Guardians of Ga'Hoole 03 - The Rescue

ryb Dewlap that Twilight was absent from his flint-mopping tasks of burying pellets, which nourishes our great tree. Upon further investigation, it was found out that all four of you, the entire ‘band’ as you are known, had left the tree on the night of the festivities. So not only was Twilight unavailable for flint mopping butthe rest of you could not participate in the sorting and grading of milkberries, as is customary after the harvest festivities, not to mention the award ceremonies, which follow the sorting, for those who have distinugished themselves at the harvest through their diligence.”
    Sorting, grading awards? Soren had never heard about all this. He stole a look at Gylfie who appeared equally bewildered.
    Then Barran, as if reading their minds, continued, “Yes, young’uns, there are things you do not yet know about—practices and ceremonies that we have here at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree. For example, Soren, it was while you were gone that we had a First-Meat-on-Bones ceremony for your sister, Eglantine, and other young’uns from the Great Downing who had missed that owl stone event.” An owl stone event was one that was considered of great significance in the development of a young owl. The First-Meat-on-Bones ceremony was one of the most important of all the ceremonies that marked a young owl’s passage through life from hatchling to fully fledged flier to adept hunter. Boron and Barran felt that even though owls like Eglantine had long been eating Meat on Bones because they had been orphaned early on and missed this ceremony with their parents, it was still important to have these moments recognized. “Better late than never,” Barran always said.
    “I missed Eglantine’s Meat-on-Bones!” A sob seemed to swell in Soren’s gizzard. “Why…why…” he stammered.
    “Why didn’t she tell you about it?” Barran asked. Then she proceeded to answer her own question. “Because isn’t it always a surprise when your parents come home with that first whole vole or ground squirrel and say ‘Beak up! Down the gullet!’? No more of their stripping out the bones like when you were a baby. So why shouldn’t it be a surprise here?”
    Soren merely blinked. Tears filled his eyes, and the big old Snowy blurred like a cloud. “But she didn’t even tell me about it when I got back.”
    “Eglantine is a sensitive young owl. I’m sure she knew that you would have felt awful for missing her First-Meat-on-Bones ceremony, and the last thing your sister would want is for you to feel bad. She loves you too much, Soren.”
    Soren’s wings hung limply by his side. He felt positively horrible.
    “Now, young’uns,” Boron had begun to speak for the first time since saying enter.
    Oh, Glaux. He’s going to ask us where we’ve been, Soren thought.
    “You were off looking for Ezylryb, I’d wager?” Soren nodded. “Well, that’s to be expected.”
    Dewlap suddenly swelled up in a puff of indignation. “I beg to differ, Boron, but duty is what is expected.”
    “Oh, you’re right. You’re right, of course.” But Soren sensed that Boron did not think that the boring Burrowing Owl was exactly right. Maybe they’d get off with just a light flint mop but, more important, maybe Boron would not ask them where they had been.
    “Where have you been?” squawked Dewlap.
    “It doesn’t really matter where,” Boron spoke now. “What matters is that in going away, the band missed the sorting and grading of the milkberries. Soren missed his sister’s First-Meat-on-Bones ceremony, and Twilight missed his flint mop for you. Thus, the tree suffered as a whole.”
    “I would say,” Dewlap’s voice thundered, “it’s payback time! The four of you are on pellet-burying detail for the next three days, twice a day.”
    As they flew back to their hollow from the parliament, Soren muttered under his breath to the others, “We can’t complain…We can’t complain…We got off light.”
    “Light? You call having to bury pellets a ‘light’ flint mop?” Twilight hissed.
    “Look,” Gylfie said, “it was because you forgot yourflint mop that we were discovered in the first place. So just shut your beak.”
    “You know,” Digger was saying, “in spite of my being a Burrowing Owl and Dewlap being a Burrowing Owl, I feel I have nothing in common with that old hoot.”
    “How could you?” Gylfie asked. “She is so boring.”
    “And mean,” Soren added.
    The others blinked. They had never