retreated, leaving the land beneath leveled. Over more thousands of years, wind and unceasing rain scored furrows in the rock, and filled the furrows with water. It is now a part of the planet where few things can live. Moss and lichens grow there, lending their greens and reds and oranges to the gray of rock and sky. There are cranberries and blueberries, and in the hollows where the wind is not so fierce, clumps of spruces huddle. The hollows are marshy, and there are grass bogs that quake at a footstep; the roots grow in the water beneath them, not in soil. The animals who call this land home have adapted to some of the worst weather in the world. It changes over minutes, not hours, and can go from bright sunlight to rain to blinding sleet and back to sunlight in 5 minutes. In winter, the cold is appalling; it is enough to freeze rapids to a