"Well that changes the plans a bit now doesn't it? If father knows of the baby he will call of the fight and I will get nothing!"
He turned the wagon left, taking them down an unfamiliar path to Alannah. She was suddenly aware that they were heading away from Port Lira, continuing in the same direction in which they'd begun.
After hours of traveling, Alannah's mind was still not any sharper than it was when they left the cabin. She was still fading in and out of conciousness, she would let her mind wander and think of the worst cases in which she was thrown over the cloff and left to die. She also began to wonder, with all this traveling, where on the island that they would end up. If they continued heading away from Port Lira , wouldn't they eventually end up heading back towards the Chateau, but on the other side of the island?
Wait, Alannah remembered something that Dominic had told her about the Island and that was, before one could travel all the way around the Island, they would have to pass through miles of what were referred to as the 'wild lands.' Although Alannah did not know what that meant, she was accutely awaret that there could be danger traveling through there? No one had explained what the 'wild lands' were, except that they were supposed to be rugged, convoluted, and thick overgrown forests in places. The area was marked by sheer rock cliffs one one side and and fast-moving streams in other places . . . such generalizations were useless at this point in time. What she needed was some sort of map and a way to get home. Unseen by the couple at the drivers seat, Alannah started to let hay fall out of the wagon, hoping that Dominic would travel this way and see it.
Mid-afternoon the wagon came to a stop, Alannah was allowed to sit up briefly and drink some water and she was given some dried fruit and meat to eat. The brief view she had of her surroundings told her nothing, as she had never been to this side of the island before. They were surrounded on all sides by dense forest: she couldn't see anything other than the trees for more than fifty feet in any direction. The respite was brief, however, and she was soon smothered beneath the blankets once more as the wagon lurched ahead and resumed its journey. They continued on as before traveling for hours at a time, until they came to a place in the road where they made another turn and began to descend sharply, the road was rocky even more so than before causing the wagon to rock back and forth. Finally they began to level out and Alannah heard, somewhere below them the unmistakable sound of waves crashing against the shoreline and Sea Gulls. Her heavy covers were pulled away, she looked up having to sheild her eyes against the late afternoon sun. By the position of the sun and the shadows on the ground Alannah could tell that it was past six pm.