Get your kicks...
The party prepares to depart the little, brush-grown draw in which they had gathered. After some initial tension, the situation resolves itself with respect to the horses. Totmacher and Asher are on foot, and Aidrin swings into the saddle of Villhalas' spare mount. Garryn lashes the two extra saddles and tack on the remaining riderless horse and eschews mounting the animal, figuring that even on foot he can keep up with Caylin's pony in an afternoon's travel.
Following his raven's lead, Aidrin begins to lead the party along the margin of the Blackthorn Hills, keeping to the more level portions near the long plains of the Central Wilds. The Hills, crowned with thick brakes of blackthorne and to the left of the party, are awash in the hot afternoon sunshine. Bright splashes of color, in the form of flowering foxglove, fireweed, aster, and lupine, abound across the landscape. Large, multi-colored butterflies flitter from flower to flower, competing with the ubiquitous honey bees, bee-flies, and other pollen-gathering insects for space on the flowers--chased away when speedy, nectar-hungry hummingbirds come to visit. Swallows dart through the sky, snatching insects on the wing, and meadowlarks call to one another across the grasslands. Cicadas add a dull, throbbing backbeat to the afternoon, and the air fairly thrums with the combined sound of bird and insect life. A herd of plains buffalo, distant, watch as the party makes its way along the Hills' margin, and lone pronghorn antelope, startled from their browsing, spring away in leaping silence. The hot sunshine pours down, drowning the day in sleepy, liquid gold.
The miles pass. Eventually, the party regains the beaten dirt path of the caravan route, as it begins to angle away from the Hills into the plains. The westering sun has been floating lower and lower into the sky, and the long shadows of the snow-clad peaks of the Turgrad Mountains, and the nearer foothills of the Blackthorns, are stretching their cool fingers across the plains. The day is coming to a close, and Dusk is beginning her long summer sojourn before She gives way to Night. Perrato murmurs a string of melodic-sounding prayers, as this time of the daily cycle is holy to his order. The smell of grass, warmed earth, and growing things is palpable on the air...along with the briefest whiff of putrefaction. High in the air, some miles away, a handful of turkey vultures circle, and the faint barking laugh of a hyena is heard...