Guardians of Ga'Hoole 02 - The Journey

forbid that we should disappoint Bubo,” Otulissa mumbled.
    Soren stole a glance at her. There was pure venom in her eyes. Why couldn’t she just be angry about being in this chaw? What did Bubo have to do with it? Soren thought. He knew why, of course. Otulissa thought she was too good to have anything to do with Bubo. Neither Bubo nor any of the owls in this chaw had the distinguished background of Otulissa. It was an outrage, as she told Soren forty times a night, that she had not been included in Strix Struma’s navigation chaw.
    Elvan continued speaking during their break. “And then, of course, after you have had enough nights of weather training we shall find a nice forest fire for you—nothing too big, mind you. Just a nice little beginning fire with a good mix of trees—Ga’Hooles, firs, pine, some soft and hard woods. Not too many ridges or mountains to complicate wind patterns.”
    “Pardon me,” piped up the little Northern Saw-whet Owl, Martin, who had been rescued the same night as Primrose.
    “Yes, Martin,” Elvan said.
    “Well, I don’t understand why we need new coals all the time. Once you start a fire going, wouldn’t there always be new coals?”
    This was some smart little owl, Soren thought. Why hadn’t the others thought of this question? Why were new coals from a new fire needed?
    Elvan turned to Bubo. “Bubo, as chief smith, would you care to answer that?”
    “Sure thing, mate.” Then he stepped up to Martin and, towering over him, began to speak. “A very good question. You are right, it is very possible to keep fires going forever and that is fine for some things—things like cooking and warming up a hollow. But for certain tasks, especially certain metalwork in the forge, we need new fresh coals that have been born of sparking trees full of sap. They become the blood of our hottest fires. Then again, we need a variety of coals. Certain coals from certain trees last longer. That’s how a fire gets bonk.”
    “What’s bonk?” asked Martin.
    “Ah, it’s an old smithy term. Hard to explain unless you’ve been working with the fires for some time. Then you know when you got a bonking good fire going in your forge. You know you got to look for the blue in the flame and then, this is the hardest, a tinge of green around the blue.”
    Soren was impressed. Being a blacksmith was truly a complicated business. Even though Bubo did not have the title of ryb, Soren thought he must be very smart.
    Soon, rest time was over, and they were told to begin marching without their coals to establish the rhythm again.
    “I simply can’t bear this a minute longer,” Otulissa said.
    “I think it’s going to be great fun when we can fly,” said Ruby, a ruddy-colored Short-eared Owl that Soren nearly bumped into.
    “How can you say that, Ruby? This is really not the appropriate chaw for you, either, no more than for me. You of all owls, with your family background—you should be in tracking.”
    “Just because my family nested on the ground doesn’t mean I can’t try something new.”
    “But you fly low and slow; that’s good for tracking.”
    “But I’ve never flown through a forest fire. And I can’t wait until weather interpretation—a hurricane! Just imagine flying through that. Life in that ground nest was boring. We were out there in the grasslands—every day just the same. The sound of the wind in the grass just the same, the way the grass moved just the same. Oh, yes. Sometimes it moved slower or faster, depending on the wind. Butthere was a terrible sameness. I can’t believe how lucky I am to be double chawed.” Ruby sighed with pleasure.
    Soren blinked. He wished he felt this way. He wanted to ask Ruby if she was nervous about Ezylryb, but at the same time he didn’t want to admit that he was. Ruby was a very tough little owl. She had been brought in by search-and-rescue shortly after Soren had arrived. She had not fallen from a nest, for indeed to fall out of a ground nest was virtually impossible. But something had scared her so bad when her parents were out hunting, she had actually flown before her primaries were fledged. No one was quite sure what had scared her. She had been found exhausted but perched in one of the few trees in the grasslands, declaring, “They’ll never find me here! They’ll never believe that an immature Short-eared made it to here!” But no one knew who they were. And Ruby never said.
    Finally, chaw practice was over. Soren