The girl cried out in sudden terror, slipping to her knees before him:--h, sire, sire, have mercy! I did not know--you are the king!----on't be afraid.--Kull knelt beside her again and put an arm about her, feeling her trembling from head to foot.--ou said I was kind--
--nd so you are, sire,--she whispered weakly.----I thought you were a human tiger, from what men said, but you are kind and tender--b-but--you are k-king and I--
Suddenly in a very agony of confusion and embarrassment, she sprang up and fled, vanishing instantly. The overcoming realization that the king, whom she had only dreamed of seeing at a distance some day, was actually the man to whom she had told her pitiful woes, overcame her and filled her with an abasement and embarrassment which was an almost physical terror.
Kull sighed and rose. The affairs of the palace were calling him back and he must return and wrestle with problems concerning the nature of which he had only the vaguest idea and concerning the solving of which he had no idea at all.
IV
--HO DIES FIRST?-- Through the utter silence which shrouded the corridors and halls of the palace, fourteen figures stole. Their stealthy feet, cased in soft leather shoes, made no sound either on thick carpet or bare marble tile. The torches which stood in niches along the halls gleamed redly on bared dagger, broad sword blade and keen edged axe.
--asy, easy all!--hissed Ascalante, halting for a moment to glance back at his followers.--top that cursed loud breathing, whoever it is! The officer of the night guard has removed all the guards from these halls, either by direct order or by making them drunk, but we must be careful. Lucky it is for us that those cursed Picts--the lean wolves--are either revelling at the consulate or riding to Grondar. Hist! back--here come the guard!-- They crowded back behind a huge pillar which might have hidden a whole regiment of men, and waited. Almost immediately ten men swung by; tall brawny men, in red armor, who looked like iron statues. They were heavily armed and the faces of some showed a slight uncertainty. The officer who led them was rather pale. His face was set in hard lines and he lifted a hand to wipe sweat from his brow as the guard passed the pillar where the assassins hid. He was young and this betraying of a king came not easy to him.
They clanked by and passed on up the corridor.
--ood!--chuckled Ascalante.--e did as I bid; Kull sleeps unguarded! Haste, we have work to do! If they catch us killing him, we are undone, but a dead king is easy to make a mere memory. Haste!----ye haste!--cried Ridondo.
They hurried down the corridor with reckless speed and stopped before a door.
--ere!--snapped Ascalante.--romel--break me open this door!-- The giant launched his mighty weight against the panel. Again--this time there was a rending of bolts, a crash of wood and the door staggered and burst inward.
--n!--shouted Ascalante, on fire with the spirit of murder.
--n!--roared Ridondo.--eath to the tyrant--
They halted short--Kull faced them--not a naked Kull, roused out of deep sleep, mazed and unarmed to be butchered like a sheep, but a Kull wakeful and ferocious, partly clad in the armor of a Red Slayer, with a long sword in his hand.
Kull had risen quietly a few minutes before, unable to sleep. He had intended to ask the officer of the guard into his room to converse with him awhile, but on looking through the spy-hole of the door, had seen him leading his men off. To the suspicious brain of the barbarian king had leaped the assumption that he was being betrayed. He never thought of calling the men back, because they were supposedly in the plot too. There was no good reason for this desertion. So Kull had quietly and quickly donned the armor he kept at hand, nor had he completed this act when Gromel first hurtled against the door.
For a moment the tableau held--the four rebel noblemen at the door and the ten wild desperate outlaws crowding close behind them--held at bay by the terrible-eyed silent giant who stood in the middle of the royal bedroom, sword at the ready.
Then Ascalante shouted: --n! And slay him! He is one to fourteen and he has no helmet!-- True; there had been lack of time to put on the helmet, nor was there now time to snatch the great shield from where it hung on the wall. Be that as it may, Kull was better protected than any of the assassins except Gromel and Volmana who were in full armor, with their vizors closed.
With a yell that rang to the roof, the killers flooded into the room. First of all was Gromel. He came in like a charging bull, head down, sword low for the disembowelling thrust. And Kull sprang to meet him like a tiger charging a bull, and all the king-- weight and mighty strength went into the arm that swung the sword. In a whistling arc the great blade flashed through the air to crash down on the commander-- helmet. Blade and helmet clashed and flew to pieces together and Gromel rolled lifeless on the floor, while Kull bounded back, gripping the bladeless hilt.
--romel! he snarled as the shattered helmet disclosed the shattered head, then the rest of the pack were upon him. He felt a dagger point rake along his ribs and flung the wielder aside with a swing of his great left arm. He smashed his broken hilt square between another's eyes and dropped him senseless and bleeding to the floor.
Latch the door, four of you!--screamed Ascalante, dancing about the edge of that whirlpool of singing steel, for he feared Kull, with his great weight and speed, might smash through their midst and escape. Four rogues drew back and ranged themselves before the single door. And in that instant Kull leaped to the wall and tore therefrom an ancient battle axe which had hung there for possibly a hundred years.
Back to the wall he faced them for a moment, then leaped among them. No defensive fighter was Kull! He always carried the fight to the enemy. A sweep of the axe dropped an outlaw to the floor with a severed shoulder--the terrible back-hand stroke crushed the skull of another. A sword shattered against his breast-plate--else he had died. His concern was to protect his uncovered head and the spaces between breast plate and back plate--for Valusian armor was intricate and he had had no time to fully arm himself. Already he was bleeding from wounds on the cheek and the arms and legs, but so swift and deadly he was, and so much the fighter that even with the odds so greatly on their side, the assassins hesitated to leave an opening. Moreover their own numbers hampered them.
For one moment they crowded him savagely, raining blows, then they gave back and ringed him, thrusting and parrying--a couple of corpses on the floor gave mute evidence of the unwisdom of their first plan.
--naves!--screamed Ridondo in a rage, flinging off his slouch cap, his wild eyes glaring.--o ye shrink from the combat? Shall the despot live? Out on it!-- He rushed in, thrusting viciously; but Kull, recognizing him, shattered his sword with a tremendous short chop and, with a push, sent him reeling back to sprawl on the floor. The king took in his left arm the sword of Ascalante and the outlaw only saved his life by ducking Kull-- axe and bounding backward. One of the hairy bandits dived at Kull-- legs hoping to bring him down in that manner, but after wrestling for a brief instant at what seemed a solid iron tower, he glanced up just in time to see the axe falling, but not in time to avoid it. In the interim one of his comrades had lifted a sword with both hands and hewed downward with such downright sincerity that he cut through Kull-- shoulder plate on the left side, and wounded the shoulder beneath. In an instant the king-- breast plate was full of blood.
Volmana, flinging the attackers to right and left in his savage impatience, came ploughing through and hacked savagely at Kull-- unprotected head. Kull ducked and the sword whistled above, shaving off a lock of hair--ducking the blows of a dwarf like Volmana is difficult for a man of Kull-- height.