"Robert E. Howard - Conan - Hour of the Dragon" - читать интересную книгу автора (Howard Robert E)

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The Hour of the Dragon
by Robert E. Howard

The Lion banner sways and. falls in the horror-haunted gloom;
A scarlet Dragon rustles by, borne on winds of doom.
In heaps the shining horsemen lie, where the thrusting lances break,
And. deep in the haunted mountains, the lost, black gods awake.
Dead hands grope in the shadows, the stars turn pale with fright,
For this is the Dragon's Hour, the triumph of Fear and. Night.




1. O Sleeper, Awake!

THE LONG TAPERS flickered, sending the black shadows wavering along the walls, and the velvet
tapestries rippled. Yet there was no wind in the chamber. Four men stood about the ebony table on
which lay the green sarcophagus that gleamed like carven jade. In the upraised right hand of each
man a curious black candle burned with a weird greenish light. Outside was night and a lost wind
moaning among the black trees.

Inside the chamber was tense silence, and the wavering of the shadows, while four pairs of eyes,
burning with intensity, were fixed on the long green case across which cryptic hieroglyphics
writhed, as if lent life and movement by the unsteady light. The man at the foot of the
sarcophagus leaned over it and moved his candle as if he were writing with a pen, inscribing a
mystic symbol' in the air. Then he set down the candle in its black gold stick at the foot of the
case, and, mumbling some formula unintelligible to his companions, he thrust a broad white hand
into his fur-trimmed robe. When he brought it forth again it was as if he cupped in his palm a
ball of living fire.

The other three drew in their breath sharply, and the dark, powerful man who stood at the head of
the sarcophagus whispered: "The Heart of Ahriman!" The other lifted a quick hand for silence.
Somewhere a dog began howling dolefully, and a stealthy step padded outside the barred and bolted
door. But none looked aside from the mummy-case over which the man in the ermine-trimmed robe was
now moving the great flaming jewel while he muttered an incantation that was old when Atlantis
sank. The glare of the gem dazzled their eyes, so that they could not be sure of what they saw;
but with a splintering crash, the carven lid of the sarcophagus burst outward as if from some
irresistible pressure applied from within, and the four men, bending eagerly forward, saw the
occupantтАФa huddled, withered, wizened shape, with dried brown limbs like dead wood showing through
molder-ing bandages.

"Bring that thing back?" muttered the small dark man who stood on the right, with a short,
sardonic laugh. "It is ready to crumble at a touch. We are foolsтАФ"

"Shhh!" It was an urgent hiss of command from the large man who held the jewel. Perspiration stood
upon his broad white forehead and his eyes were dilated. He leaned forward, and, without touching
the thing with his hand, laid on the breast of the mummy the blazing jewel. Then he drew back and