Using paper and pencil and with the help of a large chalkboard, citizens of the Valley of Sound explain to Milo that their ruler, the Soundkeeper, has locked up all the sounds. They say that, ''For years she ruled as a wise and beloved monarch, each morning at sunrise releasing the day's new sounds...and each night at moonset gathering in the old sounds, to be catalogued and filed in the vast storage vaults below.''
But, because the people didn't take the time to really listen to the sounds, she proclaimed that there would be no more sounds in the valley. The citizens beg Milo to help them get sound back. They convince him to visit the Soundkeeper and to take a sound from her fortress. If he can take even one sound, that sound will be able to break down the walls of the fortress and release all the other sounds.
Milo visits the Soundkeeper and, because he's allowed to speak inside her fortress, he saves one word on the tip of his tongue. With that word, he is able to make a sound outside the fortress and all the sounds are released again into the Valley of Sound.
