Chapter 50

The mangroves region was a tremendous inhospitable habitat that would kill travelers unfamiliar with its capricious territory. It was the sort of cold winter that would freeze the blood of those who didn't take sufficient care to be warm in heart and core.

Drifters and travelers confronted a lack of rest, especially with the wet, alligator and slug-infested wetland, scorching hot days, freezing snow-cold nights, and unforeseen storms at a moment’s notice. The cold weather that seeps through any thin cloth to drain the soul instead feeds the soul of those well wrapped in warm layers of well-insulated fabrics.

Fortunately, the panhandler at the moor knew the landscape because he had been through its jaws in the past during his alligator killing days with his father and brothers. They had crossed the barren terrain on their way to the floating cavern of the Battleaxe tribe. Winter mangrove trees line the next route. Their thin-clothed forms stand starkly against the snow, almost l