SHE WAS STANDING HIGH UP, under a wide sky just turning towards evening, rain blowing into her face. Fir trees grew around her, their dark needles feathered with fingers of bright new leaf. The full force of the Glass Town Federation, a mustering of the Founding Twelve, was sweeping across the plain towards her like a summer storm. Her own men, Parry and Ross, were far away in the distant North, exploring the frozen regions, their ships bearded with ice as they voyaged to ultima Thule in search of the fabled North-west Passage from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Many had died in the attempt to find it, but she was sure they would succeed and enable her to escape for ever. She should have gone with them and braved the frozen ocean, the mountains of ice. Staying here, even this long, was a mistake.

A high ridge in a desolate landscape. Drear and drab, all browns and greys, and it was sluicing with rain. The narrow path was stony, fast turning into a stream as it wound between gorse bushes, low wiry clumps of heather, thin spiky rushes and tufts of coarse grass. He looked up through the water dripping in front of his eyes. Not far to go by the looks of it. He slowed. The ground was slippery and he di