Megda, who perhaps had been a little reluctant in admitting just how much she did not like the great forest with all its towering trees and sneaky vines and suffocating leaves and propensity for shadows and silence, jumped off Nya deftly and immediately and ran forward a few steps into the deep sand, clumsily, almost tripping before righting herself and finding her balance and then opening her arms to the sunlight and to the sky which was even now clearing of the last of its grey clouds. Behind her the border-trees of the Tanglewood stretched on as far as the eye could see and she could not help being overwhelmingly pleased to be out of it. From that moment, she decided, she would live only in open spaces whenever possible. As soon as she was grown up, as soon as she was old enough to live somewhere on her own, it would be somewhere stretching onwards flat as the eye could see in every direction. Somewhere straightforward, with no mystery or unknown corners. Somewhere safe in the way it refused to keep secrets. It was alright for her brother to spend every waking night in the forest but give her sand. Give her sand as far as the eye could see. Give her sand and give her sun and give her flat, open ground.
