To Be a King
Page 13
Lutta shut her eyes tightly and began to concentrate. In her mind’s eye, she saw the spots that spiraled out like small galaxies from the center of the top of her head. She swore she felt the streaks of white begin to break up the dark plumage of her breast.
“What’s wrong with you?” Kreeth muttered.
Lutta blinked and looked down at her breast feathers. There were white spots and streaks but the rest of the feathers were still blue-black. She peered into Kreeth’s eyes and gasped at the reflection she saw in them. There were smears of white on her head, but again the feathers were not the tawny browns and ambers of a Spotted Owl. She was, in fact, half hagsfiend and half Spotted Owl. The owl part of her winced now at her own malodorous breath.
“You’re not doing it!” Kreeth cursed and dark spittle ran from her beak.
“I know! I know! I don’t know why—I don’t understand.”
But in truth, Lutta did understand. She was sick; sick of being half: half crow, half owl, both hagsfiend and Spotted Owl. She was, she realized, nothing. She was nothing and yet she loved. “I have a gizzard!” she screamed at her creator.
“You do not have a gizzard, you fool, you idiot. I created you.”
“You created me, but I created this gizzard.”
Kreeth was stunned. “No!” she exploded and gave Lutta a thwack that nearly sent her tumbling from the peak. Lutta rose up in pain and hovered above Kreeth. “You don’t understand, Kreeth! I feel pain. Real pain.”
“It’s a phantom gizzard.”
“What difference does it make, be it phantom or real? I love him. I love him.”
“You must kill him,” Kreeth hissed. Then a narrow beam of yellow light sprung from her eyes. Lutta felt herself go yeep.
“Down you go, dearie. Down, down, down. Right here by my talons. Nice soft landing.”
On a distant ridge, the eyes of a large Great Horned Owl and his hagsfiend consort were fixed on the scene that was transpiring.
“She used the fyngrot on Lutta. I can’t believe it!” Ygyrk gasped. “It’s wrong. Wrong to use it on one”—she hesitated and then said the next words with great vehemence—“one of your own.”
Pleek blinked at her in surprise, which for some reason irritated Ygryk. “Yes, Pleek, she is ours,” she hissed. “Even monsters can have some honor.”
“You’re not a monster, my dear,” Pleek replied. Ygryk’s hard black eyes bore into him. She knew exactly what was going through his mind, which he was too afraid to say: You are not a monster. Lutta is. She’s a freak.
“No, Pleek.”
“No what?”
“The problem is not with Lutta. The problem is with us.”
“What are you talking about?”
“She is not the freak. We are.” She paused. “We don’t know how to love.”
When Lutta woke up, she looked down and saw the tawny brown feathers of a Spotted Owl. So she’s done it. Made me Emerilla again. Cast a spell, I suppose. But what am I really?
She watched as Kreeth rose in the night; beneath the moon a yellow glare began to spread. The H’rathian Guard felt their wings still, then the Sivian guard wavered in flight. Hundreds of troops were brought to ground—to ground for slaughter. Hoole suddenly sensed the quietness on the glacial battlefield. He turned and flinched. This indeed was a powerful fyngrot. He rose, holding high the scimitar of his father, King H’rath, of his mother, Queen Siv. He knew that he must fly directly into the yellow glare. He had done it before. He would do it again. The hagsfiend who hovered as she cast her light was immense and old and ragged. He saw her wing feathers stirring with half-hags, and then he thought he saw a Spotted Owl flying close to her, but he was not sure. Hoole’s gizzard clenched as he saw the noble Lord Rathnik fall in flight and a swarm of half-hags fly from the hagsfiend’s plummels to nibble on the falling lord. He was dead by the time he hit the ground.
Not one more owl of honor must die, Hoole thought. He raised the scimitar and charged the light. He cut through it, but weakly. Glaux, this is a tough fyngrot, Hoole thought.
Suddenly, there were slits of green in the night. The wolves! Hundreds of wolves raced to the top of the ridge and though not commanded, the green of their eyes began to crisscross the fyngrot, weaving through the warp of the yellow glare like a shuttle with threads of green. It’s breaking up! It’s breaking up! Hoole silently rejoiced. At last, the fyngrot ripped. And the black trail of the Long Night ran through it. All over, feathers began to rustle and stir—spotted, tawny, pure white. Primary feathers began to stiffen, and owls who had been brought to ground spread their wings to rise, and those who had begun to go yeep regained altitude. The fyngrot was no more.
Then out of the unsullied darkness a Spotted Owl flew.
“Emerilla!” Hoole gasped.
A shriek tore through the night. “The ember, Lutta! Get the ember, or I shall curse you forever!”
A wolf, one Duncan MacDuncan, leaped high into the sky where a gnarled and screeching hagsfiend and her half-hags had begun to go yeep in the fierce blades of the green light. The lone wolf yanked her to the ground, ripped out her eyes, which were pulsing a dim yellow, and sank his fangs into the hagsfiend’s neck.
A huge cheer rose from the armies of Hoole. “To the Ice Palace!” Hundreds of owls surged over the last ridges, followed by still more wolves. Then Hoole caught sight of Theo’s battle claws shining under the moon, summoning him. “King Hoole!”
Hoole forgot Emerilla and in a quick flip reversed his direction and flew toward the crumbling palace, leading the divisions of his armies; below the wolves clambered up the ice-sheathed ramparts.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
The Ice Palace
“Emerilla?” Hoole blinked at the owl who perched beside Theo in the dripping walls of the throne room. This owl looked like Emerilla but even more so. How could that be?
“You know me?” the Spotted Owl asked. She was confused. Why was this owl, the king, studying her so?
“Of course I know you,” his voice was soft and intimate. “I was concerned that something had happened to you when you came through the Ice Narrows.”
“Ice Narrows?” Emerilla was confounded. “I was never in the Ice Narrows.”
“But I did fly through the Ice Narrows.” The voice came from behind him. A silence fell on the crowd of owls and wolves. Only the drip…drip…drip of the rotting ice could be heard. Another Spotted Owl stood in a puddle of melted ice.
“Emerilla?” Hoole turned around and saw an owl almost identical to the one he had just spoken to. She looked exactly like Emerilla. No…no…not quite exactly. The tips of her tawny wings were beginning to turn black. Lutta was changing before his very eyes. The owl he thought he knew as Emerilla was dissolving into a dark crowlike thing that was now flying directly toward him. He felt himself suddenly skid across the ice and slam into the melting throne. His eyes closed momentarily, and when he opened them, he saw Strix Strumajen hovering over a strange heap of black and brown feathers. The puddle of water was turning red with blood. Little gnatlike creatures floated dead on its surface.
“Half-hags!” the two words swept through the throne room.
“I had to kill her,” Strix Strumajen said. “She pretended to be my Emerilla. I knew from the start that something was not right about her. A blood deception she was—a hagsfiend.”
“No!” a whispery voice rose from the pile of feathers. Hoole flew over to her.
“What are you?” he asked, peering down at the dying creature.
“I am nothing, and yet I loved…”
The vial of the ember dangled from Hoole’s neck. She lifted a talon.
She wants the ember! Hoole thought.
“No, it is not the ember I wanted.” Lutta whispered, and died.
From the pile of feathers a foggy shape rose, like a shadow made of mist. It rose and then dissolved as the spirit of Lutta passed away.
“To hagsmire,” muttered Strix Strumajen. She turned to the real Emerilla. �
��Oh, daughter,” she sighed and folded her into her wings.
Hoole gazed at Emerilla. Her spots shimmered like a galaxy of stars. It was as if glaumora had come down to earth.
At last, thought Hoole. And his own gizzard quaked with something warm and genuine and new.
There was a sudden quietness in the throne hollow. “Nothing is dripping,” Theo whispered with excitement.
“The melting has stopped,” Phineas said.
“Look at the throne!” The Snow Rose lofted herself into the air and flew over the ice throne.
“To the throne, Your Majesty. To the throne!”
So Hoole took his rightful place, and the moment he perched on the throne of that noble family of the N’yrthghar, the throne stopped melting and began to glow with new ice. Hoole felt the warmth of the ember against his chest. And he knew that although the ember’s magic could not win a war it could restore a kingdom with a righteous ruler. This was the lesson of the ember. He flew to the highest ice spindle on the throne. He held the vial with the ember that now glowed an iridescent, mysterious green. “Just as the stars do not hold our destinies, this ember holds not our fate. We are masters of our own fate, dear friends. The days to come will be ones of hope and glory.” A great cheer rose up. Yes, hope and glory, thought Hoole. And perhaps love, as well.
And indeed the days and the years that followed were ones of hope and glory and love. Emerilla and Hoole found happiness together as mates. They had owlets, one of whom, H’rathruyan, became the regent of the Ice Palace of the N’yrthghar. But no one called it the N’yrthghar any longer. It became known as the Northern Kingdoms as the S’yrthghar was known only as the Southern Kingdoms. And the southern sea became the Sea of Hoolemere and the island became the Island of Hoole. And it was in the Great Ga’Hoole Tree that the king lived with his queen, Emerilla, and together they grew old.
Then one day, King Hoole said to Emerilla, “I have something to tell you.”
“I know, Hoole,” she said quietly.
“You know? How is that, my dear? What do you know?”
“I know it is time to take the ember back to Beyond the Beyond.”
“Yes. I promised Grank I would do this when he lay on his deathbed, but I would have done it, anyway. The magic is too powerful even for our own sons and daughters, who are strong and noble of gizzard. It is simply too dangerous to leave in this world. It must be buried in one of the volcanoes.”
And so, telling no one, the two elderly Spotted Owls who now were almost as white as Snowies flew without ceremony or escort from the island across the Sea of Hoolemere to Beyond the Beyond. And when they got there, an ancient wolf was waiting.
“Namara!” Hoole hooted.
“Yes, Hoole.” Beside her stood the offspring of those wolves who had fought at the Battle of the Ice Palace. “Many of these wolves are MacDuncans, pups of those who fought so valiantly in the Battle of the Ice Palace and kin of Duncan who killed Kreeth. They will keep watch on the ring of the volcanoes, to guard the ember for that owl whose destiny it is to retrieve. Among themselves they have decided to call the chief of their watch Fengo.”
Hoole blinked, and in that blink so many memories flooded back to him—his earliest days on the island in the Bitter Sea, Grank’s passionate care for him, the lessons he learned from Fengo, his friends—Phineas, Theo, the Snow Rose, whose great-granddaughter now sang for the tree. What a life he had led.
Hoole spread his wings and lofted into the air. He carried the ember—not in the teardrop container that Theo had made for him—but in his talons as he first had carried it when he retrieved it from the volcano of H’rathmore. All the volcanoes began to erupt in a fury, and the sky was scorched with their flames and, in the flames, images began to emerge. Hoole could see a patch of white and two coal-black eyes. A Barn Owl? Yes, definitely a Barn Owl. But hundreds of years, maybe a thousand years from now. He let the ember drop into the flaming mouth of a volcano. He watched as the ember, with its lick of blue at the center surrounded by the green of a wolf’s eyes, sparkled, then winked and was gone, swallowed by the bubbling lava.
But a Barn Owl will come…
Or so we believe, but by that time I who have told this tale shall be long gone to glaumora.
Epilogue
Soren closed the final book of legends. There was silence among the six owls. The ember in the latticed iron box glowed as fiercely as ever.
“He returned it to the volcano,” Coryn whispered in disbelief, and then turned to his uncle Soren. “And so must I.”
“Not yet. Your work is not done,” Soren replied. “Indeed, it is only just begun.”
“But it is so dangerous.” Coryn opened his eyes wide, stared at the ember, and then blinked rapidly as if he could not quite believe how dangerous this thing was that glowed in its lattice box.
“Coryn, you’re the Barn Owl that Hoole saw in the flames of the volcano,” Digger spoke firmly. “It is your destiny.”
“You must fight for it, Coryn,” Twilight added.
“It is not only a question of power,” Gylfie said. “It is also one of character. You have the character, Coryn, to resist the bad influences of the ember—the nachtmagen—and use it for good things.”
“And the nachtmagen must be gone now,” Twilight added. “It died with the last hagsfiend—centuries ago.”
Coryn felt a deep and awful tremor seize his gizzard. An almost palpable anxiety stirred the air.
“What is it, Coryn?” Otulissa came over and gently began to preen his flight feathers.
“Nothing…nothing,” Coryn said, and cast a quick glance at Soren. But there was something. Between the uncle and nephew, there was a dark, unspeakable secret. For the two owls suspected that not all nachtmagen had died. That the last hagsfiend had not died and through her, nachtmagen lived on.
OWLS
and others from the
GUARDIANS OF GA’HOOLE SERIES
The Band
SOREN: Barn Owl, Tyto alba, from the Forest Kingdom of Tyto; escaped from St. Aegolius Academy for Orphaned Owls; a Guardian at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree
GYLFIE: Elf Owl, Micranthene whitneyi, from the Desert Kingdom of Kuneer; escaped from St. Aegolius Academy for Orphaned Owls; Soren’s best friend; a Guardian at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree
TWILIGHT: Great Gray Owl, Strix nebulosa, free flier; orphaned within hours of hatching; Guardian at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree
DIGGER: Burrowing Owl, Athene cunicularia, from the Desert Kingdom of Kuneer; lost in the desert after attack in which his brother was killed by owls from St. Aegolius; a Guardian at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree
The Leaders of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree
CORYN: Barn Owl, Tyto alba, the new young king of the great tree; son of Nyra, leader of the Pure Ones
EZYLKYB: Whiskered Screech Owl, Otus trichopsis, the wise old weather-interpretation and colliering ryb (teacher) at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree; Soren’s mentor (also known as LYZE OF KIEL)
Others at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree
OTULISSA: Spotted Owl, Strix occidentalis, a student of prestigious lineage at the Great Ga’Hoole Tree
OCTAVIA: Kielian snake, nest-maid for many years for Madame Plonk and Ezylryb (also known as BRIGID)
Characters from the Time of the Legends
GRANK: Spotted Owl, Strix occidentalis, the first collier; friend to young King H’rath and Queen Siv during their youth; first owl to find the ember
H’RATH: Spotted Owl, Strix occidentalis, King of the N’yrthghar, a frigid region known in later times as the Northern Kingdoms; father of Hoole
SIV: Spotted Owl, Strix occidentalis, mate of H’rath and Queen of the N’yrthghar, a frigid region known in later times as the Northern Kingdoms; mother of Hoole
JOSS: Whiskered Screech, Otus trichopsis, loyal, able messenger; served under King H’rath, then under Hoole
LORD RATHNIK: Whiskered Screech, Otus trichopsis, officer of the Ice Regiment and member of parliament at the great tree
PLEEK: Great Horned Owl, Bubo virginianus, enemy of King H’rath; known to consort with hagsfiends and to have taken one, Ygryk, for a mate
THEO: Great Horned Owl, Bubo virginianus, a gizzard-resister and apprentice to Grank; possesses great blacksmithing skills
SHADYK: Great Horned Owl, Bubo virginianus, Theo’s brother; mad usurper of King H’rath’s throne in the Ice Palace
STRIX STRUMAJEN: Spotted Owl, Strix occidentalis, appointed by Hoole to be teacher of first weathering chaw; mother of Emerilla
EMERILLA: Spotted Owl, Strix occidentalis, daughter of Strix Strumajen; excellent fighter with the short blade; thought to be lost in a skirmish over the Ice Fangs
SVENKA: Polar Bear in the Bitter Sea; comes to the aid of Queen Siv
SVARR: Polar bear, father of Svenka’s cubs; listener at smee holes
PENRYCK: Male hagsfiend, ally of Lord Arrin
YGRYK: Female hagsfiend, Pleek’s mate
KREETH: Female hagsfiend with strong powers of nachtmagen; friend of Ygryk; conjures Lutta into being
LUTTA: Female hagsfiend with powers of transformation conjured by Kreeth; takes the form of Emerilla
ULLERYCK: Female hagsfiend, deadly assassin in Lord Arrin’s service
PHINEAS: Pygmy Owl, Glaucidium californicum, friend of Hoole and owl of great pluck
THE SNOW ROSE: Snowy Owl, Bubo scandiacus, gadfeather and renowned singer; joins fight against Lord Arrin; comes to the great tree with Hoole