“Get off me!” he would shout from time to time. “Leave me be! I am near to my destination and will not be denied here. No mere weather, no matter how tenacious, is going to stop me!”
There was no reply. Only the continuous moaning, and the persistent, repetitious attempts to restrain his arms and legs. Occasionally he was forced to pause and hack clutching tentacles of moisture from the limbs of his friends. But for the most part, now that they once more had room in which to move, they were able to keep themselves relatively mist free.
He hewed his way forward for more than an hour. If the retentive, obstinate fog thought it could outwait him, or discourage him, it was more than wrong. It had never encountered anyone like Etjole Ehomba, whose arms rose and fell methodically, mechanically, as he cut his way forward, dead dew dripping like transparent blood from his blade of crystallized nickel-iron.
Then, realizing that all its efforts were doomed to failure, the fog began to dissipate. Vast quantities of it drew back, rising upward in the direction of the cold mountain peaks from which it drew sustenance, while isolated pockets fled downslope to evaporate. A few persistent tendrils continued to clutch at the arms and shoulders of the determined travelers, but these were soon cut away. As they ascended through the uppermost reaches of the fog bank, the sun returned, warming their damp bodies. The clinging fog had soaked Ehomba to the skin, but in the thin air the unobstructed sun made quick work of the lingering moisture.