The relief almost brought her to tears. This place, so different from the forests she had known, sapped her strength. She had never felt so alone, as though she had been traveling among the creaking pines for weeks instead of days. The earlier panic had left her, but a deeper sadness grew in its place. The elements closed in around her: dark forest, heavy pine scent, the soughing of the branches above her as a wind picked up, the still, foreboding air hanging quiet below, surrounded by enemies, nowhere that was home. Again she thanked the gods for the horses. Without them she might have handed herself over to Leof and his men, just to have someone to talk to. She shook her head briskly and gathered up the leading reins, murmuring softly to the horses, “come on then, come on then,” to reassure both them and herself. They headed west, as far as she could reckon it. She planned to move back on Leof’s tracks and cross the border halfway between his resting place and the next border post.
