And the way Alice told it . . . ah, the way Alice told it!
It didn’t start well.
“The thing is . . .” Her mouth dried up, and she stopped.
Jesse gave her some water. She gulped it gratefully, then coughed as it went down the wrong way. Fergus thumped her on the back.
“The thing is . . .”
Her stomach lurched. It was like vertigo—it was worse than vertigo!
She closed her eyes.
An image came into her mind, of a cliff, and a rope, and a girl climbing away from a beach, up and up toward a bright blue sky, never looking down.
She opened her eyes again.
“Don’t tell if you’d rather not,” said Samira.
“It’s all right,” said Alice.
She took a deep breath.
“Imagine an island full of birds, and a rock in the shape of a castle . . .”
The others listened, spellbound, as Alice talked, and talked, and talked.
About the Author
Author photo © Red Photographic
NATASHA WARRANT lives in London with her family and a large tortoiseshell cat. A literary scout as well as an author, she has written for both young readers and adults. She enjoys long, rambling walks in the country but is a hopeless map-reader. This is her first rip-roaring adventure story and her first book for Clarion Books.
Visit her online at natashafarrant.com
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