CHAPTER 1

Once upon a time, in a quiet village lived 3 sisters. Their names were: Edma, Vjola and Greisi. Their parents had died some years ago and now they had to take care of their beautiful home and themselves too. The 3 sisters were loving, kind and sweet. They had the most beautiful features, and everyone loved them and they had never had a bad day in their entire life. They dreamed of marrying a charming lad who would make them experience the most exquisite love story ever experienced.
One night, while they were enoying their dinner and chatting about their day, a knock in the door is heard. Edma, the oldest, goes to the door and at the doorstep there was an old woman dressed rags and smelled filthy. Despite that there was this glint in her eyes that showed that she was so pure inside. So, Edma and her sisters let her in and gave her nice and clean clothes to wear and also some food for the lady. Then they asked how did she found their house and where was she from.
- " I come from a far land my children", she said taking a sip from her cup of tea,- "where everything is ruled by a vicious and tyran king, and everone is under his command. We have tried to rebel against him, but as soon as we make up our minds, he just erases it from our heads and make us think that it never occured to us. We are all under a dark curse." - she said and rested her head on the sofa, like she was waiting for something, but she wouldn't find it.
- "But that is awful!" -said Vjola who sat by the woman with a sad look in her eyes,- "there must be some way you can break that curse, everything has a solution!", - and the other made a head approval gesture.
- "That's what we thought too my dear, but we have 200 years trying to solve it, and the saddest thing is that we don't age nor can we reproduce to raise a new generation, so we are trapped in time." - her eyes looked like they longed to be somewhere else, with someone else, and that glint was more powerful and stronger than before.
- "What happened to you? How did you come here?" - asked Edma, who was listening carefuly to every word the woman said. She firstly thought that the woman was crazy, as they had never heard of such place to ever exist.
- "If you don't mind my dearests, I would like to rest and we can talk tomorrow." - said the lady and fell asleep as soon as she layed down.
The 3 sisters, were still not believing what they had heard, nor were they understanding this woman's story. They were quite suspicious, but they couldn't just throw her out in the streets, and besides, she didn't look threatening and they let her rest. They tried to sleep that night, but they couldn't, they were thinking about that strange lady sleeping downstairs. Could it be real? Or was it just that lady's imagination? When finally fell asleep, Edma saw a strange dream. She was running just like she did when she was a chid and her two sisters had followed her. then they met this young boy and he told them to disappear, that it wasn't safe there, they had to look for the stone. And the dream faded to something else, leaving nothing behind.

The morning was bright and lovely, it was a perfect sunny day, not a single cloud in the sky and the sisters woke up and went downstairs to make breakfast. As soon as they approached the kitchen door, a hearty warming smell was coming from the kitchen. When they entered, they saw a beautiful woman in her 30-ties who was making a delicious breakfast and has already set the table for four people. They were shocked as they didn't know what was happening and the old lady wasn't in the sofa anymore.
- " Good morning girls, did you sleep well?" - said the woman cheerfully.
- "Who are you?" - said Greisi who was as confused as her sisters.
- "I am the old lady you took in last night." - she said as she gestured them to sit in the table,- " I know I have a lot of things to explain, but let's eat and talk."
- "How can we know that we can trust you?" - said Edma.
- "I can eat first if you want, so you can see that I haven't poisoned the food or something like that", - and she took a bite of the egg and sausage, - "See, nothing to worry about, now have a seat my dearest and I will explain". - and that's what the girls did.
- "Wow, this is great!", -said Greisi who had started eating like she had never tasted food in her life, - " I cudd eeat zis zing forver!"
- "she said that she could eat it forever" - Vjola explained, as she saw that no one understood Greisi' little comment, while taking small bites of her breakfast, - " So, can you start telling us what you have to tell, and start from your name please."
- "My name is Antesa, I was born and raised in Orthmondus, the city I talked about last night, I was 29 years old when Kroblus, the evil king took over the city and killed all the members of the royal family, well not everyone of them. I was the royal baby's nurse and I took care of the little prince. His name is Glario. When Kroblus first arrived in the city, he was a poor magician, whose tricks were never welcomed, until one day. The king wanted someone to predict how the next war was going to end, as he had too little men power left. So, Kroblus showed up at the palace and amused the king with his tricks of controling someone's fate and destiny. The king agreed that Kroblus was what he was looking for and therefore let him guide his army. Two years passed and Kroblus was draining the king's power, making him older and tired till one day, when the king could no longer raise from his bed. The qween died while giving birth to prince Glario, and that devastated the king even more. I was the closest maid to their hignesses and I was in charge of the baby. The king gradually lost all his life he had left and signed Kroblus as a king until he would be heatlthy again, hoping that he would get better. Kroblus played his role really well by not agreeing first, and pretending he was a loyal friend and that he cared about king Maxus. After the king's death everyone in the kingdom was murning for him and accepted the new king as it was their beloved king's will to accept Kroblus. Days passed and everyone was finally seeing that Kroblus was evil, he killed a lot of innocents and prisoned a lot others, and one day he put the curse upon the city. No one could leave or enter, it was invisible to the outsiders, and a nightmare to the insiders."
- " What happened to the prince?" - said Edma who got scared by her own voice, and apparently it had the same effect on her sisters as they were listening with their mouths wide open and had stopped eating long ago.
- "The prince is safe and is waiting for me. He is a very handsome young man and he grew up till 25 years old, then stopped aging."
- "How are you a young woman today, while you were so old yesterday?" - asked Greisi.
- "One of the curse effects is that it makes us young through out the day and old during the night, so we age every single day little by little, but we never change"
- "What are you going to do now?" - asked Vjola.
- "Now I'm leaving as I have a lot to do, thank you girls for receiving me in your lovely house, I'll never forget that." - and Antesa rises to leave, when the girls all shout: "Wait"
- "We want to come with you and help you."
- "Yes we are tired of our perfect lives in here, we want to make something different for a change. Can we come with you?"
- "I don't know girls, the journey will be long and tiring and I don't want want you to step back on the way there." - said Antesa hesitating.
- "We are in!" - and they sprinted out of the kitchen to their bedrooms to pack their things, laughing and planning.