Sorry for the time skip but there was NOTHING I could think of. Even with Silverblaze102's help, I couldn't figure anything out. Sorry!

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Two weeks after the incident, Sophie, Fitz, Nadine, Biana, Valerie, Tam, Linh, and Felicity all sat in a crumbling room on the eastern wing of Thorn Root.

"So what you're saying is that you guys think there's a town on the edge of River Swan, and Alvar -as well as his army and the Neverseen- want something from it?", Biana asked Sophie. Nadine stood up.

"She's right", Nadine said. Valerie and Felicity nodded. 

"It is?", Linh asked. Nadine nodded. 

"Yes. I used to live there", Nadine admitted. Sophie and Fitz both gaped at Nadine, while Felicity and Valerie smiled. Tam and Linh only blinked, seeming to accept this piece of news easily. 

"But then you'd have to be two hundred years old!", Fitz exclaimed. 

"Two hundred fifty, actually. And Elwin helped me. When he found me, I was close to death. He put me in a time spell, and when I finished my healing cycle, he took me out. It took two hundred thirty years for me to fully heal. A part of me never did", Nadine said. Everyone in the room was silent. 

"So... Everything valuable there is gone by now, right?', Sophie asked. She may have been the princess of Havenia, but she was not allowed out past the towns the ringed the palaces. 

"Not necessarily. There is a secret way to access the secrets of the town. But they would need...", Nadine trailed, off, exchanging a glance with Valerie. 

"They would need what?", Fitz asked. 

"They would need a person from the town of Panake, who lived there before it was destroyed. Somehow, my family got out of there alive. All except me, of course", Valerie said.

"Wait, so you're...dead?', Tam whispered. Valerie started laughing.

"No, of course not! But around the same time Nadine's healing cycle finished, someone from the Netherlands alerted Elwin to my presence, and he found a way to reform me back to a person", Valerie said. Nadine nodded.

"Yep. So we set out to see if anybody from Panake was still around, and ran into the Alicorns, and they helped to adjust to our new life", Nadine finished. 

"Wow. I always dreamed of having an adventure, but that takes the cake", Fitz said. 

"But what does that have to do with what they would need?", Tam asked.  

"They have my sisters ghost. They can access Panake's secrets, and those are best left buried", Valerie said. 

"What could be so dangerous it's best left alone?", Sophie asked. 

"Panake wasn't just an agricultural town. It was an industrial town as well. We had ahead-of-the-age scientists working on powerful weapons in labs underneath the earth. The engineering team somehow rigged it so the lock would only respond to one of Panakian blood. But if they have Madeline, getting there will be no problem", Nadine explained.

"What is down in those labs?", Fitz wondered.

"A lot of different things. But the most dangerous being The Snake Charmer. It's a flute made from to bark of the oldest Panake tree before it was destroyed. When played correctly, it can control anything you want to. We may or may not have had an old enchantress living in our village. She wasn't killed, but she went missing around the time the Orge's attacked. No one knows where she went". Valerie's eyes closed like she was trying to remember something. 

"What is it?". Sophie noticed the way Valerie's brow was crinkled.

"Nothing. A glimmer of memory, but I lost it", Valerie said, shaking her head.

"Okay, now that we've addressed that, can we please address the ogre clogging the room? The fact that Wylie is missing?", Tam asked, wrapping an arm around his sister's shoulder, who was taking the missing person hard. 

"Yes, we can. What would you like to say about it?", Sophie asked, sounding like a true leader. 

Tam sighed. "I'm just saying, no one else thinks it's suspicious that he goes 'missing' right after an attack?". Linh looked at her brother angrily.

"I told you, Tam, Wylie would not that to us! He wouldn't do that to me", She whispered the last part, a silent tear sliding down her cheek. 

"No offense Tam, but I think your sister is right", Sophie said. 

"What?".

"It's not Wylie", Sophie said. She looked up, and pain was clear in her brown eyes. "It's not him because it's Dex". 

Nobody made a move. Nobody made a sound. All was silent, aside from the beating hearts of eight individuals. 

"Dex?", Biana asked, her voice barely audible. Sophie looked back down and nodded. "B-but how?".

"Remember how he, as well as his family, was taken captive by Everglade's main army?", Sophie asked, her voice trembled a slight bit. Fitz grabbed her hand, not caring what anybody thought. "Well, that army works for Alvar, who works for the Neverseen. So logic suggests that when his family was taken, they trained him int the art of infiltration, and let him go, forcing him to work against us in exchange for his families lives. Also, I found a note."

Sophie finished the explanation off, and nobody moved a muscle. 

"So then where did Wylie go?", Linh asked.  

"My guess? To check on his father", Sophie said. Linh smiled.

"You're probably right. He was talking about his father an awful lot this week", Linh said, sounding relieved. Sophie smiled. 

At the exact moment Sophie opened her mouth to reply, the door opened, and a battered-looking Wylie stumbled in.

"Hey, we were just talking...", when Tam saw Wylie's condition, the joke dried on his tongue,

"What happened!", Sophie demanded, a little scared. 

Wylie sat up against the wall, one hand holding his left rib cage. "The whole Neverseen, along with half of the Everglade Army, laid siege to the Summer Palace. The stormed the castle", he broke off in a fit of coughing, "and took the King and Queen prisoner. They're saying that if you don't get down there and surrender yourself, they will kill them". 

Everyone turned to Sophie, whose eyes were as wide as saucers. She barely moved. 

"Sophie?", Fitz asked. She stood, and started walking to the door.

"I-I need some time to think. Somebody get Wylie to the healing wing".

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