Terla halted and then stepped back behind a tree. Beneath, a squad of niflungs approached her cottage in the glade. Their dark eyes glinted above their beards, and their weapons cast back the rays of the sun. Among them strode a tall, thin figure enveloped in a cloak.

The tall one stopped before the cottage door and drew back his hood. Terla should have recognized him before: the crooked nose, the wiry eyebrows, the stringy beard—all grown larger since she last saw him. Signs of his extreme age. The years had been unkind, but such was the curse he had brought upon himself.

“Terla!” he called. “I have a request of you!” She could imagine the wry twist to his lips that his tone implied. He mocked the phrase that so many of the denizens of Gryphon Mountain used when they came for help. Moments passed, and the niflungs became restless.

“Terla!” the man yelled.

After waiting perhaps ten more seconds, he stepped forward, fists clenched at his sides. “Come out, or we’ll come in!” Scarcely waiting for a response, he turned and gestured to the niflungs in the front. Half-a-dozen of them raced forward, and he said something to them as they passed. His words were lost to Terla’s ears, overpowered by the whoops of the rest of the niflungs as they urged on their friends.

Perhaps because she was more afraid for her cottage than for herself—she had spent years getting everything arranged just so—she emerged from hiding and cried, “Dalgindis! Call them off!”

The tall man heard her and shouted at the niflungs as they reached the front steps. They growled but withdrew. Terla came down the slope and paused to set her basket of meadow flowers next to her garden. She would miss that plot of dark soil, especially now that the strength of her youth was returning and she could work longer hours in it. Her heart beat harder as she approached Dalgindis and the battle-thirsty niflungs behind him, but she forced herself to look him in the eye. “What do you want here?” she asked. “You haven’t belonged in this place for decades. You rejected it, and so the Mountain rejected you.”

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The bright blue light died, and Siggorund found himself sitting on one of the stone platforms, the backs of four stone gryphons toward him. Mendrion was nowhere in sight, but Siggorund wasn’t alone.

Trolls surrounded the stone gazebo, most of them arrayed downslope because the Gryphon’s Door was nearly backed up against a cliff. Dozens of heavy-lidded stares turned toward him, attracted by the light that had so quickly come and gone. Too many. But there was nothing for it; trolls were much too belligerent to let him pass among them peacefully.

Siggorund reached over his shoulder for his sword.

“I wouldn’t do that, Siggorund,” said a voice. Siggorund looked around quickly. He hadn’t heard that voice in years, but he would neither forget it nor mistake it for another’s. He caught sight of a familiar figure advancing through the troll camp. “It would not end well for you.” The trolls near him grinned and lifted their brutish weapons slightly, their eyes challenging him to ignore the warning.

Siggorund did ignore it. He drew his sword.

* * * *

When Mendrion saw the hut, his first thought was that maybe he’d find Siggorund inside. Perhaps the warrior had found his way here, and they would be able to continue their journey. Mendrion’s survival thus far owed much to Siggorund’s bravery and protection.

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Several hundred feet above Gargant’s forest on Gryphon Mountain’s east slope rose a bulwark of rough gray stones. The ground rose on either side, forcing Mendrion and Siggorund to choose one of the two directions to continue their ascent. Mendrion halted before doing so, watching for defenders of some kind to call out. Nothing happened except for a pair of birds swooping past, their cries soon passing out of earshot.

After a glance at his mute companion, Mendrion chose left. The sun had already fallen behind the Mountain, bringing twilight early, even though out to the east the sunlight still lit the land. When they reached the point where the slope met the top of the wall, the Seer found a wide semicircular platform before him. Its surface consisted of more of the stones. Above the surface rose a sheer cliff. Mendrion caught sight of an outcropping near the top that resembled a hook, as if an arch had once extended from the cliff face but had been broken off.

Mendrion stepped onto the stones and walked its length. He looked out over the slope and saw nothing moving, not even in the dark streak of Gargant’s forest below.

He strode back to where Siggorund waited. “What do you think of stopping here for the night?” he asked the warrior. “Our back and front will be protected.”

Siggorund looked around, including upward. The cliff was much too high for anyone to come upon them that way. He nodded, and they prepared their evening meal. Unfortunately, their position would make a fire visible for miles, so they wrapped themselves in their cloaks and quickly ate their evening meal with little to warm them.

As Mendrion tried to fall asleep, a breeze arose and swept down the mountainside. The cliff offered something of a windbreak, but he still shivered occasionally. The quieter the night became, the more Mendrion noticed the roughness of the stones beneath. Nevertheless, he finally began to doze.

His eyes snapped open—had he heard something?

Without moving, he scanned the stone platform. There. A squarish section of the floor was tilted upward, and beneath it . . . a pair of eyes nearly hidden in shadow.

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Near the northeast shoulder of Gryphon Mountain spread an ancient forest. Mendrion and Siggorund had finished their descent of the north face and rounded the shoulder, having been left unguarded by the gryphons of the high slopes yet harrassed no longer by the niflungs. Mendrion had begun to think that perhaps the worst part of the journey was behind them.

Then Siggorund stopped at the sight of the giant wood and refused to enter it.

The Seer hadn’t seen his warrior companion look at anything with such an intense stare. He looked like a dog whose master was trying to pull it into a hole in the ground.

“What’s wrong?” he asked Siggorund. Nothing but that stare. “I have to go in there. Surely there aren’t ghosts.” Siggorund shook his head.

Curious, Mendrion drew the Gryphon’s Claw out of his satchel. “What dwells in the forest that gives Siggorund cause to be wary?” he asked. The glass surface glimmered. Mendrion saw the depths of the forest, all nearly motionless. Nothing happened for a moment, and then a hulking form emerged from between a pair of trees. Lack of light offered Mendrion little detail, but he could see gimlet eyes and waves of hair on the head and shoulders. “What in … ?” he murmured. Some sort of beast-man?

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Mendrion and Siggorund evaded their strange pursuers only as long as it took them to reach the snowline of the north face of Gryphon Mountain and descend halfway down. During those days, the small men had continued to search for them on the lower slopes, unaware that the pair had slipped through the caverns and emerged away from them. Because the Seer and the warrior had left no trace, the searchers were forced to divide up into small bands and spread out.

They were just as noisy, though, giving the travelers notice of their presence.

Since the searchers were wandering aimlessly as they worked their way across the slopes, Mendrion and Siggorund hurried ahead of them in a wide circle. “I would like to know why they’re chasing us,” the Seer said to his silent companion. “But I don’t want to get close enough to them to ask. I may have to go without knowing and just remain curious.”

Siggorund stopped. When Mendrion halted as well and turned, the warrior pointed at Mendrion’s satchel, then crooked one finger. “The Claw?” Siggorund nodded. “But it doesn’t answer why questions. Only wheres and whats. Maybe whos, but I’m not sure.”

The warrior shrugged. He tensed as a familiar horn blast echoed through the trees. Siggorund put up a finger for a moment. He spun and climbed onto an outcropping of exposed rock that rose up from the slope. In seconds, he was flying down toward Mendrion, eyes wide.

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Drumbeats pounded and torchlight flickered, shattering what had been a still night. Mendrion and Siggorund crouched near their small campsite and peered through the trees and underbrush. A band of small, wiry figures hurried along a dirt track below. Sometimes they called to each other in rough tones. Other voices sounded from various directions.

They’re built wrong for dwarfs. What are they after? Mendrion wondered. He would have asked the Gryphon’s Claw, but the talisman lay in his pack within his tent. He wanted to avoid the attention he would attract by going after it. He glanced at Siggorund, who watched the searchers steadily.

The noise of shouting brought them about. A group of the wiry figures had found their tents and extinguished fire. Siggorund, who had grabbed his sword upon rising, drew it from the scabbard. The warrior stepped forward and faced the intruders, his massive weapon raised. The small men hesitated and then backed down.

They had scarcely retreated to the edge of the camp when one sounded a hunting horn. The cries around them intensified. Mendrion raced to his tent, grasped his pack, and stumbled backward. Watching him intently, the intruders nevertheless made no move to stop him. Siggorund picked up his own satchel from where he had lain in the open. He motioned Mendrion to follow him, and they plunged into the forest.

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Mendrion the Seer and Siggorund the warrior descended Gryphon Mountain’s west slope, leaving the ruined castle behind. Mendrion quickly became impressed with his silent companion. Siggorund foraged for roots and fruit, and he trapped a rabbit. Later, he trapped a deer.

They had nearly reached the bottom of the slope, the first leg of Mendrion’s journey almost over, when Siggorund left him to further forage and help replenish their supplies. As he walked alone, the Seer saw the glow of firelight below. As twilight was approaching, he thought to secure lodging for himself and Siggorund. He soon came upon a small cottage that looked like nothing more than a large, overturned bird’s nest with a roof of shingles. A large pile of uncut wood stood to one side, but from the look of the ax buried in a nearby stump, the woodcutter had been absent for at least several years.

Wary, Mendrion crossed the grassless area fronting the place and knocked on the door. A woman’s voice yelled, “What do you want?”

“Lodging for me and my companion, good woman,” Mendrion replied.

The door opened less than a foot, and a stooped old woman in a shabby robe peered at him. “Who’s your invisible friend?” She hitched up her rope belt.

“He’ll be coming soon,” the Seer said. “He’s gathering some food. If you like, we can contribute something to your meal.” He gestured toward the bubbling pot in the fireplace behind her.

She grunted. “Well, that’s fine and all, but I can’t offer anything in the way of lodging. I’ve barely room to turn around in here. What brings you to my door, anyway? This is hardly the beaten path.”

Having not decided what to tell people when they asked this, Mendrion said, “My name is Mendrion. I am sent by Terla to visit the inhabitants of the Mountain.” It was true enough.

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