CHAPTER 10
The FlightIn her cell, in the dark, Firilla could not judge the passing of time. Occasionally she heard a bell ring in the distance, the sound muffled by the walls, and once or twice she fancied she heard footsteps and flung herself against the stone, her ear pressed to it, straining to hear if they were approaching or retreating. But no one came.
After a while hunger and thirst tormented her, but then she almost forgot these sensations as her fear of the dark grew. As a child she had lived among open fields, and it was only when she had entered the forests of the tree-garths that she had felt what she was now feeling. She remembered the time when she had wandered further in search of forest fungi than she had intended. The tall, notched stems had crowded round her, the interw
