A WITCH SHALL BE BORN
By Robert E. Howard
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was first published in Weird TalesDecember 1934. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that theU.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
1 The Blood-Red Crescent
Taramis, queen of Khauran, awakened from a dream-haunted slumber to asilence that seemed more like the stillness of nighted catacombs thanthe normal quiet of a sleeping palace. She lay staring into the darkness,wondering why the candles in their golden candelabra had gone out. Aflecking of stars marked a gold-barred casement that lent noillumination to the interior of the chamber. But as Taramis lay there,she became aware of a spot of radiance glowing in the darkness beforeher. She watched, puzzled. It grew and its intensity deepened as itexpanded, a widening disk of lurid light hovering against the darkvelvet hangings of the opposite wall. Taramis caught her breath,starting up to a sitting position. A dark object was visible in thatcircle of light—a human head.
In a sudden panic the queen opened her lips to cry out for her maids;then she checked herself. The glow was more lurid, the head more vividlylimned. It was a woman's head, small, delicately molded, superblypoised, with a high-piled mass of lustrous black hair. The face grewdistinct as she stared—and it was the sight of this face which frozethe cry in Taramis's throat. The features were her own! She might havebeen looking into a mirror which subtly altered her reflection, lendingit a tigerish gleam of eye, a vindictive curl of lip.
'Ishtar!' gasped Taramis. 'I am bewitched!'
Appallingly, the apparition spoke, and its voice was like honeyed venom.
'Bewitched? No, sweet sister! Here is no sorcery.'
'Sister?' stammered the bewildered girl. 'I have no sister.'
'You never had a sister?' came the sweet, poisonously mocking voice.'Never a twin sister whose flesh was as soft as yours to caress orhurt?'
'Why, once I had a sister,' answered Taramis, still convinced that shewas in the grip of some sort of nightmare. 'But she died.'
The beautiful face in the disk was convulsed with the aspect of a fury;so hellish became its expression that Taramis, cowering back, halfexpected to see snaky locks writhe hissing about the ivory brow.
'You lie!' The accusation was spat from between the snarling red lips.'She did not die! Fool! Oh, enough of this mummery! Look—and let yoursight be blasted!'
Light ran suddenly along the hangings like flaming serpents, andincredibly the candles in the golden sticks flared up again. Taramiscrouched on her velvet couch, her lithe legs flexed beneath her, staringwide-eyed at the pantherish figure which posed mockingly before her. Itwas as if she gazed upon another Taramis, identical with herself inevery contour of feature and limb, yet animated by an alien and evilpersonality. The face of this stranger waif reflected the opposite ofevery characteristic the countenance of the queen denoted. Lust andmystery sparkled in her scintillant eyes, cruelty lurked in the curl ofher full red lips. Each movement of her supple body was subtlysuggestive. Her coiffure imitated that of the queen's, on her feet weregilded sandals such as Taramis wore in her boudoir. The sleeveless,low-necked silk tunic, girdled at the waist with a cloth-of-goldcincture, was a duplicate of the queen's night-garment.
'Who are you?' gasped Taramis, an icy chill she could not explaincreeping along her spine. 'Explain your presence before I call myladies-in-waiting to summon th