Chapter 3
At first she was confused, but then she recognized this as a dream. She had often experienced dreams as she fell asleep, when sleep eluded her completely.
She walked cautiously through the palace, trying to avoid being noticed and getting closer to a place where she knew her abductors would be, but also knowing that they weren't there yet, because she'd heard that her captors kept late hours every night. In fact, if she remembered correctly, tonight she thought the moonlight would be coming in through the balcony windows behind her. That could mean that it was near midnight already.
If she woke everyone up, however, she knew that her kidnappers would come back and drag her away by force. That would be the worst possible scenario—she didn't want anyone to die on her account—and if they caught her, she'd never be able to go home, or meet anyone who might know how she escaped. Or maybe not. After all, if someone else took her back, who would care how she got out of here? They'd only think that the spell had been broken or that she must have learned her way out of it, rather than having been rescued by someone else.
So instead of going back to bed, she decided to explore the hallways. She started with the library where she had spent the afternoon, hoping to find something interesting. When she saw that there was nothing left in the library, however, she moved on to other parts of the castle. By now she was feeling better about this whole situation, as it occurred to her that perhaps she could use magic to get back.