a glance full of cynical derision and obscene
mockery.

"She has done a clumsy job," criticized the prince, coming to the divan
and bending over the bandage. "Let me see----"

With a quickness amazing in one of his bulk he snatched her sword and
threw it across the chamber. His next move was to catch her in his giant
arms.

Quick and unexpected as the move was, she almost matched it; for even as
he grabbed her, her dirk was in her hand and she stabbed murderously at
his throat. More by luck than skill he caught her wrist, and then began
a savage wrestling-match. She fought him with fists, feet, knees, teeth
and nails, with all the strength of her magnificent body and all the
knowledge of hand-to-hand fighting she had acquired in her years of
roving and fighting on sea and land. It availed her nothing against his
brute strength. She lost her dirk in the first moment of contact, and
thereafter found herself powerless to inflict any appreciable pain on
her giant attacker.

The blaze in his weird black eyes did not alter, and their expression
filled her with fury, fanned by the sardonic smile that seemed carved
upon his bearded lips. Those eyes and that smile contained all the cruel
cynicism that seethes below the surface of a sophisticated and
degenerate race, and for the first time in her life Valeria experienced
fear of a man. It was like struggling against some huge elemental force;
his iron arms thwarted her efforts with an ease that sent panic racing
through her limbs. He seemed impervious to any pain she could indict.
Only once, when she sank her white teeth savagely into his wrist so that
the blood started, did he react. And that was to buffet her brutally
upon the side of the head with his open hand, so that stars flashed
before her eyes and her head rolled on her shoulders.

Her shirt had been torn open in the struggle, and with cynical cruelty
he rasped his thick beard across her bare breasts, bringing the blood to
suffuse the fair skin, and fetching a cry of pain and outraged fury from
her. Her convulsive resistance was useless; she was crushed down on a
couch, disarmed and panting, her eyes blazing up at him like the eyes of
a trapped tigress.

A moment later he was hurrying from the chamber, carrying her in his
arms. She made no resistance, but the smoldering of her eyes showed that
she was unconquered in spirit, at least. She had not cried out. She knew
that Conan was not within call, and it did not oc