The Second Book of Lankhmar

most nymphish lascivious look.
           "I'll fight you for her," the Mouser proposed.
           "And I you," Fafhrd confirmed, slowly drawing Graywand from its sheath beside his cot.
           The Mouser likewise slipped Scalpel from its ratskin container.
           The two heroes rose from their cots.
           At this moment, two personages appeared a little behind the girl — from thin air, to all appearances. Both were at least nine feet tall. They had to bend, not to bump the ceiling. Cobwebs tickled their pointed ears. The one on the Mouser's side was black as wrought iron. He swiftly drew a sword that looked forged from the same material.
           At the same time, the other newcomer —bone-white, this one — produced a silver-seeming sword, likely steel plated with tin.
           The nine-footer opposing the Mouser aimed a skull-splitting blow at the top of his head. The Mouser parried in prime and his opponent's weapon shrieked off to the left. Whereupon, smartly swinging his rapier widdershins, the Mouser slashed off the black fiend's head, which struck the floor with a horrid clank.
           The white afreet opposing Fafhrd trusted to a downward thrust. But the Northerner, catching his blade in a counterclockwise bind, thrust him through, the silvery sword missing Fafhrd's right temple by the thinness of a hair.
           With a petulant stamp of her naked heel, the nymphet vanished into thin air, or perhaps Limbo.
           The Mouser made to wipe off his blade on the cot-clothes, but discovered there was no need. He shrugged. "What a misfortune for you, comrade," he said in a voice of mocking woe. "Now you will not be able to enjoy the delicious chit as she disports herself on your heap of gold."
           Fafhrd moved to cleanse Graywand on his sheets, only to note that it too was altogether unbloodied. He frowned. "Too bad for you, best of friends," he sympathized. "Now you won't be able to possess her as she writhes with girlish abandon on your couch of diamonds, their glitter striking opalescent tones from her pale flesh."
           "Mauger that effeminate artistic garbage, how did you know that I was dreaming diamonds?" the Mouser demanded.
           "How did I?" Fafhrd asked himself wonderingly. At last he begged the question with, "The same way, I suppose, that you knew I was dreaming of gold."
           The two excessively long corpses chose that moment to vanish, and the severed head with them.
           Fafhrd said sagely, "Mouser, I begin to believe that supernatural forces were involved in this morning's haps."
           "Or else hallucinations, oh great philosopher," the Mouser countered somewhat peevishly.
           "Not so," Fafhrd corrected, "for see, they've left their weapons behind."
           "True enough," the Mouser conceded, rapaciously eyeing the wrought-iron and tin-plated blades on the floor. "Those will fetch a fancy price on Curio Court."
           The Great Gong of Lankhmar, sounding distantly through the walls, boomed out the twelve funereal strokes of noon, when burial parties plunge spade into earth.
           "An after-omen," Fafhrd pronounced. "Now we know the source of the supernal force. The Shadowland, terminus of all funerals."
           "Yes," the Mouser agreed. "Prince Death, that eager boy, has had another go at us."
           Fafhrd splashed cool water onto his face from a great bowl set against the wall. "Ah well," he spoke through the splashes, "'Twas a pretty bait at least. Truly, there's nothing like a nubile girl, enjoyed or merely glimpsed naked, to give one an appetite for breakfast."
           "Indeed yes," the Mouser replied, as he tightly shut his eyes and briskly rubbed his face with a palm full of white brandy. "She was just the sort of immature dish to kindle your satyrish taste for maids newly budded."
           In the silence that came as the splashing stopped, Fafhrd inquired innocently, " Whose satyrish taste?"

         V: Under the Thumbs of the Gods
           Drinking strong drink one night at the Silver Eel, the Gray Mouser and Fafhrd became complacently, even luxuriously, nostalgic about their past loves and amorous exploits. They even boasted a little to each other about their most recent erotic solacings (although it is always very unwise to boast of such matters, especially out loud; one never knows who may be