Reedy plants grow in dry, cracked Anxious. The people pluck weeds — any plant that grows too high or covers too much of the land.
“We want to be able to see around the perimeter of the fortress in case of attack,” says the Guide.
“Attacked by whom?” asks Miss Emeline.
Armies attacked Anxious once long ago, the story goes. Monsters riding other monsters charged with spears and scaled the fortress walls.
“Why?” asks Miss Doe Friend.
No one remembers. They repeat the story they once heard, and worry.
"We remain prepared,” says the Guide.
Anxians live within the fortress. They keep watch. They venture forth to weed and trim the plants.
They eat cactus. They sautée the thorns.
“Always worried,” says Miss Doe Friend, in a rare moment of extreme candor and certainty. “It’s no way to live.”
“Perhaps they were the attackers,” says Miss Emeline.
Suicidal was once an oasis, then a mud pit, and now a cracked basin where monsters wearing crowns of thorns live.
They spill seeds into the desert from which cactuses take root.
They were once covered in mud and now are covered in clay.
Anxians worry about the actions of the Suicidal.
“We must do what they dictate!” says the Guide.
But the placid clay creatures keep to themselves with no mind for the creatures they are purported to rule.
“Visitors, beware!” says the Guide. “It’s easy to enter, but impossible to exit.”
“I heard Miss Greer, turned to mud,” says Miss Doe Friend. “See the creature, there, with the straw hat.”
It’s a wearying place. Limbs become heavy. The mud pulls one down.
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