Raid on the Tower of the Black Serpent

The Raid on the Tower of the Black Serpent stands as the pivotal heist of Conan's early career, the moment when the three adventurers—Conan, Valeria, and Subotai—breach the very sanctum of the Cult of Set in Shadizar of Zamora to steal the fabled Eye of the Serpent. More than a simple theft, the raid is a descent into the heart of a nightmare religion, revealing the cult's gruesome practices and culminating in the slaying of the great serpent of Set. This single night of violence and plunder transforms the trio from thieves into hunted fugitives, setting them on a collision course with Thulsa Doom that will only end at the Mountain of Power.

The Approach and the Climb

The raid begins not with stealth but with a contest of methods. It is Conan who first climbs the Tower of the Black Serpent, requiring three throws of the grapnel to lodge it securely in the masonry at the tower's upper rim. He tests the slender silken rope and finds it holds his weight. Subotai, however, scorns such reliance on ropes, declaring, "I do not trust myself to ropes. I will climb my own way." Instead, he hooks talon-like steel spikes to his footwear and binds a pair of bronzen hooks about his wrists and lower arms, sinking the blades into the mortar between the smooth stones to ascend like a human insect. As they climb, the darkness deepens below them, and the moon glares down "with its great white eye, as if to expose them for all the world to see." Conan, glancing at the sleeping city stretched below with its lights from bonfire and hearth like a necklace of topaz, gold, and luminescent pearls, quickens his pace, uneasy at being as high above the empty thoroughfares as any sentinel pacing the towers of the nearby royal palace.

The Guardian on the Parapet

Conan's climb brings him first to a narrow window whence shines a pulsating light, filled with strange, discordant music, a muffled drumbeat, and a faint chorus of hissing voices that do not sound like human whisperings. Sickly-sweet incense wafts out, and suddenly an enormous head rears up in the embrasure—cold, slit-pupiled eyes stare into Conan's, a forked tongue flickering out to taste the air. He starts back, almost losing his grip upon the rope, until he perceives that a pane of glass separates him from the giant reptile. Resuming his climb, he reaches the parapet, where the merlons rise from the rim like the points of a crown, embedded in mortar with myriads of bright-hued gems that glimmer like frost under the moon's magnificence, fracturing into a thousand tiny rainbows in the shifting rays. As he lever himself over the parapet and drops to the walkway, a huge figure, roughly human in shape but with an apelike length of arm, rushes upon him. The creature—man, demon, or ape, Conan knows not which—deals him an unexpected blow that hurls him to the pavement. As the Cimmerian rolls to his feet and snatches out his dagger, he sees that while his adversary is wrapped in a hooded cloak, its exposed hands are covered with glittering scales. Instead of preparing to finish the intruder off, the creature is bent over the embrasure, fumbling at the grapnel hooks to cast down the rope to which Valeria mutely clings. Conan springs on the back of the thing and stabs repeatedly. The torn fabric parts to reveal a fungoid growth protruding from the base of its neck, between its thick-muscled shoulders. The puffy growth parts, and a red eye glares forth. In a spasm of horror, Conan strikes, extinguishing the orb, and liquid spurts from the wound, splashing on his chest. As he withdraws his weapon to strike again, the creature whirls about, and huge, scaly hands lock on Conan's throat. Conan slams the obscene head against the parapet and sinks his dagger into the monster's belly. Coughing blood, the creature sags against the battlements, releasing its stranglehold. As he fights for breath, the Cimmerian beholds a being from the depths of a nightmare: blind eyes, dripping mucus, rolling in deep pits; a wide, lipless gash of mouth yawning, frog-like, from folds of leprous skin. Crouching like a springing leopard, Conan grasps the inert form and, using all his fighting skills, rises to full height to fling it over the jewel-encrusted parapet. A diminishing wail drifts skyward, followed by a soggy thump. Close behind him, a woman laughs—Valeria has drawn herself through an embrasure and leans with negligent grace against a parapet. "For a thief, you make a good killer," she chuckles.

The Chamber of Corpses and the Sacrifice

Descending into the tower's depths, the three find a vaulted chamber lit but feebly through a round opening in the ceiling, which connects to the room where a ceremony is in progress. The floor beneath the circular opening is littered with corpses, male and female—some fresh, others far gone in decay, still others reduced to skeletal remains. As the men edge closer to the mass of putrescence, rats flee squeaking before them, their eyes aglow with hostility. Veiled in the darkness, Conan looks up and sees Yaro, the black priest, kneeling on his balcony. As the ceremony reaches its climax, one of the cultists steps forward, discarding its hooded robe. Revealed in the emerald light is a beautiful young woman, whose slender body is scarcely shielded by a gauzy wisp of fabric. With resolute step, the maiden mounts a stone corbel that juts out like a spar from the side of the aperture, and as she moves, the solemn chanting swells in volume. At Yaro's commanding gesture, the mesmerized girl raises her arms and falls or throws herself into the corpse-filled pit. A chorus of cries of surprise and superstitious terror fills the darkened chamber when none hears the expected thud of a fallen body or scream of a dying victim. Yaro leans forward, peering into the dim depths below. Instead of a broken body atop the pile of corpses, he sees the girl lowered unharmed to the floor by the arms of a giant who had caught her as she fell. He hears her shriek, "Our god is dead, is dead!" as she stares through the archway wherein the headless serpent lies. The serpent, it turns out, had been restrained in the adjoining rotunda, and when it pulled loose from its insecure restraint, Subotai tossed Conan his sword, hilt first. Conan caught the weapon and wheeled, just as the scaly body plunged toward him. Raising the sword with two mighty hands upon the pommel, he brought the blade down across the serpent's neck, severing the head. "Watch out!" called Subotai, as the headless body thrashed like a giant whip, knocking Conan to the ground and sending the Hyrkanian flying across the empty altar. Slowly, the reptilian thrashings ceased as the creature's life-blood ebbed.

The Escape and the Serpent's Eye

As Conan and Subotai race for the stair, the shocked moment of silence erupts into a clamour of confusion. They find Valeria cleaning the blood from her mouth and dagger at the top of the shaft. Wordlessly, Conan pulls the ice-fire gem from his tunic and holds it up to view—the Eye of the Serpent is theirs. Her smile of satisfaction is brief, for sounds of pursuit billow up from below. "They're climbing the ladder!" the girl whispers, peering down the long shaft. "I think some beast-men are among them. Hide the Serpent's Eye!" Conan proposes to lop off their heads one by one as they reach the platform, but Valeria rejects the risk, urging they go down the tower wall before the rope is cut. Soon the three, like flies upon a wall, are holding the rope and backing down the tower's face, grateful that the setting moon no longer marks their hasty passage. All but the Cimmerian have reached the safety of the ground when a hideous face appears above the battlements, and a knife-wielding, hairy hand slashes at the slender rope. Seeing the strands begin to part, Conan glances briefly downward to locate the black surface of the reflecting pool. Reassured, he plants both feet firmly on the tower wall, gives a mighty heave with his strongly muscled legs, and launches himself in mid-air just as the rope gives way. Twisting his lithe body like a falling cat, he plunges, unharmed, into the dark water. Valeria laughs as Conan emerges unscathed, her laughter echoing the angry cries from a growing number of observers on the battlements. "Fools!" she explains. "They've aided our escape! Now none can descend to hinder our flight from these most foul confines!" Chuckling, Subotai coils the rope and slings it over his shoulder, then follows Conan and Valeria over the garden wall to the anonymity of the darkling city streets.

Aftermath and the Path to Doom

The raid on the Tower of the Black Serpent is not an isolated exploit but a direct provocation that sets the larger tragedy in motion. The theft of the Eye of the Serpent and the slaying of the great serpent mark Conan and his companions as enemies of the Cult of Set, drawing the attention of Thulsa Doom himself. The raid also foreshadows the horrors to come: the cult's practice of human sacrifice, glimpsed in the corpse-filled pit and the mesmerized girl, is a prelude to the greater atrocities at the Mountain of Power, where the adventurers will later find human bodies hung from meat hooks beside a great cauldron, victims who had once been pilgrims to the Mountain of Power, followers of the serpent god. The raid thus serves as the threshold crossing into the cult's domain, the moment when Conan's personal vendetta against Thulsa Doom—born from the raid on his Cimmerian village and his enslavement at the Wheel of Pain—merges with a larger conflict against the serpent cult. The heist in Shadizar, the "crossroads of the world," is where the thief's path and the avenger's path become one, leading inexorably to the final confrontation where Conan will cleave the snake head from Thulsa Doom's body and reflect that "What matters is not the steel within the blade, but the steel within the man."