The War of the Ember (13 page)

I
n a glistening nest sparkling with frost and woven of ice shards, eight dark eggs shimmered.

“Beautiful, aren’t they?” Nyra said with soft wonder. This particular fissure in the Ice Cliff Palace widened into a vast cave. Two dozen dragon owls from the Panqua Palace were sitting on more than a dozen similar nests. There were a few Pure Ones who had joined the broody forces. Everyone took turns nest-sitting. No one was excused, as Nyra had just explained to Tarn. It was now more important than ever, since four of the reinforcement broody owls had met an untimely death on their flight to the Ice Cliffs. But at least by that time all the eggs had been transported from the Gray Rocks. That they had not lost one egg during the skirmish with the kraals and gadfeathers was a miracle.

Occasionally now, one of the eggs would jiggle or rock back and forth just a bit.

“They’ll get even darker,” the Striga added. “By the time of the eclipse they will be completely black. The blackest black.”

“How do you know?” Tarn asked.

“They always destroyed the eggs immediately after they were laid, but one was found once that had been secretly brooded, sequestered away, oh, a half century or more ago in the Dragon Court. It was, of course, immediately destroyed, but I caught a glimpse of it.” A faraway look misted the Striga’s pale yellow eyes. “I think that in some way I knew even then that it was my mission to see that such destruction might never happen again. And then when I actually had that first glimpse of the book in the library I felt disturbed, but I didn’t know why. It was only when dear Nyra explained what she had seen in that book that it all came to me. Fit together so perfectly. And then she told me of her recovery in the Panqua Palace! Oh, and now we are so close. We are almost there! Four more nights of incubation and then a very short period after hatching, three nights at the most, and they shall be fit for battle.”

“An honor, Striga,” said one of the broodies. Then another added, “Until now our lives had no meaning.”

“This is our destiny,” another said as she moved back on the nest she had left temporarily so that Tarn could view the eggs.

“But what news do you bring me?” Nyra asked, turning to the Burrowing Owl. She had hardly given him a moment to speak since he had arrived and then she had launched into the broody schedule and how all must serve.

“Well, there is some good news,” Tarn said carefully.

“And bad news as well?” Nyra’s eyes narrowed.

“Not really bad news, Madame General. We may need to adjust our schedule.”

“Now what do you mean by that?” Nyra asked.

“We have received word from several sources, including Kylor, the slipgizzle who defected from serving the Guardians, that the ember is now headed for the Beyond.”

“The Beyond, not near the coast?” Striga said excitedly.

“They no longer seem headed toward the coast. It is as far from any water as one can imagine. You need not fear fighting any battles near salt water with the young hagsfiends,” Tarn said, looking at the Striga. Relief seemed to sweep through the ice cave.

“That is good. The hatchling hagsfiends will mature quickly, but it’s best to avoid salt water.”

“And what is the business about a different schedule?” Nyra asked.

“Well, some say the ember will be there in a week.”

“A week is fine. We’ll be ready,” Nyra replied.

“But others say that the ember is there now,” Tarn replied.

“Now?” Nyra screeched, and she and the Striga both wilfed in alarm.

“Yes, but only temporarily. It will be taken to another secret location, most likely the Middle Kingdom.”

“The Middle Kingdom?” the Striga exclaimed.

“You mean that we must act now?” Nyra said.

“Indeed, Madame General. I have already alerted our forces in the Kuneer to commence invasion maneuvers.”

“But you had no authority to do that!” Nyra barked.

“But General, you were not there. We cannot afford to lose any time.”

Nyra had swelled to twice her normal size.

“Tarn did the right thing!” the Striga hissed.

“Are you both turning on me?” Nyra raged.

“Calm yourself, Madame General.” The Striga spoke urgently. Sometimes he wondered how this owl had become the leader she was. She acted purely on her
impulses for power without ever reflecting on strategy. No wonder she had been defeated in every encounter with the Guardians, even those when she had enjoyed the advantage of superior forces. “This is no time to argue about silly protocols of command. If this war comes earlier, we must be prepared. If the ember is in the Beyond and if there is the threat of it being removed, we need to be able to act quickly.”

“But what are we to do? These eggs are close but not close enough to hatching. We were counting on a hags force to help us seize the ember.”

“They will hatch. Not as quickly as we might like, but when they do, they will come. This war is not going to be over in one night. But we must be ready with the forces that we can muster right now.” The Striga said calmly.

He turned to the broodies. “Can you do double shifts? In other words, can we count on some of you to join us now in this fight? Elab, you are large, could you sit two ice nests at a time?”

“Oh, I think I could sit three if need be.”

“Good. If we can cut our broody force in half that gives us eighteen more owls to fly with us in the Striga Force!” His pale eyes glittered brightly like translucent suns.

It galled Nyra no end—this “Striga Force” business. But she had decided not to argue with him over the name. They were only a part of the Pure Ones, and the Pure Ones were her army. Nyra might be impulsive, but she had learned how to pick her battles.

“Yes, yes, I see what you mean,” Nyra said slowly. Her gizzard was twitching madly. The ember so near! And in a sense, so safe, for it was far from the water. The dragon owls need not fear the salt water, and when the hagsfiends finally hatched and were ready, they, too, would be safe. She imagined the horror in the Guardians’ eyes when the sky above the volcanoes would suddenly darken as scores upon scores of hagsfiends flew over. “You’re right. We must leave now, immediately. I shall send a message to Kuneer to begin advancing toward our mustering point, where I will meet them and resume my command of the Tytonic Union of Pure Ones.” Nyra said these last five words in a measured voice and looked steadily at the Striga.
Now
that
is the name of an army,
she thought. “And from there to the Beyond, to the front.”

“To the front,” echoed the Striga.

T
hey were heading to the Ice Palace, Namara in the lead. She had led two dozen wolves of her clan as far as possible over the land route from Broken Talon Point. At the edge of the Bitter Sea, she plunged in, striking out straight across it until she and her followers had climbed out on the other shore where the H’rathghar glacier commenced. One more water passage, across the Bay of Fangs, and they would have almost arrived at their destination: the Ice Talons, where she would home in on the target. She reflected now on all that had occurred since the polar bear Sveep had visited her. The news then had been alarming: Nyra, in collusion with this strange blue owl, the one called the Striga, of whom the wolves of the Beyond had only heard ominous rumors and who, for a brief time, had gained such power over Coryn. So it was with great relief when Coryn himself had sought her out a moon cycle after the visit from Sveep. By that time, she had already met with the other
wolves of the Beyond to alert them that trouble might be brewing in the owl kingdom. The wolf clans all had a deep, abiding hatred of Nyra. Twice they had had confrontations with her. The first time was at the Sacred Ring, when Coryn had retrieved the ember and Nyra had made a desperate attempt to wrest it from him. But Namara (who was then known as Gyllbane) with the help of Hamish, had managed to prevent her succeeding. The second encounter was at the end of the Tunnel of Despair in the canyonlands at the Battle of the Book, the battle in which the she-wolf had lost her only son, Cody. The depth of Namara’s loathing for this owl was unfathomable. Her only regret was that Nyra would not be in the Ice Palace with those heinous eggs so that she could personally put an end to her, too.

But she must rid herself of such distracting thoughts. Her mission was clear. The clan of the MacNamaras was to first destroy the eggs that would hatch the hagsfiends and then, if possible, to kill the Dragon Court owls who were brooding and guarding them. Coryn had selected them for this mission for three reasons: The first was their extraordinary sense of smell, which was vastly superior to that of owls. So although the intricate passages behind the walls of the ice cliffs that led deep into the Ice Palace were seemingly impenetrable,
Coryn realized that with their extraordinary olfactory sense, the wolves were the best suited to find the path to the eggs. He remembered reading in the legends of the stench of hagsfiends. Surely their eggs would bear traces of that malodorous scent, and surely Namara and her clan wolves could find them. The second reason Coryn had chosen the MacNamara clan was that they were the fiercest of all the clans. Many creatures who have endured cruelty become as abusive as their abusers—but not the wolves of Namara’s clan. They were exceedingly tough but had a profound sense of justice and mercy. And the third reason to dispatch these wolves as a slink melf was their unparalleled tactical intuition. Before Coryn had come to this decision he reread the chapter in the legend
The Coming of Hoole
that described when Grank had taken the young king to the Beyond to learn from Fengo. Under Fengo he witnessed the genius of wolves on the hunt. Coryn, too, had been reflecting on this tactical brilliance for some time now. It was what led Coryn to seek Namara.

The wolves were in the water again after leaving the eastern shore of the H’rathghar glacier. Namara now turned into the straits of the Ice Talons. She was at the head of the byrrgis. It was a basic formation reconfigured for water passage. In this way they “broke track” in
the water in much the same way they broke track when hunting in deep snow. At exactly the same moment, all the five wolves in this front rank detected the first tendril of the foul odor seeping from a fissure in the ice wall. Namara quickly did a wind check and calculated that this fissure must be catching a back draft from behind the cliff. This back draft would lead them to the schneddenfyrrs.

Almost undetectably, a series of signals passed among the wolves. They clambered out of the water and up the narrow ledges that rimmed the strait of the Ice Cliffs and began searching out possible entryways. Meticulous in their scent markings, each wolf left a coded trail for the next wolf of the clan to follow as they began splitting off toward different entrances into the ice cliffs.

Coryn had told Namara that this war—the War of the Ember—would be fought on many fronts. And that the first front and the most vital was here in the Ice Talons. He had told Namara and her clan of the legends, of how the wolves had defeated the hagsfiends in the Desert of Kuneer. Coryn’s words stirred an ancient clan memory and a ferocious pride within them. It was said that wolves were very superstitious and often distrustful. Namara knew this was their reputation. Perhaps it was true. She would never argue that it wasn’t, but now,
as something deep within her stirred, she wondered if it was not so much superstition as this memory, this deep clan memory. She could almost feel that battle from one thousand years before in the desert. She narrowed her eyes and saw a thin stream of green light score the ice walls. “Cast your green! Cast your green!” It was an ancient voice from ancient times, the time of the legends.

There was a terrible shriek. Then an immense flapping sound. It was Blair. Her ear had been ripped from her head and was dangling over her eye. Her mouth gushed blood. The ice passage was turning red. Blue feathers spun through frigid air, and blades of moonlight slashed through the maelstrom of blood and feathers and the fetid muck of monstrous eggs. And so the first front in the War of the Ember opened.

H
igh over the Ice Talons two divisions of owls scraped across the nearly full-shine moon, heading in a southwesterly direction. Some were gaudily festooned in colorfully dyed feathers. They were the kraals. Although not the cleverest fighters, they were dangerous when unified by strong sympathies. The other division was composed of gadfeathers. They had set aside their usual beads and berries and now, like the kraals, carried short blades in their talons. After the atrocities of the massacre at the Gray Rocks these owls were eager to join the Guardian’s forces and were proud to be led by Madame Plonk. The fame of the singer of the great tree was widespread in the Northern Kingdoms from which she had originally come. She was something of a folk hero. The kraals, always impressed with trappings of beauty, found her alluring, and the gadfeathers were in awe of her voice. That she held a charismatic charm for both groups rather astonished her.

A new wind was building. Rain and sleet slashed the darkness and, in the Beyond, thunderbolts stabbed the sky as flashes from the volcanoes ripped the night. But in the sheltered inlet, where the Sea of Vastness first broke on the rugged coast of the Beyond, a reunion was taking place.

Three Great Gray Owls perched on a rocky outcropping, speechless, their gizzards quivering. The two older owls were staring at the face of what was unmistakably the brother they had thought was lost forever. And Twilight blinked in amazement. “I thought I was an only owlet. I thought I was alone.”

“And we thought you had died…with Mum.”

“Me, die!” Twilight almost shouted. “But…but I honestly never thought, never dreamed I had a brother—two brothers! I…I…” he stuttered. “I’m not alone.” He shook his head in wonder. Then he lofted himself wildly into the air. “I am not alone! I got me two bros!”

The world in that moment brimmed with the joy that flowed from the three owls. Once more the brothers recounted how they had met up with Soren and Wensel.

“You chased off Tarn, that bad-butt Burrowing Owl!” Twilight screeched gleefully.

“We know him and his ways. We’ve been out in the desert for years.” Tavis turned to Digger. “No offense, but we can excavate as good as any Burrowing Owl.”

“But they never got us,” Cletus added. Soren, Gylfie, and Digger all blinked. Soren stepped forward.

“What do you mean they never got you?” Soren asked.

“The Pure Ones, and that blue owl. They’ve been recruiting troops out there for Glaux knows how long now.”

“What?” Soren was stunned. “How? Nyra has nothing. What is she promising them?”

“A new kingdom,” Tavis said matter-of-factly.

“What?” Gylfie flew right up to the two Great Grays. “A new kingdom? Where? How?”

“The one they call the Middle Kingdom. The one the blue owl comes from. He promises them a palace filled with jewels, servants, great splendors. And power.”

“It’s the same tactic that Theo used to get the hagsfiends out of the Hoolian world,” Soren said.

“But why did we never hear of this until now? Why didn’t our slipgizzle there say anything?”

“Oh, that Sooty Owl?” Cletus asked.

“Yes, Kylor. That’s his name. Kylor.”

“They bought him off,” Tavis replied.

“How many of them are there?” Soren asked. The
two brothers looked at each other and blinked. And cocked their heads this way and that.

“Just a rough estimate,” Digger said.

“Oh, nine hundred or so.”

“What?” the owls gasped and instantly wilfed.

“Not more than a thousand.”

“And we’re supposed to find that comforting?” Gylfie gasped. “And what are we—all told—five hundred owls?”

“And now they are all probably heading toward the Beyond because of the ember!” Twilight exploded.

“Calm down! Calm down!” Soren said.

At that moment a messenger arrived. It was Clover. “Finding you was a pain in the gizzard!” The Barn Owl looked weary and the fringes of her primaries were storm-tattered. “I thought you’d be at the Wolf’s Fang, but then I heard some wing beats in this direction.”

“What’s happening? You have an update?”

“Let me catch my breath.” Within half a minute Clover had recovered her composure. Gylfie was thoughtfully preening the Barn Owl’s fringes, which seemed to calm her. “All right. Enemy troops are heading toward the Beyond. They should be arriving in two nights. They are streaming out of Kuneer.”

“Any sign of enemy movement in the Northern Kingdoms?”

“No, not yet. But our allied forces are definitely mustering,” Clover replied.

Digger took a step forward. “Why no sign of the enemy if they are, as we believe, in the Ice Cliff Palace? If they’d seen our allied forces in the Northern Kingdoms, wouldn’t they come?”

“Not if they are busy brooding a haggish force of their own,” Gylfie said.

“Yes, of course,” Digger replied.

“There have been rumors of Nyra flying out of the Northern Kingdoms, flying south to a mustering point to lead her troops into the Beyond. We suspect the Striga will follow with dragon owls and…” Clover hesitated. She could hardly bring herself to say the word. “And hagsfiends within hours of their hatching.”

Just minutes before this report from Clover, Soren had counseled them all to calm down but now his own gizzard was in a complete tumult, grinding and lurching as if there was a storm raging in there. He swallowed hard on a rising pellet. He pressed his beak shut and squinted.
Concentrate! Concentrate!
There was a flickering in his brain. Every Band member fell silent and stared at Soren. They knew this posture. Beak clamped, eyes
slitted, he was turning his head in small circles as he did when scooping up sound. Except it was not sound he sought but ideas, memories. “Gareth’s Keep.” Soren said the two words distinctly.

“Gareth’s Keep,” Gylfie repeated. “The fortress in the Battle of Little Hoole where Strix Struma…That was years ago.”

“Exactly!” Soren’s eyes now blazed. “The Keep was almost impenetrable. Before the Battle of Little Hoole, word came of an invasion by the enemy, the Ice Talons League. Although vastly outnumbered, the troops of the Northern Kingdoms defeated the invaders by luring them into the narrow pass of Gareth’s Keep. It is one of the most famous battles in Hoolian history.

“We can do what Strix Struma did thirty years ago: use the natural terrain.”

“What terrain are you talking about?” Ruby asked.

“The yondos!” Soren and Gylfie both said at once.

The yondos were the strange rock formations that rose, writhing and twisting, from the volcanic landscape of the Beyond. The two largest yondos were called the Hot Gates of the Beyond because they were massive and flanked the entrance to the Sacred Ring of Volcanoes. A mountain ridge backed them up.

The words tumbled out of Gylfie’s beak in a rush.
“We can do what they did at Little Hoole—block their passage to the Sacred Ring. Trap them in between the two yondos in the narrowest air corridors and attack in waves just as they get into the passage. There will be no room for them to maneuver.”

“Ruby!” Soren turned to the Short-eared Owl.

“Yes, sir!” Soren blinked. He still couldn’t get used to this normally ruddy owl with her new blondish-hued feathers. “Take this message to Coryn—by now he should be at the Sacred Ring of Volcanoes.”

“What’s the message?”

“‘Gareth’s Keep.’” No need for code. He’ll know what I mean. Coryn is a student of history and he’s read every word written on the Battle of Little Hoole.”

Ruby took off, a blur darting through the night. It was probably the fastest flight any owl had ever made in such miserable weather. At this time of the year the Hoolestar rose in the northeast and began its westerly passage. It had hardly flickered over the horizon when Ruby arrived at the Sacred Ring. She was exhausted and gasped not two words but six: “Gareth’s Keep. Enemy force one thousand.”

Coryn instantly knew the meaning of her words.

And thus a second front opened in the War of the Ember.