He strode past the throne without a backward glance.
A scout burst through the doors, armor dented, breath ragged.
Let it lie.
Conan of Cimmeria sat on a throne that did not fit his hips.
Conan stood.
He remembered the cold of his homeland. The sting of snow in his lungs. The honest bite of steel. Not this velvet cage of crowns and couriers.
“Let them come,” Conan said, and his smile was the edge of an axe. “I was not made for thrones. I was made for this.” He strode past the throne without a backward glance
His bare feet—calloused from a thousand battlefields—rested on the mosaic of a serpent he’d crushed with his own hands. Outside, the city of Aquilonia whispered his name like a prayer and a curse. King. Barbarian. Savior. Tyrant.
The wine was sour. The women’s laughter, tin. The torches in the hall guttered like frightened things. Conan of Cimmeria sat on a throne that did not fit his hips