Guardians of Ga'Hoole 13 - The River of Wind

know you are brimming with questions. So find yourselves a perch and I will try to explain as much as I can.”
    The eight birds set down on various perches. Mrs. Plithiver settled herself into a relaxed coil near the yak-butter lamp, which cast a soft glow.
    “I shall address your last two points first. How do we know about the great tree’s weavers guild, and how do I know Hoolian? It was all written in the Theo Papers.”
    “Theo!” Otulissa exclaimed, and lofted slightly into the air. It was as if a bolt of lightning had shot through her.
    “Theo, the first blacksmith?” Coryn gasped.
    “Theo, the inventor of battle claws?” Twilight said excitedly.
    “Theo, the gizzard-resister?” Digger asked.
    The sage nodded.
    Otulissa could hardly recover her wits to sort out all of her questions. But of course, she thought. It’s beginning to make perfect sense that Theo came here! Otulissa had done further research inspired by reading the legends. It had seemed to her with a little reading between the lines that Theo had flown far away to some unknown place, but she had discounted this as idle speculation. Nonetheless, he seemed to have vanished. Now, however, there was much evidence pointing to where he might have gone. They had quickly recognized the weather symbols of the key to be a more ancient form of their own weather symbols. And who had been the first real weather interpreter? None other than Joss, a contemporary of Theo’s and renowned scout and messenger for the H’rathian Kingdom in the time of the legends. There were other similarities as well. Certain Jouzhen words seemed to come from Krakish root words, but with a slight twist. The word “strezhing,” which she had used in her introductory greeting, meant “originating from or hailing from.” In Krakish, one said “Stresschen,” which basically meant the same thing. “So did Theo really come here?” Otulissa said with awe.
    “Oh, yes.” The sage nodded. “And he wrote a very long document that we call the Theo Papers. It was from reading the papers that I first learned of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree and the brilliant King Hoole.”
    Otulissa and Soren exchanged quick glances. “Did you read the legends?” Soren asked.
    “Legends?” Tengshu seemed slightly confused. “Oh, no. These were real stories.”
    “Legends can be real,” Coryn added in a low voice. “Did he write of the ember?”
    “Oh, perhaps a bit,” the sage said almost dismissively. “He mostly wrote of the ways of war and his determination never to make another weapon. He sought another way. He called it ‘the way without claws.’ It has come to be known as ‘the way of noble gentleness’ or ‘Danyar.’ By and large, the Theo Papers are really philosophical documents.”
    “Did he ever return to the Five Kingdoms?” Digger asked.
    “Not that anyone knew of,” Tengshu replied. “He remained at the owlery. There was much to do there.”
    “The owlery?”
    “It is a place high, high up in the tallest mountains of Jouzhenkyn where owls who desire a simpler way of living and deep contemplation retreat. Unlike myself, they do not enjoy pursuing this life in solitude. But before Theo came, it was a place of no real discipline, and one of shallow thought at best. But at least it was different from courtlife. When Theo came he changed this. He began to teach the way of noble gentleness.”
    “But how did you know we were coming here?” Coryn asked.
    “It was predicted by the eighth astrologer, the astrologer of the old court.”
    “The old court? Astrology?” Otulissa was perplexed. She considered astrology to be a slightly yoicks discipline that should not even be considered a science. It was seldom practiced in the Hoolian world. “What is this court? Do you have a king, a royal family?”
    “Not really. Or, I should say, not real ones, not any longer.”
    The owls looked confused.
    Tengshu continued. “Once we did have a court but it became useless and, in its uselessness, even dangerous. The owls who started the owlery did so to escape the court. So now we have a mock court. Well, it is a bit more than that.”
    “A mock court? What are you talking about?” Gylfie asked. This new world, this Middle Kingdom, was proving more bewildering than any of them could have ever imagined.
    “You’ll see…you’ll see,” Tengshu churred softly. “Iknow it is all very confusing. But you have entered a new world. It is very different from yours, so I am