Writing Prompt: The rocks were wet.

Morning all, let’s let those timers go and see what we got. Fifteen minutes if you please.

I’ll be honest, not my favorite. I floundered a lot and I think I changed the landscape in there somewhat. Certainly not my favorite.

Friday, May 16^th: The rocks were wet.

The rocks were wet.  They had been rounded from years spent with water cascading over them, tumbling them down the river bed before they were abandoned here by the dying river.  It had dried to a trickle in these parts, the once mighty river that raged so wide many first believed it to be a lake.  Only it’s movement convincing them otherwise.  Now it was but a few meters wide and even in spring though the depth was still one that could be forded on food with little problem. 

Today with the rain pounding down, a rarity in the now dry Weratian Provence these days, Faron wondered if the rocks felt good about the return.  If they missed the water. Faron snorted as he picked his way across the passage. All of Weratian missed the water. Why would the rocks me any different?

The rain water made the rocks shine and grow slick.  He concentrated on his footing, setting thoughts of water missing rocks to the side as he tried to prevent his feet from slipping, breaking his ankles or worse.

He made it across the swath of former river rocks and his feet found open sand.  The previous edge of the river. There was more sand now as the drought continued and the dirt desiccated.  Right now the dried sand and parched ground was drinking in the rain.  There had been reports from the east that the deluge was set to dump even more water on them as the storm proceeded in their direction. 

It was already causing problems there.  The dry land wanted the water, but it could only hold so much until like a burst wineskin it exploded out of the seams and the excess ran out.  Faron thought they were almost three.  The sand sucked at his feet and he knew not to stop moving.  Keeping his feet flat and in constant motion was the key to crossing sand and mud like this.  If he stopped it would suck at his feet, pulling him down.  He spent time on the mud flats as a child and somehow the rhythm never left him. 

‘Simply waiting for a good rain to be put back into use,’ he thought.  As Faron continued he wonder what other skills, learned in a moment and half forgotten once no longer needed would come bubbling to the surface. 

These days it seemed his everyday skills were useless and it was only the ones dredged from the back of his mind that kept him afloat. He made it across the open ground to where the grass locked down the earth.  First it grew in small tufts with spaces few and far between.  He knew this ground as well.  To stand on the tufts of grass was to have stable footing, everything else between was easily a quagmire that could suck him in knee deep in an instant.  He placed his feet accordingly and found his gait shifting to accommodate.  The tuffs grew ever closer until they were denser.  Marsh grass interspersed with other plants and the round was somewhat more solid.  With the drought that shrunk the river much of the marshes went as well.  The patches were thin and no longer as deadly.  Three days of rain had given them back their bite.

‘And more rain on the way.’