The Siege (13 page)

O
tulissa’s face was stony. Her white spots stood out like small hard pebbles.

“Do you think she’s going to be all right, Soren?” Eglantine whispered. “You know how much she loved Strix Struma.”

“I think so.” He really wasn’t sure, but he wanted to reassure his younger sister. He was worried. They were all worried about Otulissa. The young Spotted Owl had been flying beside her commander when Strix Struma was struck. It was talon-to-talon fighting, but within the first few blows, the enemy had ripped a tremendous gouge at the point where the primary feathers joined the body. Strix Struma’s wing was almost severed and completely useless, but still she flew. Otulissa counterattacked bravely and managed to land a slashing blow across the attacker’s face.

“I tried to save her,” Otulissa told them when they visited her in her hollow. She kept repeating those words.

Digger, Twilight, Soren, and Gylfie didn’t know what to
say. Then Mrs. Plithiver slithered in. “Otulissa, my dear, she did not want to be saved. What kind of a life would she have had with one wing? Could she have continued to lead the navigation chaw? Could she have commanded her brave Strix Struma Strikers? She had led a full life. She was old. She was ready. She died fighting for a great cause. Try not to fret, dear.”

As comforting as the words had sounded to the other owls, Soren knew they had done nothing to relieve Otulissa’s grief. And now as they gathered for the Final Ceremony, as the rites for a dead owl were called, he could see that Otulissa did not feel any better. Her utter stillness was unnerving. If he had not known better, he would have thought she had been carved in stone.

Meanwhile, a mere ten or twelve feet away on the balcony in the Great Hollow, Dewlap sobbed convulsively. “I never thought. I never thought,” she kept sputtering. Now Otulissa moved. She swung her head around and puffed up in fury. “No, you never thought!” she hissed.

Then Barran flew to the highest perch. “We come to pay tribute today to a great Spotted Owl, Strix Struma. Although she and I were different species, we were sisters bound in our love of freedom and the pure joy of the pursuit of the knowledge of the stars that cycle endlessly, season upon season, in our night skies. It was from dear Strix
Struma, our navigation ryb, that I first learned about the “eyes of glaumora,” as we often call the stars. It is the hideous fury of war that has brought her end, though one cannot call it an untimely death, for she had a long and a vigorous life.” Barran continued to speak most lovingly about her long friendship with the Spotted Owl, and then it was Ezylryb’s turn.

“Her Majesty Barran spoke of the hideous fury of war that brought down our beloved soldier Strix Struma. She died with her claws on. You have heard Barran refer to Strix Struma as her sister, and I am glad she did this. For we have just been fighting a war that was instigated by the vile notion that declares that some breeds of owls are better than others, are more pure. Not one of us shall ever again say the word ‘pure’ or ‘purity’ without thinking of the bloodshed these words have caused.

“We know that one breed or species of owl is not better or more pure than another. We are all of us sisters and brothers in owlkind. I mean to turn that word around and speak of the pureness of spirit of our dear friend, our fierce warrior Strix Struma, who died protecting those very values.

“Last night an owl perished, but on this night, a new constellation rises. Fly out now, young’uns, and find her in the stars that she so loved.”

The night was crisp and clear as the owls flew out of the great hollow. Soren remembered his first navigation class with Strix Struma when they had traced the Golden Talons. Otulissa flew off by herself. Ruby, with whom she had grown so close during their time together in the Strikers, began to follow her.

“No, let her be, Ruby,” Soren said, gliding up to her and touching her wing tip with his own.

“Come, young’uns!” Bubo suddenly appeared. “I hear there is a grand old forest fire blazing on the Broken Talon Point. Ezylryb says we should go have a look. Come along, Twilight, Digger, and the rest of you. We’ll let you all fly with the colliering chaw tonight. Might learn a thing or two, eh?” He winked at Twilight.

They were halfway to the point when they caught sight of a young Spotted Owl. She was directly overhead.

“It’s Otulissa!” Eglantine said.

“What is she doing out here? I didn’t think she wanted to come,” Soren said, flipping his head backward and straight up. Above was a group of stars he had never seen before. Thickly scattered, the stars spread out into two mirror image spirals—just like the smallest dots on a Spotted Owl’s head.

“What is that?” Soren asked Bubo.

“Oh, maybe you have never flown this far north and east. There are different constellations here.”

“What do they call it?” Soren asked.

“Oh, I forget right now. I think it’s named after one of the snow flowers that grows up north at the edge of the glaciers. But I’ve never seen so many stars in it as tonight.”

Some might have called it a flower,
Soren thought.
But tonight it has changed forever.
He watched as Otulissa began to trace with the tip of one wing the spotted head that rose in the night.

Dawn had broken and a rosy pink flooded into the hollow. Soren stirred in his sleep. He had been dreaming terrible gizzard-shattering nightmares. The owl who held the moon in her face blinded him. It was like being moon blinked within his own dreams. He felt himself freeze and go yeep. He could not escape the dream.

A cold wind blew in through the hollow opening and brushed his face feathers. He blinked his eyes open. In an instant, he knew what he must do. Quietly, he rose and slipped out of the hollow and flew down to the entrance of Otulissa’s hollow.

Otulissa was at her desk, writing. Her hollowmates were sound asleep. She looked up.

“It was the moon-faced owl who killed her wasn’t it, Otulissa?”

She nodded. “They call her Nyra. She is your brother’s mate.”

“I know,” Soren said.

Otulissa blinked. “How do you know?”

“I dreamed it.”

“Then you have what they call the starsight,” she said. “You dream about things and sometimes they happen. I’ve read about it. The stars, for you, are like little holes in the cloth of a dream.”

Soren nodded. The way Otulissa had described it seemed right. “That blood across Nyra’s face, you did that, Otulissa?”

“Yes, but it was just a little wound. Hardly mortal. Nyra attacked you after she killed Strix Struma, then she and your brother both got away.” She paused. “They aren’t finished with us, Soren. We can’t wait for them.”

“What do you mean?” A tremor passed through his gizzard.

“I mean that we can’t fight defensively. We have to go after them.”

Soren blinked. There was a fierceness in Otulissa’s eyes. “What are you writing?”

“A plan—an invasion plan. I’m different now, Soren.” Her words came in a hot whisper. One of her hollowmates stirred. “I’ve changed,” she said softly, but her voice was deadly. Soren turned to leave.

Otulissa called after him. “Dream, Soren, dream. Dream your starsight dreams. Dream for your life, dream for our lives. Dream for the Guardians of Ga’Hoole.”