No more bets, we have a winner!

At some point in the Hyborian Age, I figure some gambler had to figure out, betting on Conan was like money in the bank. Wait, they didn't have banks: that guy was probably robbed by Conan later. Huh. Anyway, from 1995, Conan #4, featuring "Barbarian at the Gate" and "Wicked Conjurings" Both written by Larry Hama, pencils by Barry Crain, inks by Carlos Garzon.

The cover ties into the latter story, but doesn't happen in this issue; it's a lead-in to Barry Windsor-Smith's Conan vs. Rune. The "vampire sorceror" is not particularly impressed with that time, but casts a spell to foresee if any could oppose him: one smelly barbarian, that's it? That shouldn't be a problem at all, then. It's a short one to hype up the one-shot and Conan the Savage #4, the latter being the short-lived replacement for Savage Sword of Conan that I'm not sure I ever read.

In the lead story, three riders return to the "citadel of Harach-Gnar," although two of them are corpses tied to their saddles: Conan has returned for vengeance against the wizard, gladiator-procurer Sligo, and warrior-woman Kara. The latter hadn't betrayed him, and was Sligo's prisoner, but Conan doesn't know that; he's just tearing up the town. At the arena, Conan fights his way through the cheap seats to face Harach-Gnar, as the betting commences: the barbarian is distainful of his "legerdemain and fire powder," but the wizard may have some real powers like...stretchy fingers? Launching his brain out of his skull to attack with eyeball stalks? Not sure what he hoped would happen there, but somebody had to make a killing on that one, at a thousand-to-one, as Conan halves him, then rides out of town; either not realizing or not caring Kara was still captured; I'm not sure if she would appear again. Feel like she deserved better than being hauled off by Sligo, but who doesn't?