Guardians of Ga'Hoole 14 - Exile

with a silvery lichen called old bird’s beard. Another was made of reddish twigs with a face that was almost white and two black coals for eyes. The third was a bundle of twigs with two long sticklike legs, and the fourth was a little ball of frizzled tumble-weed. Four owls, each a different species: a Great Gray, a Barn Owl, a Burrowing Owl, and an Elf Owl. Gwyndor, the Rogue smith of Silverveil, for it was he, swiveled his head and looked at Cory. “The Band,” he said quietly. “They are burning the Band in effigy.” And just then a dozen or so owls, each sporting a blue feather, swooped around the effigies. A grim chant rose from them.
Fire does redemption bring
Cleansing flames for which we sing .
Scour the soul, prepare the mind ,
Make us to all vanities blind .
Bring your gaudies, profane art ,
Singe it, burn it, all is skart!
Let there be nought but ash ,
Make redemption ours at last .
    As they sang, owls came forward, dropping strands of beads, books, whirligigs, and all sorts of articles onto the pyre. A large Horned Owl flew up to the pyre with a torch and touched it to the kindling. There were cracks and popping sounds as pearls and glass exploded. As the flames licked higher and closer to the effigies of the Band, the figures began to jiggle in a weird palsied dance as if trying to escape. And then the red tongues reached them and they were devoured in one fiery gulp. A cheer went up, but Cory noticed that the cheers came only from the Blue Brigade. The other owls remained silent and wilfed as the fire grew hotter and hotter. The scent of sizzling glue rose from the books and with it the sad odor of the incinerating lovely things.
    In the dell of Ambala a new kind of training had begun. This training involved learning to fly dressed in draperies of moss.
    “How am I suppose to do my famous flying wedgie with all this stuff hanging off me?” Twilight grumbled.
    “Put a mouse in it, Twilight, and pay attention.” Gylfie scowled.
    “That’s easy for you to say. You’re so itty-bitty one little patch of moss covers you up.”
    “It’s all relative,” Digger said. His legs were cloaked in a very green moss called bunch clover. The owls of Ambala had introduced them to one of their oldest traditions for Balefire Night celebrations: Greenowling. The tradition could be traced back to an ancient poem of Ambalan origin:
    In a night sky drenched in flames
    Thus begin the Balefire games .
    Then high above the conflagration
    Comes the brightest green formation .
    Robed in Ambala’s greenest green
    Their brains so fit, their gizzards keen ,
    “Greenowls” is their special name .
    Cloaked in moss they play the game
    Merry, fast, and fair they play
    Until the night fades into day .
    The fires die, begin to smolder ,
    The embers grow cold, then colder .
    Another Balefire come and gone
    Ambala’s Greenowls praised in song .
    On Balefire Night, with battle claws tucked into their mossy garments and branches ready to ignite, the Band would end their exile and reclaim the great tree. If the king must die…well, they tried not to think of that. But if it did come to that, they must be prepared. Soren had been ready to kill his own brother, Kludd, and was only spared from delivering those fatal blows because Twilight had hurled himself into the fray, impaling Kludd on a firebrand. But would Soren kill the son of Kludd—his own nephew—if need be?
    He would do anything to protect Pelli, the three B’s, and the great tree. He was, after all, a mate, a father, and finally, a Guardian of Ga’Hoole.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Something Familiar?
    Y ou mean I can’t see the king?” Cory asked. “Why should you be able to see him? You’re just an ordinary owl,” a Barred Owl replied. The owl sported a blue feather tucked into the coverts of his primary feathers.
    “I have very important business.” Cory didn’t want to say his real name. He remembered how the awful blue owl had ordered that Kalo be dragged from the burrow, and then sneered at her when she had said his name. He had claimed that to name an owl “Coryn” was blasphemous. It was Cory’s third night at the tree and still he had not seen the king for whom he had been named. Suddenly, that same hideous blue owl stuck his head out of the port of the king’s hollow.
    “What does this Burrowing Owl want?” he asked.
    “To see the king. Claims he has business of a personal nature. He’s getting tiresome.”
    Suddenly, Cory got an idea. He