“I told you it wasn’t my imagination.” Piper said.
“And you were right,” Jax replied. “I can see the ‘green spot’… now that it’s right in front of me.”
“You know, for this area to be so green, there must be a spring up there in the hills. Shall we go find it?”
“Sure,” Piper said. “Let’s see if Chantel is ready to go.”
Chantel had found a comfortable place to sit and sketch the area.
“We’re going to see if we can find the spring that feeds this green patch,” Piper called to her. “Do you want to come with us?”
“Let me put my stuff away, and I’ll be right with you.”
The three cats walked to the small stream running through the center of the lush area.
“Let’s go see where this water’s coming from,” Jax said, leading them up the narrow valley into the foothills.
They followed the stream as it meandered between the two steep-sided hills. Tall grass and wildflowers crowded the stream, filling the air with a cool freshness.
Chantel breathed deeply. “What a wonderful place. You could forget all your troubles here.”
“Too true,” Piper said. “It makes you wonder what’s around the next bend.”
“Well, there’s your answer,” Jax said as he walked past the outcrop that had blocked their view.
Looking around the beautiful, lush meadow that opened up before him, Jax waited for Piper to join him.
“So, what do you think, Hon, should we build our cabin here?”
“Sure…” Piper said, taking in the tranquil scene. “when you decide you want to hide from the world.”
“Not our place then,” Jax laughed. “It is beautiful, though.”
Walking into the clearing, Piper saw that there was only one way in or out. “The spring must be close.”
“Well, with the help of these hills,” Jax said, looking around, “I think we’ve got it surrounded.”
“There’s something over there.” Chantel pointed to some large stones at the far end of the clearing.
Following the stream across the clearing, they saw more than just a pile of stones.
“That looks like the entrance to a cave,” Chantel said, trying to see inside. “That’s where the stream is coming from.”
“That’s a pretty good-sized opening,” Jax said. “It’s time to break out the shiners.”
With the stream flowing against one side of the opening, there was still room for the three cats to enter, walking side by side.
“This is much bigger than I was expecting,” Jax said, his voice echoing around the cave.
“And look, the stream is coming from that opening at the back.”
“Okay, now,” Piper cautioned. “This is all very exciting, but we need to take this seriously. Caves can be dangerous.”
“You’re right, of course.” Jax said, stopping to carefully examine his surroundings.
Chantel spoke up. “With that in mind, since I haven’t had any experience in exploring caves, I suggest that I wait outside in case you two get into trouble. I’d be able to go for help.”
“Alright then, that’s the plan.” Jax agreed.
When Chantel was standing at the cave entrance, Jax turned and led Piper deeper into the cave.
Still following the stream, they entered a second chamber.
“Now this is a good size.”
“Hell, we could build our cabin in here,” Piper joked. “It’s awful chilly in here, though.”
“Yeah, I noticed that.” Jax said, shining his light at the ceiling and walls. “It looks stable enough. Let’s keep going.”
Crossing the chamber, they found themselves standing at the entrance of a third, enormous chamber.
“Now there’s something you don’t see every day,” he said as they shined their lights around a huge cavern.
“Well, that’s where the stream is coming from,” Piper stated, shining her light on a large pool in the center of the cavern.
“Is that ice covering the far wall?” Jax asked.
“As cold as it is in here,” Piper said with a shiver, “I’d say that was a good guess.”
“What do you think, does it look safe enough for Chantel to come in and see this?”
Swinging his shiner around the cavern again, “I don’t see any rubble on the floor, so it must have been stable in here for a long, long time. I’d call it safe.” he decided.
It wasn’t long before an amazed Chantel stood gazing at the ice-coated cavern.
“I absolutely have to draw this scene,” Chantel said, her eyes glowing with excitement. “Can you give me time to do that?”
“Of course, we can,” Piper told her. “Just don’t take all day. If you haven’t noticed, it’s freezing in here.”
“Yeah, I noticed.” Chantel said, taking off her pack. “I think it’s time to put on our heavy robes.”
With Jax and Piper lighting the cavern for her, Chantel went to work on her drawing.
It wasn’t too long before she called a halt. “Well, that’s not my best work, but it’s just too darned cold. I’ll have to come back sometime, better set up to handle the cold.”
Back outside in the warm sunshine, Chantel showed them her drawing.
“You’re right, that is pretty rough,” Piper said, “but maybe you can refine it later.”
“I want to keep this one as my first impression,” Chantel replied. “I’ll make a new one from memory. You never know what details your subconscious has picked up that might surface in the second drawing.”
“Well, what do you think,” Jax asked, “shall we head back down to the ‘Green Spot’ to continue looking for the History Tree?”
“Yeah, we’ll save this for another day.” Piper said.
“It is pretty cool though,” she said with a grin. “Get it… cool, ice.”
“Okay, I’ll give that one,” Jax laughed. “That was pretty good.”
“You two are a good match,” Chantel said with a chuckle.
“You mean because nobody else would be able to put up with us,” Jax grinned.
“Well, I wasn’t going to say…” Chantel laughed.
Back at what they had officially named the Green Spot, the three cats relaxed, eating their midday meal.
“How are you doing, Chantel? This is a little different from studying drawings and writings in a library.”
“I wouldn’t say that work in the library can’t be exciting at times,” Chantel replied with a smile. “But I love it out here in the real world. Think about what we saw today. This is wonderful.”
“It’s even more fun when you get to tell other cats about it,” Piper told her.
When they were done with lunch, Piper stood up and stretched, “The first thing we need to do is pace off the size of the Green Spot, edge to edge.”
“I’ve got paper and a drawing stick,” Chantel said, “why don’t you let me keep track of your paces?”
“Hey, I’m not completely uneducated,” Piper replied, acting indignant. “I can count higher than the number of my fingers and toes.” Then she burst out laughing at Chantel’s shocked expression.
“Sorry, Chantel, I knew what you meant.” Piper laughed. “How about every time I get to a hundred, I say it out loud, and you can mark it down?”
“Okay, we’ll do it that way,” Chantel said. “Oh, and by the way, you do know, don’t you, that I’ll be paying you back for all the times you’ve been teasing me?”
“I’d expect nothing less,” Piper replied with an impish grin.
“And Jax, you might just as well relax until we get back from the eastern edge of this green spot. We’ll keep on counting until we get to the western edge to get an accurate count.”
“Of course, it’s all an approximation, but it looked like we’d need to go four more ‘green spots’ to get in line with our ‘three steep hills’ reference point.”
“It sounds like that’ll be a good place to camp for the night,” Jax said.
Jax settled back, getting comfortable. “Wake me up as you go by.”
After a lot of counting, the three cats stood at the western edge of the green spot.
Jax and Piper looked to Chantel, who was totaling up all the marks.
“We’ll multiply the number of strides it took to cross the Green Spot by four, and that’s how much farther we need to go to find that ‘three steep hills’ reference point.”
“I’ve got forty counts of a hundred,” Chantel said. “That makes four thousand strides, which means we’ve got sixteen thousand strides to go.”
“Damn, that’s a lot of counting,” Piper said. “I’m glad you’re keeping track.”
“We should come up with a marching chant that repeats every ten strides,” Jax said. “That would make the time go faster.”
“Maybe, but by the time we got there,” Piper replied, “I’d never get the chant out of my head.”
“Alright then, back to counting,” Jax said, leading off.
When they finally called a halt, it was late afternoon, and Piper was looking a little frazzled.
“Oh great, now I can’t stop counting,” Piper said, holding her head.
“That’s okay Hon,” Jax said, giving her a hug. “You just find a comfortable spot and lay down for a bit. I’ll set up camp and get a fire going.”
“You’re going to spoil me,” she said, enjoying the hug.
Jax came back later, finding Piper napping in a patch of afternoon sunlight.
“Time to wake up. We’ve got one last thing to do before we call it a day,” he said as she slowly opened her eyes with a smile.
“I love naps,” she said with a long, sensuous stretch.
“So, what’s this last thing that we need to take care of?”
“We need to find your three pointy hills and mark out the direction to the History Tree,” Jax explained.
“Oh yeah, that is why we’re here, isn’t it,” she said.
“Where’s Chantel?”
“She found an out of the way spot and has been working on a drawing,” Jax answered.
“Maybe it’s a picture of the three pointy hills,” Piper said.
“Could be, let’s go find out,”
Chantel’s drawing was a beautifully detailed picture of the ice cave.
“My goodness, that’s beautiful. You’re definitely a cat of many talents,” Piper said, admiring the fine details.
“We need to locate Piper’s three pointy hills while we still have some sunlight,” Jax said, indicating the lengthening shadows.
“There they are… big, pointy, and there’s three of them,” Jax said, pointing northwest across the valley.
“We’re assuming that we’ve traveled the right distance from the Green Spot. So, let’s drive a rod in the ground where we’re standing.”
“Now let’s walk about fifty feet south toward the mountains.”
“Now, turn around and find the ‘three hills’ again. Move one way or the other so that the rod we just drove lines up with the center of the three hills. Drive our second rod at the point where everything lines up.”
“And if we head southeast along the line indicated by the two rods, we should find the History Tree,” Piper finished for him.
She continued, “We need to find an easy-to-find reference point on the mountain, that’s in line with our rods and the three hills. That will actually be where Benji’s big boulder is, but as big as that rock was, I don’t think we can see it from here, so we’ll need something bigger.”
“I also think that as we travel through the foothills toward the mountain, we should leave stacks of stones or marker stakes on hilltops to maintain our line of reference.”
“Does that make sense?” she asked the other two.
“It does when you explain it like that,” Chantel said. “I probably wouldn’t have thought of all that until I was wandering around lost.”
“See,” Jax said to Chantel, “stuff like this is why I keep her around.”
“That’s why you keep me around?” Piper asked, fixing him with a glare.
“Whoa there!” Jax frantically answered, holding out his hands. “Let me rephrase that.”
Chantel was looking from one to the other with a frightened expression, when first Piper, then Jax broke down laughing, hugging each other.
When they finally stopped laughing, wiping tears from their eyes, Chantel stood with her hands on her hips.
“Be warned! Your payback will be huge and terrible,” she said in a menacing voice.
That reduced them to fresh gales of laughter, with Chantel laughing along with them.
Finally catching their breaths, they settled down and started getting things ready for dinner.
Chantel quietly walked up behind them and whispered, “Huge and terrible.”
Jax looked at Piper with mock terror, “Huge!” he said, and Piper replied with a trembling voice, “and terrible.” Then the laughter started all over again.