The Golden Tree Page 8

  “Then why did you hide it for Madame Plonk?”

  “She merely requested that I keep it for her. I had no idea why.” A tiny lie., she thought. “But you’re more than welcome to it.”

  Gemma had seemed visibly upset. This had obviously been too easy. “But you were hiding it in that cubby.”

  “I don’t have a lot of room in here, as you can see,” Otulissa had said, gesturing with a small sweeping arc of one wing. “I put it out of harm’s way.”

  “Aha!” Gemma screeched, and lofted herself directly into the air. “So you consider myself and the rest of the order of the Guardians of the Guardians of the Ember to be ‘harm’?”

  “I never said such a thing!”

  “Yes, you did, just now. I arrest you for unemberish glimpox activity. Article One, Section B of the Glimpox Statutes for Protection of the Ember.”

  With that, three other members of the order, who must have been waiting outside on a close branch, stormed into Otulissa’s hollow, and the next thing she knew she was in a prison that she didn’t even know existed in the great tree.

  She ran her talons over the bars and mused that Bubo himself must have made them. What must he have thought? At just that moment, as if reading her mind, there was a flare of ruddy red outside the opening and the old blacksmith appeared.“Otulissa!’ he said in a raw, desperate voice. “I thought I was making rods for still another cage for the ember. I swear, Otulissa. I would have never done it had I known.” The Great Horned looked an absolute wreck. His yellow eyes flickered madly.

  “Bubo, I know you couldn’t have known. No need for an apology.”

  The light of the setting sun flashed off the bars, tingeing them gold. Bubo squinted and blinked. “It’s a terrible time, ain’t it?” He shook his head wearily. “What with this Golden Tree and all.”

  “I’m starting to hate gold,” Otulissa said.

  “I even think Plonkie’s getting a bit disgusted with it all.”

  “As well she should!” Otulissa scowled.

  “Look, don’t go too hard on her. She feels terrible about the whole thing.”

  “Yes, but look who’s in prison.”“But she’s under ‘tree arrest,’ as they call it.”

  “Tree arrest! What will they think of next? What does that mean?”

  “She can’t leave the tree, but they have to have her around to sing all them new chants for them ceremonies.” The very words caused a deep twinge in Otulissa’s gizzard as she saw the three Bs completing their First Flight ceremony. What has happened to the real ceremonies that mark growth and the passages in an owl’s life? Ceremonies for an ember - racdropsl “What are we going to do?” Otulissa sighed. “When will Soren and the Band and the king get back? Coryn would have a fit if he saw this nonsense with the ember.”

  “I’m thinking, Otulissa, we got to get word to them!”

  “But we don’t even know where they are.”

  At that moment, a song began to rise in the tree as Madame Plonk’s unearthly voice spiraled up into the soft purple of the twilight. It was a new song that had replaced the old one that hailed the coming of First Black. This one hailed the glow of the ember.

  Eternal ember, strong and glowing,

  let your light suffuse our tree.

  Most holy spirit of the fires,

  deliver us from fate most dire.On the word “dire,” there was an ear-shattering crack that resounded throughout the tree. A high flutter could be heard as hundreds of owls flew out from their hollows. The golden leaves of the tree shivered and a few even fell off drifting lazily toward the ground.

  And then the word swirled through the tree. A burly Short-eared Owl flew by the bars of her prison. “Matron! Matron! What is it?” Otulissa called out.

  Barely turning around, the matron called back. “It’s Madame Plonk. Her voice has cracked!”

  CHAPTER SIXTEENCracked

  Listen to me, Bubo,” Madame Plonk spoke in a low, hoarse voice. Each word was like a rough-edged shard grating against the next. “I got her into this. I’ve got. to get her out: of it.”

  “But not. you, Plonkie, dear. You know nothing about flying around out there. When was the last time you crossed Hoolemere? You know nothing about tracking. I should go.”

  “They’re not going to let you go for a minute. Bubo. They got you working that, forge all hours. And they’d suspect, you. They know how close you are to Coryn and to Soren and the Band.” .Madame Plonk fixed her old friend in a steady gaze. “Look, even when I bid that cup they didn’t really want to punish me because they needed my voice. Same way they need your smithing. Tree arrest. That’s a laugh. I was planning this before my voice cracked. It hurts to talk so don’t make me explain too much, lust, listen. I’m the first to admit that I’m a vain old owl. ‘The first singer of the tree’ was what they used to call a gadfeather. She was a Snowy like me and my line is descended from hers. Her name was Snow Rose. She not only sang, but she was a heroic owl. She helped save the life of Hoole’s mother, Siv, then joined Siv’s troops in the Battle in the Beyond when Hoole retrieved the ember.” Madame Plonk paused. “I didn’t know any of this until I took the cup to Otulissa and had, well, I had my last spot of tea in the coronation cup, and she joined me and told me this part of the old stories. The ones they call the legends. But imagine this Snow Rose, a warrior singer! A soldier singer! It’s true. All written down it is in them old books of Ezvlrvb’s. I can do it, too, Bubo. I can be a warrior singer. I know I can.”

  Bubo looked at her with some alarm. Madame Plonk had led a rather comfortable life, indeed one might say cushy, in that tricked-out hoi low of hers that was almost frothy with its trimmings of lace, tassels, gewgaws, and baubles. She was Trader Mags’ best customer. The various doodads that Mags stripped from the castles, manor houses, churches, and abbeys of the Others found their way into Madame Plonk’s hollow. There were plump cushions stuffed with her own discarded feathers covered in velvet from a prince’s cloak. “Gemma and Elyan are so

  worried about me now since my voice cracked because without it they can’t have their stupid rituals. They’re smothering me with kindness.” “You’re not under tree arrest?”

  “No. I told them that I had to be entirely alone if my voice was to come back, that it made me too nervous to have all these matrons and owls checking on me all the time. I can get away, Bubo, I can.”“But, Plonkie.”

  “Bubbie?” She turned her yellow eyes on him, batted them a few times in a sad vet still flirtatious manner, and implored. “You’ve got to understand. No one will suspect me if I go.”

  “But how will you find them? No one knows where they might be.”

  “I’ll go to these grog trees I’ve heard about. A lot of gossip swirls about in grog trees. If my voice is back, I might sing. Singers in olden days were always welcome at grog trees, Otulissa told me.” She shut her eyes for a long time. A very long time, and did not open them when she began to speak. “And it will come back, Bubo, it will. As soon as I get away.” She opened her eyes now and looked straight into the Great Horned’s eyes. “There is something wrong with the tree, Bubo. You know it as well as I do. It ain’t right. Everything looks all gold and glorious but something’s amiss. It shames me now to think of meself singing away at all those stupid ceremonies for the frinkin’ ember.”

  “Hush, Plonkie. Mind your beak. They got slipgizzles all over. Can hardly breathe without them listening in.”“Oh, Bubo, but all that nonsense - acolytes of the ashes, the ember procession, the sacred this, the blah-blah that - and I was actually enjoying it for a while. I got to wear that scrap of purple velvet tufted with ermine, and I felt so special.”

  “You are special, Plonkie.”

  “It’s my voice that was special and now it’s cracked.”

  There was a fluttering outside the hollow and the shadow of wings passed through the stream of moonlight. Bubo looked around nervously and then leaned in close to the Snowy so that his beak was almost touching her ear slit. “Plonkie
, are you really set on doing this?”

  “I am, Bubo.”

  chapter seventeenThe Shape Of the Flames

  Awing and a whisper, thought Soren. Is that all we’ve got? Yes. That seemed to be what he, the Band, and Coryn were flying on. It was all too vague. He wanted to be able to trust the strange rabbit’s mystic web readings, but it just all seemed so … so … he searched for the word … so wispy. So insubstantial. And if Nyra was really there in this cave with whatever remnants of the Pure Ones there might be, things needed to be firmer. They had to plan a strategy. What were they to do? just fly in and seize the book? Even if they were successful in taking the book, would that be the end of their troubles? It wasn’t really the book that was the problem. It was, Soren supposed, the ideas in the book. But ideas could be dangerous just the way the ember could be dangerous in the talons of the wrong owl. He supposed they must fly on. Within a split second of having that thought, he knew he was dead wrong. And as if to confirm his next thought he saw the dark tendrils of smoke rising in the distance.

  Soren lifted a port wing, giving the signal to land. They had flown fast from Silverveil and were now on the border between The Barrens and Ambala.

  “What are we stopping for? I’m not tired,’ Coryn asked as they settled into one of the rather puny trees in The Barrens. But Gylfie took one look at Soren and realized immediately that something was disturbing him deeply. The spindly branch could barely support the weight of the five owls and bowed toward the ground,“Brushfire over there half a league away.” Digger nodded toward the rolling smudge of smoke on the horizon.

  “I know,” Soren said. “That’s part of the reason we’ve stopped.”

  “What’s the other part?” Gylfie asked. She fixed her old friend with a knowing look. “We’re rushing into this.”

  “What do you mean?” Coryn asked. His voice was slightly strained. “That was one of the clearest readings I’ve ever gotten from the rabbit.”

  “You’ve encountered that rabbit all of two times, Coryn,” Soren said. “We need more information. I want to dive into that brushfire. Get some coals and build a small fire here.”

  Coryn looked somberly at his uncle. “You know I can’t just simply ask a fire. That’s not how it works.”

  “I know, Coryn, I know. I don’t want you to ask anything. I only want you to

  watch - just watch. There are hot coals in these brushfires. They’ll give you good flames.”Gylfie sighed. “Except for you. and Coryn, the rest of us won’t be much help in harvesting coals. We’re hardly colliers. Too bad Otulissa isn’t here.”

  Soren jerked his head up. He felt a sharp ping in his gizzard and blinked at Gylfie. The moment she said the words “too bad Otulissa isn’t here” it reminded him of something.

  “What’s wrong. Soren?” Gylfie asked.

  He shook his head as if to dislodge a thought that had become wedged deep in his brain. “When you said ‘Otulissa’ it reminded me of something.” Another wisp? A wisp of a dream perhaps?

  An hour later, the five owls backed away from a small fire that they had built with the half dozen or so coals that Soren and Coryn had retrieved. Coryn stood the closest to the fire. He felt clumsy, even stupid. The flames looked so ordinary. This wasn’t right. He spun his head around finally. “I don’t mean to be rude, but the rest of you get out of here. Scram. I can’t do it when you’re watching me.”

  “Of course,” Soren said. “We’ll go hunting.”

  Once they were gone, Coryn relaxed. He let the heat of the flames lick his face, He closed his eyes and watched the red shadows dance jigs on the inside of his eyelids, then opened them again. The moon was rising. More than halfway through its newing, it appeared slightly lopsided, as if it were about to tumble off the horizon. When it was full in a few more days, there would be an eclipse according to Gylfie, who knew the ways of the stars and the planets because she was the navigation ryb. Coryn had been hatched on the night of an eclipse. And so had Hoole, the king of the legends, and so had Nyra. He felt a shiver pass through him. How could the world contain such good and such bad?

  And what was he? What if the blood of a hagsfiend really did run through his veins? His mind wandered. The flames cast red silhouettes against the moon that trembled now on the darkening horizon. Odd, but he suddenly realized that he had never seen the flames in just this manner - their silhouettes as opposed to looking directly at them. He could not look into them as deeply, but their contours, their shapes had a new clarity. He saw the shape of an owl. A Whiskered Screech, he was certain. He could tell by the small tuft of feathers that hung from his face. He was not especially strong nor a steady flier, and what was that - a nest-maid snake coiled on his back? A wind stirred the fire and the flames leaped

  suddenly to one side, stretching, nearly galloping across the silver of the moon. His gizzard gave a small jump. Something so familiar in that shape, but just then low clouds brushed across the moon. “Racdrops!” Coryn muttered, and dropped his gaze to the flames in the fire. Could he find it there? It was the second shape, the second silhouette that intrigued him, and not that of the Whiskered Screech. There was something in that shape, and he was sure that it was not an owl this time that tugged at his very’ gizzard. He felt a longing, a deep and anguished longing - for a place? For a creature? He peered deeply into the flames. There are so many different colors in a fire no one would believe it, thought Coryn. There is never just red or orange. Coryn had heard that there were no two snow-flakes exactly alike, and he believed that no two flames were alike, either. He had once tried to count the shades of orange, but at some imperceptible point the orange seemed to melt into yellow, and then within the yellow… Coryn’s gizzard flinched. A lovely shade of cream! Soren was right - they were rushing into things. They should not be flying toward the canyonlands at all. They needed an immediate course correction. Coryn had only seen that peculiar cream color once before, and not in a fire but in the Beyond. It was on the glossy coat of a dire wolf. “Gyllbane!”

  CHAPTER EIGHTEENMost Distressing News

  It was a long way to the Beyond, but luckily once again the wind blew from behind and gave them a hefty push north and west. The night was thinning. The moon had slipped away into another world, and it was becoming that hazy time before the dawn. As they shifted positions in their flight formation so that Twilight could fly point in this murky light streaked with false shadows and blurred horizons, Soren could feel the tremor of excitement that coursed through their gizzards. They were at last to meet Gyllbane, the courageous she-wolf, who had turned on her own clan, the notorious MacHeaths. and befriended Coryn. Her own pup had been maimed by Lord MacHeath in hopes that this would qualify the young wolf to become a member of the Sacred Watch.

  Once more, Soren felt a strange little ping in his gizzard. Otulissa! Had he dreamed of her? Had he seen something in a dream? Had his starsight revealed something he could not quite grasp? It seemed odd to him that now for the first time he was flying to the Beyond. Otulissa, of course, had been in the Beyond. That was where she had firstfound Corynandtaught him to collierand then… Well, thought Sores, as they say, the rest is history.

  “Fire In the sky! Volcanoes! Dead ahead!” Twilight shouted back.The Band blinked as they perched atop a ridge. It was a strange and wonderful place. the Beyond. A trio of wolves approached them.. The noble Gyllbane and her son, Cody, and. the faithful Hamish, Coryn’s best friend from his time in the Beyond. Hamish, born with a crippling deformity, had qualified for the Sacred Watch in which he had briefly served. But one of the true blessings of the ember was that once it was recovered, the wolves of the Watch were restored. What was broken in their bodies was mended. What was deformed was made to grow straight. What was crippled gained strength. When Coryn saw his dear friend Hamish come bounding up the rocky escarpment, sleek and powerful, he experienced an unspeakable thrill. And though he was far from the ember he felt a shimmering within him, a glow at the very core of his gizzard that he knew could only
be that of the ember. It was strange, but for the first time he began to get a glimmering that one did not need to have the ember to possess it. Fie realized this as Hamish stepped closer and he touched his beak to Harnish’s wet nose in greeting. Coryn saw the deep burnish of green in his wolf eyes, the same flickering green found in what they had come to think of as the gizzard of the Ember of Hoole. That glimpse of green in the wolf’s eyes seemed to kindle a sympathetic response, a shimmering heat within Coryn.

  Soren, although he had read about the wolf clans in the legends and heard from Coryn about their peculiar and elaborate codes of conduct, was nonetheless astonished. Despite Coryn’s protests, the three wolves scraped the rough ground as they kneeled, then crouched and sunk to their bellies, twisting their necks in all sorts of odd contortions, then flattened their ears and flashing the whites of their eyes. This was the conduct required of a creature of low rank when approaching one of high rank. Coryn was a king and not for one minute would these wolves let him forget it.After the introductions were made and the greetings exchanged, Gyllbane, one of the most beautiful wolves imaginable, turned to Coryn and said, “So, friend, what brings you here, so far from your island in the middle of the sea?”

  Coryn turned his head toward the circle of the five volcanoes that made what was called the Sacred Ring. It all looked so different now. Colliers still plunged in steep dives to harvest the coal slopes that spilled from the volcanoes’ craters, and there was the usual traffic on the fringes of the circle between the colliers and Rogue smiths as they haggled over the price of coals and whether one was truly bonk or not. But the immense piles of gnaw bones surrounding the five volcanoes seemed bare without the wolves of the watch keeping their vigil from the tops.

  Finally, Coryn answered. “I began this journey for the most selfish of reasons. I feared that I bore the traces of a vile heritage. I could not put my obsession with my mother, Nyra, to rest.”Gyllbane blinked. In her own way, she understood this. She had met Nyra and knew her power, and she herself had once been a victim of ruthlessness. It had been hard for her to forget Mac Heath and his abuse of her and her pup.