Osric and Yasimina (father and daughter)

Osric, King of Zamora, and his daughter Yasimina form the emotional and political heart of the tale, a father-daughter bond shattered by the serpent cult of Set. Their relationship is the prime mover of the plot: it is Osric's desperate love for his lost child that compels him to hire Conan, Subotai, and Valeria, and it is Yasimina's captivity and eventual liberation that frames the story's climax. The arc of their connection—from a king's grief over a corrupted heir to a queen's lonely inheritance of a throne—charts the personal cost of the cult's rise and the collapse of traditional authority in Zamora.

The King's Grief and the Daughter's Fall

Osric is introduced as a monarch in decline, a weak old man beset by problems he cannot solve. His kingdom is infested with the black towers of Set, and his own guards dare not stand against the cult. His daughter, Yasimina, the heir to the Ruby Throne, has fallen under the spell of Thulsa Doom, becoming a high priestess of Set. Subotai reveals to Conan that she is "one of them," entrapped by the priests' lies and drugs, and that death lurks behind her dreamy eyes. The king, trembling and burying his face in his hands, confesses to the adventurers that his daughter follows Yaro, the black priest, wherever he goes, seeking truth in the depths of her soul. He laments that his own flesh and blood has turned against him and the elder gods, and he fears she may one day bear a serpentine dagger pointed at his heart, just as his own brother, ensorcelled by witchcraft, had slain their father.

Osric's grief is compounded by a profound sense of generational betrayal. He hurls the serpent's fang—the dagger that killed his father—to the marble floor, declaring that each generation is weaker than the one before. Today's young, he rails, wallow in the snake cult, yearning to be slaves and beggars, drugged dreamers, whereas in his youth boys strove to be heroes. His lament is not merely for his daughter but for the erosion of the old strengths and virtues he once embodied as a warrior-king. In his despair, he is reduced to calling on thieves to save his kingdom, a bitter admission of his own impotence.

The Desperate Commission

Despite his weakness, Osric's love for Yasimina is the one force that galvanizes him. He tells Conan that there comes a time when, even for kings, gems cease to sparkle and gold's lustre dims, and all that remains is a father's love for his child. He confesses that when his end comes, he shall not greatly mind, if only his child be free of the curse and able to serve her people as their queen. This paternal devotion drives him to commission the rescue: he sends Conan and his companions to the Mountain of Power, the stronghold of the cult, to steal Yasimina back. As an earnest, he spills a dazzling flood of gems—rubies, amethysts, topazes, sapphires, and diamonds—before the adventurers, promising them all the remaining jewels in the lair upon her return. Conan, moved by the king's plea and nursing his own score against Doom, agrees to slay the cult leader or die in the attempt, and to rescue the princess if he can.

The King's Vigil and the Assassin's Blade

While Conan and his friends penetrate the Mountain of Power, Osric waits in Shadizar, making wassail in the great hall of his palace. His seers have informed him that Conan has reached the temple, and the king looks forward to the imminent return of his daughter. His age-worn frame is decked in robes of glittering brocade, his bent fingers glow with splendid rings, and he sits proudly on his throne, sipping wine from a cup of beaten gold. Yet even in the throne room, he does not feel safe from Doom's assassins; grim-faced guards stand in pairs at every portal and window. His vigilance proves justified when Yaro, the black priest, arrives begging a private audience, claiming the matter concerns the Princess Yasimina. Osric, his face turning grey, orders the priest searched most thoroughly, warning that these snake-worshippers are cunning and treacherous, and that the most unlikely object may become a deadly weapon.

Yaro's audience reveals the cult's ultimate insult to the king's authority. The priest announces that Thulsa Doom, the true prophet of Set the Eternal, wishes to honour Osric's house by marriage with his daughter. Osric reacts with shrill fury, crying that Doom abuses the word "honour" and his patience. He claws at his beard with a shaking hand, denouncing the priest's effrontery as surpassing all belief. The marriage proposal is a direct assault on the king's traditional authority, an attempt by the charismatic cult leader to legitimize his power through dynastic union. Osric's rejection is absolute, but it seals his fate: the audience with Yaro is the prelude to his assassination.

The Queen's Inheritance

Yasimina's fate is intertwined with her father's death. After Conan beheads Thulsa Doom, he offers to take her home, telling her that her father will be glad to see her. Her reply is devastating: "My father is dead," she says. "A messenger from Shadizar arrived but five days past to say that he'd been slain by Yaro's minions." The king's fear of the cult's assassins, which had haunted his throne room, is realized in his own murder. Conan tells her that she is now queen and will be needed in Zamora to rule her troubled land. But Yasimina's final words betray her anxiety: "But what of Yaro? He will not accept me on the throne." The father-daughter relationship thus ends not in reunion but in succession—Osric's love, which had driven the entire quest, is answered by his death, and Yasimina inherits not only the Ruby Throne but also the unresolved threat of the cult that had consumed her youth. The king's dying wish, that his child be free of the curse and able to serve her people as their queen, is granted only in the most bitter form: freedom through his sacrifice, and a crown weighed down by the knowledge of his murder.