As Sina jogged through some waist-high grasses – sparse, dry plants with sufficient space between them to allow her to run easily ­– she had a realisation. This was the first time she had ever been alone in her life. Was that a sad thought? Well, yes. She missed her maid, Kristina, and all her friends. She even missed her parents, though she had only seen them at formal events in recent months. On the other hand, there was freedom on this planet. Freedom from responsibility and schedule and especially freedom from public scrutiny. Back home, a part of her mind was always on guard duty to make sure her social media was always positive and gave no opportunity for critics of the monarchy to score points.

Here there was the sound of her feet slapping into the ground; her panting breaths; the brush of tall grasses against her thighs; a salt-filled scent of the sea; the feel of the afternoon sun warm on her left cheek and neck. But there were no people. No cameras. No events to prepare for. She liked this aspect to the adventure at least. And when she got home – she would get home one day, wouldn’t she? And out of this old woman’s body? – there would be another benefit to having been alone, a gain at a deeper level than having experienced the enjoyment of having no responsibilities. Sina would have a much better understanding of who she was.

When you spoke lines that had been written and rehearsed by others, or even words that were your own but which you choose to please family, church and your Instagram followers, then you had no idea what you really thought. All Sina knew about herself was that she was a good person, who tried to be kind to others and honest too. But what she thought of other issues, especially anything to do with politics – which the monarchy was obliged to avoid – she had no idea. She wouldn’t even have known who to vote for, so carefully had her advisors trained her to stay away from controversy and from being seen to take sides with one party against another.

An hour into her run and her body finally eased up to a walk. Not bad for an old lady carrying a spear (she really needed to fashion some kind of harness to fasten the weapon to her back). On Earth, Sina could manage a ten kilometres run in about the same time: well, her personal best was 54 minutes. The Otaxel, unfortunately, had been moving steadily northwards too and while Sina had closed the gap she was still about an hour away from it.

Forcing her body into a jog again, Sina ran for about thirty minutes until she came to two parallel lines of flattened grass. They were about two metres apart. She stood between the tracks and looked north and south, the directions in which they led. What were these lines? The impressions of a cart of some sort probably. To judge by the depth of the two tracks heading north compared to those going south, the vehicle had travelled northwards… in the same direction as the Otaxel. And not too long ago either.

What did this mean? North on her map was the realm of Red Moon tribe, who had been described as cannibals by the Kangarans. Was this the trail made by one of their vehicles? Maybe the Otaxel was drawn to it by whatever the cart was carrying? Should she turn back? This new development made her uneasy. But the system menus made it clear that taming the Otaxel was possible and that might make all the difference to her survival.

The edge of the forest was only about another thirty minutes to the west and it ran north-south. Once among the trees, she could travel northwards without being openly visible on the grasslands. Very well. Swapping the spear to her left hand to give her right arm a rest, Sina began jogging again, now very much more alert to possible movements, especially from the north. While she was relived to reach the cover of the trees, there was a downside to running in the forest, which was that the bracken and bushes underfoot were much thicker than the grassland. Settling for a brisk walk, she pushed on, checking the map from time to time to see that she was still gaining on the Otaxel.

Another hour of jogging and brisk walking and Sina was thirsty, sweaty, and beginning to get concerned about how low in the sky the sun was. Having come this far though, she didn’t want to turn back. And the Otaxel was close. In fact, what was that? A cart? Beyond the line of trees, was a slow-moving vehicle. Hurrying now, but keeping a screen of trees between her and the cart, Sina moved up until she was nearly parallel with it. Yes, a two-wheeled cart with a cage on it, a woman seated as the driver and six men pulling it forward, three each side of a central spoke.

In the cage was the Otaxel! But that creature wasn’t the focus of her attention. Sina was intent on studying the people. The woman was important. She had a headdress of scarlet feathers, a silver necklace, and a scarlet cloak over her shoulders. The men, on the other hand, were just wearing ragged shorts and tops. They were barefooted and struggling to keep the cart moving forward. It lurched erratically as it rolled over the uneven ground.

Squatting down behind a bush, Sina found her heart was beating fast. What was going on? Were the men slaves? Or willing servants? They had captured the Otaxel, did they have the same quest as her? In any case, this meant the end of her own hopes of taming the monster and earning a useful guard. Yet the cart was a very crude vehicle, with wheels of solid wood and no evidence of metal for rims or even nails and screws. Their progress was slow and Sina was sure they would have to camp before reaching their destination.

What should she do? Giving up and running back to the base was one option, but… The cage was only fastened together with rope. The metal from the spaceship was easily sharp enough to cut through that. Might there be a chance to free the creature during the night? And if so, was a night away from the base really any more dangerous than being back in her lean-to? Whether or not Sina could complete the quest to train the Otaxel, it would be a real shame if these were the Red Moon tribe and they gained the monster for themselves.

Telling herself she would not go close to their camp if it seemed at all dangerous, Sina moved quietly through the lengthening shadows of the forest, keeping herself well away from the people and their cart. At last they stopped and it seemed the men were willing servants of the woman. There was no sign of weapons or whips or any means of making them obey her, yet the priestess with the fancy headgear got off the cart and started issuing instructions which all obeyed.

As the people she was spying on prepared their camp, Sina thought about how inefficient humans were. The men went forwards and back, not always with any particular purpose. Each time one of them went to the cart, where they seemed to have room for supplies as well as the cage, the Otaxel would stir, once even letting out a deep roar and banging against the bars. Eventually, they had raised a large tent and had started a fire after taking what looked like a clay pot from their female commander. It was interesting to see a woman in charge. Back on Earth, Sina was being trained for the day that she became queen. Not that she’d really be in charge of anything. Being monarch had almost become a job: you were told where to go and what to do. And even though she was squatting in a darkening forest, hungry and thirsty, at least she felt free compared to being a puppet for her civil servant handlers.

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It was tedious, watching these people prepare their camp. And since they were no longer moving and there were still a couple of hours before sunset, Sina felt that there was nothing to lose from leaving her observation spot to go deeper into the forest in the hope of finding berries, nuts, or water. Having a map was very helpful, especially with the Otaxel marked on it, because even as the shadows of dusk gathered and deepened and masked the more distant trees, Sina always knew exactly where she was relative to the enemy camp. Enemies? She had called them enemies in her thoughts and was probably right about that. Surely they were the Red Moon tribe, since that cart couldn’t have come from a long distance. In which case they were cannibals and that very definitely made them enemies.

Having found some Rittle Berries, Sina got some relief from her thirst. The berries were very moist, like grapes, and she quickly stripped the bush of over twenty of them and ate them at once. Perhaps she could chew on one of the pieces of jerky that she’d brought for the Otaxel? But the reek of salt that surged up when she untied the straps put her off. Also, on Earth she’d been a vegetarian and while it did not seem at all practical to be a vegetarian on Grimworld, she still felt a certain revulsion at the prospect of killing animals for their meat. No doubt that would change when she was hungry enough. She was already daydreaming about catching and cooking a fish…

Twilight in the forest brought out a range of bird calls, many of them similar to those she would have heard on Earth. It was time to move back and see how the cannibals were doing. There was no chance of finding more berries now. And the growing darkness was making her fears grow. She hadn’t forgotten the computer’s warning about predators.

Nothing much seemed to have changed. Their fire was brighter and bigger perhaps. And the people around it were talking in voices too low for Sina to hear. They were eating and the scent of their food was good. Some kind of meat. But what if it was human flesh? Would Sina ever be that hungry? Perhaps. Nothing could be ruled out on this planet and if it proved necessary… well, she may be a princess but she was a princess who was determined to survive.

After a while, with the first of many bright stars appearing in the sky, the woman in charge of the enemy group stood up and did some kind of swaying dance, it was hard to see her properly in the darkness of the shadows cast by the fire. Then she chanted and the men responded. Rather unenthusiastically thought Sina.

It would be a long wait but surely there would come a time when some of these people were asleep? Others would be guards, presumably. And the question then would be whether Sina could come close enough to the cart to cut the cords on the cage. The fact that they only had one fire and no modern, electrical lights was very encouraging. The cart itself cast a long, black shadow which might provide cover depending where the guards were placed. Settling in a more comfortable position, Sina was prepared to wait for hours. There was no danger of her falling asleep, because strange calls had started up from deep in the forest: loud roars as though angry monsters were disputing their territory. One of those roars was a howl, like that of a wolf, and immediately the Otaxel in the cage gave an exact copy of the sound.

The Red Moon men all sprang up and Sina could see the gleam of metal spearpoints. They formed a circle around their female commander and even at this distance and in this poor light, she could sense their fear.

Another howl from the forest to the north of her, closer. Another reply from the cage. Call, response. Call, response. And there it was. A large, growling monster was padding through the grass towards the camp and growling with a deep voice that seemed to be speaking to them: let my sister go or you will all suffer.

From inside the circle the priestess seemed to be chanting a loud and urgent prayer.

A crackle of lightning flashed across Sina’s vision, leaving a vivid purple afterimage and a loud booming sound made her shrink into herself and away from the threat. The beast was down. What had that been? It was like a drone strike. But how? They didn’t have the technology. Sina found herself bitterly disappointed. For she realised now her heart had been entirely on the side of the beasts, even though they were predators and were perhaps a danger to her.

The men with spears had run over to the prone body of the Otaxel and were shoving the points of their spears into it. From the cage came a long, plaintive howl that went on and on, filling the night sky with mourning. Now the men were taking knives to the corpse.

This was a chance. No one was on guard, their attention was entirely on the creature they had just killed. And the cries of the captured beast would mask the sound of her feet. Sprinting as fast as she could, Sina ran to position the cage in between her and the fire and then, even though she could no longer see the woman who represented the biggest danger, kept going through the deep shadows. Crouched so that her head was just above the tall grasses, Sina felt her heart pounding as she got closer and closer to the cage in the cart.

The Otaxel was facing away from her, towards its fallen companion, still sending out a yowl that overwhelmed all other sounds. A little clumsily at first, because her arms were shaking, Sina positioned the blade of her spear against one of the wooden bars of the cage and pulled it downwards, sheering through ropes as though they were just cotton threads. The blade of spaceship metal was very sharp. Again and again, she cut away the thick cords that bound the cage together. Then she ran off, following the shadow of the cart to its full extent and more.

Only when cart, Otaxel, and cannibals were at a very safe distance did she stop, panting but feeling elated. She had been brave! She’d risked extreme danger and survived! Catching her breath Sina squatted in the grass and watched. The Otaxel could surely escape now? One whole side of the cage was no longer attached to the rest. Yet it hadn’t realised the opportunity because of its grief.

At last, the Otaxel ceased its cries and turned about to lie down in cage, causing Sina’s hopes to rise. Yes! It had knocked against the weak side and even from where she was, by the flicking orange light of the camp fire she could see the wall of the cage fall away. Immediately the Otaxel gave a bound and leapt clear of the cart. It was galloping silently through the grass westwards and again Sina felt a rush of delight. The creature was free!

With shouts of consternation the Red Moon men ran over to the broken cage. They would not be able to catch the Otaxel now. Running after it into the darkness would have been hopeless and quite possibly very dangerous. A taste of victory and achievement coursed through Sina like champagne: a good Bollinger. This was glorious. She had thwarted the Red Moon people and kept her own hopes alive. The Otaxel was on her map still; the green dot moving steadily away towards the sea.

Catching her breath, Sina suddenly held herself perfectly still. The female commander was on top of the cart, holding a severed rope in her hands and staring out, searching.

Should she run? No, probably it was dark enough that staying still was the best option. Movement was much easier to see under these conditions than a motionless person among tall grasses. And indeed, after several tense minutes, the woman came down from the cart and began haranguing the men.

As she ran away under a sky now full of stars, Sina felt waves of elation rise up inside her once more. Her happiness came with the thought that she had thwarted a potential enemy. Not only that, she felt happy too that she had taken the chance when it came. With hindsight, it would have been easy to have stayed hidden, to have returned home, telling herself that she had been wise. Instead, she hadn’t hesitated. Perhaps she was more capable than she knew.

With that comforting thought, Sina used her map to keep a steady pace back towards the base. She would drink and drink and drink, then sleep before once more going in search of the Otaxel. At least it was moving in a similar direction to her.