“Why is it, Riddle-Vendor, that you always give us half knowledge?” Fafhrd pressed angrily. “Is it that at the last moment our blades may strike with half force?” Ningauble chuckled. “It is because I know you too well, children. If I said one word more, Hulk, you could be cleaving with your great sword—at the wrong person. And your cat-comrade would be brewing his child’s magic—the wrong child’s magic. It is no simple creature you foolhardily seek, but a mystery, no single identity but a mirage, a stony thing that has stolen the blood and substance of life, a nightmare crept out of dream.”
