As I crested a small rise in the road, I stood and inhaled a deep, long breath of that sharp, fresh air, letting my eyes survey the landscape’s gradual unveiling. There was, in that cold atmosphere, a hint, a smell not akin with the natural farmyard odors of earth and animal. It was a smell I knew far too well in the city from which I was fleeing. I turned to find the shambling thing in my wake, the tatters of its faded clothes flapping in bleached shreds.
I unhooked my backpack from my shoulders, laying it by my heels.
Tale Told 