The Capture

wrong. Maybe it wasn't so close to the river. Maybe it wasn't a fir tree after all."

    Twilight and Gylfie looked at each other. This was the third tree that they had visited. There was not a sign of an owl family living in any of the trees, but in two of the three, this last one included, there were hollows and definite signs of owls having once nested in them. "You know my memory isn't really perfect," Soren said weakly. "I... I... could have --"

    Gylfie interrupted. "Soren, I think they've gone."

    Soren turned on the little Elf Owl. "How can you say that, Gylfie? How can you ever say that?" Soren was trembling with rage. "You don't know them. I know them. My parents wouldn't have left -- ever."

    "They didn't leave you, Soren," Gylfie said in a very small voice. "They thought that you were gone forever, snatched."

    "No! No! They would believe! They would believe like the way we were taught to believe in flying. They would believe, and my mother would never agree to leave this place. She would always hope that I would come back."

    And it was when Soren said the word "hope" that something deep inside him collapsed. It almost felt as if his gizzard was shriveling up. He began to weep with the unthinkable notion of his parents giving up hope for him. Shudders racked his entire body. His feathers, stiff with frost, quivered.

    Then Twilight spoke, "Soren, they're gone. Maybe something happened to them. You shouldn't take it personally. Buck up now, old buddy."

    "Personally? What do you know, Twilight, that is personal about any family? You've never had a family.
    Remember, you're always telling us about how much you learned in your own orphan school of tough learning. You don't know the feel of a mother's down. You don't know what it's like to hear stories from a father, or to hear him sing. Do you know what a psalm is, Twilight? I bet you don't. Well, we Barn Owls know about psalms and books and the feeling of down."

    Twilight's feathers had ruffled up, spiky with ice crystals. He looked fearsome. "I'll tell you what I know, you miserable little owl. The whole world is my family. I know the softness of a fox's fur, and the strange green light that comes into their eyes during the spring moons. I know how to fish because I learned from an eagle. And when meat is scarce I know how to find the ripest part of a rotten tree and peck the juiciest bugs from it. I know plenty."

    "STOP FIGHTING!" Gylfie screamed. "Soren, you're broken, you're sad. I will be the same way."

    Soren looked up, startled. "What do you mean 'will be'?"

    "What do you think the chances are of my family being found?" She didn't wait for Soren to answer the question. "I'll tell you. None."

    "Why?" Soren said. Even Twilight seemed surprised. "We were snatched, Soren. Do you think any owl parents would stay in the same place? Those St. Aggie's patrols know where to find owls. They'd come back. They'd look for young owl chicks. Any family with any sense would move on. They wouldn't want to lose all their chicks. And I think I know where mine would go."

    "Where?" Soren asked.

    "The Great Ga'Hoole Tree," Gylfie spoke quietly.

    "Why?" Soren blinked. "You're not even sure it's a real place. What did you call it?"

    "Tales of Yore."

    "Yes, Tales of Yore. Why, in the name of Glaux, would your family take off for a Yore place, not proven, not real?"

    "Because maybe they were desperate," Gylfie said. That's no reason."

    Then Gylfie answered in a stronger voice, "Because they felt it in their gizzards."

    "How do you feel a legend in your gizzard? You're talking racdrops, Gylfie." It made Soren feel good to use a bad word. But at the same time he felt he was betraying his own father. For hadn't his father said that one began to feel a legend in one's gizzard and over time it could become true in one's heart?
    "Racdrops!" he repeated. "Complete nonsense, Gylfie, and you know it." As angry as Soren was, what he had just uttered made him feel worse.

    "Since when has anything made sense? Does St. Aggie's make sense? Do Skench and Spoorn make sense?"

    "Grimble made sense," Soren said in barely a whisper.

    "Yes," Gylfie replied, and reached out with the tip of her wings to touch Soren.

    Twilight had remained quiet. Finally, he spoke. "I am going to search for the Great Ga'Hoole Tree. You two are welcome to join me. Gylfie, it is not far out of our way to go by the Desert of Kuneer. Even though I think you're right about your parents, maybe for your own