That morning, Emily woke up feeling slightly dazed. The stone had been haunting her dreams and she wished someone would have told her about the curse before she put the necklace on. Still, she retained her composure and got up, dragging on her clothes and strapping her boots.

Something down the hall smelled incredible, so she wandered in that direction and found Miskit and her mother making a massive breakfast.

Karen twisted her head at the sound of her daughter entering and said, "Good morning," with a welcoming smile.

With surprise in her voice, Emily replied, "Good morning," back to her mother.

Karen explained, "We wanted to make sure you eat as much as you can now so you won't be hungry later, and you can put some of the left overs in your satchel."

Emily sat down at the table while her mother set a large plate of pancakes, eggs, and bacon in front of her, along with a fork. Everything was drenched in syrup. The stonekeeper stared longingly at the plate for a moment, and then began to dig in.

After she had eaten and put the remaining food in her pack, she met up with Leon at the edge of the staircase leading to the outside. He pointed north east and said, "That is the way you need to go. My friend has a place set up near the foot of the mountain. Are you ready?"

"More than I'll ever be."

"Heh, that won't be the case later. Now use what I have taught you to lower yourself to the ground."

She engulfed herself in the stone's power and landed without any trouble.

With a smile Leon said, "Good work, and good luck." She smiled back and turned to start walking through the trees. "Find a walking stick first!" Leon shouted.

From the top of the house, Navin yelled, "BYYYYYYE EEEEEMM!"

Emily laughed as Karen called, "Be careful!"

Then the young stonekeeper disappeared into the thick shrubbery, her friends' and familes' voices growing fainter and fainter with every step. She hoped she was going the right way.

The sunlight filtered through the trees, making the forest a mass of different shades of green and brown. A tree that seemed to have been struck by lightning offered thin branches just a few inches taller than she was. She took one and removed the smaller twigs from it, and concluded that this would be her new staff.

The whole forest seemed to be asleep. Very few birds were singing and there wasn't really anything moving in the underbrush. She realized how boring and hard this was going to be when her stone's voice interrupted her thoughts.

"You will not get through this quest without your friends. It is my turn to be in control. You may not believe me now, but you will soon find out why what I have said is true."

"Do you have a name?" she asked, trying to change the subject.

"Does it matter?" the stone replied.

"No wonder I don't trust you." She expected it to say something immediately in defense, but the only thing she heard was the wind rushing through the leaves and the odd melodies of unknown birds.

She started to walk forward again when she heard something in her mind that sounded like a sigh. The stone whispered, "The name I have been given is Lezelldium."

"Pffft. What kind of name is that?"

"An unimportant name. What did you think you would accomplish by asking?"

She shrugged, even though the amulet couldn't exactly see her. "I guess I thought that since you know almost everything about me, I should know something about you."

"Fair enough."

She trudged on for nearly four hours, and then slumped against a tree, taking out a sausage link and eating it. The sky was filled with a thick mass of clouds that had formed when she was walking. She felt a cold prick on her forehead; it was water.

Suddenly, it was pouring and she couldn't see three yards ahead of herself. She pulled up the hood of her cloak, but that didn't help much. Now she was realizing how great it was to have a house to go into. It would take her forever to build a shelter, and that wouldn't do much either because everything was already wet.

A twig snapped behind her.

Immediately, she whipped around and hit the thing that made the noise with her walking stick. Stuck in battle mode, she tripped it and pointed her glowing staff in its face. Then she stopped because she realized the thing was Prince Trellis.