Angelica did not know how long she had been sleeping but suddenly felt that someone was shaking her shoulder. It was Elsa.
"Get up!" she said. "It's time to go! Just help me with the basket, ok?"
Lica nodded. She roused herself and was fully awake. After that she went outside and helped the goblin woman to put the basket on the saddle. Soon they left the City of Goblins and came to the wide valley.
"Over there," the woman pointed, "is the Valley of Oblivion. While we are passing that way you can even see the tomb of our young King."
Indeed, about an hour Lica saw a tall stone building.
"This is the tomb!" Elsa said.
"Can I go there and see?" Lica asked suddenly.
"Not now! It is at least two hours both ways. Moreover the horse is loaded... So come on - on the way back you will go there!"
The girl had no choice and agreed.
About two hours later Elsa and Angelica came to the foot of the mountains. Here the woman had been leading Lica some secret paths and soon they were at the entrance of the cave.
The girl and the woman put the basket down and took it inside the cave, which was quite a well-lit by torches.
"Elsa, who is it with you?" Angelica heard a woman's voice.
"Madam, this girl has helped me to lift the basket with roots and stones here. And also she wanted to ask you about something."
It was silence and then the voice said:
"Well, let her go to the hall."
Elsa nodded and said:
"You see, you're lucky! She has not turned you away."
She was pushing Lica to the corridor in the far corner of the cave.
"You must go along this corridor and then turn right. There you'll wait for the witch."
"And you?"
"She never let me go there. My place is here."
And the maid pushed the girl again.
Angelica pulled herself together and went forward. She came into a long narrow corridor, which was also illuminated. On the left of the corridor there were different rooms but Lica remembered that Elsa had told her to turn right. So she came to the first right turn and bend. There was a large room more looked like a big hall.
In the middle, on the platform there was a table with burning candles in the graceful candlestick. Also on the table Lica saw a large crystal ball in the small stand. Next to the table there were a few chairs. The girl went and sat down on one of them. A moment later she heard footsteps and a woman entered the room.
Angelica had expected to see a decrepit old woman but saw a quite young and pretty one. The girl jumped up from the chair and said:
"Hello!"
"Hello, my dear," the woman said.
She passed by and sat in the chair in front of Lica.
"I am the witch! Sit down and tell me why you have come to my humble abode?"
Angelica sat down, plucked up heart and said:
"Last year the Prince Night visited you, he needed a potion for the Princess."
"Has not the potion worked?" the astonished witch interrupted the girl.
"No, the potion has worked! But the Prince..."
"What's wrong with him?" she smiled.
"He has changed a lot! He is just a different person!"
"So, girl," the witch snapped, "the Prince is alive and the potion has worked! What more do you want?"
"The Prince!" Lica said firmly. "I just want him to be real as before!"
The witch winced.
"And why do you think that he is not real?"
"Why? I'll explain you!"
And Angelica started telling the story from the beginning...
She told her about coming to the Prince's Night ball; about rescuing the Princess and that the Prince declared his love to her but the evil Wizard had torn them apart; and that this year she had been at the ball again but the Prince had not recognized her and how she had gone to the witch...
"And now I am here," she finished her story.
The witch thought a little and finally said:
"You're very brave! You deserve to know the truth. Yes, the Prince Night was here last year. He asked me to give him a potion for a blind Princess. To make this potion was very hard work and its price was very high! I warned the Prince about that. But the Prince was a man of honor and he agreed to pay this long price."
"What was the price?" Angelica asked.
"The soul! The soul of the Prince..."
"So is the Prince dead?" Lica horrified.
She tried to jump out of the chair but she felt dizzy and lost consciousness.
She came to senses because she felt some nasty smell from the bottle the witch had brought to her nose. Angelica opened her eyes.
"Do not be so sensitive," the cave hostess admonished her. "You must understand that each thing has its price. And it's not easy to give eyes to the blind. The Prince had chosen it himself nobody had made him. His soul had left his body. But I hadn't been able to allow his body to be useless! So I had made up something."
"Who is in the Prince's body now?" Lica asked quietly.
"Oh! I have sworn to keep this secret until I die. So do not ask me about that. And now – you have to go! Elsa will show you the way."
The witch stood up and took the girl to the corridor.