Conan the Barbarian #37 – “The Curse of the Golden Skull” – Roy Thomas/Neal Adams
This one starts ages ago, with a dark wizard of Lemuria (Rotath) being killed by King Kull. The dying Rotath put a deadly curse on his own bones, a curse that would affect whoever found his remains. Millennia later, a hillsman was exploring a lost valley and found a ruined city and Rotath’s skeleton, now made of solid gold. The hillsman couldn’t resist the lure of gold, but as soon as he touched the skeleton, he was taken over by Rotath’s spirit. Months later, a contingent of Turanian soldiers (including Conan) travelling through the territory of the rebellious hill tribes, escorting King Yildiz’s granddaughter (Yolinda) home from a convent. Conan is nervous
about passing through the rebels’ territory and his fears prove true when they’re attacked by hillsmen. They’re better armed than the ragtag tribes Conan faced before and they soon overwhelm the Turanians. Conan fights valiantly (and his life is saved by a fellow mercenary named Juma), but he eventually falls to greater numbers. Conan wakes up chained to Juma and they’re forced to march through the mountains into a hidden valley that has tropical weather, even though they’re pretty far north. (Yolinda is also brought along as a captive, but all the other Turanians are dead.) After almost getting run over by a rhinoceros (which they refer to as a unicorn), Conan, Juma, and 
Yolinda arrive at a gleaming tower. They ride to the top of the tower in a bubble that’s pushed upwards by a jet of water. In the throne room, Yolinda is grabbed by a strange half-baboon creature called Anaxor and taken to Rotath’s throne. Rotath (who seems to be made of gold) plans to marry Yolinda to gain a claim to the Turanian throne, but Conan challenges him to let her go. Anaxor attacks Conan, but he strangles it with his manacles and starts fighting the guards. Rotath threatens to kill Yolinda, so Conan stops fighting but it turns out Rotath is casting an illusion. Juba wasn’t the target of the spell, so he could see that Rotath was actually holding his sword the throat of the already-dead Anaxor. Rotath uses drugged darts to knock Conan and Juma
out and they wake up in the mines, where they’re expected to dig for gold. They notice that a lot of the gold isn’t being sent toward the surface but deeper into the mine. They sneak down there and steal a mine car full of gold, heading deeper underground. They crash and are almost killed by a giant lizard, but it gets eaten by a huge slug that rises from an underground lake. The slug chases Conan and Juma and they lead it to the surface and towards the palace. Rotath freaks out and takes Yolinda up in the water elevator, but Conan realizes the giant slug feeds on gold, so he tosses the loot from the mine car onto the water jet. The slug goes for it, cutting of the jet and causing the 
bubble to fall. The slug absorbs Rotath’s golden form and shambles off, leaving Conan and Juma to escort Yolinda back to civilization. This is a pretty good story, although it was originally supposed to be longer. Neal Adams was meant to do an adaptation of a Conan story by L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter (The City of Skulls) for Savage Tales magazine, but de Camp was hesitating on giving permission, so the story had to be truncated and changed so it didn’t resemble the Carter/de Camp tale. Using a Robert E. Howard vignette about Kull as the prologue, Roy changed the story enough to satisfy de Camp, although he did get permission to use Juma, an original character from The City of Skulls. I like Juma, although I think Roy goes overboard pointing out that he and Conan are unlikely friends because Juma is black. I guess such cooperation
was still a novelty in those less woke times. Conan and Juma fighting together kinda reminds me of Kirk Douglas and Woody Strode in Spartacus. The giant slug’s face looks a bit like a vagina (or a Georgia O’Keeffe painting) and it must’ve gotten Conan and Juma excited, because in the last panel it almost seems like Conan’s suggesting they have some fun with Yolinda on the way home. (Although, in the Carter/de Camp story, Conan apparently gets the rescued princess pregnant …)
Conan the Barbarian #38 – “The Warrior and the Were-Woman” – Roy Thomas/John Buscema
This one starts with Conan at a feast in honour of Yolinda’s safe return. Conan isn’t enjoying the feast much, nor his recent promotion to guard captain. (Juma opted for another tour of duty.) Conan has been having strange dreams lately, about a frightening woman who tries to bite his neck. One of Narim-Bey’s cousins suggests Conan might be cursed and the barbarian tosses the guy around. He also threatens to kill Feyd-Ratha, who hints that he knows about Conan’s illicit liaison with Narim-Bey’s mistress, Amytis. One of the harem dancers goes nuts and
tries to stab Conan, ending up impaled on her own dagger. Conan hears a strange voice that seems to confirm he has been cursed, and when he and Narim-Bey go outside, Conan sees a cobra on the ground … but there’s nothing there. He goes to sleep and has the same disturbing dream about the mysterious woman. He awakens, certain the woman was actually in his room, and almost kills Amytis, who has come for a booty call. She tells Conan the woman in his dreams is Lilitu, the Were-Woman, and that he is under a curse, cast by a former priest called Gimil-Ishbi. Amytis tells Conan where to find Gimil-Ishbi and he heads out to confront the evil priest, but after he leaves we see 
someone else show up. Apparently, Amytis was forced to tell Conan about Lilitu, but she wasn’t supposed to mention Gimil-Ishbi, so her visitor decides to follow Conan and kill him personally. Outside the city, Conan finds Gimil-Ishbi, who gives him some magic dust and teaches him a spell that can protect him from Lilitu. Gimil-Ishbi demands a life in return for his help, so Conan kills him to satisfy the bargain. Conan finds an empty house and prepares by putting the dust across the door and windows ills, then settling down to wait. Soon a strange creature enters the house and Conan recites the spell, trapping the beast with him. He stabs it repeatedly, but no blood comes out and he soon realizes his isn’t Lilitu, but her mate, Ardat Lili. Lilitu arrives but can’t enter the house without being trapped. To free her mate, she promises anything Conan
wants, so he asks the name of the person who set her on his trail in the first place. After she tells him, he breaks the spell and leaves, but Lilitu and Ardat Lili come after him immediately. He flees, running into the architect of the whole scheme, Narim-Bey (who wanted revenge on Conan for banging Amytis). Conan steals Narim-Bey’s horse and takes off, leaving him to be torn apart by Lilitu and Ardat Lili. This story was based on a non-Conan tale by Robert E. Howard called House of Arabu, which dealt with lycanthropes. Roy changed a few names and slotted it into L. Sprague de Camp’s Conan chronology, which said Conan spent a couple of years as a mercenary in the 
Turanian army. Roy cut that time down a bit (since Conan leaves the Turanian army at the end of this issue), but otherwise followed the chronology pretty closely. In the original story, the hero killed Gimil-Ishbi in cold blood after getting his help, but Roy figured Conan wouldn’t do that, so he tried to make Gimil-Ishbi seem very evil. His price of a life for helping Conan was basically his way of claiming Conan’s soul, so killing him was the logical move.