One priest tripped on his feathered robe and fell. Before he could recover, the jaws of the dragon slammed shut upon him. The reptile raised its head. Then it jerked its head back several times, while the elastic skin of its throat swelled and shrank with gulping motions. With each jerk, the priest slid further into its jaws, until only his feet, still wearing their gilded stilt shoes, were visible. A final jerk and gulp, and the dragon's throat bulged as its prey slid down its gullet.
Meanwhile other dragons, with tongues flickering and jaws opening to emit their groaning roars, crowded past the first. There seemed to be no end to the procession. They scrambled across the pavement and plunged into the screaming, clawing mass of Antillians. Some people were crushed beneath the monsters' clawed feet; others were knocked about like dolls by casual swings of huge, scaly tails. Blood lay in puddles and ran into the gutters in sticky scarlet streams. Everywhere., dragons paused to raise their heads and gulp down their prey before plunging on after another mouthful.
Meanwhile, high up on the side of the red-and-black pyramid, a small door opened. Conan stepped out, carrying the sword of black glass with which the guard had been armed. The salt wind from the sea whipped his shaggy gray mane. He expanded his huge chest to take in a lungful of clean, fresh air, welcome after the stenches of the charnel cavern world below.
After he had opened the gates that loosed the reptilian horde upon the people of Ptahuacan, he had mounted the stone stair that slanted up from the platform in the wall of the dragon chamber. Other passages branched off horizontally from this tunnel. But Conan, reasoning that the sacrifice should be taking place on top of the pyramid and that the steepest passageway would bring him out closest to that place, continued on up, until he had come to the door from which he just emerged.
For an instant he stood staring down, watching with grim satisfaction the scene of havoc and madness below. Some of the dragons had reached the tiers of stone benches where the nobles and higher priests had sat. They were lurching up and down these benches, pursuing and capturing screaming, befeathered fugitives.
From his height, Conan could see along the streets that let out of the square. Each of these streets now bore a stream of madly running fugitives. Some darted into the first open door they reached, to slam and bar it against later arrivals. Others kept running until they passed through the city gates and straggled out into the countryside.
Craning his neck in the other direction, Conan looked up to the top of the pyramid. Here, where rose the temple of Xotli, knots of men struggled. The colors of their skins told Conan that some of these were his own crew, battling with priests and guards.
Then Conan became aware of a figure standing near him on one of the stairways that led to the top of the pyramid. This was the gaunt old hierarch himself, recognizable by the splendor of his feathered robe - now torn -and his golden ornaments. His plumed headpiece was gone, and blood ran down one side of his head. Leaning forward, he gesticulated frantically with his skinny brown arms, screaming commands to the milling soldiers and priests below.
At the base of the pyramid directly below the hierarch, one of the dragons looked up, its pink tongue feeling the air. Then the monster began to claw its way up the stair.
A wicked grin wrinkled Oman's bearded face. Thrusting his glass sword through his belt, he vaulted to the next higher level of the yard-high steps that made up the pyramid. He stepped softly along the step until he came to the stair on which the hierarch stood, behind and above that personage. Without a word, he placed both hands on the small of the archpriest's back and gave a terrific shove.
The hierarch shot out from the surface of the pyramid in an arc and struck the steps lower down. He rolled over and over in a whirl of brown limbs and green feathers, until he reached the dragon coming up from below. A loud chomp, and the jaws dosed upon the age-old master of Antillia.
The high priest's skull-like head jerked frantically; his bony fists beat futilely against the scaly jaws. Then, as one of the saber-like fangs reached a vital organ, the body relaxed. The high priest's screams ceased; his head and limbs hung limply. Squatting at the base of the pyramid, the dragon settled down to the agreeable task of swallowing its catch whole.
Up on top of the pyramid, Yasunga still swung his chains like a flail, while sweat ran down his ebony hide. Another pirate and a priest rolled over and over on the pavement, hands locked on each other's throats. Milo the boatswain had tangled a soldier's halberd in his chains and strove to hold the weapon down, while the soldier struggled to wrench it loose. Artanes the Zamorian fought two Antillians at once with a captured pike, which he wielded like a quarterstaff. Sigurd struggled to unlock the manacles and neck-rings of some of the pirates, while others fended off the attempts of a few priests and soldiers to get to him and recover the keys. Many of the Antillians had fled from the top of the pyramid, but some still struggled with their former captives.
With a booming war cry, Conan bounded up the steps and hurled himself into the fray. In his mail shirt, he was easily a match for any three of the little brown men. An Aatillian head went flying from its body to bounce and roll down the steps of the pyramid. Another man of Pta-huacan collapsed in a mess of spilled entrails. Another clutched, screaming, at the stump of a hand.
Their eyes big with superstitious terror, the Antillians gave back before Conan, who lunged hither and thither like a razor-edged whirlwind, constantly shifting his position so that it was hard for an opponent to get a good cut or thrust at him. If he was not so agile as he had been decades before., his attack was still the most awesome thing the Antillians had ever seen.
'A demon! He is a demon!' they cried, backing away.
Soon nobody stood between Conan, bloody glass sword in hand, and the knot around Sigurd. The Northman looked up.
'Amral' roared Sigurd. 'By Crom and Mitra and all the gods, we thought you dead!'
'Not yet, Redbeard! I still have some killing to do.' Conan clapped the stout Vanr on one shoulder. 'What's here?'
'I'm trying to get these damned rings unlocked, but it takes an expert touch. Can you do it faster, ere they rush us again?'
'The key's too slow,' growled Conan. 'Let's see if glass will cut glass. Stretch that chain across the altar stone.'
The glass of the swords and that of the chains, he thought, were basically the same material. But, just as the steel of a sword is more finely tempered than the iron of an ordinary chain, so the glass of his sword might be superior to that of the glass chains. Whereas a chain must merely hold, a sword must cut. Well, he would put it to the test.
His sword flashed in the afternoon sun as he swung it above his iron-gray head. The blade whistled down, with all the power of his huge muscles behind it, to strike the altar surface with a crash. A link of the chain shattered beneath the blow, the flying shards sparkling like diamonds.
'Now the next!' cried Conan.
Chain after chain was severed, until all the pirates who were still chained were free. As they were released, they looked around for dropped weapons to snatch up before plunging back into the fray. The remaining priests and soldiers on the top of the pyramid fled with cries of despair, abandoning still more weapons to their attackers.
Conan looked below. The unleashed monsters had proved an effective diversion, engaging the attention of most of the Antillians and enabling Conan to free his shipmates while the number of enemies still on top of the pyramid was too small to interfere.
The square was now mostly clear. Here and there a dragon lumbered about the pavement, chasing a scampering fugitive. The soldiers who had not fled in the general exodus stood in solid clumps, forming hedgehogs of leveled spears to hold off the dragons. Priests moved among the soldiers, directing and exhorting them.