(GoG Book 02) The Journey (16 page)

“Oh, you mean like this?” And Ruby did a perfect recreation of what she had done that night.

“Yes, that’s it. And it says here that the swillages are measured in tailspans of the individual owl. So if you feel the breeze on either side of your tail at one time you know that it is one tailspan wide.”

“Oh, I’ll never remember all this! The words, the numbers, it’s too much.”

“Yes, you will, Ruby.”

Otulissa had just come into the library and was pulling out another book on weather interpretation.

“Did you get your chaw changed, Otulissa?” Soren whispered, for he knew she had applied directly to Barran.

Otulissa blinked. Large tears were forming in her eyes. “No! I’m stuck and I can’t fly nearly as well as either of you. I’ll probably get killed.”

For the first time, Soren felt really sorry for Otulissa. Just then a dried caterpillar dropped into the book she had opened.

“You’ll do fine, child. Spotted Owls have an amazing talent for sensing pressure changes. Of course, it does make them fussy and hard to live with. I suggest you read that book over there—
Atmospheric Pressures and Turbulations: An Interpreter’s Guide.
It was written by Strix Emerilla, a renowned weathertrix of the last century. But I always want a Spotted Owl in my chaw, even if they continually beak off.” Ezylryb, with his odd three-taloned walk, hobbled out of the library.

Confound that owl,
Soren thought.
He is as impenetrable as any weather system.
Here, he had hardly spoken to Soren and now seemed to go out of his way to chat it up with Otulissa.

“A Strix wrote this?” Otulissa said as she opened the book. “Oh, my goodness, it could be a relative. And, of course, you know, to become a weathertrix requires the most highly refined sensitivities of all. No wonder a Strix would become one. With our ancient lineage, I would imagine these skills have been honed to perfection through the ages.”

Oh, Glaux, did this owl ever shut up?
Soren decided to go visit Mrs. P. before good light.

“Well, I don’t know. I just don’t know. I don’t think I’m sure about anything, really.” Soren stopped just outside the
small hollow that Mrs. P. shared with the two other nest snakes. It was the sadness in Mrs. P.’s voice that really stopped him. Mrs. P. never sounded this way. She was always so positive and full of hope. He listened for a few moments.

“The harp guild is the most prestigious and I think it is my destiny to become a member,” the other snake was saying. “You know, the way the owls feel things in their gizzards. Now I know that we don’t have gizzards, but even so.”

“Mercy! The very idea.” Mrs. P. sounded genuinely shocked by the suggestion. She spoke sharply now. “I think it is very presumptuous of us to ever think of ourselves as anything like these noble owls. We are not of their station.” Now she was sounding like herself again. Mrs. P. did not have feelings of inferiority. She felt she was the best nest-maid snake ever, but she would never presume, as she said, to think she shared anything with the members of the finest class of birds. Her duty in life was to serve them, and to serve them well was a noble task.

“But Mrs. P.,” the snake continued, “you must have some preference for a guild.”

“Oh, it is more than a preference. When we went for our tour of the guilds, I knew immediately that the harp was for me. As I slipped through the strings from one note
to another, climbing the scales, leaping octaves, the vibrations never left me. And the very best part was to try to—oh, how shall I explain—weave the music into Madame Plonk’s voice. So that together the sound of the harp and the sound of Madame Plonk’s voice made something so large and splendid.”

Soren blinked. Mrs. P., he thought, had something much better than a gizzard.

“Must be off myself,” the other nest snake said cheerily. “I’m just going around to drop in on Octavia, bring her a few well-seasoned milkberries. She does love them so and, as you know, she does keep the nest for Madame Plonk. Never can hurt, can it? Ta-ta!” And she slithered out of the hollow.

Soren wedged himself into a corner where he wouldn’t be seen. But he heard Mrs. P. muttering after the other snake was out of earshot. “To presume to have a gizzard and then go slithering off to Octavia, humming tunes and besieging her with milkberries. Well, I never!”

Soren decided to skip visiting Mrs. P. He knew what he must do. He must “drop by” Madame Plonk’s, and he must tell her that here was a very special snake, a snake that had something even finer than a gizzard, a snake of the highest—what was that word Mrs. P. was always using?—“Sensibilities, artistic sensibilities.”

Y
ou see, Madame Plonk, I know that perhaps this is not proper—me coming to you this way.” Soren could hardly keep his mind on what he was saying, as he had never in his life seen a hollow like this one. The air spun with colored light from the whirlyglasses that hung from the ceiling and sometimes jutted out from the walls, suspended on twigs jammed into cracks. There were several openings through which light poured. There were pieces of cloth embroidered with beautiful designs and one little niche spilled over with strands of luminous beads. Indeed, the hollow seemed to swirl with color. And in the middle of all this color there was a dazzling whiteness—Madame Plonk.

Soren gulped and tried to keep his eyes from straying from that whiteness. “But I just know that Mrs. P. is rather shy and would never dare.”

“Mrs. P.?” Madame Plonk broke in. “I don’t believe I know this snake.”

“She came with me, ma’am. She’s my family’s old nest-maid snake.”

“Oh, and you were saying that she wants to be in the harp guild?”

“Yes, ma’am.” Soren thought he sounded so stupid.
Who cares?
he thought. He was here for Mrs. P. She wanted this so much. Then it was as if Madame Plonk nearly took his next thought directly out of his head.

“But wanting is one thing. One cannot merely want.”

“Yes, yes, just because you want something doesn’t mean it should always happen.”

Madame Plonk blinked and nodded. “Very wise, young’un. But tell me now—why do you think she, this Mrs. P. as you call her, wants it?”

An idea suddenly popped into Soren’s head. “You know,” he began thoughtfully, “some snakes might want it just because it is thought of as the most important guild, one for snakes who have served in nests of very old, distinguished families. But I don’t think that is why Mrs. P. wants it.”

“No?” Madame Plonk seemed surprised.

Soren had a dreadful feeling that he had said something wrong. He took a deep breath. There was no backing out of it now. “No, I don’t think she gives two pellets about that kind of thing.”

Madame Plonk blinked.

She’s laughing at me,
Soren thought. But he continued. “I think she wants to be a member of this guild not because it is the most important but because it is the most artistic.”

Madame Plonk gave a little gasp. “That’s very interesting. Now what do you mean by artistic, young’un?”

Oh, dear,
Soren thought. It was as if his gizzard had just dropped out of him. He had no idea what he meant by artistic. But he knew that what he had said was right in some way.

Madame Plonk waited.

Soren continued. “When Mrs. P. spoke about music she said how when she visited the great harp, she tried to weave the notes not just through the strings of the harp but into your voice. So that together the sound of the harp and the sound of your voice made something that she called splendid and grand. Well, I think that is what it means to be an artist.”

There was silence in the apartments. And then Madame Plonk sighed deeply and reached for a hankie made by the lacemakers’ guild. She blew her beak and dabbed her eyes. “You are most unusual for a Barn Owl.” Soren did not know if that was good or bad. “Now I think you must go. It is almost time for Evensong. So, go along. I hear you’re doing quite well in weather chaw.” Soren was about to ask
how she knew about weather chaw but then remembered that Octavia took care of both Madame Plonk’s and Ezylryb’s nests. “Now fly along.”

“Yes, yes, thank you for your time, Madame Plonk,” Soren said, backing out of the hollow.

“Octavia!” Madame Plonk called as soon as Soren had left. “Octavia, come in here immediately.”

The fat old nest snake slithered in from a branch where she had hung herself just outside the apartment.

“Did you hear that, Octavia?”

“Yes, ma’am. I think we got ourselves a G-flat!”

E
zylryb perched on a limb at the very top of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree and squinted into the blueness of the early summer day. He had been perched here for the last two days almost continuously with Poot by his side. They were studying the cloud behavior on the far side of Hoole-mere.

“Bring the chaw up,” he ordered tersely. “There’s enough for them to observe.”

“What! What!” Soren yawned sleepily as Poot shook him awake. “It’s the middle of the day, Poot. We’re supposed to be sleeping.”

“Not now, young’un. Important lesson, top of the tree. Cap wants you there now. Quick-o!”

What could it be?
Soren thought. Poot only called Ezylryb “Cap” when they were on a flight mission. But there wasn’t any bad weather. It was a calm, perfectly clear day. It was the time of the golden rain, when the strands of
Ga’Hoole berries that hung from the limbs turned a rich yellow.

By the time Soren got to the top limb, the others had assembled—albeit sleepily. Martin was yawning into the morning sun, but Otulissa was alert and full of questions and already peppering the air with her observations of cloud formations. Ruby yarped her morning pellet and looked to Soren as if she was so sleepy she might pitch forward off the limb. Just at that moment, Bubo and Elvan arrived. This was the first time Soren had seen Bubo for a while. Presumably, he had been on the reconnaissance mission to The Beaks, and, thankfully, returned safely, as had the others.

“Put a mouse in it, Otulissa,” Bubo growled and delivered a field mouse headfirst into the talkative owl’s beak.

“Thank you, Bubo,” Ezylryb said in a low growl and blinked.

“Now, anyone know why we are here?” Ezylryb turned to the owls of the weather chaw. Otulissa’s talon immediately shot up even though she could not yet talk with her beak stuffed full of mouse. Soren looked around. This was the first time the three rybs, although Bubo was not officially a ryb, had ever been together with the weather chaw. It was obvious: The days of practicing with Bubo’s coals
from the forge were over. They were now going into a forest fire. A silence fell upon the young owls. They pulled in their feathers tight to their sides. The only sound was Otulissa gulping the last of the mouse. Then, in barely a whisper, her voice shaking with fear, she said, “But I just ate. How shall I ever fly on such a full stomach?”

“Don’t worry,” Ezylryb said. “We’re not flying yet. Not until later. But I want you up here today because you’re going to see how fire changes things—the wind, the clouds. You can see these changes even from here. You see, young’uns, there is a fire burning over there across Hoole-mere. A great fire.” He bobbed out on the branch toward the water. “So later, we shall cross Hoolemere. Then we’ll fetch up on some high cliffs on the other side that are perfect for a closer look. We shall camp there for a day or two and then we shall fly in.”

For the rest of the morning, they observed the unique behavior of the clouds on the far side of Hoolemere. The young owls of the weather chaw were used to odd words such as baggywrinkles and scuppers and gutters. But now there were even stranger words as the rybs discussed “pressure differential,” “thermal inversions,” and “convective columns.”

By mid-afternoon, they were dismissed to take a short
nap. They would be awakened at tween time, that time between the last drop of sun and the first shadows of twilight, and then take off across Hoolemere.

“Are you nervous, Ruby?” Soren said as they made their way back from the top limbs for their naps.

“I’d be a fool not to be,” replied the rusty-feathered owl.

“But you fly so well.”

“Not to mention,” Martin added, “that both of you are about twice as big as me.”

“What are you most scared of?” Soren asked.

“That thing they call crowning,” Ruby said quickly. “When the fire leaps from treetop to treetop. I can’t imagine what it does to the air. I mean, flying through it must be almost impossible. You could never even half guess where the dead falls might be.”

“Technically, the fire does that”—Otulissa had caught up with them—“because the fire climbs what is called, according to the literature, a fuel ladder.”

“Yes, and think of me,” Martin now spoke. “I am on the ground, supposedly looking for the smallest embers. One of these crowning things happens, and at my weight I get sucked straight up the fuel ladder.”

“We all have to spend time on the ground, not just
you,” Soren said. “It could happen to any of us. You don’t have to be little.” Martin cocked his head and blinked. He did not look convinced.

Although they had yet to be in an actual forest fire, each member of the chaw had a type of coal or ember they were in charge of gathering. Ruby, being the best flier, would seek airborne embers that were dispersed to the highest parts of the thermal draft columns. Soren and Otulissa were assigned a midpoint position on various sides of the convection column and little Martin was on the ground. But, indeed, they would all have to do a certain amount of groundwork.

Soren could not help but think about how different this flight across Hoolemere was from the time he had crossed the sea to the Great Ga’Hoole Tree nearly six months before. He remembered how the blizzard had raged, how the entire world had turned a swirling white, and the sky and water had melted into one indistinguishable mass. Today, the air was clear, the sea below calm with barely a white cap to ruffle the blueness. Seagulls dipped in the last rays of the setting sun. The silvery glint of a fish leaping to escape a larger fish sometimes flashed above the water’s surface. Yet as they drew closer to the opposite shore, the air did seem different. And although Soren, like
other owls, did not have the keenest sense of smell, the air seemed tinged with an acrid odor.