I always want some more.
That’s the insect I adore
More than beetles, more than crickets,
Which at times give me the hiccups.
I crave only to feed
On a juicy centipede
And I shall be happy forevermore.
Just as Soren finished the song, his mother flew into the hollow and dropped a vole at her feet. “A nice fat one, my dear. Enough for your First Fur ceremony and Kludd’s First Bones.”
“I want my own!” Kludd said.
“Nonsense, dear, you could never eat a whole vole.”
“Whole vole!” squeaked Eglantine. “Oh, Mum, it rhymes. I love rhymes.”
“I want one all for myself,” Kludd persisted.
“Now, look here, Kludd.” Marella fixed her son in a dark steady gaze. “We do not waste food around here. This is a very large vole. There is enough for you to have your First Bones ceremony, Soren to have his First Fur ceremony, and Eglantine to have her First Meat.”
“Meat! I get to eat meat!” Eglantine gave a little hop of excitement. She seemed to have forgotten all about the joys of centipedes.
“And so, Kludd, when you want a vole all of your own, you can just go out and hunt it for yourself! I spent most of the night tracking down this one. Food is scarce in Tyto this time of year. I’m exhausted.” A huge orange moon sailed in the autumn sky. It seemed to hover just above the great fir tree where Soren and his family lived, and it cast a soft glow in through the opening of the hollow. It was indeed a perfect night for the ceremonies which these owls loved and that marked their growth and the passage of time.
And so that night, just before the dawn, the three little owlets had their First Meat, First Fur and First Bone ceremonies. And Kludd yarped his first real pellet. It was the exact shape of his gizzard, which had pressed it into the tight little bundle of bones and fur. “Oh, that’s a fine pellet, son,” Kludd’s father said.
“Yes, indeed,” his mother agreed. “Quite admirable.” And Kludd, for once, seemed satisfied. And Mrs Plithiver thought privately to herself how no bird could be really bad that had such a noble digestive system.
That night, from the time the big orange moon began to slip down in the sky until the first grey streaks of the new dawn, Noctus Alba told the stories that owls had loved to hear from the time of Glaux. Glaux was the most ancient order of owls from which all other owls descended.
So his father began:
“Once upon a very long time ago, in the time of Glaux, there was an order of knightly owls, from a kingdom called Ga’Hoole, who would rise each night into the blackness and perform noble deeds. They spoke no words but true ones, their purpose was to right all wrongs, to make strong the weak, mend the broken, vanquish the proud, and make powerless those who abused the frail. With hearts sublime they would take flight—”
Kludd yawned. “Is this a true story or what, Da?”
“It’s a legend, Kludd,” his father answered.
“But is it true?” Kludd whined. “I only like true stories.”
“A legend, Kludd, is a story that you begin to feel in your gizzard and then over time it becomes true in your heart. And perhaps makes you become a better owl.”
True in your heart! Those words in the deep throaty hoot of his father were perhaps the last thing Soren remembered before he landed with a soft thud on a pile of moss. Shaking himself and feeling a bit dazed, he tried to stand up. Nothing seemed broken. But how had this happened? He certainly had not tried flying while his parents were out hunting. Good Glaux. He hadn’t even tried branching yet. He was still far from “flight readiness” as his mum called it. So how had this happened? All he knew was, one moment he was near the edge of the hollow, peering out, looking for his mum and da to come home from hunting, and the next minute he was tumbling through the air.
Soren tipped his head up. The fir tree was so tall and he knew that their hollow was near the very top. What had his father said – ninety feet, one hundred feet? But numbers had no meaning for Soren. Not only could he not fly, he couldn’t count either. Didn’t really know his numbers. But there was one thing that he did know: he was in trouble – deep, frightening, horrifying trouble. The boring lectures that Kludd had complained about came back to him. The weight of the terrible truth now pressed upon him in the darkness of the forest – those grim words, “an owlet that is separated from its parents before it has learned to fly and hunt cannot survive”.
And Soren’s parents were gone, gone on a long hunting flight. There had not been many since Eglantine had hatched out. But they needed more food, for winter was coming. So right now Soren was completely alone. He could not imagine being more completely alone as he gazed up at the tree that seemed to vanish into the clouds. He sighed and muttered, “So alone, so alone.”
And yet, deep inside him something flickered like a tiny smouldering spark of hope. When he had fallen, he must have done something with his nearly bald wings that “had captured the air” as his father would say. He tried now to recall that feeling. For a brief instant, falling had actually felt wonderful. Could he perhaps recapture that air? He tried to lift his wings and flutter them slightly. Nothing. His wings felt cold and bare in the crisp autumn breeze. He looked at the tree again. Could he climb, using his talons and beak? He had to do something fast or he would become some creature’s next meal – a rat, a raccoon. Soren felt faint at the very thought of a raccoon. He had seen them from the nest – bushy, masked, horrible creatures with sharp teeth. He must listen carefully. He must turn and tip his head as his parents had taught him. His parents could listen so carefully that, from high above in their tree hollow, they could hear the heartbeat of a mouse on the forest floor below. Surely he should be able to hear a raccoon. He cocked his head and nearly jumped. He did hear a sound. It was a small, raspy, familiar voice from high up in the fir tree. “Soren! Soren!” it called from the hollow where his brother and sister still nestled in the fluffy pure white down that their parents had plucked from beneath their flight feathers. But it was neither Kludd nor Eglantine.
“Mrs Plithiver!” Soren cried.
“Soren … are you … are you alive? Oh dear, of course you are if you can say my name. How stupid of me. Are you well? Did you break anything?”
“I don’t think so, but how will I ever get back up there?”
“Oh dear oh dear!” Mrs Plithiver moaned. She was not much good in a crisis. One could not expect such things of nest-maids, Soren supposed.
“How long until Mum and Da get home?” Soren called up.
“Oh, it could be a long while, dearie.”
Soren
