Skulls
in the Stars
By Robert
E. Howard
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"Across the fen sounded a single shriek of terrible laughter"
He told how murderers walk the earth
Beneath the curse of Cain,
With crimson clouds before their eyes
And flames about their brain:
For blood has left upon their souls
Its everlasting stain.
THERE are two roads to Torkertown. One, the shorter and
more direct route, leads across a barren upland moor, and the other, which is much longer, winds its tortuous way in and out among the hummocks and quagmires of the swamps, skirting the low hills to the east. It was a dangerous and tedious trail; so
Solomon Kane halted in amazement when a breathless youth from the village he had just left, overtook him and implored him for God's sake to take the swamp road.
"The swamp road!" Kane stared at the boy.
He was a tall, gaunt man, was Solomon Kane, his darkly pallid face and deep brooding eyes made more somber by the drab Puritanical garb he affected.
"Yes, sir, 'tis far safer," the youngster answered his surprized exclamation.
"Then the moor road must be haunted by Satan himself, for your townsmen warned me against traversing the other."
"Because of the quagmires, sir, that you might not see in the dark. You had better return to the village and continue your journey in the morning, sir."
"Taking the swamp road?"
"Yes, sir."
Kane shrugged his shoulders and shook his head.
"The moon rises almost as soon as twilight dies. By its light I can reach Torkertown in a few hours, across the moor."
