Description acceptable. After returning from this place, a character watches an object “wilt into gory icicles” in a passage that concludes “He who wields power over time and tide: He is the true Lord.” The “burning waters” surrounding this place inspired a later author’s description of “tricksy lights” in the Dead Marshes. A group traveling to this place encounters an old man’s severed head under a cliff. A man takes a hilt from this place after he beheads a corpse, whose blood melts a (*) sword “from the days of the giants.” A journey to this place is prompted by the murder of the wise councilor Aeschere. Upon receiving the sword Hrunting, a man swims down to this place to do battle with a creature who terrorized Heorot after the death of her son, a “descendant of Cain.” For 10 points, give this residence of a monster and his mother in Beowulf. ■END■
ANSWER: Grendel’s lair [or Grendel’s mother’s lair; accept cave in place of “lair”; accept synonyms such as hideout in place of “lair”; accept any answer that describes where Grendel or Grendel’s mother lives] (The Dead Marshes are in Middle-earth, near Mordor. All direct quotes are from Seamus Heaney’s translation.)
<HG, British Literature>
= Average correct buzz position