Avon Murder Mystery Monthly No. 41 — page 161: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

A, MERRITT 163 “Martin!” I could not keep back the cry; heard mingled with it Drake’s own cry to Ruth. Ventnor raised his hand in greeting; I thought he smiled. The cubes on which we stood shot forward; stopped within fifty feet of them. Instantly the guard of swordsmen raised their blades, held them over the pair as though waiting the signal to strike. _ And now I saw that Ruth was not clad as she had been when we had left her. She stood in scanty kirtle that came scarcely to her knees, her shoulders were bare, her curly brown hair unbound and tangled. Her face was set with wrath hardly less than that which beat from Norhala. On Ventnor’s forehead was a blood red scar, a line that ran from temple to temple like a brand. | The curtains of the first litter quivered; behind them someone spoke. That in which Ruth and Ventnor had ridden was drawn swiftly away. The knot of swordsmen drew back. Into their places sprang and knelt a dozen archers. They ringed in the two, bows drawn taut, arrows in place and pointing straight to their hearts. Out of the litter rolled a giant of a man. Seven feet he must have been in height; over the huge shoulders, the barreled chest and the bloated abdomen hung a purple cloak glittering with gems; through the thick and grizzled hair passed a flashing circlet of jewels. | The scarlet armored Kulun beside him, swordsmen guarding them, he walked to the verge of the torn gap in the wall. He peered down it, glancing imperturbably at the upraised, hammer-banded arms still threatening; examined again the breach. Then still with -Kulun he strode over to the very edge of the broken battlement and stood, head thrust a little forward, studying us in silence. “Cherkis!” whispered Norhala—the whisper was a hymn to Nemesis. I felt her body quiver from head to foot. : A wave of hatred, a hot desire.to kill; passed through me as I scanned the face staring at us. It was a great: gross mask of evil, of cold cruelty and callous lusts. Unwinking, icily malignant, black slits of eyes glared at us between pouches that held them half closed. Heavy jowls hung pendulous, dragging down the corners of the thick lipped, brutal mouth into a deep graven, unchanging sneer. | As he gazed at Norhala a flicker of lust shot like a licking tongue through his eyes. — Yet from him pulsed power; sinister, instinct with evil, concentrate with cruelty—but power indomitable. Such was Cherkis, descendant perhaps of that Xerxes the Conqueror who three millenniums gone ruled most of the known world. GOGO .S (GO)