Red Meadows
A sweet smell drifts on the breeze. The trees part to reveal a red stained scar across the forest, spreading far in either direction: tall grass--bobbing lazily in the breeze. All is quiet until a wild goat ventures forth from the tree-line to graze. One step, then two, into the tall grass. It bleats in satisfaction, lowers it's head to feed, and for a moment all is well. A struggle, and a cry. The goat is pulled to the ground, writhing, bleating in fear. Then silence. This is no ordinary grass. It is the grasping-grass, the choking-weed, blood-barley--dyed red with the life of it's victims. It draws them in, and it feeds. Commentary Science-fiction art is full of depictions of planets with wild and unnatural colors. Most recently, I think it was a piece for No Man's Sky that stuck in my mind. Red grass is just so delightfully alien. I wanted to infuse a fantasy world with a dash of that strangeness. On another occasion, I was thinking about Forestcrawls and was ponde...