The Spellbook in the Forbidden Room

"Why is it such a terrible thing to look in that silly room?" she thought. She carefully stepped to the door at the end of the corridor. Ever so slowly she turned the latch so it didn't make a sound. Yet the moment she pushed the door open the smallest crack it flung fully open and the maiden was pulled inside, even though she grabbed hold of the doorway and tried to hold on all with all her might.

Then slam! The door locked shut, sending a whoosh of wind that blew her hair and caused something behind her to rustle. Turning around, she noticed a bookstand in the middle of the room holding open a large dusty volume with some of its pages rustling from the wind. As she stepped toward the book, she noticed something else - at one end of the room were rows and stacks of gilded birdcages, each one containing a yellow songbird, and each bird chirping wildly. Tears welled up as she bemoaned her lost freedom, missing sisters, and the cruel fate that was sure to follow. Then it hit her. First her eldest sister had disappeared, then her next eldest sister. Then she finds herself mysteriously imprisoned in this room filled with caged birds. Could it be her sisters had also been trapped, then changed into birds? Could the other birds also be maidens suffering the same fate? And what about that large opened book - could it have a clue?

Anxiously she searched the pages. It was a large spell book with frightening illustrations drawn in the margins and spells she could barely pronounce. Which one could undo her sisters' enchantment? A distant sound of footsteps meant the enchanter was entering the castsle. Frantically she skimmed the pages - there was a spell for making oneself irresistible, another for revealing a person's deepest desire, another for starting fire, one for taming dragons, one for turning creatures into mice... Her head pounded with exasperation. Closer and louder than ever came the footsteps until with a furious final stomp, the enchanter lunged into the room.