The High Plains down around Big Spring and Odessa had gotten generous rains this year, but the Troupe had since moved far north, near Palo Duro Canyon. Up here, the grasslands had gotten a good start for spring and then stalled. The unnatural lushness of greenhouse rain had faded to the windy dryness once more natural to the Texas Panhandle, and the supercharged vegetation started to hesitate and shut down. It didn’t wither exactly—stuff like hairy grama, elbowbush, and buffalo grass was way too tough and mean-spirited to do anything as sissy as "withering"—but it got yellow and tight and sere and spiky. And up in the Oklahoma Panhandle, it hadn’t rained since late March.