Book 12 - The Golden Tree (2 page)

dissolve the gol ymopes,
"What do you mean ... 'have a go'?" Coryn blinked at Soren. His uncle, although stil a handsome owl, had uncountable nicks and marks of battles and from his life as a col ier. His beak had long lost its pale tawny glimmer
21 and was now tarnished from his years of plunging into forest fires to retrieve coals. His talons, too, had darkened and grown knobby with fire cal uses. The white feathers of his legs were patchy and ash-colored. He looked like a hardened, seasoned owl and yet vigor and gentleness stil flowed from him.
"I mean travel, dear lad. Get the lay of the land. See what, exactly, these owls want to learn from us. Besides, it's been so long since any of us have had a good flight - just for fun. Do you know that there is much talk that grog trees, which have been so rare in recent times, are now coming back? There's even rumor of gadfeathers, by Glaux. How lovely to gather with one's old friends in the branches of a grog tree and listen to the sweet tunes of a gadfeather. Ahh, to see old friends again!"

"Mist!" Coryn exclaimed excitedly.
"You cal her Mist, but Gylfie and I shal always think of her as Hortense. She must be getting on now, but I long to go to Ambala and seek her out." Soren detected a new sparkle in his nephew's eyes. Yes, this is it. I must get him. cut and on the wing. This obsession with his haggish mother is dangerous. Too self-absorbed, an unwholesome indulgence for a king, especial y one as intel igent and bold as Coiyn. "How about it?" "Yes ..." Coryn said slowly.
10 22 "You are worried that kings shouldn't just have fun?" Soren blinked at his nephew. "Wel , I don't want to be thought of as ..." He hesitated.
"A sporting king?"
"I suppose so, yes."
But, Soren said eagerly now, "even a king must be curious about how the hard-won peace lies on the land. These are exciting times."

"It is a good plan, Uncle!" Coryn spoke now with
genuine enthusiasm.. "But we should meet with the Band to discuss it first, don't you think?" "Yes, of course," Soren agreed. "We'l speak with them immediately and the parliament must be consulted on the morrow. First Black." "And Otulissa, wil she come as wel ?" Coryn asked, Otulissa, although considered by many a prickly sort with a confidence bordering on arrogance, was a favorite of Coryn's. Otulissa was the first Guardian of Ga'Hoole that Coryn had met. Through some scroomish vision, an odd
phenomenon in itself for an owl who was so dedicated to rational thought, Otulissa had been inspired to go to the Beyond. It was there she encountered Coryn and. seemed instantly to sense his destiny and that she was part of it. It 23 was Otulissa, the prodigiously talented and knowledge-able Spotted Owl, who first taught Coryn to dive for coals. She claimed no credit, however, for Coryn had a remarkable genius for col iering

and in no time had learned to pluck the most
chal enging of coals from the volcanoes' spume - the bonk ones that many col iers never learned to retrieve.
"I doubt if Otulissa, with her additional responsibilities, wil be able to accompany us," Coryn said. "But I shal certainly ask her." Otulissa, an esteemed teacher of the tree, had recently been appointed chief ryb, as her expertise extended over so many of the disciplines - from the literature of the legends to the sciences, including weather interpretation and metals. She hardly had a moment to spare. Nonetheless Soren would go to the hol ow where she resided with her old nest-maid snake, Audrey, to ask if she would travel with them. But first he would meet with Gylfie, Twilight, and Digger. And, of course, he would have to explain to Pel i. No doubt Basha, Blythe, and Bel would beg Soren to wait until they had fledged their flight feathers so they might go, too. But they were at least a moon cycle away from fledging, and this was not a trip for young'uns.
Soren was just about to leave the hol ow,

immensely
12 24 pleased with himself for coming up with this idea, when Coryn suddenly said, "Uncle?" "Yes?"
"What about the ember?"
"The ember? What about it?" Soren asked, slightly bewildered.
"Wil it be safe here?"
"I can't imagine a safer place than here in the great tree. We certainly don't want to carry it around with us," He paused and looked steadily at the ember. In a low voice he said, "We do not want to become slaves to the ember. If the legends taught us anything, it was that."
"You are right, Uncle. We are free owls!" 13 CHAPTER THREE
What About the Ember?

Coryn looked across at the members of the
parliament perched on the how-shaped birch limb. In his head he was searching for the right words to announce this trip. Soren was right. It would be curious to see how peace lay across the owl kingdoms now that the threat of the Pure Ones was gone - or at least greatly diminished. He was interested in not only what he and the Band might learn, but what they might possibly share with the rest of the owl kingdoms now that this menace was gone and every ounce of energy did not have to be devoted to fighting and war. This reminded Coryn of the owls who had arrived at the tree recently and told them of a meeting in Ambala. Coryn coughed slightly and began.
"As most of you know, a smal delegation from Ambala arrived three nights ago. They told us of a loose confederation of owls from the Shadow Forest, Silverveil, and, I believe, Tyto that came to meet there. It seems these owls
14 26 are most interested in weather
interpretation, as wel as search-and-rescue techniques, and we felt..."

Coryn had hardly finished the explanation of the
trip he and the Band had planned when there was a great rustling of feathers in the parliament chamber and a half dozen voices began murmuring, "The ember. What about the ember?"
The discussion dragged on with frequent
interjections of "What about the ember?" They're obsessed! thought Soren. And he
believed if he had to hear those four words one more time, he would shree as only a Barn Owl could shree.
For perhaps the third time Soren made his argument that there was no safer place for the ember than right here in the tree. It was then suggested that Bubo make another cask for the ember.
"What's wrong with the one ye got?" Bubo, burly Great Horned Owl and chief blacksmith of the tree, growled.
"Is it strong enough. Bubo?" Elvan, a handsome Great Gray Owl and member of the navigation

chaw, spoke up.
"Of course, it's strong enough. Fired with the best bonk coals around. Them coals are straight out of Dunmore. Caught on the fly they were, by Ruby over there."
15 27 Five volcanoes comprised what the wolves of the Beyond cal ed the Sacred Ring, and the one named Hrath'ghar was the volcano from which Coryn had retrieved the ember. Ruby, a powerful Short-eared Owl known for her extraordinary powers of flight and her near legendary col iering skil s, had caught four fantastic bonk coals on a trip back to the Beyond shortly after Coryn had arrived at the tree. "I don't know what more you could ask for!" Bubo fumed. His exceedingly bushy ear tufts twitched, and his eyes showed a touch of rancor. Although most Great Horaeds had rather somber plumage composed of dusty browns and dark grays. Bubo's feathers were shot through with deep rusty reds and bronzes. It was almost as if they had taken on the hues of those bonk fires he nurtured. His coloring fit his temperament. Quick to flare, Bubo did not suffer fools gladly. He seemed on the

brink now of doing just that as he looked at Elyan,
for he suspected that a fool perched across from him.
"Surely the container is not the only security problem." Gemma, a Whiskered Screech, spoke up now.
"What other problems are there?" Bubo asked, feeling that there might be more than one fool in the parliament hol ow.
Gemma straightened up and looked down her beak. "As my esteemed late kins-owl, Ezylryb ...' 16 28 Ezylryb? She's comparing herself to Ezylryb! Soren thought.
"... always said, 'Vigilance is its own reward.'" Both Bubo and Soren looked confused. Soren, for one, could not remember Ezylryb ever saying such a thing. "It is my feeling that we not only need a much stronger container but that the coal must be under constant surveil ance. A guard must be set up, a dedicated guard, chosen from the most trustworthy Guardians. An elite guard, the - how shal I put it?- Guardians of the Guardians? I am

sure Ezylryb ..."
Otulissa blinked her eyes and twisted her head toward Soren.
"With al due respect, Gemma, you're no Ezylryb." The words were not Otulissa's but Bubo's. There was a sharp inhalation of breaths. The owls of the parliament blinked rapidly.
"I'm not sure what you mean by that," Gemma replied huffily.
"I mean you are no Ezylryb. He wouldn't put up with any of this nonsense about Guardians of Guardians, and some of us being more trustworthy than others -"
"I am sure that al of us here have only one thought in mind: the safety and wel -being of the ember," Gemma interrupted. "Ezylryb valued vigilance. I mean, it's not a job that you would want to hand over to nest-maids."
17 29 "What!" Soren almost barked. He swiveled his head around. "I've never heard anything so

absurd! What in the name of Glaux is not trustworthy
about our nest-maid snakes, pray tel ? We trust them with our very lives when we are sick or wounded. And you suggest we should not trust them with the ember? I'd wager they are as vigilant as they are skil ful in the medical arts. And let us not forget their finely tuned sensibilities. If anything would go awry with the ember, or an il -intentioned owl approached, it would be the nest-maids to first sound the alarm,"
A wizened elderly Northern Saw-whet raised a shaky talon to speak,
"Fleemus has the perch!" Digger shouted. "Let the good owl speak,"
Fleemus, the doctor and healer of the great tree, lifted an arthritic wing. ' When I first arrived at this great tree many years ago, there was much of which to be fearful. There were the Pure Ones, as wel as those thugs from St. Aggie's - with whom Soren and Gylfie were al too wel -acquainted, When I began my practice here in the tree, only matron and her smal contingent of nurse owls were trained as field medics for battle. Since that time,

however, we have an entire new guild of nest-maid
snakes whose sole focus is the medical arts. If you can't, trust a nest-maid
30 snake, you can't trust anyone," He paused. Then in a smal , creaky voice, he added, "I think al this talk about security is nonsense, nothing more than a pile of racdrops." He muttered something in a strange language.
"What was that?" Gemma asked. "What did you just say?"
"Krakish, from the Northern Kingdoms from which both your old kins-owl Ezylryb and I came. Indeed, it was the language of the famous sagas of the Northern Kingdoms, The History of the Wars of the Ice Claws by Lyze of Kiel."
"And what does this Lyze of Kiel have to say?" Gemma lifted her beak in a most haughty manner. "Fyrndronken nyghot ig fyrnsfris" "'And for those of us not fluent in Krakish?" Gemma pressed. A sneer tinged her words.

"We have nothing to fear except fear itself,"
Fleemus replied. There was a murmuring among the owls. Soren and Gyifie were watching Gemma careful y. They sensed what was about to happen. "And who is this so-cal ed historian? 'Lyze of Kiel' you cal ed him?" She could barely contain the contempt in her voice, and had Soren and Gylfie not known what the answer to her question was, their gizzards would have twitched in sympathy for old Fleemus.
19 31 "Why, Gemma," Fleemus said with a wicked sparkle suddenly infusing his rheumy old eyes. "Lyze of Kiel? You don't know him? Why, he's your old kins-owl, Ezylryb. He wrote these histories after the Ice Talon Wars ended, and before he came to the great tree. He spent years with Octavia at the Glauxian Brothers retreat on their island in the Bitter Sea, writing under the pen name Lyze of Kiel. Invert the letters and they spel Ezyl. And, as we al know, Ezyl, our dear departed ryb, came from the Bay of Kiel in the Everwinter Sea."
"Apparently not al of us," someone whispered as Gemma wilfed to half her size,

Soren winked at Gylfie and both the owls silently
saluted the dear old healer who, many years after Ezylryb, had come from that same Glauxian retreat. Otulissa now turned to Gemma. "The books are in the library and are part of my standard curriculum for the young'uns, if you'd care to read them." Several owls, perhaps a dozen, began to
squabble again. The words "ember security,' "tree vigilance," and "island protection" threaded through the air. Soren exchanged a quick glance with Coryn. The parliament seemed evenly divided. There were Fleemus and the Band in addition to Otulissa; Sorens sister. Eglantine; Ruby; Martin-in short, the renowned and remarkable Chaw of Chaws, a 20 32 group that had no equal in terms of fighting skil s, felt that the ember needed no special guard. The rest of the parliament thought otherwise. These ten owls seemed stunned by this new obsession with security and fear concerning the ember. Soren in particular wondered if it had been a mistake that they had not read the ancient legends aloud to the entire parliament. But Otulissa had given three

extensive lectures on them and the "complicated
goodness," as she had cal ed it, of the ember. Perhaps, Soren thought, she should have cal ed it complicated "dangers" rather than "goodness," But she had certainly warned of the pitfal s of overreliance on the ember's magic.
"'Here! here!" Coryn flapped his wings and swooped off his perch. He flew up to Gemma and Elyan, who were the most obstreperous of al the owls, and glared at them. The hol ow fel silent, "I shal not have you al talking at once. Dissent is welcome in this hol ow, but I am hearing insults as wel . You are talking about protecting something, the ember that many of you feel wil somehow become vulnerable if I leave the great tree on this flight. I do not want you to feel uncomfortable in my absence. So, if it wil make you feel better, yes, protect it. But there is no one owl or creature in this tree who is more trustworthy than another. The notion of an inner group of Guardians - Guardians of Guardians - is contrary to al
33 that we value. If there is to be a watch - and I prefer to cal it a watch, not a guard - it must have a representative from every chaw and each guild of

the nest-maid snakes - those of the harp, the
weavers, the lace-makers, the new medical and nursing guild, and so on."
"And how shal this ... this ... watch be chosen?" Gemma asked..
Coryn blinked. "The ember is in my hol ow. I have spent more time in its presence than any other living creature. I think that it is only appropriate that I appoint those who wil be perching in my hol ow." Soren was proud of Coryn's quick and firm response. Coryn paused. "Now listen to me, owls, and listen hard." He blinked. There was a new sternness in his voice that went beyond the firmness they had just heard. Was it threatening? Some of the owls wilfed a bit. "When I first came here, I said to you that I had survived the ordeal of my upbringing with Nyra because I believed in the legends, the truths of courage and loyalty and of goodness and mercy. Those, indeed, were the truths of the popular legends that you al listened to as young'uns. The even older legends of which you have heard Otulissa speak held other truths. And one of them was that we must not become slaves of the ember. Fear enslaves. Remember that. And I