CHAPTER SEVENIt grew hotter still and she was beginning to think that she would have to try and find her way back to the river which she knew flowed through the valley a long way away.
She was now in the foothills of the mountains and there were huge boulders of rocks and also a lot of scattered stones that might have come from an avalanche.
But, although she kept looking, there was no cascade of clear water that she had hoped to find.
She told herself that what she ought to do was to return to the Palace, but every instinct in her body fought against facing the problems that awaited her there.
She was still finding it hard to think, she only knew that somehow, somewhere, there must be a solution and yet if there was one it escaped her.
“I cannot go – back,” she whispered beneath her
