First published in 1968, Swords in the Mist is author Fritz Leiber's collection of short stories. Comprised of six separate, but connected, stories, Swords in the Mist follows Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser as the two heroes travel across the world of Nehwon, finding adventure everywhere they go.
"The Cloud of Hate," the first short story contained in the novel, the duo travel to a town called Lankhmar, where the two must contend with the town's citizens. Those citizens, who are hateful and are magically inclined, give the duo a hard time as they travel.
The second short story contained the novel, entitled "Lean Times in Lankhmar," picks off after the duo have parted ways after they deal with significant loss and hardship. In the short story, readers see that Fafhrd has become one of the first adherents to a new religion and that Fafhrd has become an enforcement thug for a group of bad people. As they always do, however, the duo come back to each other and begin their journey once again.
In the third short story, entitled "Their Mistress, the Sea," the duo embark on a trip across the sea. During that time, they reconcile despite the difficulty of their journey and the varied troubles they deal with. On their journey, the duo invades the boudoir of a sea God that they no longer inhabit (which is detailed in the next short story, "While the Sea-King's Away").
In "While the Sea-King's Away," readers and the characters learn that the sea God was not, in fact, really away. He laid dormant in another world waiting for some to disturb his boudoir so that he could hunt down those who wronged him. Fafhrd and the Gray Mouser flee the angry God's wrath and travel to another world (as detailed in the fifth short story, "The Wrong Branch"). On their journey, and in the final short story of the novel, "Adept's Gambit," the duo must perform a strange quest near the Castle of Mist to a break a curse that had previously been placed on them because of some of their previous quests.
