Dive Deep into Creativity: Discover, Share, Inspire
So far, they’ve made pretty good time. Hamal realizes with a start that they’re only a day or so out from Meadow Rock. It’s less of a town than Independence and more of a…village. As far as they can remember, there’s a shop that calls itself a general store but mostly sells fish bait and trail rations, an old lady with no teeth who sells moonshine, a courier who could be paid to run letters to the proper postmen in Independence, and a handful of drunken hunters. Not exactly a bustling metropolis, but it’s also the last speck of civilization they’ll see for some time. Shortly after that realization, they notice clouds building on the horizon, as though nature itself had come to the same conclusion and decided it couldn’t let them off quite so easily. All day they watch the clouds grow taller and darker, like titans formed of turbulent shadow. When the wind picks up, Hamal calls it and stops the wagon. Narinder looks up from his book — a well worn copy of Frankenstein, this time — and asks, “Why are we stopping?” Hamal gestures to the looming clouds as they climb down from the wagon. As their boots hit the dirt, they hear him simply say, “Ah.”