Kull: Exile of Atlantis by Robert E. Howard Read Free Book Online

and groves were deserted; carefully trimmed trees were bulky shadows; fountains near by flung their slender sheen of silver in the starlight and distant fountains rippled steadily. No guards walked those gardens, for so closely were the outer walls guarded that it seemed impossible for any invader to gain access to them.
    Vines curled up the walls of the palace, and even as Kull mused upon the ease with which they might be climbed, a segment of shadow detached itself from the darkness below the window and a bare, brown arm curved up over the sill. Kull’s great sword hissed half-way from the sheath; then the king halted. Upon the muscular forearm gleamed the dragon armlet shown him by Ka-nu the night before.
    The possessor of the arm pulled himself up over the sill and into the room with the swift, easy motion of a climbing leopard.
    “You are Brule?” asked Kull, and then stopped in surprize not un-mingled with annoyance and suspicion; for the man was he whom Kull had taunted in the Hall of Society; the same who had escorted him from the Pictish embassy.
    “I am Brule, the Spear-slayer,” answered the Pict in a guarded voice; then swiftly, gazing closely in Kull’s face, he said, barely above a whisper:
    “Ka nama kaa lajerama!”
    Kull started. “Ha! What mean you?”
    “Know you not?”
    “Nay, the words are unfamiliar; they are of no language I ever heard–and yet, by Valka!–somewhere–I have heard–”
    “Aye,” was the Pict’s only comment. His eyes swept the room, the study room of the palace. Except for a few tables, a divan or two and great shelves of books of parchment, the room was barren compared to the grandeur of the rest of the palace.

     
    “Tell me, king, who guards the door?”
    “Eighteen of the Red Slayers. But how come you, stealing through the gardens by night and scaling the walls of the palace?”
    Brule sneered. “The guards of Valusia are blind buffaloes. I could steal their girls from under their noses. I stole amid them and they saw me not nor heard me. And the walls–I could scale them without the aid of vines. I have hunted tigers on the foggy beaches when the sharp east breezes blew the mist in from seaward and I have climbed the steeps of the western sea mountain. But come–nay, touch this armlet.”
    He held out his arm and, as Kull complied wonderingly, gave an apparent sigh of relief.
    “So. Now throw off those kingly robes; for there are ahead of you this night such deeds as no Atlantean ever dreamed of.”
    Brule himself was clad only in a scanty loin-cloth through which was thrust a short, curved sword.
    “And who are you to give me orders?” asked Kull, slightly resentful.

     
    “Did not Ka-nu bid you follow me in all things?” asked the Pict irritably, his eyes flashing momentarily. “I have no love for you, lord, but for the moment I have put the thought of feuds from my mind. Do you likewise. But come.”
    Walking noiselessly, he led the way across the room to the door. A slide in the door allowed a view of the outer corridor, unseen from without, and the Pict bade Kull look.
    “What see you?”
    “Naught but the eighteen guardsmen.”
    The Pict nodded, motioned Kull to follow him across the room. At a panel in the opposite wall Brule stopped and fumbled there a moment. Then with a light movement he stepped back, drawing his sword as he did so. Kull gave an exclamation as the panel swung silently open, revealing a dimly lighted passageway.
    “A secret passage!” swore Kull softly. “And I knew nothing of it! By Valka, someone shall dance for this!”
    “Silence!” hissed the Pict.
    Brule was standing like a bronze statue as if straining every nerve for the slightest sound; something about his attitude made Kull’s hair prickle slightly, not from fear but from some eery anticipation. Then beckoning, Brule stepped through the secret doorway which stood open behind them. The passage was bare, but not dust-covered as should have been the case with an