Look: A mouth in the cliff, wide enough for two wagons side by side, cut square, with the stone down each side still straight after all this time. Two rows of narrow slots run up either side of the opening, which the town takes for drain holes. From the valley floor it looks like a black notch, and the eye keeps going back to it.
Inside: The first hall is dry and sound, with empty beam sockets in its walls. A shrine cut into the rock has no known purpose, though the town assumes it belongs to the nature faith simply because it is old. Beyond it, most branching galleries are blocked by falls or flooded, leaving only the first sections passable. The rock is bad, falls are frequent, and those who go deep do not always return. The deepest cut runs straight into the mountain, made for wagons rather than ore. Its destination and purpose are unknown.
The detail: The mouth breathes. Cold air comes out of it steadily in all weathers, so snow never lies at the entrance and the grass in front stays burnt and short.
Worked out: The veins were emptied long before any village stood in the valley. Nobody from the town has ever worked the place, because there was nothing left in it to work.
Who goes in: Someone walks the first hall now and then, out of duty or for a dare. Nobody goes far. It runs deeper than a dare will carry anyone.
The visits: People once went up to the shrine. A fall killed a party on the path, Algeron forbade the visits, and the way was never re-cut.
What is argued: A few scholars say the works were more than a mine. Nobody in the valley takes an interest.
The name means nothing in any tongue spoken in the town. It is simply what the place has always been called, and the older form of it is lost.
The moaning is said to be the men who never came out, calling from behind the falls. The story returns every few years, with new names in it each time.
The mine experts say it is only the cold air, carried back out along the long straight cut. Most people believe them.