Grimble's Story
I thought I was being so smart," Grimble said. He had led them into another crack in the canyon wall that was off the large one that led from the pelletorium. "You see, the snatching patrols had just snatched one of my young ones as I was returning with my mate from hunting. It was little Bess. She was my favorite, I have to admit. I swooped in and attacked ferociously. It was actually a cousin of Jatt and Jutt who had Bess in his talons. His name was Ork. He was considered very dangerous and, well, I killed him. The other owls were stunned. They shrank back from me, but then Spoorn and Skench flew in. They saw what had happened. Oddly enough, they were thrilled that Ork was dead. You see, the previous leader of St. Aegolius had died the year before and since then a bitter power struggle had gone on between Ork and his forces and those of Spoorn and Skench. Skench and Spoorn were so happy that they said they would spare my family, never
come by our nest again, if I would agree to return to St. Aegolius and join them. They wanted me for my fighting skills. I had killed Ork with no battle claws at all, just my bare talons and beak. They needed me.
"Well, it seemed that there was no choice. I looked at my dear mate. There were three other young ones in the nest. I had to do it. I had to go. My mate begged me not to. She swore that we could go elsewhere, far away. But Skench and Spoorn laughed and said they would find us no matter where we went. So I joined them. My mate and our owlets promised they would never forget me. Spoorn and Skench promised that I could visit them thrice yearly, which, at the time, seemed very generous. I should have' suspected something right away. But I didn't know about moon blinking then, either. The visits would become meaningless if I were successfully moon blinked. My family would not recognize me nor would I have any feeling for them. This is because moon-blinked owls have no real feelings, and without our feelings we become unrecognizable over time to those who do have feelings. That is the evil genius of moon blinking.
"So I was determined, like you, to resist and to pretend I was fairly successful. Skench and Spoorn had valued my fighting skills so much that they allowed me to earn a name. I had been number 28-5. But I became Grimble." And now ..." Grimble began to shake again.
"Something has changed."
"What do you mean? You resisted," Soren said.
"Yes, to a point."
"To a point? You either are or you're not moon blinked," Gylfie said.
"After every few newings, we are required even as mature owls to be reblinked. I think something has begun to change. It seems that although I resisted, now I am losing something. The faces of my dear mate, my little Bess, have begun to fade. When I used to visit them, my old voice came back. The call of Boreal Owls is like a song, some say like the bells that used to toll in the churches, but now it has become flat. Eight or so newings ago, when I made one of my visits home, I called out as usual as I approached, but no one recognized my call. Then two newings ago, when I arrived, neither my mate nor Bess recognized me."
"Unbelievable," Gylfie whispered.
"And now they are gone," Grimble said.
"Gone?" said Soren. "You mean they left?"
"They left, or perhaps they were killed by Skench and Spoorn or perhaps ..." Grimble's voice dwindled off
"Perhaps what?" Gylfie pressed.
"Perhaps they are there and I simply cannot see them at all, nor do they recognize me. I think I have become like air -- transparent, like nothingness. Is that not the ultimate savagery of being moon blinked? I would say that in another few newings I shall be the perfectly moon- blinked elderly owl."
"But why? Why do they do this? What is the purpose of St. Aggie's?" Soren asked.
'And the flecks, what are they about?" Gylfie looked straight up at the Boreal Owl, who towered over her.
"Ah! One simple question, one not quite so simple. The purpose of St. Aggie's is to take control of every owl kingdom on Earth."
'And to destroy it?" asked Soren.
"You can be sure the kingdoms shall be destroyed, but control is really what they want. And for the kind of control they want they must moon blink. That is their main tool, for moon blinking destroys will, erases individuality, makes everyone the same. The flecks, however, are another kind of tool, a weapon for war."
"What can flecks do?" Gylfie asked.
"No one really knows. I am not entirely sure. The flecks do have powers if certain things are done to them."
"What kind of powers?"
'Again, I am not certain. They seem to be able to pull things toward them, sometimes. When I am working in
the fleck storage area of the library, sometimes I think I can feel their force."
Soren and Gylfie were mystified. "How strange," Gylfie said.
"Teach us to fly, Grimble! Teach us to fly." It was Soren who blurted out the words. The idea half formed seemed to explode at once in his head, sending tremors all the way down to his gizzard. There was a stunned silence. Gylfie and Grimble both looked at Soren and blinked but remained wordless.
"But you know, Soren, and you know, Gylfie, I can tell you what to do, and I can help you practice, but I cannot do everything. It's very strange with flying. A young owl can do everything just perfectly but if you don't believe ..."
Gylfie and Soren both blinked at Grimble and together said, "If you don't believe, then you'll never fly."
"Yes, yes. I see you understand. And, of course, that is why none of the owlets in the glaucidium will ever fly. It is not only that the vampire bats quiet their stirrings and cause their feathers to turn brittle, but if an owl is moon blinked it, of course, has no notion of what it means to believe."
"But we aren't moon blinked," Gylfie said. "And I don't believe you are either, Grimble."
"You give me hope, you two young ones. I thought all of my hope had been destroyed, but you give me hope. Yes, I shall try. Here is what we must do."
So Grimble explained to them that he was in charge of organizing the products of the pellets -- the teeth, the fur, and the flecks -- after each day's work. "I store them in the library and keep lists, inventories. I can get you a pass to help in the listings. I work mostly in a small area off the library and then take them in when I get enough. When I don't do that, I am on day guard of the library. You will never be permitted in the library, but I can try to teach you how to fly in that small space. It isn't ideal but it is the only place we have. It connects to the library, which is larger, but you can't go in there because when I am in the inventory area someone else is guarding the library."
"I thought the library had books," Gylfie said.
"It does. But we store these materials there, too. Near the books that supposedly explain them."
"Gylfie feels somehow deep in her gizzard that the flecks might help us escape." "Don't depend on such things," Grimble said sharply. "Your own belief in yourself will help you much more than any fleck ever will."
And so it was arranged. Gylfie and Soren would be given passes to help in the inventory area, the inventorium, each night during the newing and on various nights until the moon was full again and all owlets were required in the glaucidium for moon blinking. Their first lesson would begin that very evening.
