Guardians of Ga'Hoole 15 - The War of the Ember

of blood, an arrowhead buried in his breast. And now she must go out into the world. She must fly to the great tree and tell the shocking news of the intruderwho spoke of hags and hagsmire and demanded the ember. And if one owl knew the ember was at the Palace of Mists, did others?
    Bess shut her eyes. I can’t go! I can’t! I am so scared. She felt her gizzard clench. A warm draft of air rose up from below. Such warm drafts or thermals were rare. Was it a sign? These thermals were the easiest to fly, giving owls a sturdy boost, allowing them to soar with hardly a wing waggle for propulsion. It seemed as if the very elements were conspiring against her fear. Or are they conspiring for me? Trying to entice me into the sky?
    She felt pressed now between this rising thermal and that pool of blood in the crypt. She closed her eyes, gave a sudden small yelp, and flung herself onto the warm breast of the updraft. Here goes nothing! she thought. And felt the warm air fold around her like the wings of her da.

CHAPTER SEVEN
I’m Here!
    T he days had shortened and the nights had grown longer. In the few daylight hours left, the owls slept deeply, recovering from all the work and play of the season of long nights. Since her injury of the previous year, Otulissa found that she had to rebuild her strength gradually and often retired earlier than the other owls, taking a few hours of quiet reflection before sleep. There had been a string of sparkling days in the season of the Copper-Rose Rain, and since she had not exhausted herself flying all night long she often retreated to her favorite spot in the Great Ga’Hoole Tree—the hanging garden. It was her chosen place for reflection. The pockets of the tree, where the major limbs joined the trunk, had always collected a variety of organic matter. It had been customary to clear this out several times a year as it was thought to be better for the health of the tree. Otulissa had supervised this chore. But in Otulissa’s capacity of Ga’Hoolology ryb, she hadbegun a series of experiments in which she let the organic matter accumulate. She discovered that with careful management of the small shrubs, lichens, and plants that took root in the pockets, the overall health of the tree was enhanced. Indeed, many of the plants in the hanging gardens offered additional crops that could be gathered for food. A new variety of nooties, similar to the ones that could be harvested during the time of the Copper-Rose Rain, now grew during other seasons. Aside from the nutritional benefits of the cultivated pockets, there was the sheer beauty of their hanging gardens; the mosses, lichens, and many flowering plants—including orchids—were suspended like colorful constellations from the canopy of the tree.
    On this morning, with the sun bouncing off the rosy golden milkberries, the tree seemed spangled with light. Cleve joined her, as did Tengshu, her old friend from the sixth kingdom, who was staying for a spell in the tree. So successful had the Greenowls—trained by Tengshu—been in routing the Striga and his troops from the great tree, that Coryn had decided upon the formation of a new chaw so that Guardians could learn Danyar, the fighting discipline practiced by the blue owls of the Middle Kingdom. Tengshu was here to teach to them.
    “I do feel, Cleve dear, that perhaps we owls, being night creatures, have underrated the splendor of the day.”
    “Perhaps. But it is hard to imagine flying about in the daylight with a scalding sun blasting your wings. Daylight has no texture. It’s not like the night. There are no stars, none of the black feathery softness of the evening.”
    “Oh, Cleve, just listen to your prejudice. You define everything in owl terms—saying the black is feathery.”
    “I agree,” Tengshu said. “You know, in the Middle Kingdom, we do quite a bit of day flying, since we have no crows, and need not fear mobbing. I was flying about just now. There is a new freshness in the air.” He hesitated. “I don’t know how to describe it. Should I say ‘thump of wind’ coming in from the north?”
    “Ah, the katabats!” Cleve said.
    “The katabats?” Tengshu asked.
    “Yes, that’s what we call them in the Northern Kingdoms where they originate. You’re just feeling the very outermost fringes of them,” Otulissa said, then continued. “They are actually caused by a reverse cyclonic inversion…”
    “Your knowledge, madam, astounds me,” Tengshu exclaimed