The Shattering

Knowing how mortified Twilight must feel, Otulissa tried to set things to rights again. “Oh, I have never been all that comfortable with fancy stuff. Madam Plonk’s voice is so beautiful when she sings, and she herself is so lovely to look at, I feel she needs no further adornment. And such ornamentation would be completely wasted on me.”

It had been a gracious speech until this point, but then for some reason that eluded even Otulissa, she swivelled her head towards Ginger. “Just give me my helm, my nickel-alloy battle claws and a burning branch, and I feel adorned.” The glare in the young Spotted Owl’s yellow eyes was harsh. It had been in just such battle gear that Otulissa had served with great bravery in one of the fiercest encounters with the Pure Ones.

Once more silence settled on the table, thickly this time, like fog that wouldn’t burn off.

A wet poop joke, that’s what we need, Soren thought desperately.

“Did you hear the one about the seagull that got hit by the wet poop of a bat?” Often, wet poop jokes began with seagulls, for they were considered the worst and messiest of the wet poopers.

“No, what’s that?” said Gylfie, equally desperate to lift the mood.

“Well, this seagull got hit right in the eyes by an off-loading bat and could hardly see to fly. And the bat turned around and said, ‘Now you’re as blind as a splat!”’

The table roared with the churring sound of owl laughter. A little too hard, Soren thought, for the joke was not that funny. He nervously looked down at Mrs P because they had just violated one of the few rules of the dining hollow – no wet poop jokes at meals. Nest-maids were under strict orders to writhe at the first words of a wet poop joke and throw everything off the table and send the owls scattering. But Mrs P was as still as could be. She must have been as desperate as the rest of them to change the subject once the dreadful word had been mentioned.

Everyone continued to churr and guffaw. Soren noticed that other tables began to look at them as loose feathers from the laughing owls drifted down. But then he swivelled his head towards Primrose and caught his breath when he saw her. Glaux! Is she laughing or crying? The little Pygmy was shaking hard and making unintelligible sounds, but there were tears streaming from her eyes.

CHAPTER FOUR

A Missing Piece

“You see, Eglantine,” Ginger was saying back in the hollow, “just one more way you’re being left out.”

“I know. It’s getting bad. And did I tell you how Soren missed my first Fur-on-Bones ceremony?”

“No, you don’t say! I am shocked. Your own brother didn’t come to your Fur-on-Bones ceremony? That’s unforgivable.”

“He had some excuse, but he was really out larking about with the band.”

“The band?”

“That’s what everyone calls the four of them – Soren, Gylfie, Twilight and Digger – because they all came here together, and they stick together.”

“And leave you out!”

“Right! I’ve never felt more left out in my life.”

You feel left out?! What about me? Primrose almost screamed from the branch she was perched on just outside the hollow. She was eavesdropping. She knew it wasn’t very nice, but it was her hollow too after all, and they wouldn’t talk this freely if they knew she were around.

“Do you know what I think you should do about it?” Ginger asked.

“What?”

Primrose inclined her head a bit more so she could hear better.

“Well,” Ginger said in a cozy, chatty voice. “If I were you, I’d make a list.”

“A list?” Eglantine said.

“Yes, a list of all the things that your brother and his friends have left you out of. I think it always makes one feel better to make a list.”

Racdrops! Complete racdrops! That idiot owl doesn’t even know how to write! Primrose raged silently.

“Hmmm,” Eglantine said.

“Making that list will be a relief. Trust me.”

Don’t trust her! Primrose thought and rushed into the hollow.

“Come on, Eglantine. It’s a great night for flying.”

“Oh, I don’t think we’ll be coming Primrose. We have things to do,” Ginger said.

Primrose blinked. All right. I’m finished with being polite. “I actually didn’t ask you, Ginger. I thought with you still healing from your wing injury you wouldn’t be up for it, but surely you are Eglantine.”

Eglantine looked nervously towards Ginger, almost as if to ask permission to go. “Well … well, maybe just for a little while,” Eglantine replied. “But I’ll come back early and make that list, don’t worry Ginger. Yes, we have important things to do.”

“It will be a relief, Eglantine. I promise.” Then as Primrose and Eglantine were leaving the hollow to join the others for a few flight frolics under the rising moon, Ginger called out, “A real relief, like sleeping.”

Primrose brimmed with joy to be flying with her best friend through the satiny black night. The air was so smooth and soft, soft as an owl chick’s down. Ruby, a Short-eared Owl and probably the best flier in the tree, was inscribing figure-of-eights just under the paws of the constellation of the Big Raccoon, which was rising in the eastern sky. Primrose, however, was cautious. She didn’t want to get too happy. Things might change. And she certainly didn’t want to think about Eglantine making that stupid list. She was wondering if she should say something, not specifically about the list, but about Eglantine feeling left out. She was sure Soren didn’t mean to leave her out. He didn’t have a choice with this weather experiment thing. And just as she was wondering whether to say something, Eglantine said, “Well, time to get back to the hollow.”

“What? Are you yoicks? The night is just beginning. The Big Raccoon is hardly up. I can only see two of his paws.”

“Well, look. Soren and the band are taking off to do their weather experiments already.”

“That’s different. They have things to do. They can’t mess around out here like we can. You don’t see anyone else taking off for their hollows.”

“Well, I have things to do too.”

“Like what?” Primrose was flying just beneath Eglantine, and flipped her head backwards and up as only owls can.

“Just things,” Eglantine answered vaguely. “And sleep. I want to catch a few winks.”

A few winks? That must be an expression she picked up from Ginger. “What do you need to sleep for? Owls don’t sleep at night – especially not a night like this.”

“Well, I’ve been feeling Kind of tired lately.” Eglantine tossed this last comment over her shoulder as she flew off in the direction of the great tree.

Primrose blinked. Maybe there really was something wrong with Eglantine. Maybe she was getting summer flux or grey scale. They said that owls with grey scale slept a lot. Oh, dear, I hope she isn’t really sick.

CHAPTER FIVE

A fragment from the Sea

Meanwhile, as the Big Raccoon climbed higher and higher in the sky, the band of four – Soren, Twilight, Gylfie and Digger – headed north to a small speck of an island that dripped like the tiniest leak from the peninsula of the Broken Talon. They were flying there to perform their weather experiment for Ezylryb.

The conditions were perfect for setting out the small floats made from bundles of downy feathers and hollowed-out Ga’Hoole nuts.

“Now, what’s this all about?” Twilight asked.

“The idea is to measure the wind drift and current variations in this part of the Sea of Hoolemere,” Soren replied. “So we set out these little floats, then fly back in a few days and see where they are. Make sure the streamers are well attached because that’s how we’re going to find them again.”

It was fun work, and for a snack when they finished Soren had brought along some barbecued bat wings left over from tweener.

“Glaux, this island is so tiny even I feel big on it,” Gylfie said. “Where are we going to light down for a snack?”

“Look over there.” Digger flipped his head towards the northern tip of the island. There were three rocks that dribbled off the island, not more than a foot or two away from the shore. “That looks nice enough.”

The four owls lighted down on the rocks by a small tide pool. As they ate their bat wings in the moonlight they peered into the shallow water.

“Are starfish good to eat?” Digger asked, spotting one on the bottom.

“They’re fish aren’t they?” growled Twilight.

“They don’t look like fish,” Digger said.

“I wouldn’t risk it,” said Soren. “Remember how that Brown Fish Owl’s hollow smelled last autumn in Ambala?”

“Hmmm.” Digger looked at the starfish and seemed to think twice about eating it.

“I don’t think it would be good for your gizzard,” Gylfie said. “I mean bones and fur, that’s one thing, but Glaux knows what these creatures are made from. I’d steer clear of it.”

“Pretty though, aren’t they?” Digger said.

Twilight now bent closer to look at the starfish. “S’pose you could take it back for decoration. They dry out, you know. Might be able to trade it for something with Mags.”

“TWILIGHT!” they all shrieked.

“It’s alive,” Soren said. “You kill things to eat, not for decoration.”

“Barely alive, I’d say. Doesn’t have a brain, doesn’t have a gizzard.”

“Still,” Gylfie said, “it’s alive in its own way.”

“S’pose you’re right,” Twilight said and looked up from his examination of the starfish. “Hey! What’s that over there caught in the rocks?”

Something was fluttering between two rocks in the next tide pool. Soren lofted into the air to fly-hop the short distance. “It’s a piece of paper.” He poked at the piece with his talon. “Or a piece of a piece of paper.” And then more slowly, “Or a piece of a page of what was once a book.” He blinked at the smeared letters. “Great Glaux … Fleckasia! It’s part of the book that Dewlap confiscated from Otulissa.”

“No!” Gylfie said in a stunned voice.

Soon they were all crowded around Soren and peering at the fragment of the page. Then Digger spoke: “Otulissa will flip her gizzard when she sees this. Can you make out any of the writing? She was just talking about this thing called shattering, which fleckasia can cause. It’s worse than moon blinking. But she never got to finish the chapter because Dewlap came in and took the book.”

“Then Dewlap must have thrown it away,” Soren said. “What a complete creep that owl is. Imagine destroying a book like this.”

“How did this piece of it ever get this far without completely dissolving?” Gylfie wondered.

“Maybe a seagull picked it up then dropped it here. You know they’ll try to eat anything. And it was caught in this little crack where it kept pretty dry,” Soren said. “In any case, we have to take this back to Otulissa. Maybe she can make something of it.”

When they returned to the great tree, the first pink streaks of dawn were just showing. After a quick breaklight Soren, Digger and Gylfie went to their hollow. Otulissa had completed her experiment for Ezylryb on the far beach but had not yet returned from a special errand for Barran and Boron. She was flying to a slipgizzle who it was thought might have information about the Northern Kingdoms. Soren felt that Boron and Barran were trying to placate Otulissa, who had been plotting a very complex attack on the Pure Ones in which she envisioned enlisting recruits from the Kielian League. Soren and Gylfie had discussed this plan, and both thought it was probably never going to happen. But Boron and Barran seemed to have decided to let Otulissa explore where things stood in the Northern Kingdoms. Ever since Strix Struma had been killed in battle, Otulissa had been obsessed with her plan. In any case, the owls of the band would wait until the next night to show Otulissa the fragment of the page they had found.

In the coolness of the breaking day, the owls nestled into their hollow and, after a few sleepy words, were sound asleep – except for Soren. His mind continued to speculate almost playfully on how that fragment of paper got to where it was between those rocks. He supposed it could have got caught in the sub-Lobelian current. He tried to recall what those current charts looked like and imagine the course that little piece of paper had travelled. He wondered if there were possibly more pieces of paper caught in rocks. No, not a chance, this was a one-in-a-million thing. He yawned again and was asleep.

The sea seemed to float with pieces of paper and oddly enough, the writing on the bits of paper was perfectly legible. But every time Soren swooped down to pick one up, the fog rolled in and he couldn’t see. He wished that Twilight were here. Twilight was the master of seeing in conditions like these.

Aaah, finally the fog is lifting. But suddenly, Soren realised that he was no longer over the sea. Racdrops! He looked down and saw the regularly undulating hills. The Beaks! His gizzard twitched with dread. Mrs Plithiver’s raspy voice scratched in his ear: “No owl, especially a young impressionable one, has any business in The Beaks. It’s a bad, bad place.”

And then below him were the tantalising Mirror Lakes that had transfixed the band in a kind of deadly stupor on their first journey to Ga’Hoole. Great Glaux. He blinked at the dazzling sparkle of the lakes beneath him, but those lakes abruptly shattered into thousands of pieces.

“I’m sorry, Mrs Plithiver,” he heard himself say. Without even banking, he did a steep dive towards the lakes. He blinked. A dazzling white brightness nearly blinded him. Dread crept around the edges of his gizzard. The radiant brilliance of the shards reminded him of something. Something terrible. What was it? No time to wonder. The fog was drifting back over the lake. Only it wasn’t fog. It was smoke – but there was one small clear space above the lake. He would dive for it now. “I’ll take these lakes – piece by piece. Yes, Mrs Plithiver, piece by piece by piece.”

Soren woke up suddenly and clamped his beak tight. Great Glaux! It was a dream! I was talking in my sleep! He looked across at his hollowmates and hoped his babbling hadn’t woken them up. But they all seemed to be sleeping peacefully. Soren went back to sleep and would not remember this dream for a long, long time – until it was almost too late!

CHAPTER SIX

So Close!

And in another hollow, another Barn Owl dreamed another dream.

Yes, just like the old fir tree, Eglantine thought. Just like home. And look, there’s moss draped across the opening, the same way Mum did it, to keep out the cold wind, or the sunlight if it was too strong. She crept closer on the branch. Did she dare peek through? Why, Great Glaux! Even this branch I am standing on is the same. Then she heard a soft hiss and a slithering sound. Why, that’s exactly the sound Mrs Plithiver makes when she’s tongue-vacuuming and sucking up all the vermin. I’d know that sound anywhere! Eglantine’s gizzard was about to burst with excitement. This is more than a dream, she thought. Oh Glaux, don’t let it end! If I peek in, will I see Mum and Da and Mrs P? Will everything be like before? Eglantine edged in close to the moss curtain. Behind it, she saw a shape bustling about. The whiteness of a Barn Owl’s face shone through the green strands of moss. Is it really you, Mum? She was about to poke her beak through the curtain and ask. Then a breeze stirred the moss. It riffled through her pinfeathers, a cool current of air. This was no dream about a breeze. She really felt it.

“Wind shift,” a voice outside her hollow said. It was Ezylryb.

“Oh no!” moaned Eglantine, and woke up. “I was so close! So close, this time.”

“So close?” said Primrose, coming into their hollow. “So close to what? Eglantine, don’t tell me you’ve been sleeping all this time? Glaux, it’s not even near morning. How will you ever sleep during the day when we are supposed to?”

Eglantine blinked. “Oh I will.” I have to, she thought. She was absolutely desperate to get back to her dream hollow.

“Verrry interesting!” Otulissa pored over the fragment that the band had brought back from the island off the Broken Talon peninsula.

“Is it from the book?” Soren asked.

“Definitely,” Otulissa replied.

“Can you read it?” Gylfie asked.

“Just barely. There’s one word that looks like ‘quadrant’.”

“Quadrant?” Gylfie said. “That’s a navigational term.”

“I know,” said Otulissa. “I can’t imagine why it would show up in a book on fleckasia.”

“You know,” Soren said, “I’ve seen Ezylryb fix up old books, especially ones where the pages have faded. He takes Ga’Hoole-nut oil and soaks it into the page. The writing becomes a lot clearer.”

“Worth a try.” Otulissa looked up. “If only to prove that Dewlap is a traitor and not in the least shattered or having a nervous breakdown.”

Soren looked at Gylfie and the same thought went through both their minds. She’s still blaming Dewlap for Strix Struma’s death. Soren wondered if bringing this fragment back had been such a good idea after all. If Otulissa was only using it to get back at Dewlap, it seemed kind of stupid – even wrong – to him. The parliament would never decide to turn her out. It wasn’t the Ga’Hoole way. Boron and Barran, the monarchs of the tree, had said as much: Turn an owl out and it becomes your enemy. If Dewlap was not a traitor before, she would certainly become one if she were banished.

Instead Dewlap would be relieved of her responsibilities. She would be quietly retired. Already she had been removed from the parliament. That was the supreme dishonour. No owl in the history of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree had ever been removed from the parliament. But Soren knew it was useless to talk to Otulissa about this. She was bound and determined to have her vengeance on Dewlap for the death of her beloved Strix Struma. She had sworn to do so. And she had changed. He had seen that immediately after the last battle of the siege in which Strix Struma had been killed. He had gone to check on Otulissa in her hollow. She was bent over a piece of paper, writing and drawing something. When he had asked what it was, she had said it was an invasion plan. Even though Strix Struma had been killed, the Guardians of Ga’Hoole had won the last battle. Yet somehow the leaders of the so-called Pure Ones, Kludd and his terrifying mate Nyra, whose face shone white as a baleful moon, had escaped. Otulissa’s words came back to him:

“They aren’t finished with us, Soren. And we can’t wait for them to come back and finish.”

“What do you mean?” he had asked.

“I mean, Soren, that we can’t fight defensively. We have to go after them.”

The fury in Otulissa’s eyes had made Soren’s gizzard roil.

“I’ve changed,” she had said softly. But her voice, Soren remembered, was deadly.

The invasion might wait, but for Otulissa the vengeance was to begin here, right here in the tree, with Dewlap as its target.

A silence fell on the group. They all sensed the pent-up violence in Otulissa, who was normally a reflective, highly intellectual owl. It unnerved them.

“Well,” said Gylfie a little too brightly, “isn’t it almost time for Trader Mags to arrive? Let’s go and wait for her.”

“Why would I want any of that ostentatious stuff she’s always strutting about with?”

Aaah, that’s the old Otulissa, Soren thought thankfully.

“But I guess there’s nothing else to do. I’ll go,” Otulissa said grudgingly.

Madame Plonk, whose ethereal voice sang them to sleep each morning and roused them in the evening with the accompaniment of the grass harp, was as always first in line to survey goods brought in by Trader Mags and her assistant Bubbles, a rather scatterbrained young magpie.

“Oh, Madame Plonk, as gorgeous as ever,” Mags addressed the large and lovely Snowy. “What have we here to show off the glorious whiteness of your silken plumage?” Mags cast a sweeping, beady-eyed glance over her goods. “Ah yes. A crimson, ermine-trimmed cape – well, part of a cape.”

Trader Mags then swivelled her head towards Primrose, who was examining a drop of amber. “Hold it up to the moonlight, dear. It’s got a bug in it. Little, tiny beetle. They say it’s a good-luck charm. Not heavy at all. Even a Pygmy like you can fly with it.”

“Fool’s iron! That’s what I call it.” Bubo the blacksmith had come up. “But pretty.” He nodded towards the amber drop.

It is lovely, Primrose thought. She didn’t much believe in good-luck charms, but most of the jewellery and pretty things that Madame Plonk sold were too heavy for a small owl like herself. She had some awfully pretty turquoise chips that she had found in a stream on a search-and-rescue mission once.

“Would you take some turquoise chips for the amber, Trader Mags?” Primrose asked.

“Oh yes, dear. I am mad for turquoise chips. They become me, you know. You have to have a certain plumage and stature for them to show. Run and get your turquoise and I’ll wrap up the amber for you.”

Soren, who was watching the bargaining from a wingspan away, caught a blur of movement behind a small stand of birch trees where mice could often be found. He decided to explore and, without saying where he was going, slipped away silently.

Soren’s beak dropped open in utter horror as he peered down through the slim white branches of the birch tree. Never in his life had he seen anything as revolting as the scene beneath him. An owl had just pounced upon a mouse. After having made a deep gash in its back exposing the spine, the mouse not yet dead but still mewling in agony, the owl had proceeded to tickle the dying creature with a blade of grass, all the while singing a little song. And then, most shocking of all, Soren recognised his own sister, Eglantine, who seemed frozen in rapt attention, watching as her friend Ginger sang, tickling and playing with what she would soon eat. This was in violation of every food and hunting law in the owl kingdom. Where had this Barn Owl been raised? What kind of family allowed this sort of behaviour? Without thinking, Soren swooped down and thwacked the mouse on the head, killing it instantly, and then gulped it down headfirst in proper fashion.

“Hey, no fair! Why did you do that? That was my mouse.”

Soren glared at Ginger. “You are a disgrace to the tree, a disgrace to every owl kingdom on the face of the earth. What sort of creature plays with her food? You don’t deserve to eat.” Then he swivelled his head towards Eglantine. “Eglantine, you go back to my hollow. I’ll talk to you there.” Eglantine blinked. It was as if she were coming out of a spell.

“You’re always ordering her around. She doesn’t like it. And you never include her. She feels left out,” Ginger said.

“I hope she feels left out of this!” Soren shreed, in the high-pitched tone of voice understood instantly by all owls to express anger. “Eglantine, on your way. And you!” He turned his attention back to Ginger. “You, I am reporting to Boron and Barran.”

“Oh Soren, don’t report her. She’s been raised by those awful owls, the Pure Ones. They never taught her anything. They were brutes, all of them,” Eglantine pleaded. Within seconds both Ginger and Eglantine were sobbing.

“She’s right. I know nothing,” Ginger was saying, suddenly contrite. “I learned nothing except bad manners.”

“This is beyond bad manners. This is brutality.”

“Well yeah. That too,” she replied. “Your own brother was the most brutal owl imaginable.”

“Yes, but I’m not, and Eglantine’s not. And we were all born in the same tree, in the same hollow, in the same nest to the same parents. We are not like Kludd, and you don’t have to be this way either. Don’t use excuses. You’re among civilised owls now. Haven’t you learned anything?”

“Oh yes, so much. So much from your sister.”