Morning broke on the palace and the large group that had decended for anuall festivites was beginning to stir. Suddenly, a scream tore through the air and a figure tore through the halls.

"WHAT?!" yelled Lantis as he heard frantic pounding on his door.

"Lantis! It's me, Emerria! Clef!......he's......he's....GONE!!!!"

"WHAT???" said a chorus of voices around her. Looking behind her, a large crowd of familiar and not so familiar faces had gathered around her.

"He's gone........" she cried as she collapsed onto the floor surrounded by her long flowing robes of white. Her body shook with wracking sobs as Presia soothed the girl, and Lantis finally stepped out of his room.

"Emerria, can you tell us anything else? Anything at all?" Presia gently pressed.

"I.....I went to bring him his morning tea, because that's what I do every morning......." Emerria stopped to catch her breath. "And......he was......he was gone........" She again stopped, this time because of the choaking sobs. "It looked as though he had struggled......his staff was across the room........and......and......something......his.........bed.............was............was..........destroyed......"

Lantis and Ferio immedieatly turned and ran towards Clef's room with the rest of the crowd following as fast as they could. When Presia and Emerria finally got there, Lantis stood with his sword drawn and Ferrio stood almost dumbfounded. The room was torn to bits. Clef's staff was indeed across the room, and there was a large hole in the wall from where the head of the staff had hit the wall. The bed was smashed in the middle, leaving no doubt that there had been a struggle. The question was, why had no one noticed it, seeing that a struggle of that magnitude would have surely made noise of some kind.

"Don't worry, Emerria. We will find him." A familiar voice said to her. Fuu put her hand on her shoulder and patted it. "And Clef will be okay."

"Yeah! We can't have him off somewhere else! The festivities just won't be the same without him!" Umi held her friend's arm protectively.

"Eme-chan! Everything will be okay in the end, I PROMISE!" cried Hikaru as she wrapped her friend in a tight embrace. Emerria smiled in spite of the tears running down her cheeks. She hugged her friends tightly and wept.

On the other side of the room, the men were planning. "Whatever did this was after Clef in particular." said Lantis as he re-sheathed his sword.

"Yes, and was either more powerful than Clef, or caught Clef off guard." Ferrio leaned back on the wall. "Either way, the sucker is pretty powerful."

"To be more powerful than Clef, the supreme Sorcerer in all of Cephiro, is highly unlikely." said Ascot softly, eyeing the floor that had been singed from the unknown assailant. "The power needed would be almost godlike....."

"No one has ever been able to surpass Clef, not even me, though he believed I would one day." Lantis sighed. "Cephiro is a world of will, and Clef's will is some of the strongest. He protects the well-being of the world sometimes."

"What if Clef didn't really have the will to resist? What if, in his heart, he didn't want to win this fight?" Eagle looked at the others. "If Cephiro is a world of will, the winner of this battle is the one who had the stronger will, and if Clef's will is some of the strongest, the person who fought him must have had stronger will."

"That's interesting, but very unlike Clef." Ferrio looked at the others. "Clef wouldn't give up that easily."

"But Master Clef has been acting very strangely lately." said a small voice. Emerria walked to the group of males with her head bowed. "His mind has been so distracted, and every night for the past few weeks, I hear him cry out in his sleep." Looking at the group, Emerria's eyes were still watery but she had a certain strong controll of them. "He hasn't been himself lately."

Eagle put his hand on her shoulder and looked at her with his soft eyes. "We will find him, and you won't have to worry anymore, I'm sure of it." The other men nodded their heads and grumbled an agreement.

Emerria nodded her head and bowed to the group of men around her. "Thank you. If I can be of any assistance, please tell me." She had calmed down and walked out of the room with a surprisingly regal gait, though her head remained bowed. The others stared at her in surprise as she walked out of the room.

"That was odd." said Geo, stepping beside his commander.

"She's an odd person." Ascot supplied. The girls cried out in dissagreement, and Umi smacked Ascot upside the head.

"She's OUR friend!" yelled Umi as Ascot rubbed the spot where he had been hit. "You don't have to be so rude!"

"I'm sorry, but every time I meet her, she seems more and more odd......"

"I'm sure that she is feeling a little guilty about Clef's dissapearance. She was in the next room, and I'm sure that she could have helped Clef fight his attacker if she'd have made it here in time." Lantis sighed. "Emerria is becoming a very powerful sorceress with Clef's help."

"Really?" asked Ferrio in amazement. "I had no idea!"

"Yes, Clef would write to me from time to time, updating me on Emerria's progress, and telling me that if we ever needed anything, he would re-claim his title as Palace Sorcerer. I always told him that we were okay, because I knew that he was enjoying his teaching far too much to give it up. His letters were always very enthusiastic."

"Poor Emerria." said Eagle. "I haven't known her very long, but I would like to call her a friend."

"Yes, she does seem to have that quality." said Presia. "She is so open and fresh, like a child some times, and others she's so demure and calm. I can see why Clef was so enamored with her."

"Yes. I hope we find him. For her sake." said Lantis, thinking of his old friend.