Despite his long walk he was not tired and he enjoyed the deep peace on the mountains.

He might have been awed at another time, but now he was not afraid.
Zillenstein, too, came out, bathed in silver, an immense threatening mass set solidly in the shoulder of the opposite mountain, more sinister even in the moonlight than in the sunlight.

He wondered how many hundreds of innocent human beings had perished in its dungeons.

He had not the slightest doubt that Julie was there, but she at least was safe from everything, save a long imprisonment and a powerful pressure that might compel her to become the morganatic wife of Auersperg.

It might be the old story of the drop of water wearing away the stone.
Clouds began to trail slowly up the valley, and Zillenstein faded away again.