okay so um I'm not sure if 27 loaded.... but anyways here we go!
Chapter 28 Explanation
“Wait, what! you've seen one of the Crystal Shards!” Kalmar exclaimed.
“Yes, we have a secret vault and I haven't exactly gone inside the vault but I've stuck my head around the door to see what's inside. When I was a lot younger I snuck inside the doors and my parents scolded me for doing so, but I explained I just wanted to know about the shiny crystal thing I saw. My father told me that the Crystal Shard was something more powerful than anything in Ember Island and that his job was to protect it with his life. And that if anything were to happen to that Crystal Shard then Ember Island would fall to its doom.” Gracie explained.
“So where is this vault?”, Janner asked.
“It's, uh, only for the royal family but in the basement.” Gracie said skeptically.
“ I bet you guard that thing pretty heavily?”, Sara asked, thinking of all the Hi-Tech gadgets that might be down there protecting that Crystal Shard.
“Yes, it's very well protected. If something were to happen to it I don't even know what would happen, I just know that it wouldn't be good and we would probably lose everything here on Ember Island.” Gracie said, still a little skeptically.
“Where exactly are we on Ember island?” Nia asked, trying to change the subject.
Gracie got up and opened a drawer on her desk and pulled out a map. She spread it across her bed and said, “We're right here in the very center of Ember Island.”, as she pointed to a little gray castle on the map surrounded by a lava marked castle flame.
Everyone was looking at the map of Ember Island when Kalmar pointed out a forest on the map. “What's that?” he asked,
“Oh that! That's the Twisted Tree Forest. Legend says that if you go inside it'll make all of your thoughts and words jumbled up and mixed around like a big pot of jumbled up thoughts.”
“What makes it so jumbly?” Leeli asked.
“Well, there's five paths, only one leads out, you can't go back, you can only go forward. The other four paths lead to, well no one's ever lived to tell what's actually there, but you get the idea.” Gracie explained, shuddering at the thought of ever even thinking about going into the Twisted Tree Forest.
They continued to look at the map and Gracie told them about every single Landmark on the map, including one of her favorite spots, the Lava Cake Bakery and the School of Wizards, Magic, Mystery and Dragons.
Suddenly coming from downstairs there was a big loud, shatter. They all looked up from the map to see what happened, as they heard screams of terror come up from the floor below.
“Gracie!! Come down here, we need your help!” they heard Queen Amber call from the floor below.
“Okay, stay in here and whatever you do, do not come downstairs. I have to go fight for my family.” Gracie said, putting on a strong face and opening up her door and walking through it and then closing it.
“What's happening?”, Janner asked as they all heard loud clatter and screams from the floor below.
“Either that princess dragon of theirs went crazy or Queen Opal caught up to us.” Artham said.
Suddenly from below they heard that same royal but cold voice shouting, "Where are my friends, the Wingfeathers?”
“Oh no!” Janner said, as they heard this.
“If Opal's here she's here for two reasons, one to get us back and two for that Crystal Shard.” Kalmar said nervously.
“We have to get that crystal before she does whatever that other world is that she told us about. It can't be good and if she gets all of those crystals she'll be insufferable!” Janner said, thinking about all the possible outcomes of enacting this plan. They weren’t very good.
“Even if we did do that, how would we find the vault that Gracie told us the Crystal Shard is in?” Esben asked.
“There's got to be building schematics somewhere around here…” Sara said, “but… they probably wouldn't be in here so our best guess is to try and figure out where the basement is ourselves.” she said, as they heard Opal scream again at the royals of the castle. Then they heard the bone chilling sound of feet coming up the staircase.
“We have to go right now!”, Janner said quickly.
“We can't use the front door though she'll see us.” Leeli said.
“No, but we can climb out the window.” Janner said as Kalmar looked at him as if he was out of his mind.
“Or we could just use the back door.” Esben said, pointing to the little door next to Gracie's closet.
Everyone rushed to the little door and opened it, revealing a staircase to the floor below. They all rushed down the staircase trying not to make a sound because they didn't want to bring any attention to themselves. The staircase ended into a hallway which was lined with a ton of doors.
“How are we supposed to find the basement in all of these doors?” Kalmar asked, feeling doubtful about this plan. Every single door was the same color except for one, this door was a darker brown color than all the others. “This one,” Sara said, pointing towards the dark brown door. “Are you sure?” Leeli asked.
“No, but why would a secret vault be in a plain door that wasn't special when there's a door right here that's different from all the others?” Sara asked.
“In the words of Eisenhower the… well we don't really have time for quotes but the point is, let's give it a try.” Oskar said, and they thrust open the door and bolted down the staircase.
I didn't read this because chapter 27 hasn't been published yet.