Blue Hills Read Free Page B

jroon Kar set out to complete a task, completed it is. And with flair!” spouted Kar from her silly mallet head, its blue plume waving. “Nothing could be simpler. So! Such! These so said mysterious Blue Hills lie somewhere beyond the source of the Greenwilla River, if I clearly understood Freshet Spill. And I did. I am the first and only jrabe jroon and my hearing is uncommon keen. What say you, Bekka of Thorns? Shall we depart right now?”
    Kar’s eyes, pink though they gleamed, were truly Kar’s, and I could read ‘em. They urged me to say yes.
    â€œYes. We will … go to … the Falls of Horn. Yes! That’s it! Then up the Greenwilla all the way to its source and beyond to … the Blue Hills,” I managed to say. Then I added, “Won’t you come with us?”
    Three of the waterwizards shifted their gazes to the fourth. The fourth, the one in purple with the white moons and stars, stroked his blue beard with a minty green hand. I tried to remember his name. Was it … Runnel … Furn? … No … Burn? Yes! That was it!
    â€œIt be for me to tell ye that all waterwizards everywhere be flowing here to the Well of Shells,” he said. “We four arrived first because we make our watery homes nearby. Mine be the pool beneath the Falls of Horn. Freshet Spill’s be found in Dragon’s Deep Pool. Riverine Run be my neighbor. His home be the Falls themselves. Eddy Gurge swims the depths of a beckoning pool in the Chack Tree Forest. So ye see, we be closest to here of all the waterwizards. And here we will wait for the gathering. In collection will we gather around the Well of Shells. When the last one of us dribbles in, we shall turn as one and gaze at yon beeketbird for the pure true sign of your success. If it flies, the witch be returned, and with her, our powers. If not …”
    Runnel Burn shrugged and fell silent.
    â€œThe beeketbird will fly!” shouted Kar, and she leaped up to swoop and flutter in the air. “Bek, let us away now to the Falls of Horn and the Blue Hills!”
    I stood, rushed into the hut, grabbed Jo Bree, dead brown stick though it was, looked at my chonka, rejected the idea of taking it, rushed back outside, and followed Kar’s ridiculous wobbling flight into the Villcom Wood after waving what I thought was a dignified good-bye to the four waterwizards.

Chapter Eight
    To the Falls of Horn
    â€œKar, fly closer. What do you think happened?”
    â€œThe witch went to the Blue Hills.”
    â€œI know that. But why? I mean why do you think she did it?”
    â€œI don’t know why. She did it. We have to get her back.”
    â€œBut don’t you wonder?”
    â€œI’m not the wonderer. You are, Bek.”
    â€œSuch.”
    â€œSo. And … Oho! There’s Janellia Spurl like as you said. That is a plump sudplum she’s reaching for.”
    â€œLeave it alone, Kar! I want it to be there when … when we … I … bring the Babba Ja Harick back from the Blue Hills. Blue Hills? Listen to me. I’m talking about somewhere I never even knew existed when I woke up this morning.”
    â€œLook there, Bek. Hodding Spurl. He was caught in laughter. So. Better than being caught like this. Why did I make these wings so such stubby? I tire so quickly and have to rest too often. Stick out your arm, Bek. I’ll perch there for a span.”
    â€œWell, so, Kar, you aren’t heavy at all, are you? You are just a clump of ridiculous feathers. And why did you make the webbed feet point backward?”
    â€œThought it was funnier.”
    â€œOh.”
    Thus and so, we moved through the Villcom Wood, chatting the way we always chat whenever we are chatting. I’ve known her longer than anyone. We were misfits together for bar years of our younglinghoods in the hedge as bendo dreen before we discovered on our first adventure that Kar was in truth a shapeshifting jrabe.