priest lurks and chants. In days gone by +one of the sons of Atlantis had this office, and by all rights of men +and gods it should be mine this day. For though we sons of Atlantis +worshipped our ancient gods in secret, the black people would have none +of them and to hold our power we were devotees to their foul gods and +we sang and sacrificed to him whose memory we cursed. + +"But Nakari discovered the secret, known before only to the brown +priests, and now one of her black Satellites mounts the hidden +stair and yammers forth the strange and terrible chant which is but +meaningless gibberish to him, as to those who hear it. I, and only I, +know its grim and fearful meaning." + +Kane's brain whirled in his efforts to formulate some plan of action. +For the first time during the whole search for the girl, he felt +himself against a blank wall. This palace was a labyrinth, a maze +in which he could decide no direction. The corridors seemed to run +without plan or purpose, and how could he find Marylin, prisoned as +she doubtless was in one of the myriad chambers or cells? Or had she +already passed over the borderline of life, or succumbed to the brutal +torture-lust of Nakari? + +He scarcely heard the ravings and mutterings of the dying man. + +"Stranger, do you indeed live or are you but one of the ghosts which +have haunted me of late, stealing through the darkness of my cell? +Nay, you are flesh and blood--but you are a white savage, as Nakari's +race are black savages--eons ago when your ancestors were defending +their caves against the tiger and the mammoth, with crude spears of +flint, the gold spires of my people split the stars! They are gone and +forgotten, and the world is a waste of barbarians, white and black. Let +me, too, pass as a dream that is forgotten in the mists of the ages----" + +Kane rose and paced the cell. His fingers closed like steel talons as +on a sword hilt and a blind red wave of fury surged through his brain. +Oh God! to get his foes before the keen blade that had been taken from +him--to face the whole city, one man against them all---- + +Kane pressed his hands against his temples. + +"The moon was nearly full when last I saw it. But I know not how long +ago that was. I know not how long I have been in this accursed palace, +or how long I lay in that dungeon where Nakari threw me. The time of +full moon may be past, and--oh merciful God!--Marylin may be dead +already." + +"Tonight is the Moon of Skulls," muttered the other; "I heard one of my +jailers speak of it." + +Kane gripped the dying man's shoulder with unconscious force. + +"If you hate Nakari or love mankind, in God's name tell me how to save +the child." + +"Love mankind?" the priest laughed insanely. "What has a son of +Atlantis and a priest of forgotten Golgor to do with love? What are +mortals but food for the jaws of the black gods? Softer girls than +your Mara have died screaming beneath these hands and my heart was as +iron to their cries. Yet hate"--the strange eyes flamed with fearful +light--"for hate I will tell you what you wish to know! + +"Go to the Tower of Death when the moon is risen. Slay the black priest +who lurks behind the skull of Nakura, and then when the chanting of the +worshippers below ceases, and the masked slayer beside the Black Altar +raises the sacrificial dagger, speak in a loud voice that the people +can understand, bidding them set free the victim and offer up instead, +Nakari, queen of Negari! + +"As for the rest, afterward you must rely on your own craft and prowess +if you come free." + +Kane shook him. + +"Swift! Tell me how I am to reach this tower!" + +"Go back through the door whence you came." The man was sinking fast, +his words dropped to whispers. "Turn to the left and go a hundred +paces. Mount the stair you come to, as high as it goes. In the corridor +where it ceases go straight for another hundred paces, and when +you come to what seems a blank wall, feel over it until you find a +projecting spring. Press this and enter the door which will open. You +will then be out of the palace and in the cliffs against which it is +built, and in the only one of the secret corridors known to the people +of Negari. Turn to your right and go straight down the passage for five +hundred paces. There you will come to a stair which leads up to the +niche behind the skull. The Tower of Death is built into the cliff and +projects above it. There are two stairs----" + +Suddenly the voice trailed out. Kane leaned forward and shook the man +but he suddenly rose up with a great effort. His eyes blazed with a +wild and unearthly light and he flung his shackled arms wide. + +"The sea!" he cried in a great voice. "The golden spires of Atlantis +and the sun on the deep blue waters! I come!" + +And as Kane reached to lay him down again, he slumped back, dead. + + + + + _6. The Shattering of the Skull_ + + "By thought a crawling ruin, + By life a leaping mire, + By a broken heart in the breast of the world, + And the end of the world's desire." + + --Chesterton. + + +Kane wiped the cold sweat from his pale brow as he hurried down the +shadowy passage. Outside this horrible palace it must be night. Even +now the full moon--the grim Moon of Skulls--might be rising above the +horizon. He paced off a hundred paces and came upon the stair the dying +priest had mentioned. This he mounted, and coming into the corridor +above, he measured off another hundred paces and brought up short +against what appeared to be a doorless wall. It seemed an age before +his frantic fingers found a piece of projecting metal. There was a +creak of rusty hinges as the hidden door swung open and Kane looked +into a passageway darker than the one in which he stood. + +He entered, and when the door shut behind him he turned to his right +and groped his way along for five hundred paces. There the corridor was +lighter; light sifted in from without, and Kane discerned a stairway. +Up this he went for several steps, then halted, baffled. At a sort of +landing the stairway became two, one leading away to the left, the +other to the right. Kane cursed. He felt that he could not afford to +make a mistake--time was too precious--but how was he to know which +would lead him to the niche where the priest hid? + +The Atlantean had been about to tell him of these stairs when struck by +the delirium which precedes death, and Kane wished fervently that he +had lived only a few moments longer. + +At any rate, he had no time to waste; right or wrong, he must chance +it. He chose the right hand stair and ran swiftly up it. No time for +caution now. He felt instinctively that the time of the sacrifice +was close at hand. He came into another passage and discerned by the +change in masonry that he was out of the cliffs again and in some +building--presumably the Tower of Death. He expected any moment to come +upon another stair, and suddenly his expectations were realized--but +instead of up, it led down. From somewhere in front of him Kane +heard a vague, rhythmic murmur and a cold hand gripped his heart. The +chanting of the worshippers before the Black Altar! + +He raced forward recklessly, rounded a turn in the corridor, brought +up short against a door and looked through a tiny aperture. His heart +sank. He had chosen the wrong stair and had wandered into some other +building adjoining the Tower of Death. + +He looked upon a grim and terrible scene. In a wide open space before +a great black tower whose spire rose above the crags behind it, two +long lines of black dancers swayed and writhed. Their voices rose in +a strange meaningless chant, and they did not move from their tracks. +From their knees upward their bodies swayed in fantastic rhythmical +motions, and in their hands torches tossed and whirled, shedding a +lurid shifting red light over the scene. Behind them were ranged a vast +concourse of people who stood silent. The dancing torchlight gleamed on +a sea of glittering eyes and black faces. In front of the dancers rose +the Tower of Death, gigantically tall, black and horrific. No door or +window opened in its face, but high on the wall in a sort of ornamented +frame there leered a grim symbol of death and decay. The skull of +Nakura! A faint eery glow surrounded it, lit somehow from within the +tower, Kane knew, and wondered by what strange art the priests had kept +the skull from decay and dissolution so long. + +But it was neither the skull nor the tower which gripped the Puritan's +horrified gaze and held it. Between the converging lines of yelling, +swaying worshippers there rose a great black altar. On this altar lay a +slim white shape. + +"Marylin!" the word burst from Kane's lips in a great sob. + +For a moment he stood frozen, helpless, struck blind. No time now to +retrace his steps and find the niche where the skull priest lurked. +Even now a faint glow was apparent behind the spire of the tower, +etching that spire blackly against the sky. The moon had risen. The +chant of the dancers soared up to a frenzy of sound and from the +silent watchers behind them began a sinister low rumble of drums. To +Kane's dazed mind it seemed that he looked on some red debauch of a +lower Hell. What ghastly worship of past eons did these perverted and +degenerate rites symbolize? Kane knew that these black people aped the +rituals of their former masters in their crude way, and even in his +despair he found time to shudder at the thought of what those original +rites must have been. + +Now a fearful shape rose up beside the altar where lay the silent girl. +A tall black man, entirely naked save for a hideous painted mask on his +face and a great head-dress of waving plumes. The drone of the chant +sank low for an instant, then rose up again to wilder heights. Was it +the vibrations of their song that made the floor quiver beneath Kane's +feet? + +Kane with shaking fingers began to unbar the door. Naught to do now +but to rush out barehanded and die beside the girl he could not save. +Then his gaze was blocked by a giant form which shouldered in front of +the door. A huge black man, a chief by his bearing and apparel, leaned +idly against the wall as he watched the proceedings. Kane's heart gave +a great leap. This was too good to be true! Thrust in the black man's +girdle was the pistol he himself had carried! He knew that his weapons +must have been divided among his captors. This pistol meant nothing +to the chief, but he must have been taken by its strange shape and +was carrying it as savages will wear useless trinkets, or perhaps he +thought it a sort of war-club. At any rate, there it was. And again +floor and building seemed to tremble. + +Kane pulled the door silently inward and crouched in the shadows behind +his victim like a great brooding tiger. His brain worked swiftly and +formulated his plan of action. There was a dagger in the girdle beside +the pistol; the black man's back was turned squarely to him and he must +strike from the left to reach the heart and silence him quickly. All +this passed through Solomon's brain in a flash as he crouched. + +The black man was not aware of his foe's presence until Kane's lean +right hand shot across his shoulder and clamped on his mouth, jerking +him backward. At the same instant the Puritan's left hand tore the +dagger from the girdle and with one desperate plunge sank the keen +blade home. The black crumpled without a sound and in an instant Kane's +pistol was in its owner's hand. A second's investigation showed that it +was still loaded and the flint still in place. + +No one had seen the swift murder. Those few who stood near the doorway +were all facing the Black Altar, enwrapped in the drama which was there +unfolding. As Kane stepped across the corpse, the chanting of the +dancers ceased abruptly. In the instant of silence which followed, Kane +heard, above the pounding of his own pulse, the nightwind rustle the +death-like plumes of the masked horror beside the altar. A rim of the +moon glowed above the spire. + +Then from high up on the face of the Tower of Death a deep voice boomed +out in a strange chant. Mayhap the black priest who spoke behind the +skull knew not what his words meant, but Kane believed that he at least +mimicked the very intonation of those long-dead brown acolytes. Deep, +mystic, resonant the voice sounded out, like the endless flowing of +long tides on the broad white beaches. + +The masked one beside the altar drew himself up to his great height and +raised a long glimmering blade. Kane recognized his own sword, even as +he leveled his pistol and fired--not at the masked priest but full at +the skull which gleamed in the face of the tower! For in one blinding +flash of intuition he remembered the dying Atlantean's words: "Their +brains hinge on the skull of Nakura!" + +Simultaneously with the crack of the pistol came a shattering crash; +the dry skull flew into a thousand pieces and vanished, and behind +it the chant broke off short in a death shriek. The rapier fell from +the hand of the masked priest and many of the dancers crumpled to +the earth, the others halting short, spellbound. Through the deathly +silence which reigned for an instant, Kane rushed toward the altar; +then all Hell broke loose. + +A babel of bestial screams rose to the shuddering stars. For +centuries only their faith in the dead Nakura had held together the +blood-drenched brains of the black Negari. Now their symbol had +vanished, had been blasted into nothing before their eyes. It was to +them as if the skies had split, the moon fallen and the world ended. +All the red visions which lurked at the backs of their corroded brains +leaped into fearful life, all the latent insanity which was their +heritage rose to claim its own, and Kane looked upon a whole nation +turned to bellowing maniacs. + +Screaming and roaring they turned on each other, men and women, tearing +with frenzied fingernails, stabbing with spears and daggers, beating +each other with the flaming torches, while over all rose the roar of +frantic human beasts. With clubbed pistol Kane battered his way through +the surging, writhing ocean of flesh, to the foot of the altar stairs. +Nails raked him, knives slashed at him, torches scorched his garments +but he paid no heed. + +Then as he reached the altar, a terrible figure broke from the +struggling mass and charged him. Nakari, queen of Negari, crazed as any +of her subjects, rushed upon the white man with dagger bared and eyes +horribly aflame. + +"You shall not escape this time, white man!" she was screaming, but +before she reached him a great black giant, dripping blood and blind +from a gash across his eyes, reeled across her path and lurched into +her. She screamed like a wounded cat and struck her dagger into him, +and then the groping hands closed on her. The blind giant whirled her +on high with one dying effort, and her last scream knifed the din of +battle as Nakari, last queen of Negari, crashed against the stones of +the altar and fell shattered and dead at Kane's feet. + + * * * * * + +Kane sprang up the black steps, worn deep by the feet of myriad priests +and victims, and as he came, the masked figure, who had stood like one +turned to stone, came suddenly to life. He bent swiftly, caught up the +sword he had dropped and thrust savagely at the charging white man. But +the dynamic quickness of Solomon Kane was such as few men could match. +A twist and sway of his steely body and he was inside the thrust, and +as the blade slid harmlessly between arm and chest, he brought down the +heavy pistol barrel among the waving plumes, crashing head-dress, mask +and skull with one blow. + +Then ere he turned to the fainting girl who lay bound on the altar, he +flung aside the shattered pistol and snatched his stolen sword from +the nerveless hand which still grasped it, feeling a fierce thrill of +renewed confidence at the familiar feel of the hilt. + +Marylin lay white and silent, her death-like face turned blindly to the +light of the moon which shone calmly down on the frenzied scene. At +first Kane thought her to be dead, but his searching fingers detected a +faint flutter of pulse. He cut her bonds and lifted her tenderly--only +to drop her again and whirl as a hideous blood-stained figure of +insanity came leaping and gibbering up the steps. Full upon Kane's +out-thrust blade the creature ran, and toppled back into the red swirl +below, clawing beast-like at its mortal wound. + +Then beneath Kane's feet the altar rocked; a sudden tremor hurled him +to his knees and his horrified eyes beheld the Tower of Death sway to +and fro. Some horror of Nature was taking place and this fact pierced +the crumbling brains of the fiends who fought and screamed below. A +new element entered into their shrieking, and then the Tower of Death +swayed far out with a terrible and awesome majesty--broke from the +rocking crags and gave way with a thunder of crashing worlds. Great +stones and shards of masonry came raining down, bringing death and +destruction to hundreds of screaming humans below. One of these stones +crashed to pieces on the altar beside Kane, showering him with dust. + +"Earthquake!" he gasped, and smitten by this new terror he caught up +the senseless girl and plunged recklessly down the cracking steps, +hacking and stabbing a way through the crimson whirlpools of bestial +humanity that still tore and ravened. + +The rest was a red nightmare, in which Kane's dazed brain refused to +record all its horrors. It seemed that for screaming crimson centuries +he reeled through narrow winding streets where bellowing, screeching +black demons battled and died, among titanic walls and black columns +that rocked against the sky and crashed to ruin about him, while the +earth heaved and trembled beneath his staggering feet and the thunder +of crashing towers filled the world. + +Gibbering fiends in human shape clutched and clawed at him, to fade +before his flailing sword, and falling stones bruised and battered him. +He crouched as he reeled along, covering the girl with his body as best +he could, sheltering her alike from blind stone and blinder human. And +at last, when it seemed mortal endurance had reached its limit, he saw +the great black outer wall of the city loom before him, rent from earth +to parapet and tottering for its fall. He dashed through a crevice, and +gathering his efforts, made one last sprint. And scarce was he out of +reach than the wall crashed, falling inward like a great black wave. + +The night wind was in his face and behind him rose the clamor of the +doomed city as Kane staggered down the hill path that trembled beneath +his feet. + + + + + _7. The Faith of Solomon_ + + "The last lost giant, even God, + Is risen against the world." + + --Chesterton. + + +Dawn lay like a cool white hand on the brow of Solomon Kane. The +nightmares faded from his soul as he breathed deep of the morning wind +which blew up from the jungle far below his feet--a wind laden with +the musk of decaying vegetation; yet it was like the breath of life to +him, for the scents were those of the clean natural disintegration of +outdoor things, not the loathsome aura of decadent antiquity that lurks +in the walls of eon-old cities--Kane shuddered involuntarily. + +He bent over the sleeping girl who lay at his feet, arranged as +comfortably as possible with the few soft tree branches he had +been able to find for her bed. Now she opened her eyes and stared +about wildly for an instant; then as her gaze met the face of +Solomon, lighted by one of his rare smiles, she gave a little sob of +thankfulness and clung to him. + +"Oh, Captain Kane! Have we in truth escaped from yon fearful city? Now +it seems all like a dream--after you fell through the secret door in my +chamber Nakari later went to your dungeon--as she told me--and returned +in vile humor. She said you were a fool, for she had offered you the +kingdom of the world and you had but insulted her. She screamed and +raved and cursed like one insane and swore that she would yet, alone, +build a great empire of Negari. Then she turned on me and reviled me, +saying that you held me--a slave--in more esteem than a queen and all +her glory. And in spite of my pleas she took me across her knees and +whipped me until I swooned. + +"Afterward I lay half senseless for a long time, and was only dimly +aware that men came to Nakari and said that you had escaped; they said +you were a sorcerer, for you faded through a solid wall like a ghost. +But Nakari killed the men who had brought you from the cell, and for +hours she was like a wild beast. + +"How long I lay thus I know not. In those terrible rooms and corridors +where no natural sunlight ever entered, one lost all track of time. +But from the time you were captured by Nakari and the time that I was +placed on the altar, at least a day and a night and another day must +have passed. It was only a few hours before the sacrifice that word +came you had escaped. + +"Nakari and her Star-maidens came to prepare me for the rite." At the +bare memory of that fearful ordeal she whimpered and hid her face in +her hands. "I must have been drugged--I only know that they clothed me +in the white robe of the sacrifice and carried me into a great black +chamber filled with horrid statues. There I lay for a space like one in +a trance while the women performed various strange and shameful rites +according to their grim religion. Then I fell into a swoon, and when I +emerged I was lying bound on the Black Altar--the torches were tossing +and the devotees chanting--behind the Tower of Death the rising moon +was beginning to glow--all this I knew faintly, as in a deep dream. And +as in a dream I saw the glowing skull high on the tower--and the gaunt +black naked priest holding a sword above my heart; then I knew no more. +What happened?" + +"At about that moment," Kane answered, "I emerged from a building +wherein I had wandered by mistake, and blasted their hellish skull to +atoms with a pistol ball. Whereupon, all these people, being cursed +from birth by demons, and being likewise possessed of devils, fall +to slaying one another, and in the midst of the tumult an earthquake +cometh to pass which shakes the walls down. Then I snatch you up, and +running at random, come upon a rent in the outer wall and thereby +escape, carrying you, who seem in a swoon. + +"Once only you awoke, after I had crossed the Bridge-Across-the-Sky, +as the black people called it, which was crumbling beneath our feet by +reason of the earthquake. After I had come to these cliffs, but dared +not descend them in the darkness, the moon being nigh to setting by +that time, you awoke and screamed and clung to me, whereupon I soothed +you as best I might, and after a time you fell into a natural sleep." + +"And now what?" asked the girl. + +"England!" Kane's deep eyes lighted at the word. "I find it hard to +remain in the land of my birth for more than a month at a time; yet +though I am cursed with the wanderlust, 'tis a name which ever rouses a +glow in my bosom. And how of you, child?" + +"Oh heaven!" she cried, clasping her small hands. "Home! Something of +which to be dreamed--never attained, I fear. Oh Captain Kane, how shall +we gain through all the vast leagues of jungle which lie between this +place and the coast?" + +"Marylin," said Kane gently, stroking her curly hair, "methinks you +lack somewhat in faith, both in Providence and in me. Nay, alone I am +a weak creature, having no strength or might in me; yet in times past +hath God made me a great vessel of wrath and a sword of deliverance. +And, I trust, shall do so again. + +"Look you, little Marylin: in the last few hours as it were, we have +seen the passing of an evil race and the fall of a foul black empire. +Men died by thousands about us, and the earth rose beneath our feet, +hurling down towers that broke the heavens; yea, death fell about us +in a red rain, yet we escaped unscathed. + +"Therein is more than the hand of man! Nay, a Power--the mightiest +Power! That which guided me across the world, straight to that demon +city--which led me to your chamber--which aided me to escape again and +led me to the one man in all the city who would give the information I +must have, the strange, evil priest of an elder race who lay dying in +a subterranean cell--and which guided me to the outer wall, as I ran +blindly and at random--for should I have come under the cliffs which +formed the rest of the wall, we had surely perished. That same Power +brought us safely out of the dying city, and safe across the rocking +bridge--which shattered and thundered down into the chasm just as my +feet touched solid earth! + +"Think you that having led me this far, and accomplished such wonders, +the Power will strike us down now? Nay! Evil flourishes and rules in +the cities of men and the waste places of the world, but anon the great +giant that is God rises and smites for the righteous, and they lay +faith on him. + +"I say this: this cliff shall we descend in safety, and yon dank jungle +traverse in safety, and it is as sure that in old Devon your people +shall clasp you again to their bosom, as that you stand here." + +And now for the first time Marylin smiled, with the quick eagerness +of a normal young girl, and Kane sighed in relief. Already the ghosts +were fading from her haunted eyes, and Kane looked to the day when her +horrible experiences should be as a dimming dream. One glance he flung +behind him, where beyond the scowling hills the lost city of Negari lay +shattered and silent, amid the ruins of her own walls and the fallen +crags which had kept her invincible so long, but which had at last +betrayed her to her doom. A momentary pang smote him as he thought +of the myriad of crushed, still forms lying amid those ruins; then +the blasting memory of their evil crimes surged over him and his eyes +hardened. + +"And it shall come to pass, that he who fleeth from the noise of the +fear shall fall into the pit; and he that cometh up out of the midst of +the pit shall be taken in the snare; for the windows from on high are +open, and the foundations of the earth do shake. + +"For Thou hast made of a city an heap; of a defended city a ruin; a +palace of strangers to be no city; it shall never be built. + +"Moreover, the multitude of Thy strangers shall be like small dust +and the multitude of the terrible ones shall be as chaff that passeth +suddenly away; yea, it shall be at an instant suddenly. + +"Stay yourselves and wonder; cry ye out and cry; they are drunken but +not with wine; they stagger but not with strong drink. + +"Verily, Marylin," said Kane with a sigh, "with mine own eyes have I +seen the prophecies of Isaiah come to pass. They were drunken but not +with wine! Nay, blood was their drink and in that red flood they dipped +deep and terribly." + +Then taking the girl by the hand he started toward the edge of the +cliff. At this very point had he ascended, in the night--how long ago +it seemed. + +Kane's clothing hung in tatters about him. He was torn, scratched and +bruised. But in his eyes shone the clear calm light of serenity as the +sun came up, flooding cliffs and jungle with a golden light that was +like a promise of joy and happiness. + + + THE END + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77605 *** |
