The Shattering (Guardians of Ga'hoole) (10 page)

The coastline of the cape began to appear as a blurred line jutting out into the sea. They would make their landfall on a more or less protected beach within a bay called The Bight. There were some good trees that would afford perches for a rest before they began scouring the landscape in a tiered formation of low-level, mid-level, and high fliers.

It has to work,
Soren thought.
It just has to work.
He had lost Eglantine once. But he would not lose her twice! Twice would be too cruel to endure.

The dread that Eglantine had first felt when she realized that she was caught in a dream from which she could not wake up had continued to build. As she flew into the headwinds that tossed up slop from the Sea of Hoolemere, there was one thought that she tried to keep in her mind. She repeated it again and again.
I must look into my dream mum’s eyes, I must look behind her eyes. I must see what is real and what is not. I must go back one last time.

“Eglantine!” Ginger shouted out. “I don’t understand why we couldn’t have waited a few hours for this weather to pass. Why now? This stuff is hard to fly through. Your mum will still be there.”

She’d better be,
Eglantine thought. But was it really her mother? She began thinking of the very small differences, starting with the words her dream mum used, and her face. Had her mother’s face been quite that white? And why was her da never there?

The two owls flew on. The weather grew worse. Ginger was having a hard time. But finally the coastline of The Beaks appeared. Soon they were flying over the Mirror Lakes.

I should have known…I should have known,
Eglantine thought. Hadn’t Mrs. Plithiver told her about the Mirror
Lakes of The Beaks and the strange spell it had cast on Soren, Gylfie, Twilight, and Digger? The gleaming surface of the water had dazzled them and they had become fascinated by their own reflections—
hypnotized,
Mrs. P. had said. It was a dangerous place. And now, thought Eglantine, it was a dangerous place with dangerous owls. Once more, she felt a jolt run through her gizzard.
Dangerous? My mum dangerous? How strange.

She was now approaching the fir tree. She knew she had to appear normal—but what was normal? How long had it been since she had been normal? A fog was beginning to lift in Eglantine’s brain, but it took enormous energy not to sink back into it.

“Darling!” her mum called out. “Oh, I’m so pleased. And in this bad weather. Oh, how lovely that you came.”

My real mum would scold me for flying in this bad weather.

“Come in. I have your favorite snack waiting for you—centipedes. But darling, Eglantine. No papers for me? You know how much I enjoy the papers you bring me.”

“Uh…it was raining, you know. I thought they might get wet.”

“Oh, yes, of course, silly me. Your da is always saying I’m such a silly old thing.”

“He does?” Eglantine said blankly. “Are you sure?”
Suddenly, the big white-faced owl blinked at her as if watching her more closely.
Uh-oh! Be careful.
Eglantine’s gizzard quivered with fear. But the quivers felt almost good, because each time her gizzard stirred, she began to feel more like her old self.

“I have a wonderful surprise for you.”

“A surprise? Da? Soren?” Eglantine blinked and looked closely.
Is she my mum? Really? How can I tell for sure?

Primrose could hear their conversation. She was being held in a hollow just off the one in which Eglantine and the Barn Owl were talking. She blinked her eyes.
What in Glaux’s name was Eglantine talking about? How could Soren or her da be here, and why was Eglantine calling this female owl “Mum”?
Primrose had seen and heard all this before when she had first arrived, just before she had been stuffed into the sack. She could hardly believe her ears then, and now she was hearing it all again!

So far, Primrose had not only resisted shattering but given a fairly decent impression of a shattered owl. She had even managed to affect that glassy, unblinking look that she had noticed in Eglantine. At first, she thought it was a symptom left over from the summer flux, but now she knew better. It was the look of a shattered owl. She was sure. But still the fact remained that she was a prisoner, and so was Eglantine for that matter. Because even though
Eglantine’s body was free to fly back and forth between this hollow and the Great Ga’Hoole Tree, her mind was completely enslaved to these owls. And they were the Pure Ones. They were not here in full force, but there were enough of them to make escape almost impossible. Metal Beak and apparently hundreds of others were off on some mission. Otulissa was right; they should have launched an attack as soon as they could after the siege of last winter. They had to fight offensively. But how in Glaux’s name could a two-ounce seven-inch Pygmy Owl fight these monsters by herself?

Primrose leaned closer to the opening, trying to catch more of the strange conversation going on in the hollow below.

The wind howled. The fir tree at the edge of the Mirror Lake rattled ferociously.

“Odd for The Beaks,” the large Barn Owl said. “But now for the surprise,” she said to Eglantine. But then she looked up and emitted a sharp shree. Something tumbled down out of a hole above that led to another hollow. There was a blur of feathers. Eglantine blinked. There, standing before her right next to Ginger, was Primrose. The two owls stared at each other, displaying neither shock nor dismay.

“Here is your little friend now,” the Barn Owl said.
She looked from Eglantine to Primrose and back again. “Are you surprised? I always like to encourage friendship, you know.”

Eglantine felt a dreadful quiver in her gizzard.

“Hi,” said Primrose softly. Eglantine didn’t quite know how to respond. She had so many questions. Why were Primrose’s eyes so glassy? It was Primrose, wasn’t it? Or was it a dream Primrose like her dream mum? Eglantine’s gizzard began to twitch as it had not in weeks. Her mother set out some centipedes, and then turned to Primrose and to Ginger.

“Eglantine and I always sing the centipede song together, don’t we, darling?”

Eglantine swung her head toward the large Barn Owl. Her black gaze bore into this dream mother. And one thought filled her brain:
Would I rather live in a world without my mum and da or in a world with a dream mum?
She knew the answer. In that infinitesimal sliver of a second, the world became clear to Eglantine.

“It’s
Eggie!
Mum called me
Eggie.
NOT DARLING!” she roared. Eglantine now knew that this was not her mum, nor just any dream mum. This was Nyra, the deadly mate of Kludd. And now Nyra was moving toward her with a savage look in her eyes. Her beak dropped open, ready to
stab. Then an immense
crack
split the night. Primrose felt every feather on her body stand up. Eglantine stared as Nyra’s feathers stuck stiffly straight out from her body and quivered. Next, there was a terrible sizzling sound and, suddenly, the fir tree burst into flames.

E
zylryb and his weather-and-colliering chaw perched in the highest branches of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree. The weather was foul, but nonetheless they tried to look out across the Sea of Hoolemere. Legions of electrical storms like attendants for a monarch had been accompanying this late-season hurricane that had swirled out of the warm waters of the southernmost region of the sea. Ezylryb had been expecting something like this. All summer his weather probes, a series of devices and experiments, had shown unusually warm water. Hurricanes fed on warm water.

Next to Ezylryb perched Soren, frantic with worry over his sister and Primrose.
They could be anywhere out there in this beastly weather,
he thought. And the two young owls were completely inexperienced in flying the unpredictable—and often lethal—winds of a hurricane. Soren himself had flown in only one, and it had really been just the raggedy fringes of a hurricane at that. But it had been bad enough.

The search-and-rescue mission for Primrose and Eglantine had been called off due to the weather.
But…
Soren almost dared not give words to the thought. He turned his head slightly toward Ezylryb. Was the old Whiskered Screech thinking of launching a weather-and-colliering chaw mission? With all the electrical storms, there were bound to be forest fires. Bubo’s forge was low on the kind of coals he liked the best, the hottest ones, which burned with a fierce energy and were full of what blacksmiths called bonk. If it hadn’t been for the great abundance of bonkful coals last winter, they never would have survived the siege of the Pure Ones. But, of course, Soren was hoping not just to find bonk coals but also his sister and the dear little Pygmy Owl, Primrose, whom he had met on his very first night in the Great Ga’Hoole Tree when she had been brought in dazed from a fire in her home forest of Silverveil. Just as Soren was thinking about all this, Bubo lighted down on the limb.

“What’cha think, Cap?” Bubo asked.

“Can’t see much from here. Not the course of its river at least.”

Soren knew that what Ezylryb meant by “its river” was the constantly moving and changing air that was embedded deep in a hurricane and, as it flowed, directed its course. “From here, it’s hard to see much. I think I see a
smudge of rosy light stretching from The Barrens to maybe even The Beaks.”

“Huh, that be curious,” Bubo said. “The Beaks. Usually sweet as spring there. Nary a storm nor even the slightest thundershower.”

The Beaks!
Even though it had been long ago that Soren and his band had been caught in its deadly charm, The Beaks still struck fear in him. Surely, Ezylryb was not thinking of going to The Beaks. It was known to be a dangerous place for owls with its mesmerizing beauty, softest moss, plentiful game, and the shimmering Mirror Lakes.

“Heh!” snorted Ezylryb. “Imagine that! The Beaks on fire. Very curious. Might want to see that myself.”

Soren exchanged glances with Otulissa.

“The Beaks,” Otulissa whispered. “The Beaks is the last place we need to go.”

Soren knew exactly what Otulissa was thinking. She wanted to go to the Northern Kingdoms, specifically to the Kielian League to gather forces to help fight the Pure Ones, but so far no one had paid much attention to her idea. She spent unbelievable amounts of time in the library, researching the Northern Kingdoms and all their various clans.

Later, a decision was made, and as twilight stole over the sea and the Island of Hoole was wrapped in the first purpling of the night, a chaw rose into the sky. It was not just any chaw, however. At its very center was the Chaw of Chaws. Perhaps this had been Ezylryb and Barran’s strategy from the beginning, when the Snowy monarch of the tree suggested that Gylfie fly with search-and-rescue and then Ezylryb suggested that the weather-and-colliering chaw reconnoiter the possibility of forest fires in The Beaks. Maybe it had all been a grand scheme to assemble the band in addition to Ruby, Martin, and Otulissa for an action that was more extensive than finding two lost owls. Soren didn’t know, but he felt more confident than he had in the last three days as they circled and climbed higher over the Sea of Hoolemere and set a course for The Beaks.

“South by southeast,” Gylfie shouted out. Now, in addition to her usual navigation responsibilities, she had to fly low-level for search-and-rescue.

The hurricane was far to the southwest of them but was causing unstable weather throughout most of the Southern Kingdoms. Massive thunderheads piled up like mountains around them, and as they approached the coast, they threaded their way through a string of electrical storms
that were setting forests on fire. It was unimaginable to Soren that either Eglantine or Primrose could fly through this kind of brutal weather. Lightning cracked the sky, flaying the blackness of the night. “Showing its bones,” as owls said. Each time a bolt sent its jagged white fire across the night, Soren flinched. That whiteness bothered him. Why? He’d flown through electrical storms before. It was all part of being a member of the weather chaw. There was another
crack.
The blackness was fractured once more by the bony streaks of lightning, and just above the horizon, it looked as if a deranged skeleton were dancing an eerie jig across the night sky.

Ezylryb had dropped back from the point position and slipped in next to Soren.

“The path of this hurricane and its speed make me think that the most logical place Eglantine and Primrose would be blown is toward The Beaks. Hurricanes, as you know, go counter-round, so if it gives you any peace of mind they would at least be on the less turbulent side of it.”

But it didn’t give Soren much peace of mind because ahead the coast of The Beaks raged with fires. And Eglantine and Primrose knew very little about navigating through forest fires.
Some choice,
he thought,
being battered to death by a hurricane or being fried by a forest fire!

Twilight, who was flying point, now called out, “Mirror Lakes ahead!”

And for the band the words were like an electrical current crackling through their gizzards.

Soren blinked.
I shall not be transfixed. I shall not be charmed. I shall not yield!
Below him, the usually still and gleaming silver surfaces of the lakes danced frantically with the reflections of flames.

“Great Glaux!” Gylfie gasped. “It looks like hagsmire.”

Indeed, Soren thought he was looking into the very heart of owl hell. The flames dancing across the surface might have been the devils of that hell, the hagsfiends that flew with not two wings but dozens, all tipped with fire. Was this yet a new way that the lakes could work their deadly charms? It could be like fire blinking, the most dreaded trick that fire could pull on a collier. This happened when the fire, raging with all its deadly beauty, transfixed an owl so that it could not fly. The owl went yeep, lost all instincts to fly, and suddenly plummeted to the ground or, in this case, into the water to drown.