Lords of Destruction by James Silke, Frank Frazetta Read Free Book Online Page B

looked at her, and a smile leapt onto her cheeks, unsteady, immature, but
honest. “Think of that, Gath. Then you wouldn’t need her… or me. You’d be
free. That’s what you really want… isn’t it?”
    A short time later, as the stallion galloped through the dark night, Cobra
sat behind Gath clinging to his metal-clad chest and smiling with satisfaction.
She felt strangely like a young girl again, one moment sublimely content, the
next desperate and confused. Realizing this, she resolved not to let her
feelings show, but to keep the cool composure which had come naturally to her
when she was a queen. Consequently, she put her smile away and closed her eyes,
resting her cheek against the Barbarian’s back. After a while she believed she
could feel his heat through the metal, and the smile, without her noticing,
returned.
    They were headed east, in the direction of the Valley of Miracles.

Nine
    GUESSWORK

    G he two riders thundered through the morning sunlight at Pinwheel Crossing,
veered onto Weaver Road and raced under the overhanging oaks and willows. Robes
billowing, whips lashing and faces as sober as grave markers.
    They had been on a dead run since leaving Rag Camp in the Valley of Miracles.
At dawn, a traveling tinker had wheeled excitedly into the village and awakened
them, telling them that he had seen a wagonload of suspicious-looking foreign
mercenaries riding through the night toward the village of Weaver. The pair now
headed for that village, eager to investigate the strangers and possibly prevent
another murder. In the last seven days there had been five.
    Each of the victims had been a young girl, well known for her beauty, who
belonged to one of the Barbarian tribes occupying the western end of the Great
Forest Basin. Each had disappeared, then been found deep in uninhabited parts of
the forest with their bodies crushed and bitten by snakes and lizards. The
behavior of the reptiles was easily explained. Weeks earlier there had been a
series of volcanic explosions in the distant heart of the forbidden lands. Ever
since, hordes of animals and creatures had been migrating into the basin in
search of food. But the fact that reptiles did not selectively abduct pretty
young girls added an unholy atmosphere to the growing mystery which, until this
morning, had provided no clues or suspects.
    Old Brown John led the two riders.
    He was the bukko, the stagemaster and leader of the Grillards, a tribe
of traveling performers whose home base was Rag Camp. In the spring he had
convinced Gath of Baal to defend the Barbarian tribes, and together they had
raised an army and defeated the marauding Kitzakk Horde. As a reward, the
Council of Chiefs had confirmed upon him the kingship, at least in times of
crisis, and now there was one.
    The king was short, wiry, bandy-legged, and did not look like a king. He wore
a bone-brown cloak with dark brown patches, the mark of his clan, brown boots
and a belted short sword without decoration. His white hair fluttered in silky
ringlets around his large ears, and his tangled white eyebrows arched low over
alert brown eyes. He was a genial man who much preferred ordering about
large-hipped, big-breasted dancing girls to solving crimes, and he would have
much rather been traveling with the Grillard wagons which were now on the road,
providing music and laughter to the forest tribes. But he was also a man of
responsibility with the gift of foresight. He could see things coming, and
within the murders he could sense a great and terrible impending tragedy.
Consequently, he urged his already lathered horse on and, the performer showing,
did so with gusto, noise and excessive gestures.
    The second rider followed the bukko on a dappled grey stallion,
sitting his saddle seemingly without effort, like the pea riding the pod. He was
young, not more than twenty summers, and lean of body and face. A Kaven
aristocrat, but without the pious rigidity and