Free Flash Gordon 5 - The Witch Queen of Mongo by Alex Raymond Page A

it.”
    Azura’s eyes narrowed. “There’s a locket in the clasp of my cape,” she told him.
    Flash looked down at the clasp that held Azura’s cape together in front of her throat. He saw a small jeweled locket.
    “Open it,” Azura commanded.
    “If you’re tricking me, Azura,” Flash began threateningly.
    “I swear,” she said softly.
    Flash opened the locket. There was a small capsule inside.
    “Break the capsule,” said Azura.
    Flash glanced over Azura’s shoulder at Qilp. The dwarf stared at him with no expression in his eyes at all.
    With sudden resolution, Flash crushed the capsule.
    Instantly, he felt a languor overtake his entire body. He smiled at Azura and let her go.
    She rose and straightened her sheath dress, watching him carefully.
    Flash leaned back and looked up at her. For some reason he was suddenly afraid, more terribly afraid than he had ever been in his life before.
    “What is it, Flash?” asked Azura with veiled interest. “You look different.”
    “Yes, Earthman,” Qilp said grinning evilly. “What is it?”
    Flash shook his head. “Nothing.” He closed his eyes and drew in a deep breath to steady himself. He could feel his flesh crawling, almost with terror.
    Azura stood over him, reaching out her hand to him. “All right, Flash. Was I lying to you?”
    Instinctively Flash recoiled from the touch of her hand. He drew back away from her, his whole body quivering with an atavistic fear he could not isolate.
    “Go away!” he cried. He was astonished to hear his voice high and reedy and bordering on hysteria.
    Azura threw back her head and laughed throatily.
    Flash could feel cold perspiration on his forehead. “What are you laughing at?”
    “It’s a new preparation we’ve developed here in the Kingdom of Blue Magic,” she said, her voice bubbling with mirth. “It makes cowards of the bravest of men.”
    “C-c-cowards,” Flash stuttered, unable to say the word correctly. “I’m no coward!”
    “Perhaps you weren’t, Flash, but you are now.”
    Qilp giggled.
    Flash frowned. He understood. “You tricked me. You made me break a capsule of this new formulation invented by your evil scientists.”
    “Exactly,” Queen Azura crowed.
    “But when I broke the capsule, why weren’t you affected by it?”
    “I stayed far enough away,” said Azura. “It is called pacifist mist, Flash Gordon, but we also serve it in the food of those we wish to keep subdued.”
    “And if I refuse to eat?” Flash demanded.
    “You starve to death, Earthman!” yelped Qilp.
    Flash frowned. He was regaining some of his old courage. “But I won’t let it work. I’ve got a stronger will than most people. I can think away fear.”
    Azura turned quickly to Qilp. “Run!” she ordered him. “Get your cousin here. I don’t think that stuff is working.”
    Qilp bolted headlong across the chamber to the door and slammed it behind him.
    “So,” said Flash, jumping down off the gravity sled and advancing on Azura. “It’s not working. It can make the average man a coward, but not Flash Gordon.”
    Azura backed away, her eyes showing momentary terror. “I think you may be the exception,” she murmured and quickly touched her belt.
    Flash saw the quick movement of her hand.
    “What are you doing?”
    But she had out another locket, and the fumes of the second capsule had risen to his nostrils before he could draw back.
    The greatest terror gripped him. In the air around him suddenly, he could see the shapes of hideous monsters—things conjured from the imagination of a madman.
    There were misshapen animals with pointed teeth, dripping blood. There were emaciated, wrinkled, hideous old crones, lifting talons to rake his flesh. A corpse of moldering putrescence floated toward him, screaming hysterically and reaching out to touch him with slimy fingers.
    “Stop! Stop!” screamed Flash.
    He fell back and crawled away from the phantoms in the air about him. Soon his shoulders touched the wall