Guardians of Ga'Hoole 03 - The Rescue

thought of Dewlap as mean, just boring. So had Soren until Dewlap had squawked, and he had seen a weird greenish glimmer in her yellow eyes that seemed to mask a stingy gizzard. Soren’s mother had always told him that it was a stingy and envious gizzard that made owls mean. His mother had said that envy and stinginess were the worst faults an owl could have. Her words came back to him: There is never any call for envy or stinginess in owls, Soren. We have the sky, we have the great forests and the trees. We are the most beautiful fliers on earth. Why would we envy any other bird or animal?

CHAPTER TWELVE
Rusty Claws
    B y the time the four owls had returned to their hollow, Eglantine had fallen sound asleep. And soon the rest were also sleeping. Eglantine was twitching nervously in her sleep. She had seemed upset ever since they had told her about the walled garden of the forge.
    Soren couldn’t think about any of that now. There was still this dreadful unfinished business of Metal Beak and the “you only wish.” A horrid image if there ever was one—a half-faceless owl flying around slaughtering creatures. Then again, there was just getting through the flint mop for Dewlap. Gylfie stirred and Soren saw that she was awake, too.
    “Gylfie, why do you think Boron and Barran didn’t ask us where we had been?”
    “They knew that it had something to do with Ezylryb. They know how you feel about him. They didn’t have to know exactly where you went.”
    “You know,” Soren said slowly, “I have the feeling thatin some way Octavia might be important to all that stuff the rogue smith of Silverveil told us.”
    “How?” Gylfie asked in her usual practical way. “What’s the link?”
    “I feel it in my gizzard,” Soren continued, thinking aloud, “that she somehow is connected to Ezylryb’s past when perhaps he was a different kind of owl.”
    “Different?” Gylfie asked.
    “Remember how the Snowy told us that she met Octavia before she was blind?” Gylfie nodded. “And it was Octavia who told her about the Dark Fowl Island where the master blacksmith nested. There’s a connection there, a link with Ezylryb. Did Ezylryb know her then, too, before she was blind? And the rogue smith said they came here together years and years ago. She was blind then, but what was she really before that? What did she do for Ezylryb? How does a snake know about a forge on an island that makes battle claws?”
    “What are you suggesting we do, Soren?” Gylfie asked.
    He turned and looked at his best friend in all the world, the little Elf Owl with whom he had already endured so much. Could he ask her to do this? He knew it would shock her. He took a deep breath and then told her what he wanted to do. “I am suggesting that we get into Ezylryb’s hollow when Octavia is not around.”
    Gylfie gasped so loud that she almost woke Twilight. “Soren, I can’t believe it. That’s trespassing, snooping, spying, and Ezylryb is your favorite teacher. It’s so…so…”
    “Scummy,” Soren offered.
    “Well, yes,” Gylfie nodded. “I was going to say unethical. But yeah, ‘scummy’ just about sums it up. Soren, you surprise me. I mean, that’s really asking for a flint mop.”
    “Who cares about flint mopping? This is life or death. If we can discover something that would help us find and save Ezylryb, it can’t be scummy, unflecktual.”
    “Unflecktual!” Gylfie whispered hoarsely. “Flecks, Soren? Do you think this is connected with flecks?”
    Soren blinked. He had meant to say that word Gylfie had used—unethical. But it had come out wrong. Still it was just a slip of the beak. But was it connected with the flecks in some way? There was a web being spun here. He could feel them all being reeled in, and at the center of the web sat a spider with a Metal Beak.
    “I have to go,” Soren said.
    “I won’t let you go without me,” Gylfie said.
    “It should only be the two of us.”
    “No,” Digger suddenly spoke up.
    “You awake?” Gylfie asked.
    “I just woke up. Listen, I want to be in on this. You’ll need a lookout. I’ll stand guard. What are you two going todo if Octavia slithers in? I could distract her long enough for you to get out. Ezylryb does have a few sky ports in his hollow, doesn’t he?” Sky ports were the openings directly to the outside of the tree from which the owls could fly from their hollows. There were smaller holes called trunk ports which the nest-maids usually came