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further, and have the more difficult route to follow. We could have been halfway up the mountain by now,” said Dad, still cross with himself.
    “In this wind,” pointed out Mum.
    “Let's get out of it a minute so we can think and seeabout the child's feet, eh, Tiger?” said the Guide, smiling at me in spite of everything.
    I felt Mum and Dad pull themselves together.
    “Where's shelter? Lead on,” said Dad, and the Guide nudged the donkey's neck with his shoulder, and led us off the road toward a rocky outcrop at the base of the mountains.
    When you have sore feet, it seems worse to start walking again, even for a little way, once you have stopped. But I kept my eye on the rocky outcrop and knew that once there I could stop at last, so I hurried and even hopped the last few steps.
    Turning in behind the first huge rock wall was wonderful. The noise of the wind didn't stop, but at least it wasn't nearly as loud, and couldn't touch us at all here. It felt as though someone had put on the heating—it wasn't exactly warm behind the wall, but it certainly wasn't so cold. I sat down on the dry rock floor and couldn't wait to get my sandals off from over my thick socks.
    The adults bent as if to help and nearly knocked their heads together, but sensibly decided to leave it to the owner of the sandals (who would obviously be the most expert at undoing them) to get them off.
    “Ah!” I said when they were off, and stretched out my feet in the thick socks and wiggled my toes.
    “Is that better?” said Dad, amused, but the Guide didn't smile. He crouched down and carefully, slowly, began to peel off one of the socks, rolling it down from the top. I put out my hand to stop him, as there was no way I wanted to get my feet any colder—once cold, I was sure they'd never warm up again. But Mum saw something as she looked down at my feet that was blocked from my view by the Guide's hand, and sucked in her breath through her teeth.
    “What?” I asked, pulling back my hand and leaning forward for a better look.
    Under the sock where the straps of the sandals had been were ugly, deep red weals in the skin. “Ouch,” I said, as the Guide had to unstick the sock gently from parts where the skin had oozed.
    I was pleased that the damage was so impressive. You know how much something can hurt, but there's nothing to show for it, sometimes. It just doesn't seem fair. Now both socks were off, I leant back and admired my feet. I thought of the pain. Yes, my feet looked like they should if they had felt like that, if you know what I mean.
    “That's a trace of mud, there,” said Dad, looking closely at the damage. “Tiger! Did you clean and
dry
these feet really well before we set off the other day, when they were covered in mud from the puddle?”
    “Yes, of course I did!” I said crossly. I was looking forward to plenty of sympathy for these feet, not blame.
    “As well as you could, I'm sure,” said Mum, digging about in her backpack for the first-aid kit and giving Dad a flattening sort of look.
    “There's sand in here as well,” the Guide added, to back me up, as he shook out my socks. “That has made it worse.”
    Then Mum said, “This will make it feel better,” asgrown-ups
always
say, before they slop on something that you can guarantee will immediately make whatever hurts, hurt a lot more (at least for a moment), and I held my breath as she mopped around with stuff out of a bottle.
    I managed to hold my breath until the feeling that I had just put my feet into a hot kettle, and somehow a block of ice at the same time, had passed. The pain then settled down to a nice stinging throb, so I let my breath out and said, “Thanks, that's much better,” and she smiled and looked pleased.
    The Guide, who had been looking at me, had to bite his lip to stop a grin. I bet he had some better medicine in his bag, probably made out of mashed-up root or something, which wouldn't have hurt half as much, but I knew he couldn't say