"More wine, my Lady?" Muhbaras said. He sat on the edge of the magical pool in their meeting chamber, legs dangling, holding out the jug.
The Lady of the Mists nodded, extending one bare white arm. She wore nothing, and Muhbaras no more. Now they did not disrobe by magic when she transformed the chamber, but disrobed each other, touching and caressing as they went.
"You would make a fine servant, Muhbaras," the Lady said, as the golden wine flowed into her cup. "Perhaps I should bind you to me so that you will be here forever."
Muhbaras could not keep his hands from tightening on the jug. It tilted, spilling a few drops of wine into the water. The Lady looked at the widening gold circle and laughed.
"Does that frighten you, Muhbaras?"
"Yes, my Lady. It does. I have lived all my life as my own man, free to decide for myself and for those placed under me. I would not willingly give it up."
He smiled. "Besides, my lady, I think you have found me skilled enough as a free man, not to wish to exchange me for a slave." He slipped into the water and swiftly embraced the Lady.
She struggled, or at least pretended to do so. But Muhbaras's lips were on hers, and even when she poured her wine over his head, he did not take them away. At last she went limp in his arms—then grappled him like a mating she-leopard with a great cry of triumph and delight.
Presently they lay in the pavilion, as a soft scented magical breeze dried their bare skins. The Lady shook her head. "I would never change you, Muh-baras. This I pledge, by—"
Muhbaras did not recognize the names of half the gods (if they were gods) that the Lady invoked. He was glad of this. The Lady had delved far too deep into ancient and forbidden knowledge that he had no wish to share.
"I also call them to witness that if I changed you, I would be sorry for it."
"Sorrow has not seemed part of you."
The Lady of the Mists turned her face away. With her head muffled in a pillow, she said, "I have not allowed sorrow near me in many years. Not since I came to womanhood and my powers at the same time."
Muhbaras did not have to wait long for the story. He heard it gasped out between barely muffled sobs. Long before it was done, he lay spoon-fashion with the Lady, her head against his chest, cradling her as he would have done a hurt child.
Horror seethed within him, at the tale. Revenge would have heated his blood, except that the men re-sponsible were all long dead. The Lady had taken that vengeance into her own hands, and done thorough work.
So how an Aquilonian noble's daughter came to be the Lady of the Mists was answered. What was not answered was another, far more urgent question (at least in Muhbaras's eyes).
How was a common man to endure long enough as consort to a sorceress, to heal her from her wounds and make her whole as both woman and witch?
Conan's band hugged the foot of the mountains for the next two days. Once more they rode by night to hide themselves from any human watchers who might be lurking either among the rocks or among the dunes.
"To be sure, the Lady's magic may have given her a clear sight of us since we fought the loosefeet," Omyela said cheerfully. "And if it has, she has doubtless prepared for us hospitality that we will not be able to refuse. But she may find me a more awkward guest than she anticipated when she sent the invitations."
The thought of being watched through magic was one of the few things in the world that could make the Cimmerian uneasy. However, he had gone on this quest knowing that there was magic at the end of it, and too many followed him to let the uneasiness show.
"I've been the same kind of guest to a good few witches and wizards," Conan said. "Spells against steel do not always go the way the spellcaster wants it, if the steel's in good hands."
"Just as long as you do not think I am one whom you can cut down before I can bespell you," Omyela said. She was smiling, but the smile did not reach her eyes, and Conan heard no warmth in her voice.
"You need not fear me even trying," he said evenly. "Not unless you give me cause."
They rode on in silence.
In the heart of the peak at the far end of the Valley of the Mists, there was discontent.
That is applying a term suited for living creatures, even intelligent ones, to something that was neither living nor dead, neither intelligent nor mindless. It merely was.
But it could feed, and when the essence of living beings was offered to it, it did so in a way that might be called eager. Feeding had become a habit, and it had gained the notion that this would continue if it obeyed certain commands that seemed to come at regular intervals.
Now the commands no longer came as often. Nor did the feedings. The discontent grew.
There also grew what might be called an idea. If the life essences no longer came to the entity, could it not go to them?
The problem was where.
It began to seem that the commands had come from a particular place. It gave cause for the entity to wonder.
If it found the place where the commands had come from, would it then be able to feed?
At least this gave some direction to the search— and the entity below the mountain had begun to be able to distinguish what had direction from what did not.
The Lady of the Mists had labored and sacrificed for years to bring the Mist to this point, but when the Mist finally reached it, she did not know until it was much too late.
Fifteen
The mountains lunged skyward and dawn was tinting the distant snowcaps as Conan reined in. His sense for danger told him that they should ride on, and not make camp here. His other senses told him that the danger was being seen if they rode on in daylight.
He dismounted and studied the ground, seeking a sign of hostile presence to justify his unease. The ground was too hard in most places to show tracks, and during the night the wind had blown hard, with nearly a sandstorm's strength. On the softer ground any tracks left before dawn would have long since been obliterated.
Voices broke into Conan's study of the ground, coming up behind him.
"—old crone's fancies," came in Farad's voice.
"Old crone? Is that what you see when you look at me?" That could only be Omyela.
"With my eyes, yes. We Afghulis are not much for magic."
"Hmmp. We call that 'stone-brained' among my folk. I see a stone-brained young warrior who loves his chief's woman."
Only Farad's trying to choke back an angry retort broke the ensuing silence. That, and Conan's swift feet as he hurried back to the others.
"What Bethina is to me, and I to her, and what Farad may be toward both of us, is not for spreading on the desert wind like camel-stink," Conan said sharply. He did not look at either Omyela or Farad, but saw out of the corner of his eye that both took the chiding to heart.
"Now, Omyela, you had some—what Farad called by a rude name—to speak of to me? True?"
The old woman inclined her head with almost regal grace. "That is so, Cimmerian. My 'fancies' tell me where lies the Valley of the Mists."
That silenced even Farad, and the two men listened with great attention as Omyela explained. Conan had no more love for sorcery than ever, but in his years of adventuring, magic-wielders had sometimes been more help than hindrance. Omyela was looking to be one such.
He hoped she was. The Kezankian Mountains were full of valleys, some known only to the mountain folk who lived in or about them, others hardly visited at all by mortal men. It would take longer than they could afford, climbing among the peaks and peering into each valley—and perhaps learning that they had found the Valley of the Mists when its witch-Lady hurled her magic at them.