Guardians of Ga'Hoole 13 - The River of Wind

cloudy. What’s the point of tracing the Golden Talons if you can’t even see it? she wondered. Maybe she’d just fly off for a short look, because if there was a gale with real scuppers…Oh, it was just grit in her gizzard that Blythe might dance the hurly-burly in the scuppers, and she’d come back all braggy about it. Bell just had to try it. No one from the navigation chaw would miss her when she was flying double tail so far back. And she’d only be gone a minute…or two…or three…certainly no more than five.

CHAPTER FIVE
The Palace of Mists
    I t was strange , Mrs. P. thought. From a great distance, she could hear an enormous sound of the crush of water plummeting, but through that roar she could make out so many other sounds—voices of the Guardians and Bess. She listened beyond these, however, and perceived not echoes but vibrations or perhaps other ripples. Then, within the ripples she sensed—what should she call them?—lumps? Seeds? Yes, seeds from a time long ago when other voices might have stirred the mists of these palace chambers. It was a peculiar place, which seemed composed as much of mist as stone. The palace with its turrets, spires, and towers was tucked behind the great curtain of cascading water, and its back wall was the soaring stone cliff.
    “You brought a nest-maid snake? Mrs. Plithiver, you call her?” Bess was whispering, thinking that she could not be heard. But, of course, Mrs. P. could hear everyword and so much more. But she didn’t feel that it was time for her to say anything—not yet, at least.
    “Yes,” Soren was saying. “But don’t worry.” Mrs. P. could feel Bess shrug. “She is very discreet. Nest-maids are, you know.”
    Not all, Mrs. P. thought. Not Audrey. Biggest gossip in the tree.
    Bess now turned to Otulissa. “So you explained to them?”
    “Well, as best I could,” Otulissa replied.
    “I have found more document fragments. It’s all quite amazing. I’ll go fetch them.” She flew to the stone stacks toward the rear of the library, a series of deep niches in which scrolls and books were placed. While she was gone, a draft of cold mist swirled down, fogging the table where they perched.
    “It’s that storm that came up,” Twilight said. “A real wester. Odd this time of year. Imagine what a waggle Ezylryb would have gotten out of this one.” Like a fleeting shadow, the worrisome thought of the three B’s caught in something like this crossed Soren’s mind. But they were safe. Pelli and Eglantine and Primrose would have made sure they got to one of the numerous hollows near the training grounds where the chawlets were practicing.
    When Bess returned, she carried a botkin stuffed with fragments of old scrolls. She carefully took them out of their oiled mouse-skin covers.
    “For all this time,” Soren said, “we have known that there was this place that we called The Elsewhere. But never before had we imagined that there was a kingdom of owls there. We thought perhaps it was a place the Others had been, but never owls. Whatever led you to think that there were owls there, Bess?”
    She drew out a fragment from one of the botkins. “This was my first clue.” She put down the piece of parchment. At first glance, it looked like a small bit that had been torn from one of the star charts because there were constellations sketched on it. Bess took out a magnifying glass from a pouch made of vole skin. This instrument always fascinated the Band. It was a tool of the Others, and Bess used it to read the dim handwriting on the most ancient of manuscripts. She set the glass down on the torn piece of parchment. “Now look. Tell me, what do you see?”
    The owls peered over the glass and then all gasped.
    “An owl’s eye!” Twilight said.
    “B-b-b-but…but…” Otulissa stammered. “That proves nothing. I mean, an Other could have drawn that.”
    “Yes, possibly,” Bess agreed. “Although I feel the pressure used with the writing tool is not that of an Other. It’s a fragile line. But if you are not convinced, look at this.” She slid the magnifying glass down a bit. It revealed talon writing. There was no doubt about it. And although the foreign words seemed slightly familiar, there was one word that sailed out: Glaux!
    “It’s the same in any language, isn’t it?” Gylie said. “Krakish, Hoolian…and…and…”
    Bess whispered now. “I have been studying and have just started to understand a few words of the sixth