Sorry for the late reply, you guys! Pretty busy over the weekend, but that should be clearing up now.

Skulduggery would be pretty neutral about the choice between exploring or sticking to the map. In his experience, there's pros and cons for both. If the characters are all pretty evenly divided on that front, is there any chance for splitting up?

Definitely not taking that big black heart. For all they know, it's the tree's heart, and taking it would kill the forest, and people tend to frown on that sort of thing. So... well, he'd be against stabbing it too. Probably pretty firmly.