The sun was up, but there was still a chill in the air as the three cats prepared to start the last stage of their search for the History Tree.
“Okay, who’s going up the first hill?” Jax asked as Piper was putting out their morning campfire.
“You didn’t hear? We already voted to let you have the honor,” Piper said, winking at Chantel.
“Oh, did you?” Jax replied, raising an eyebrow.
“Yep, I think you were still asleep.” Piper said innocently. “We didn’t want to wake you.”
“How very considerate of you,” Jax chuckled.
“Okay, let’s decide on a hill that’s in line with our reference line,” he said, looking off to the southeast. “When I get up there, you guys will need to site over the two rods we planted yesterday. You can direct me exactly where to place a marker. If I can find enough rocks, I’ll stack them up; otherwise, I’ll drive a stake with a piece of colored cloth tied to it.”
“Right,” Piper said. “Then, after that, when we go up the next hill, we’ll lose sight of the two rods, so we’ll have to use the first hill marker lined up with the center of the three steep hills.”
“We don’t need a marker on every hill that’s in line, as long as we can see the last one and the three hills, we should be okay.”
“So the next decision is, do we climb each hill that’s in line, which will be a lot of work? Or do we mostly travel down between the hills, only climbing the ones where we want to place markers?”
“I propose a compromise,” Chantel said, joining the conversation. “One of us will go up and down each hill, placing markers as necessary, while the other two follow along down below. We can rotate the hill climbing duty so we can all get plenty of exercise.”
“That’ll work,” Jax said, pointing to the hill where the first marker would go. “I’ll wave when I get on top so you can guide me where to put the marker.”
Standing on the hilltop, Jax watched as Piper sited over the reference rods, while Chantel stood ready to give him directions.
“Okay, Chantel, Jax needs to move about six feet to the west,” Piper said as she crouched down so she could site along the rods and see Jax on the hill.
Chantel looked up at Jax, raising her right arm straight up, then dropped it down to point westward. As Jax moved in that direction, Chantel slowly brought her arm back up to vertical, telling Jax to stop.
“How’s that, Piper?”
“He’s close, just another foot to the west.”
Chantel raised her arm straight up again, then just a bit to the west, holding it there until Piper said, “Stop.” Then she snapped her arm straight up again.
Looking back over her shoulder, she asked, “Is that good?”
“That looks good to me, give him the okay to plant the marker.”
Chantel raised her other arm and made an X over her head, and held it there until Jax returned the same signal.
“Okay,” Piper said, reaching for her pack. “Let’s go find that tree.”
Walking along between the hills, it wasn’t long before they lost sight of the three steep hills behind them. From then on, they relied on Jax on the hilltops to keep them traveling in the right direction.
“I can’t believe how fast we lost all our reference points,” Chantel remarked. “This would be hopeless without the hilltop markers. There’s definitely a lesson to be learned there.”
“Spoken like a true teacher,” Piper said. “But you know, with young cats and kittens growing up in the village, these are things they’ll need to learn.”
“That’s something to think about,” Chantel replied, glancing up to keep Jax in sight.
After a few hours, Jax stopped to build a pile of stones on the hill he was on before coming down to join Piper and Chantel.
“I’m ready for a break,” he said, pulling out his water skin. “How’s it been going down here?”
“It’s been pretty strenuous, but we’re managing to keep up,” Piper grinned. “How about you give me a break and let me climb hills for a while?”
“You’ve got yourself a deal,” Jax replied with a smile. “But seriously, slow and easy, we’re not in any hurry. At least up on the hilltops you get a good view of the terrain. I hope you see more than I did. All I saw was hills, hills, and more hills.”
“Alright,” Piper said, “hand over those marker stakes and the mallet, and I’ll go find a hill to climb.”
Just after midday, Piper marked her hill and walked down to where Jax and Chantel were waiting.
“No luck, I take it,” Jax said, noting Piper’s frown.
“I have a feeling we missed it,” she said. “From up on the hill, I’d say that we’re about half way to the mountains. When we were up by Benji’s big boulder, it looked like the depression with the tree was about a third of the way from the forest’s edge to the mountains.”
“I think we were pretty close on that estimate,” Jax said, looking at the mountain peaks to the south, “so if you think we’ve gone half way, then yeah, we missed it.”
“So what do we do now?” Chantel asked.
“Well, it’s time to head back to camp anyway,” Jax said. “Maybe we can find it on the way back.”
“I suggest that I walk the hilltops, keeping a few hills off to the side, but paralleling line of markers that we’ve already set,” Jax said, “then Chantel can do the same a few hills farther away, keeping in line with me, with Piper repeating that a few more hills away, keeping in line with Chantel.”
“That’ll let us cover a good chunk of land,” Piper said. “So which side of the line are we going to search?”
Jax quickly asked, “Chantel, which side?”
“West,” she replied without thinking.
“Okay then, west it is,” he said.
“Let’s take a break and have some lunch,” Piper said, dropping her pack, “then we can head back.”
After lunch, they spread out, each to their own line of hills, and started back heading northwest.
They weren’t exactly staying in line with each other because of the different sizes of the hills they were each climbing, but keeping an eye on each other, they managed a pretty consistent search pattern.
About an hour into the return search, Piper gave a loud shout.
“Hold up!” she yelled, frantically waving her arms. “Over here! You’ve got to see this!”
Chantel immediately headed to where Piper was dancing around excitedly.
Jax smiled at Piper’s antics, then reached into his pack for a marker stake and his mallet. He pounded the stake in place and then decided to add a second one in a line to where Piper was doing her dance. He thought his markers would be visible to anyone following the main line of markers that they’d already laid down.
“Alright, hold on,” he shouted, “I’m coming over.”
To say that Piper and Chantel waited patiently for Jax would be a complete exaggeration, but they did wait.
“Well, that’s exactly what I expected… almost,” Chantel stated, looking down at the area surrounded by hills. “There’s a huge tree growing in the center, and there are seven tall stones marking the perimeter of the area, but there’s more to it.”
“Enough of this,” she said, starting to show her excitement. “Let’s get down there and take a closer look.”
Jax had to laugh watching the two cats bounding down the steep hill. “Careful, ladies!” he cautioned. Then, after planting a last marker, he followed them down.