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we’re in that area of forest just below it.’
    She squinted. ‘There’s a town, not too far.’
    I scrutinised the black dot she was referring to. The name was short but I couldn’t read it. Not that it really mattered. All we needed to know was that it was a town. People. Civilisation.
    ‘Did you notice if we went through a town on the train, before we got here?’ I asked.
    ‘I think so. Yes, I’m pretty sure we did.’
    We all turned and looked at the tracks, leading back the way we’d travelled. Whoever had built the railway had cut a wide path through the trees, slicing the forest in two. It was wide enough for two tracks, with another two metres of clear ground either side of the rails. Only the first few metres of this path were visible. Beyond, pitch darkness.
    ‘How far do you think it is?’
    ‘Hmm. I don’t know. Nine or ten kilometres.’
    ‘So that’s, what, six or seven miles?’
    Laura put her hand on my arm. ‘You’re not thinking of trying to walk there, are you? Wouldn’t we be better off heading out of the station, trying to find a road?’
    ‘I don’t know,’ Alina said. ‘You can see here, on the map: the train track runs straight to the town. The road also goes into t he for est, but is much longer.’
    As she said that, a noise came from the blackness at the far end of the platform. Laura’s grip on my arm tightened, her fingertips digging into my flesh.
    ‘What the fuck was that?’ she said, her voice escalating a pitch.
    Something growled.
    Alina took a few tentative steps along the platform towards t he noise.
    ‘It’s a dog,’ she said quietly.
    The growl came again and the dog came into view to our left, at the end of the platform, the mountains behind it. Then, as Alina backed away, another appeared. Two black dogs. They looked a little like Dobermanns, but slightly smaller and completely black. They stared at us, silent now, but with drawn-back lips that displayed two sets of sharp, yellowish teeth.
    Laura stepped behind me. She has always been afraid of dogs. My parents have a black Labrador, a docile but boisterous creature, and whenever Laura visited, the dog would have to be locked in the kitchen because Laura found him frightening. It stemmed from her mother, who was attacked by a dog when she was a kid, passing on her lifelong fear to her own child.
    Alina had moved slowly back to stand beside the window. Laura was gripping my arm so hard that I would have bruises the next day.
    One of the dogs took a step forward and growled again, low and menacing. A word popped into my head. Rabies. With it came images of foaming mouths, thrashing bodies, heat and pain a nd death.
    ‘I think,’ Alina whispered, ‘I would rather walk to the nearest town than stay here with them. If we walk along the edge of the tracks it should only take a couple of hours.’
    ‘What time is it?’ Laura asked.
    I checked my watch. ‘Just after three.’
    ‘Then we’ll be there in time for breakfast,’ Alina said.
    I nodded. ‘Laura, are you OK with this plan?’
    She looked at the dogs, then turned her head to look along the tracks.
    ‘It’s too dark. How the hell are we supposed to find our way?’
    ‘They’re railroad tracks. We just follow them. And I have the torch, remember?’
    I had slipped the skinny Maglite into my backpack at the last minute when packing back home, thinking it might come in handy. I had stopped short of bringing a Swiss Army knife, but only because I didn’t own one.
    Laura looked at the dogs, then at the tracks, then back at the dogs, both of which took another step forward, teeth on display.
    ‘OK,’ Laura said, her voice just audible above the growling of the two dogs.
    We backed slowly away from the dogs, careful not to make any sudden movements. I bent and picked up the two backpacks, passing Laura’s to her, and we slung them onto our backs, but not before I’d retrieved the torch, which I switched on, relieved to find that it