In the grand bedchamber of the Royal Palace of Tarantia, capitol of Aquilonia, mightiest of the Hyborian realms, amid a vast bed carved of alabaster and covered with silken pillows and soft sheets, King Conan II – Conn, as he was known to his closest friends – slept fitfully, awakening every few minutes as he tossed and turned amid the still, humid, rose-scented air.
It had been a wild night of debauchery, such as he had indulged in countless times since his father's sudden abdication and departure of some years before. Some part of him – a lingering vestige of the dour and sombre ways of his Cimmerian forefathers, perhaps – felt a tinge of shame at wallowing in such revelries of wealth and luxury.
But he was his father's son, and his father, for all his grim Cimmerian heritage, had always had a spirit more akin to that of the Cimmerians' Aesir neighbours, those mighty Northmen who reveled in taking life by the throat and squeezing whatever they wished out of it. And Conn himself was but half-Cimmerian, and had never been to the land of his forefathers. Raised from birth in the Royal Palace of Tarantia as heir to the Lion Throne, he was also half-Hyborian by his late mother's blood, half-Nemedian to be precise, and that nation of worldly philosophers had never taken as dim a view of the enjoyment of earthly pleasures as did the staid and sober Aquilonian priests of Mitra, god of the Hyborian race. Conn's heritage, a mix of the hot and lusty blood of the greatest and boldest warrior of the age and that of palace concubine, in truth did little predispose him to refrain from those pleasures and privileges which his royal station afforded him.
Conn's lack of royal, noble or even Aquilonian blood was a fact not unnoticed by those amongst his nobles who, as ambitious as they were unwise, still harkened for the long-lost days when Numidides, last king of a weak and degenerate Aquilonian royal house, sat (or slept) upon the Lion Throne of Tarantia. The son of a usurper was still viewed by many as a usurper in his own right. For this reason alone, Conn had good cause to maintain a watchful guard at all times, and not to take his safety for granted even in the depths of his own Royal Palace. Even when he slept soundly, he was never entirely at ease in his heart. And tonight he was restless – partly on account of too much wine drunk and too many women pleasured in too short a time, and partly on account of something else he could not name, and yet which laid a cold chill down his spine when he half-turned his thoughts to it.
In time it seemed to Conn as he hung suspended in the dim half-light between fretful sleep and wakefulness that a shadow took form against the alabaster walls of his chamber – a shadow in the form of a serpent, big as an ox, black as midnight, its slitted eyes glowing with an unholy crimson. Closer and closer it crept to his bed, its envenomed jaws dripping acid onto the marble floor, which smoked and pitted beneath.
Conn could not move, but in his dream-state he felt his blood run cold, as the primal fears of his ancestors and all Hyborian legend took form before him – for was not the serpent the symbol of Set, greatest demon and chiefest calamity of the age? And now this foul being hovered right over his motionless, naked form, gloating with delight as it prepared to snuff out his young life with a single, poisoned strike.
Conn struggled to awake from this nightmare, and as he did so the serpent shifted in form, until it appeared not as a giant serpent but a giant man, dark-skinned as a Kusthie, his hugely-muscled form draped in robes of black cloth, a wicked-looking curved blade held in his outstretched hand.
A white fire of panic shot through Conn's veins as he realized that this was no longer any dream, but rather a scene from real life!
Cursing out loud, Conn barely managed to roll out of harm's way as the envenomed blade of his would-be assassin plunged through the pillow where his head had lain but a moment before. The man grunted as he pulled his blade up for another strike, his brutal face contorted with rage that his prey had eluded him at the last moment.
The man leaned forward over the bed, but his balance was off, and Conn was now wide-awake and alert as a tiger – a gift of his Cimmerian heritage. Whipping out the sharp dagger he always kept hidden beneath one of the pillows of his bed, he blocked the man's advancing blade-arm with his left hand, while plunging his dagger into his adversary's exposed flank with his right.
The man stifled a scream, dropping his envenomed blade an inch from Conn's head from shock and pain. But then in a flash he grabbed Conn by the throat, seeking to squeeze the life out of his foe, and to silence the young king before he could call for the palace guard, who stood watch just outside the chamber while the desperate struggle continued in silence.
His eyes bulging out of his skull, a dark and ominous shadow appearing at the limits of his vision, Conn tensed his thick neck-muscles as best he could while plunging his blade again and again into the thick, corded muscles of the assassin's heavy frame. But the man seemed made of iron, and seconds lasted for an eternity as Conn wondered desperately how he could possibly throw the man off before his own soul was forced from its body to face its face in the netherworld.
Then, marvelling at his own stupidity, as if he were still as drunk as when he had taken to bed, Conn did the obvious – and shifted his razor sharp blade a foot lower, slicing of his foe's manhood as easily as if it were made of butter.
The huge man shot back and let out an unearthly scream of agony as blood burst forth in spurts from beneath his shredded robes. His eardrums pulsing with thunder, his neck on fire as the blood returned to his nearly crushed veins, Conn watched again as if in a dream as the doors to his chamber shot open, and a moment later his dozen bodyguards shot his foe full of crossbow bolts.
The Kushite (if such indeed he was) tottered on his feet for a moment, his dark face now locked in a silent scream, his huge frame stuck like a pincushion with iron bolts as blood poured from his body in over a dozen bloody streams. Then he collapsed suddenly, twitched for a moment, and lay stone dead, his dark soul dispatched to the netherworld to meet its deserved fate.
"Your Majesty!" cried the young lieutenant in command of the night's watch, the white plume on his black helm bobbing absurdly as he rushed to his young liege's side. "Are you injured? Has this dog struck you with his foul blade?" Even as he spoke, another guardsman removed the Kushite's curved dagger from the bed by its grip, careful not to touch its sharp blade, which appeared envenomed with a pungent slime that was an evil shade of verdure.
"I live," gasped Conn, "but by Crom and Mitra it was a close-run thing! How in the names of all of the seven hells did this devil find his way into my bedchamber, when you young toughs stand guard outside the door, and even a Darfari ape could not climb up the polished marble walls of this tower from the outside?"
"I swear I know not, my liege," stammered the lieutenant, his smooth face pale with fear and shame. "I swear by Mitra and on the lives of my wife and son that he did not enter by the door, nor is there any other way into your private chamber that I can imagine!"
"Evil sorcery let this dog into His Majesty's chamber," cried another of the guards, engaged in searching the blood-drenched form of the assassin. "Look! A foul token of our greatest foe!"
And he held up an amulet, a golden circlet upon a golden chain, which had lain about the assassin's neck, underneath his robes. On it was engraved the unmistakeable sigil of Set, the Old Serpent, enemy of Mitra, lord of light, and bitterest foe of the Hyborian race, and of all men who had turned their backs on the darkness of the uttermost void to worship the divine fire.
"Mitra save us!" cried the other guardsmen, invoking His sign of protection with their crossed fingers, while Conn, still unsteady on his feet, lifted his naked body off his bed and slipped on a blue silken tunic he had thrown over a nearby chair.
"The sigil of Set," whispered Conn. Then, more loudly, "A Stygian plot! Once again that foul breed of sorcerers sets itself against the Lion Throne!"
"Shall it be war then, your Majesty?" asked the lieutenant, clenching his sword hilt in anticipation of striking blows against the ancient and despised enemy of the Hyborian race.
"A holy war?" smiled Conn. "The fair worshippers of Mitra against the rabid dogs of Set? We shall see. I shall call a council of war, and set our best spies to work at once. We shall determine soon enough where to fix the blame. But by Crom and Mitra, heads will roll in the thousands for this fell attempt against my life, or I am no son of Conan the Great!"
A cheer rose up at the name of his illustrious father, and Conn, who smiled outwardly, wondered privately how his long-vanished father might have acted in his place.