Guardians of Ga'Hoole 04 - The Siege

several seconds was questionable.
    “Your mission is to penetrate the St. Aegolius Academy for Orphaned Owls.”
    What! Soren thought. Go back! He and Gylfie were horrified.
    The two owls almost fell off the parliament perches. They were being asked to go back to the place that had attempted to destroy their personalities and their wills through the brutal processes called moon blinking and moon scalding.
    “We have reason to believe that a dangerous group of owls, the ones that call themselves the Pure Ones, have possibly already infiltrated St. Aggie’s with the intention ofcapturing the immense stores of flecks. We have had intelligence reports from Ambala that suggest this,” said Boron.
    “Ambala?” Digger said. “Isn’t that where the slipgizzle was, the Barred Owl?”
    “Was is right,” Boron said. “As you know, he was killed. Over the last several months, we have been cultivating a new slipgizzle. She is rather frail and quite eccentric. They call her Mist, and she is perfectly suited for this work because through some odd accident, an almost terminal shock to her gizzard, she has lost all her coloration. Her feathers have turned a pale, almost foggy gray. Some might think she is a scroom. But she isn’t. She does not fly well, but she has incredible powers of observation. The reports she has been sending about the Pure Ones are most disturbing.”
    Soren blinked. “Why?”
    “They want flecks,” Barran said, “and St. Aggie’s has the largest repository of flecks in existence. But Mist thinks their interest extends beyond the flecks, and that is what we want you to find out. The two greatest threats to the owl kingdoms are St. Aggie’s and the Pure Ones. The very idea of their being brought together in some sort of grand mischief is…” Barran hesitated.” “…gizzard-chilling, to put it mildly.”
    Then Boron resumed. “So, you see how important theseven of you are. We have faith in you. Now the question is, will you accept this mission?”
    The owls were stunned. They had come in expecting a scolding or a flint mop and, instead, they had been charged with this important mission. Soren felt Ezylryb’s gaze upon him. And Boron began to speak. “Soren and Gylfie, we realize that going back to St. Aggie’s will be most difficult for you.”
    “Yes,” Soren said slowly. “But, Boron, won’t they recognize us?”
    “Never!” Barran said quickly. “You were an owlet when you were there before. Your flight feathers had not fledged, nor had your face fledged white, and you were half your size. Gylfie—you, too, looked quite different.”
    “And,” Ezylryb began to speak for the first time, “as you two well know, they are stupid, these owls of St. Aggie’s.” He paused. “But still, you’ll need a cover story.”
    “A cover story?” Martin asked.
    “Yes, where you came from, why you are there,” said Ezylryb.
    Otulissa raised her talon now to speak. “Can we say something like we got sick of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree? We didn’t trust the Guardians—something like that.”
    “No,” snapped Ezylryb. “They’ll never believe you. It will raise their suspicions if they think you have anythingto do with the great tree. You need to come from a place that they know very little about.”
    Soren suddenly realized that Ezylryb had thought out this entire cover story.
    “A place like what?” Soren asked.
    “A place like the Northern Kingdoms,” said Ezylryb.
    “Hold on a second.” Digger had now raised a talon to speak. “Ezylryb, Gylfie and I are desert owls. The chances of our coming from the Northern Kingdoms are just about zero.”
    “I have it figured out,” Ezylryb replied. I thought so. Soren blinked.
    Ezylryb continued, but he did not stand still on the perch. He began sweeping through the air.
    “Last summer, before certain unfortunate incidents like the Great Downing and my own entrapment in the Devil’s Triangle, I had commenced a set of weather interpretation experiments. My original intention had been to pick up information on atmospheric particles and subpar-ticles as they related to the displays we call the Aurora Glaucora, those magnificent colors in the summer sky when the entire night seems to pulsate with glorious lights. There was one last summer, as I recall, just around the time of my entrapment. Well, as often happens with scientific inquiry, one sets out to solve one problem and,quite by accident and happy surprise, one finds the answer