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“I know you do,” she says. “But there’s no other place I would rather be.”

Putting his arm around her, he gives her an affectionate squeeze. Then they return to the others and help with preparations for the meal. A filling meal of the last of their dried beef and a few old tubers Brother Willim dug from the ground satisfies their hunger if not their taste buds. How the tubers came to be here is anyone’s guess, could be they manage to grow in the wintertime.

Once the meal is over and they are sitting around a campfire, they decided to risk one seeing as how nothing is out here, they settle in for the night. As hard as it may be, they try to put what may happen on the morrow out of their minds as they spend one last time together like they use to back at The Ranch. Stories and songs, most of which are by Perrilin, go a long way in taking away their worries and fears. But when the time comes to sleep, once again each one begins to dwell on what will happen. For some, sleep takes a long time to come.

“Where is it?” asks Stig.

The lightning of the sky with the coming of dawn revealed that the fog was nowhere in sight. “I told you it moves,” Brother Willim says. “The edge has simply moved further away from us.”

“It must be scared,” jokes Shorty. “It knows we are on the way.” A couple snickers are all he gets for his levity, not nearly what he was hoping for.

“Guess we’ll have a little more of a ride this morning than we anticipated,” James says. Climbing into the saddle, he waits for the others to mount. Then he nods to Jiron to lead the way. With Aleya riding beside him, he heads out.

The fog doesn’t take too long to makes its appearance. Less than an hour after they get underway it appears on the horizon. The sight of the fog before them affects each in their own way. Most however feel a sense of dread at the sight, one of impending doom.

Steeling their nerve, they continue on toward the wall of fog. It rises to a point high above the ground and when they at last reach its boundary, it towers far above them. “Never seen fog or mist behave this way before,” Perrilin states. “A sheer wall rising to the sky like this.”

“This is no ordinary mist,” Brother Willim states. “It differs slightly from that you would normally find in the world.”

“How so?” asks James.

“Hard to explain,” he replies. Gesturing to the mist before them he says, “This goes against the natural order of the world.”

They pause momentarily at the mist’s boundary. James gazes intently at the mist before them and tries to penetrate its murky depths. “Everyone keep a constant lookout for hell hounds,” he says to the others. “With any luck, they may not be in this area.”

“I wouldn’t trust to that if I were you,” comments Potbelly.

“I’m not,” he responds. Then with a glance to Jiron, he nods that they should enter.

“Here we go,” breathes Jiron as he nudges his horse to move forward.

As they enter the mist and it envelops them, it almost feels as if the mist is sucking the warmth right out of their bodies. The world turns hazy as the light from the sun above becomes diffused as it works its way down to where they are. Sound too, seems to be muffled in some way, the clip-clop of the horses’ hooves no longer resonates as it had when they were not in the mist.

Onward Jiron leads them. Everyone stays in a compact group, all unconsciously remain together for safety. When after a few minutes’ time nothing happens, Jiron picks up the pace.

James wants desperately to use magic to see if there is anything nearby, but realizes that if he does, those within the temple will undoubtedly pick up on it. So he resists the temptation and uses what senses are available to him; sight, smell and sound. Unfortunately, the mist allows neither one to be very effective.

Time becomes meaningless within the constant grayness of the mist. They begin jumping at imagined shadows as the monotonousness of the mist starts playing tricks on their senses. “Is there anything you