The Apoconomicon
an excerpt

The days got longer as they walked more southward towards their final destination. The days dragged on and on. The walk seemed never ending. One older person passed away overnight one night. They went on, leaving the body behind. Aden had to hunt another maskim down for the group. He did it with relative ease with Matopaha’s sword. The group was barely living as it was. The meat kept them alive, but it always left a sick feeling within everyone. Aden never complained, but some people did. Aden made it a point to remind them that they all were going through the same sickening feeling, and he wasn’t every shy about it.
The days turned once again into weeks, the mountains rose up on both sides of them in the distance as they cut more southwards into a great basin. The map showed that they were close. Aden hoped each day to see the ruined city, to see the edge of the wastes. Every day grew a bit warmer. A week into the trek the outer layer on everyone’s clothing was too warm, so people took it off in the heat of the day, which was still close to zero.
Each day morale dropped. One more person died in the night when their snow cave collapsed on them. Their cave-mate had survived and had come to Aden’s little cave.
The maskim meat held out nicely through the days, though it was starting to get thin.
Then, two weeks after having been ambushed by the dragons, Aden saw a sight he thought he would never have seen. There before them, in the midday sun, lay the edge of the wastes. The weather was so warm Aden was wearing only his last three layers. Others only wore two. Aden hadn’t been this warm outside since he was a young boy on the eastern coast. The snow was a little softer though the dunes were much smaller. They got smaller and smaller all day long. As they entered what was obviously a large basin Aden began to see the glimmer of something in the distance.
“Aden… is that it?” asked Kat.
“I believe so.” Aden murmured; hope ringing softly in his words.
There were similar murmurs all across the group. They were no more than a day’s walk now, or so it seemed. There was, now, hope. Aden grinned. They had almost made it. Aden walked a small bit more, the snow giving way to a salty dirt which crunched under his feet. He fell to his knees, and looked up to the sky, beautiful and blue. He smiled and a tear rolled down his cheek as he smiled, the tear glinting in the sunlight. He had finally escaped one of the greatest torments of his life. He was out of the wastes.