The Capture. Kathryn Lasky

babble and it was not long before, on the fourth sleep march, his own name began to sound odd to Soren. Within another one hundred or so times of repeating it, it seemed almost as if it was not a name at all. It was merely a noise. And he too was becoming a meaningless creature with no real name, no family, but … but … but maybe a friend?

      Finally, they stopped again. And it was in the silence of that moment when they stopped that Soren suddenly realised what was happening. It all made sense, particularly when he thought of what Gylfie had explained to him about moon blinking. This alone would keep him awake until he met up with her again.

      “They are moon blinking us with our names, Gylfie,” Soren gasped as he edged in close to the little owl under the stone arch. Only the stars twinkled above. Gylfie understood immediately. A name endlessly repeated became a meaningless sound. It completely lost its individuality, its significance. It would dissolve into nothingness. Soren continued, “Just move your beak or say your number, but don’t say your name. That way it will stay your name.” There would, however, be at least three more nights of full shine and then the fullness would begin to lessen until the moon was completely dwenked.

      Gylfie looked at Soren in amazement. This ordinary Barn Owl was in his own way quite extraordinary. This was absolutely brilliant. Gylfie felt more than ever compelled to figure out a solution to sleeping exposed to full shine.

CHAPTER SIX

       Separate Pits, One Mind

      When Soren and Gylfie parted at the end of that long night, they looked at each other and blinked, trembling with fear. If only they could be together in the same pit, then they could think together, talk and plan. Gylfie had told Soren a little about her pit. She too had a pit guardian who seemed very nice, at least compared to Jatt and Jutt or Skench. Gylfie’s pit guardian was called Unk, short for Uncle and, like Auntie, he tried to arrange special treats for Gylfie – a bit of snake sometimes, often even calling Gylfie by her real name and not her number, 25-2. Indeed, when Gylfie had told Soren how her pit guardian had asked her to call him “Unk” it was almost identical to the way in which Aunt Finny had insisted on Soren calling her “Auntie”.

      “It was all so weird,” Gylfie had said. “I called him sir at first, and then he said, ‘Sir! All this formality. Really, now! Remember what I asked you to call me? ‘Uncle,’ I answered. ‘Now … now … I gave you my special name’.”

      The special name was Unk and the way in which Gylfie described Unk drawing that term of endearment from her, well, Soren could just imagine the Great Horned Owl dipping low to be on eye level with the little Elf Owl, the huge tufts above his ears nearly scraping the ground.

      “The pit guardians go out of their way to be nice to us,” Soren had said. “But it’s still kind of scary, isn’t it?”

      “Very!” Gylfie had replied. “It was after I called him Unk that he gave me the bits of snake.” She had then sighed. “I remember so well, as if it was yesterday, my First Snake ceremony. Dad had saved the rattles for me and my sisters to play with. And you know what, Soren? It was as if Unk had read my mind because I was thinking about my ceremony and just then he says, ‘I might even have some rattles for you to play with.’ And then I thanked him. I over-thanked him. It was disgusting, Soren.”