Snippet #2532477

"A drunkard took pity on me. Now what is the road we are taking? Are you sure you know the way?"
"Of course I know the way!" Richter replied indignantly and not entirely truthfully, not even having doubts about how she had actually acquired her new cloak, "Our first stop will be a village named Alcaire, and we should reach it if we just follow the road south. Just follow me, I know exactly where we're going."

Richter led Rahiq towards the city's south-west gate, constantly turning around to make sure that she was still behind him, lest he lose her in the city's morning bustle. The children had once again returned to the streets and were once again hurling snowballs at one another, building snowmen and sledging down the city's steeper streets. Despite the fact that one stray snowball nearly struck Richter in the back of the head he couldn't help but smile as he watched them; they reminded him of his own childhood. While he'd grown up in the countryside he'd done exactly the same things; urban snow was no different from rural snow. He wondered what Rahiq would make of it; she'd probably never even seen snow before, let alone played in it.

It wasn't much longer after the duo was out of the city's gate that they were suddenly alone on the road. It was barely visible due to the coating of snow that smothered everything, but it was visible enough to follow. Richter strode down the path, whistling to himself as he went, happy to have a new goal in life other than going wherever the road took him.

However, Richter's confidence did not last. Eventually Richter looked back down to his feet, only to notice that the path was no longer at all visible. He tried kicking away snow to reveal it, but all he could find was grass and pebbles.
"Um," Richter began awkwardly as he swivelled around to face Rahiq, "You knew what I said earlier about know exactly where we're going? I... may have been wrong. We seem to have gone off the path. I know where we're meant to be, and where it is, and how to get there, but the snow got in the way. We're lost."
Richter slumped down onto the snow, crossed his legs, cradled his chin in his right hand, and stared off into the distance. Even if he was completely lost, at least the scenery was beautiful. Perhaps snow obscured everything, but it also made it much prettier.

That was when he began to wonder what Rahiq thought of the snow, again. Presumably she'd never been in a snowball fight, but there had to be a first time for everything, and he didn't just want to mope around while he was lost. So, he rolled up a snowball, stood up once again, and flung it at the back of Rahiq's head at full force.