‘I think so,’ Deborah replied. ‘That sort of round hill over there on the horizon . . . it was to their right, and they were heading southwest. So that means . . .’
Pran almost groaned aloud at the sight of the rounded hill. ‘In all the wide lands, that is the last place to which they should have fled! Let us make haste. They are less than a day’s journey distant.’
Hesitating, Deborah said, ‘Why shouldn’t they have gone there? Is it dangerous?’
‘Not for us,’ Pran replied, cryptically. ‘And not for them. But perhaps for those that dwell there.’
Deborah was unsatisfied with his reply, but momentarily distracted, she stopped to consider Éha a moment. The dark-haired Pixie was hugging herself and considering the darkening skies. ‘What is it?’ Deborah asked her.
‘No more Elf Weather,’ she replied in an unreadable voice. ‘But still . . . something about it is not natural.’
Pran, too, stopped to consider Éha’s observation. What he sensed only seemed to increase his sense of urgency, and he urged them on at a quicker pace.
As they mounted their horses, Deborah once again found herself a bit awestruck by the fact that Éha wore only her light Pixie-dress, if it could be called a dress at all. The first time Deborah had seen the girl walking barefoot in the snow, she had shuddered at the sight.