ewancummins wrote:
INTO HARROWDALE…
SIR CLIVE
Sir Clive soon leave the soft, damp earth of the farm belt and reaches the higher, firmer ground of Harrowdale-town.
A quick look back shows his prints have left a pretty good trail in the soft earth.
On the road into town he comes across an overturned wheelbarrow.
He soon locates the smoke’s source from a smoldering plank that lies on a grassy patch of ground on the northeast corner of a large masonry building.
Something black and stick bubbles on the smoking wood.
Looking about a little more, he notices that a rear door to the stone building is missing a panel of the same size. And that door looks scorched.
The pinkish-gray stone building has the look of a civic hall or a shrine, with bas reliefs and prettily carved pillars and the like, though the façade bears more decoration than this plainer area in back.
A frieze of the damaged rear door has been splintered and gouged.
Houses nearby look intact at first glance, apart from some boarded doors and windows here and there.
Standing alone in the street, Sir Clive hears faint laughter and whispering voices that seem to come from somewhere nearby.
Inside the temple, maybe? Beyond that darkened doorway...
