So the second Prince journeyed on and on, along the road his eldest brother had gone before him, and it was not long until he came to the place where the old woman was tending her fire. All about in the shadows stood figures of stone, some big and some little, but the Prince did not think to look at them.
He asked if he and his animals might rest a bit beside the fire and warm themselves.
“You yourself are welcome,” said the old woman, “but I fear that your animals, may tear at me or eat me.” She then asked the Prince’s permission to touch each animal with her rod, that it might know her as its mistress. “Then I will no longer fear them,” said she.
The Prince was willing, so she took the rod that leaned against a tree near by and struck the animals lightly, first one and then another, and as she touched them, they were turned to stone. Last of all she touched the Prince, and he too became a stone image.
Then the old hag laughed aloud for joy of her wickedness, and put aside her rod once more, and went on with her cooking.
Now it happened that not so very long after this the youngest Prince, who had journeyed far and wide in his wanderings, began to think of his two brothers and to wonder how it had gone with them in the world.
So he came back to the place where the three roads parted, and the tree stood with the three notches in it.
He put his finger on the notch that was his eldest brother’s, and blood ran down from it; and his heart was heavy within him, for he knew that harm must have come to his brother. Then he put his finger upon the notch of the second brother, and from that, too, trickled down the blood. Then the young Prince cried aloud in his sorrow. “Never will I rest or stay,” cried he, “until I know what has happened to my brothers and whether or no I can do aught to aid them.”
So he set out the way the second brother had gone, and before long he, too, came to where the old woman was tending her fire.
The old hag laughed in her heart, when she saw him, for she thought, “here will be more stone images to be set round me.” She spoke to the Prince and made him welcome, and bade him sit beside the fire to rest himself. But she said she feared his animals, and she took her staff in her hand and asked the Prince’s leave to touch them each one with it. “Then,” said she, “they will know me as their mistress and will not touch or harm me.”