In a matter of moments they were jogging off down the valley, with Fafhrd singing tales of snowstorms and hunting and monsters big as icebergs and giants as tall as frost mountains, and the Mouser dourly amusing himself by picturing his own death at the hands of some overly affectionate “great strong-hipped” woman.
Soon the way became less barren. Scrub trees and the valley’s downward trend hid the city behind them. A surge of relief which the Mouser hardly noticed went through him as the last stony sentinel dipped out of sight, particularly the black monolith left to brood over the adept. He turned his attention to what lay ahead—a conical mountain barring the valley’s mouth and wearing a high cap of mist, a lonely thunderhead which his imagination shaped into incredible towers and spires.
Suddenly his sleepy thoughts snapped awake. Fafhrd and Ahura had stopped and were staring at something wholly unexpected—a low wooden windowless house pressed back among the scrubby trees, with a couple of tilled fields behind it. The rudely carved guardian spirits at the four corners of the roof and topping the kingposts seemed Persian, but Persian purged of all southern influence—ancient Persian.
And ancient Persian too appeared the thin features, straight nose, and black-streaked beard of the aged man watching them circumspectly from the low doorway. It seemed to be Ahura’s face he scanned most intently—or tried to scan, since Fafhrd mostly hid her.
“Greetings, Father,” called the Mouser. “Is this not a merry day for riding, and yours good lands to pass?”
“Yes,” replied the aged man dubiously, using a rusty dialect. “Though there are none, or few, who pass.”
“Just as well to be far from the evil stinking cities,” Fafhrd interjected heartily. “Do you know the mountain ahead, Father? Is there an easy way past it that leads north?”
At the word “mountain” the aged man cringed. He did not answer.
“Is there something wrong about the path we are taking?” the Mouser asked quickly. “Or something evil about that misty mountain?”
The aged man started to shrug his shoulders, held them contracted, looked again at the travelers. Friendliness seemed to fight with fear in his face, and to win, for he leaned forward and said hurriedly, “I warn you, sons, not to venture farther. What is the steel of your swords, the speed of your steeds, against—but remember”—he raised his voice—”I accuse no one.” He looked quickly from side to side. “I have nothing at all to complain of. To me the mountain is a great benefit. My fathers returned here because the land is shunned by thief and honest man alike. There are no taxes on this land—no money taxes. I question nothing.”
“Oh, well, Father, I don’t think we’ll go farther,” sighed the Mouser wilily. “We’re but idle fellows who follow our noses across the world. And sometimes we smell a strange tale. And that reminds me of a matter in which you may be able to give us generous lads some help.” He chinked the coins in his pouch. “We have heard a tale of a demon that inhabits here—a young demon dressed in black and silver, pale, with a black beard.”
As the Mouser was saying these things the aged man was edging backward and at the finish he dodged inside and slammed the door, though not before they saw someone pluck at his sleeve. Instantly there came muffled angry expostulation in a girl’s voice.
The door burst open. They heard the aged man say “…bring it down upon us all.” Then a girl of about fifteen came running toward them. Her face was flushed, her eyes anxious and scared.
“You must turn back!” she called to them as she ran. “None but wicked things go to the mountain—or the doomed. And the mist hides a great horrible castle. And powerful, lonely demons live there. And one of them—”
She clutched at Fafhrd’s stirrup. But just as her fingers were about to close on it, she looked beyond him straight at Ahura. An expression of abysmal terror came into her face. She screamed, “He! The black beard!” and crumpled to the ground.
The door slammed, and they heard a bar drop into place.
They dismounted. Ahura quickly knelt by the girl, signed to them after a moment that she had only fainted. Fafhrd approached the barred door, but it would not open to any knocking, pleas, or threats. He finally solved the riddle by kicking it down. Inside he saw: the aged man cowering in a dark corner; a woman attempting to conceal a young child in a pile of straw; a very old woman sitting on a stool, obviously blind, but frightenedly peering about just the same; and a young man holding an ax in trembling hands. The family resemblance was very marked.
Fafhrd stepped out of the way of the young man’s feeble ax-blow and gently took the weapon from him.
The Mouser and Ahura brought the girl inside. At sight of Ahura there were further horrified shrinkings.
They laid the girl on the straw, and Ahura fetched water and began to bathe her head.
Meanwhile, the Mouser, by playing on her family’s terror and practically identifying himself as a mountain demon, got them to answer his questions. First he asked about the stone city. It was a place of ancient devil-worship, they said, a place to be shunned. Yes, they had seen the black monolith of Ahriman, but only from a distance. No, they did not worship Ahriman—see the fire-shrine they kept for his adversary Ormadz? But they dreaded Ahriman, and the stones of the devil-city had a life of their own.
Then he asked about the misty mountain and found it harder to get satisfactory answers. The cloud always shrouded its peak, they insisted. Though once toward sunset, the young man admitted, he thought he had glimpsed crazily leaning green towers and twisted minarets. But there was danger up there, horrible danger. What danger? He could not say.
The Mouser turned to the aged man. “You told me,” he said harshly, “that my brother demons exact no money tax from you for this land. What kind of tax, then, do they exact?”
“Lives,” whispered the aged man, his eyes showing more white.
“Lives eh? How many? And when do they come for them?”
“They never come. We go. Maybe every ten years, maybe every five, there comes a yellow-green light on the mountaintop at night, and a powerful calling in the air. Sometimes after such a night one of us is gone—who was too far from the house when the green light came. To be in the house with others helps resist the calling. I never saw the light except from our door, with a fire burning bright at my back and someone holding me. My brother went when I was a boy. Then for many years afterwards the light never came, so that even I began to wonder whether it was not a boyhood legend or illusion.
“But seven years ago,” he continued quaveringly, staring at the Mouser, “there came riding late one afternoon, on two gaunt and death-wearied horses, a young man and an old—or rather the semblances of a young man and an old, for I knew without being told, knew as I crouched trembling inside the door, peering through the crack, that the masters were returning to the Castle Called Mist. The old man was bald as a vulture and had no beard. The young man had the beginnings of a silky black one. He was dressed in black and silver, and his face was very pale. His features were like—” Here his gaze flickered fearfully toward Ahura. “He rode stiffly, his lanky body rocking from side to side. He looked as if he were dead.
“They rode on toward the mountain without a sideward glance. But ever since that time the greenish-yellow light has glowed almost nightly from the mountaintop, and many of our animals have answered the call—and the wild ones too, to judge from their diminishing numbers. We have been careful, always staying near the house. It was not until three years ago that my eldest son went. He strayed too far in hunting and let darkness overtake him.
“And we have seen the black-bearded young man many times, usually at a distance, treading along the skyline or standing with head bowed upon some crag. Though once when my daughter was washing at the stream she looked up from her clothes-pounding and saw his dead eyes peering through the reeds. And once my eldest son, chasing a wounded snow-leopard into a thicket, found him talking with the beast. And once, rising early on a harvest morning, I saw him sitting by the well, staring at our doorway, although he did not seem to see me emerge. The old man we have seen too, though not so often. And for the last two years we have seen little or nothing of either, until—” And once again his gaze flickered helplessly toward Ahura.