The Shattering (Guardians of Ga'hoole) Read Online Free PDF Page B

called out, “Eglantine! Ginger!” He was trying extra hard to be nice to Ginger. He had felt that Eglantine had been right in a way—Ginger, after all, had known only the brutal waysof the Pure Ones, and her bad behavior really wasn’t all her fault. And Ginger did seem to respond well to his kindness. She seemed much nicer and was genuinely trying to learn the ways of civilized owls. The three of them now sought a perch in a spruce tree that somehow clung to the rocky edge above the beach.
    “Where have you two been?”
    “Halfway across the sea!” Eglantine exclaimed with delight. “I think I really am getting better. I’m not sleeping nearly as much. I think it’s that tonic matron has been giving me.”
    “And she’s getting stronger, too,” Ginger added.
    But what Eglantine did not tell anyone was that although she wasn’t sleeping as much, her dreams had become even more intense. And more important, she now knew they were not just dreams but were real and true. Out there—somewhere—was a hollow just like the one in which she and Soren had been hatched, and their mother was there, waiting for them. It wasn’t in the Forest of Tyto but rather, she suspected, in the region known as The Beaks. She could see this place perfectly in her dream. The hollow was in a fir tree, and it was near a beautiful shining lake. She hadn’t told anybody yet, not even Primrose or Ginger. But she knew if she stayed awake a littlelonger each night and tried to fly as hard as she could, soon she would be strong enough to fly there.
    And then what joy there would be! She would be Soren’s hero. She would be the one who found their parents. And Soren would never again dare leave her out of anything. They would all be happy together. Eglantine had already figured out that they would live together here in the Great Ga’Hoole Tree part of the year and then the other part of the year in their own private hollow in The Beaks, or maybe even back in Tyto. And Mrs. Plithiver would come along and keep everything as neat and perfect as she had before. Yes, it would all be so perfect, and she just knew that her parents were so smart that Boron and Barran would ask them to be rybs. Oh, it would all be so wonderful.
    Eglantine and Ginger flew back to the tree with the other owls who had been out. They headed toward Mrs. P.’s table for breaklight.
    “Good news!” Mrs. P. said as they gathered around her for one of their favorite summer meals, milkberry jelly with a small bug set right in the middle.
    “What’s that?” said Soren.
    “Matron says that Eglantine is well enough to return to her own hollow to sleep.”
    “You were out flying tonight,” Gylfie said to Eglantine. “So you must be feeling a lot better.”
    “Yes,” Eglantine said.
    “Oh, great!” Primrose said. She had missed Eglantine so much when she was gone. But she had to admit that Ginger was a lot nicer than she had been at first.
    “But,” Mrs. P. continued, “you have to keep taking the tonic, Eglantine.”
    “Oh, I will. I promise. ”
    “Oh,” Primrose exclaimed. “I got a dragonfly in my jelly. My favorite!”
    The other owls began poking at their milkberry jelly to see what bug might be embedded in the lilac-colored treat.
    Eglantine peered down into her own jelly. It wasn’t a slug or a grasshopper. It was a centipede, her very favorite bug. It had to be a sign—a sign that her dreams were real. Her mum had always brought back centipedes as a special treat for her, and Soren would sing the centipede song. She looked up at Soren now with huge, blinking eyes.
    “Eglantine, you’re not going to make me sing the centipede song here?” he whispered.
    Eglantine giggled. “No, don’t worry.” And she might have said aloud what she was thinking: I don’t need the centipede song to prove that my dream is real. Mum is waiting for me with a dozen centipedes, I just know it!
    The shortest night and longest day of the year were approaching. It was