Journey to Thorn Valley

Chapter 6

Waking up with the rest of her family in a strange place in the middle of nowhere must have been enough to drive the point home for little Cynthia to understand their situation.

She didn't complain, she just looked around, taking in the novelty as they had breakfast before she asked a new question.

"We are not going home?"
"No, Cynthia. We are going to a new place."
"Well, technically we are going home, only it's a new home."
"Like when we go back and forth from the summer house to the winter house."
"Okay," Cynthia kept quiet for a little while, "when will we get back?"
"Not ever," answered Martin firmly, "from now on we'll have just one house. This is the last time we move."
"Oh. When will we get there?"
"In a couple days more, give or take," answered Timothy, who had been eating while checking the maps.

Everyone turned to him.

"Are you sure?"
"Yep, something like that."

Martin crouched down next to him, frowning, "what do you mean give or take?"

Timmy took a deep breath and pointed to one specific point in the map, "this is where we are. This is where the farm is, and this is where we are going. If we calculate how long Jeremy covered in one day, we can count how many days it will take him to do the rest of the journey... which is between two and five days."
"Two and five days?"
"Mhm!"
"There is a big difference between two and five days! Which one is it?"
"Well, I can't tell! Everything is so small in this map, and I don't know the exact point where we are, or where we are going. And then there's wind and rain stuff! If we get lucky maybe we could be there in two days. If not, then it can take as long as five."

"That's a lot of days..." Teresa sighed. One whole day traveling on the back of Jeremy had already felt tiring. "Not really," said Timmy, with a cheerful tone, "it is still less than a week."
"I'm sorry, Jeremy," said Mrs. Brisby, "it seems like you could be far from home for almost two weeks."
"Oh, don't worry Mrs. Brisb, two weeks is not that long. Besides, once I know the way it will be easier to come back."
"It will probably be something between two and five for us, so for him... around a week."

Martin slapped Timmy on his shoulder and shook him encouragingly, "well done Timmy!" and the little one smiled proudly. Mrs. Brisby said nothing, but she smiled too.

The journey continued. Like previously, the takeoff felt exhilarating and the children were entertained simply looking and commenting on how different things looked from a new perspective, and especially now that it was morning.

As they got used to the situation and a little more confident, they started loosening up their bindings and it got a lot easier to move around and entertain themselves with word games and stories, or anything that they could see in the distance.
Timmy practically untied himself and just held onto the cord around Jeremy's neck while his mother held him from behind. He asked Jeremy if he could distinguish with his bird eyesight any large landmarks that he could use to locate them on the map, and this gave them plenty of conversation.

Mrs. Brisby had bundled up and tied Cynthia against her back using her red cape, and Teresa helped keeping the little one entertained, though at some point she just fell asleep against her mother's back. Mrs. Brisby and her eldest daughter entertained themselves by humming a sweet lullaby, which later developed into full on group singing.

Halfway through the third day, Timmy asked, "Jeremy, you said a hawk could try to hunt you?"

"Well, yeah, depends on the kind of hawk and the occasion, you know? I-"
"Is that a hawk?"
"What? Where?"

Jeremy looked over his shoulder, saw the distinctive silhouette over him and screamed.
The hawk lounged. Everything happened so fast.

Jeremy flapped his wings frantically just to get off the raptor's course, who flew past right next to them like a bullet, and Martin saw it expertly turn in the air and correct its course to chase after them in the time that Jeremy had only managed to turn towards the trees.
It was very fast. Much faster than Jeremy.