A fantasy adventure novelette by Robert E. Howard, part of his Conan cycle. Conan climbs a sheer jungle cliff toward an ancient city and its fabled treasure, caught between rival factions and the secrets of a lost civilisation. A brisk, atmospheric tale of intrigue and peril.
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Cover of the original edition (Project Gutenberg, public domain).
Text source: gutenberg.org · The work is in the public domain.
Opening of the book
JEWELS OF GWAHLUR
By Robert E. Howard
[Transcriber's Note: This etext was first published in
Weird Tales March 1935. Extensive research did not uncover any evidence that the U.S. copyright on this publication was renewed.]
1 Paths of Intrigue
The cliffs rose sheer from the jungle, towering ramparts of stone that glinted jade-blue and dull crimson in the rising sun, and curved away and away to east and west above the waving emerald ocean of fronds and leaves. It looked insurmountable, that giant palisade with its sheer curtains of solid rock in which bits of quartz winked dazzlingly in the sunlight. But the man who was working his tedious way upward was already halfway to the top.
He came of a race of hillmen, accustomed to scaling forbidding crags, and he was a man of unusual strength and agility. His only garment was a pair of short red silk breeks, and his sandals were slung to his back, out of his way, as were his sword and dagger.
The man was powerfully built, supple as a panther. His skin was bronzed by the sun, his square-cut black mane confined by a silver band about his temples. His iron muscles, quick eyes and sure feet served him well here, for it was a climb to test these qualities to the utmost. A hundred and fifty feet below him waved the jungle. An equal distance above him the rim of the cliffs was etched against the
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