Chapter 204 - Storm Unbound

The sky above the Empire had been gray for as long as anyone could remember a dull, oppressive canopy that pressed down on the spires and towers like a sodden blanket. The scholars claimed it had always been this way, that the grayness was natural, a function of geography and atmospheric conditions. But the old ones, those few who still remembered the time before, knew better. They remembered when the sky had been blue, when storms had come and gone with natural rhythm rather than being held in check by the Gate's iron will.