Conan of the Isles

Conan of the Isles is a fantasy novel by American writers L. Sprague de Camp and Lin Carter, featuring Robert E. Howard's sword and sorcery hero Conan the Barbarian. It was first published October 1968 in paperback by Lancer Books; publication was then taken over by Ace Books, starting from May 1977. In the novel, Conan is his mid-60s. He is the widowed king of Aquilonia, fearing that he is destined to die in bed, helpless while surrounded by physicians and whispering courtiers. His eldest son and heir Conn is 20-years-old. A new threat appears when the wizard-priests of the dark god Xotli, descendants of refugees from sunken Atlantis, start kidnapping random Aquilonians to offer human sacrifice to their god. After being contacted by the ghost of the prophet Epemitreus, Conan abdicates the throne and travels to the pirate hideout on the Barachan Islands. He recruits a polyglot crew of pirates and sets sail for the city of Ptahuacan in order to face the priests. The novel was intended to be Conan's final adventure, though the character is alive at its end. After a crime boss takes control of Ptahuacan in a coup d'état, Conan and his crew set sail towards the unexplored west coast of the Western Ocean (Atlantic Ocean). Their ship is last mentioned while skirting the Antillian Isles (Antilles), and would be remembered in the legends of Mayapan as Quetzlcoatl (the "winged (or feathered) serpent").