She was beginning to feel the cold terribly. Her teeth were chattering, and her feet were so frozen that she barely noticed when they scraped across sharp stones in the darkness, tearing her skin and breaking her nails.
Onwards and upwards she went. The place was not as big as it had seemed, because before long she had reached a grassy plateau above the highest terrace, and she could make out a rough path disappearing into the mountains. Behind her the dark huddled shapes of the stone buildings with their thatched, cone-shaped roofs had grown smaller, the soft glow of firelight edging the occasional window and open doorway.
She turned her back on the horrible place, and began to pick her way up the rocky path. Low branches of shrubs clawed at her bare ankles, and trees crowded in on eith
