The Keepers of the Keys

by Kathryn Lasky

  “Yeeeecch!” Third said.

  “Yes, I know it seems astonishing.”

  Astonishing, thought Jytte, was not the word she would have chosen. Try “disgusting,” she thought.

  “We feel that Glaux blessed us with this form of digestion.”

  “Blessed?” Jytte asked.

  “Oh, please don’t mistake me. I don’t mean to sound superior. I mean, we are all Glaux’s creatures.”

  Glaux, Svern had told them, was the owl equivalent to Great Ursus. There was even a constellation called the Great Glaux.

  “This way, please. Enough pellet talk. Follow me.”

  They walked through a tangle of aboveground roots that were as tall as their shoulders when they stood upright. The ground began to slope down steeply. The bears crouched now.

  “Here we go!” Rosie called cheerfully.

  Now the path was climbing up through the interior of the massive tree trunk. It was so wide that an occasional owl would swoop by them. The owls were all quite curious about the spectacle of the bears and would often do the most peculiar things with their heads as the bears passed. To catch a better look, they would twist their heads in almost a complete circle, and a few times, an owl, while flying forward, would flip its head back and upside down so its crown brushed the back of its shoulders. The bird would then turn its face completely upside down for a better look.

  Jytte, who was in the lead, stopped in her tracks. “Holy Ursus—I mean, Great Glaux … how did she do that?”

  “Me! Me! You’re talking about me.” Another tiny owl flew back and began hovering just in front of Jytte, all while flipping its head this way and that.

  “That’s some trick,” Jytte said.

  “Not a trick at all. Part of our natural equipment,” the owl replied.

  “Tink!” Rosie said. “Quit showing off.”

  “I’m not showing off. We can all do it.”

  “But how?” Stellan asked.

  “You see, an owl’s neck is a very odd thing compared at least to other birds’,” the owl called Tink explained. “We have extra bones in our necks that allow us to swivel, flip, and twist our heads.”

  “What kind of an owl are you?”

  “Elf owl, smallest of all species and proud of it.”

  “Don’t brag, Tink.”

  “I’m not bragging, Rosie. It’s the truth. A statement of fact.”

  There was a slight slithering sound as a pink-colored snake slipped over the ledge. She coiled up neatly and began swinging her head. The four cubs froze in horror. Their last encounter with snakes had been with the deadly frost vipers as they made their way through the ice crevasse on Stormfast Island. But Rosie did not seemed frightened in the least. She was greeting the snake warmly.

  “Oh, Mrs. Minette, you’ve been told about our new visitors.”

  “Yes, I can feel their vibrations. Quite a wake they create.”

  “Who’s that?” Froya whispered.

  “I’m right here, dear. No need to whisper. I might be blind, but my hearing is fine. Good as any owl’s if you count my unique skills for detecting the most minuscule vibrations. Even vermin. I can track down any bug no matter how small.”

  “Mrs. Minette is a nest-maid. She tends to our hollows and serves in the dining hall. She is absolute death to any pests, parasites, or other creepy-crawly things that can infest a nest or a hollow.”

  “And thank you for not saying lowlife. A term we snakes shy away from.” She twisted her head toward the bears. Where her eyes would have been there were simply two small dents. “I’ve prepared hollows for you. Two large galls have been excavated on the southeast side of the tree. Perfect for accommodating yosses.”

  And with that, Mrs. Minette slithered off. Jytte thought to herself that never in her life had she seen anything like this tree. Her own head was almost spinning, and she wouldn’t be at all surprised if it flipped backward and upside down at any second.

  Stellan’s eyes moved slowly as he scanned the parliament hollow. Neither he, nor any of the other bears, had ever seen such a sight. First of all, there were candles. Svern had told them about candles, but he hadn’t told them about the shadows that could be cast in such a light in an enclosed space. The shadows of all the owls, the members of the parliament who numbered more than a dozen, were cast in the amber glow of the hollow against the walls. The owls sat on a long, curved birch branch. And although they were very still, their shadows seemed to have an antic dance of their own in the flickering candlelight. Stellan knew the names of very few species of owls. His father had once told him that there were more than one hundred. Some very large and some tiny like Rosie and Tink.

  “That one must be a great gray,” Stellan whispered to Jytte. “They’re the biggest, Da said.”

  There was a barn owl next to the great gray that much resembled Bash. Possibly a sister. On a gnarled branch jutting out from the wall encrusted with lichen and draped in hanging moss was another barn owl. The ancient owl was frail and his eyes were clouded, as old eyes sometimes became. And yet the young bears knew that this was the king. He needed no crown, no throne, no scepter. No battle claws or swords. He was simply majestic and possessed an unnamable power. He appeared luminous in spite of his tattered feathers. He was most essentially Soren, monarch of the Great Tree. Warrior who vanquished the Pure Ones. The most legendary of all the Guardians of Ga’Hoole.

  “Come forward, young’uns,” he addressed them in a croaking voice.

  The bears hesitated, but Stellan’s curiosity got the best of him. The eyes of the owl, although dim, drew him forward. He had to see this owl.

  “Yes, please come even closer, young’un. My eyes have begun to fail. Neither daylight, nor candlelight”—he tipped his head toward one of the thick candles—“are any longer my friends. But in the pitch of night with no clouds, I can see the stars.”

  The other bears tentatively took a step or two closer. The king tipped forward at a precarious angle. Jytte held her breath, thinking he might fall, but of course that was stupid. He still had his wings.

  “We bring greetings from our father.” Stellan nodded his head. The pouch with the key swung a bit as he spoke.

  “A good bear, Svern,” Soren replied.

  “We also bring something else,” Jytte offered.

  Urskadamus, Stellan almost swore out loud. Jytte was so impulsive. Why had she just blurted that out? They should have waited.

  “And what might that be?”

  Uh-oh! thought Third. If Jytte just blurts everything out … Third did not finish the thought.

  “Uh … I mean the—” Jytte began, but Stellan put a hand on her shoulder to stop her.

  She fell silent and Stellan continued for them. “As you know, sir, there is trouble in the Far Ice, the Nunquivik. There is this … this … monstrous Ice Clock.”

  “So I have heard, and a brutal leader who thinks he is Glaux—pardon me, Great Ursus. I mean no disrespect.” There was a shiver of fear in the king’s tone that all four bears found deeply disturbing. “Please continue.”

  Stellan lightly touched the pouch holding the key with his second claw. He had to do this right in order to convince Soren of how serious the situation was. That they were all imperiled. “The clock—” His voice broke on the word clock. Oh Urskadamus, he thought. I sound like a yearling still on his mum’s milk! He began again. “The clock must be stopped.” He paused and took a breath. “It must be stopped, because if it isn’t, these murderous bears will continue with their false worship of this clock. Every day, young cubs known as Tick Tocks are sacrificed to keep this clock running. The clock has no hunger. That is a lie. The clock is a mechanical thing, but the real hunger is the Grand Patek’s for power. The only thing that can stop the clock is the key in this pouch.” Stellan lightly tapped the pouch his father had made for the key.

  “And so you found it? You penetrated the ice maze and entered the Den of Forever Frost, where the noble Svree once presided at the council of bea
rs in the Ice Star Chamber?”

  All four bears nodded. They were holding their breath.

  They have to believe us! Froya thought. What if they don’t? The question clanged in Froya’s head as Stellan stepped forward, closing the gap between himself and Soren.

  “And what do you want from us?” Soren asked.

  “Your help, sir. The help of the owls of this Great Tree. The help of the Guardians of Ga’Hoole.”

  “Really, now?” The owl seemed to drag the two words out.

  “Well, yes, sir,” Stellan continued. “I mean … uh … you know.” Jytte’s heart was thumping, and a thumping bear heart was louder than that of an owl one, but she was frightened. She didn’t like the way Stellan was almost stammering.

  “I know what? Please explain,” Soren asked. Urskadamus! Jytte swore silently. This king was playing her brother. Stellan, in the meantime, could almost riddle his impatient sister’s mind. Her frustration was sizzling in his bones. He reached out behind him and touched her lightly with his claws, a warning sign if she were paying attention. Let me handle this and just shut up, Jytte! Stellan felt that the owl was not “playing” him. He was sincere. He saw it in those black eyes set in the lovely white face. There was honesty and genuine curiosity in the darkness of those eyes. Stellan had to convince the king that the help of the Guardians was needed. But did he have to blurt it out? Because you have wings and we don’t?

  “Sir …” Stellan was trying to control his voice, which was suddenly quavering. He wasn’t sure if he was somewhere between sobbing or shouting out in desperation. “Sir,” he began again. “It’s because the clock must be stopped. The clock is huge. We cannot fly up there and put the key into the keyhole.” He took a deep breath. The candle near Soren seemed to quiver as he sucked in the air. “But you, sir, and these owls”—he turned slightly and swept his head toward the owls perched on the curved branch—“you can! You are Glaux blessed with wings!”

  “And just like that”—Soren fluttered his port wing for emphasis—“you expect me to commit owl troops for this endeavor?”

  There was silence. Then, to Stellan’s regret, his sister spoke up.

  “Our father told us about the Frost Beak unit and the medics led by a noble owl called Cleve. And—and others—” she stammered.

  Soren looked at each of the bears for what seemed like endless seconds. He turned his head toward those assembled owls, the members of the parliament. He then quickly flicked his head back to the four bears.

  “Bears, let me tell you a story. It’s a story of the first time I entered this parliament seeking the help of the old monarch Boron, the wonderful snow owl who ruled this tree. I too was with my three dearest friends, Gylfie, Twilight, and Digger, asking for help. And here is what Boron told me: ‘The nobility of the owls you see here in the parliament has not simply been given, nor has it been earned through courageous acts. Indeed, nobility is not always found in the flash of battle claws or flying through the embered wakes of firestorms, or even in making strong the weak, mending the broken, vanquishing the proud, or making powerless those who abuse the frail. It is also found in the resolute heart, the gizzard that can withstand the temptations of false dreams, the mind that has the imagination to comprehend another’s pain.’ That is what he said. No, I don’t doubt that you young’uns don’t lack in any of those capacities. And I don’t doubt that you have been tested in your young lives. I see some scars on you already.” His eyes settled on the toothwalker scar that streaked Stellan’s haunch. “To have reached the Den of Forever Frost, you must have encountered the ‘remnants,’ as we call those monsters who have lain sleeping for centuries upon centuries. But it is going to take more than owls to solve this problem. To stop the clock. It is going to take hundreds—no, thousands—of creatures of resolute hearts.

  “So what I can offer you is this: I can keep your key secretly tucked away in one of the highest hollows of the tree, but you”—he paused and looked first at Stellan, then shifted his gaze to the other bears—“must first agree to this proposition. All four of you must go out to Ambala, to the Shadow Forest, to Tyto, to Silverveil, and beyond the Beyond. In other words, you must travel to all the regions of the Ga’Hoolian world and bring together an alliance of good creatures—all the good creatures in this world of ours. The clan wolves of the Beyond. The greenowls of Ambala. You must understand that to us the Nunquivik is far away. It is hard to imagine this Ice Clock, this cruel bear who demands worship of this false god. It is distant in our minds and in our hearts and gizzards. And to win a creature to your cause, you must first reach its gizzard, or perhaps for species other than owls I must say its heart, or, if they be wolves, its marrow. That is what you need—an alliance, a team of hearts, gizzards, and bone. So go to the lands that stretch from here to the Beyond and gather your team. Then come back and we shall fly with you to the clock. But mind you, it will take more than simply the turn of a key to defeat this monstrous creation.”

  Stellan almost staggered as the king said these words. The task Soren had just set seemed overwhelming. Bears by nature were lone creatures. The very notion of forming an alliance was completely foreign to them.

  More than simply the turn of a key; the words echoed in Stellan’s mind and clashed with what their father had told them: that delivering the key was their sole mission. Get it to them. The owls will take care of the rest. This alliance would be so much more complicated than just getting the key to the owls. How could they ever achieve what the king was saying? What do I know about this new country, this land that is iceless? Frostless! The bears that live here are not even white but brown. The wolves live in something called “clans.”

  “I know what you must be thinking, young’un. What I just told you about traveling to all these regions—meeting creatures whose natures are mysterious at best to you—seems impossible. But you will learn.”

  “How, sir, shall we learn?” Third spoke up now for the first time.

  “Here. Here at the Great Tree. I am not going to send you out with no preparation. You are going to have to study and study hard. You will learn first more about us here at the tree and those owls and creatures in other territories. You certainly are not foolish enough to think that stopping the clock will put an end to the Grand Patek’s and his followers’ power.”

  The bears said nothing, though they were tempted to say, Why not? Stellan himself was inclined to say, Yes, we are that stupid, sir. But he dared not. However, Third, the smallest, did step forward. “There is something more that must be done, sir?”

  Now Soren lofted off his perch and settled directly in front of Third. “Bend down, young’un, so I can see you closer. We can stop the clock.” But then he swiveled his head and addressed them all. “Do not doubt in the least that what will follow stopping this infernal clock will be war, and that is what we must prepare for! War! And for that we need more than wings. And Glaux forbid if they find hireclaws, for there are always traitors in any species—hireclaws or hireteeth, outclanner wolves or whatever. So we have to be prepared. We have to be on a war footing.” He looked down at Third’s tiny paw. “Or a war talon!” He raised his port leg and raked the air. A huge and fearsome shadow of his menacing talons slashed across the parliament hollow.

  Stellan had one thought: We are in for so much more than we ever imagined. Had their father known this when he bid them farewell?

  The bears were directed to their hollows on the southeast side of the tree. Two immense connecting galls had been hollowed out for them. Dismayed and depressed, they sank down on piles of fluffy down feathers.

  Stellan emitted a deep sigh. “Well, that didn’t go quite as I expected.”

  “Quite!” Jytte gave a low snarl of derision. “I would say it didn’t go at all.”

  “No! No, I disagree, Jytte,” Third said. “We made some progress. I mean, Soren agreed to keep the key for us while we go out to find allies. That’s something.”

  “After we learn about the creatures of a
ll the regions of Ga’Hoole and everything else there is to know,” Jytte said. “I heard that one-eyed spotted owl talking about teaching us special owl words and geography and customs. That just seems like a big waste of time to me. If it’s war, we have to learn to fight with weapons. But we already know how to fight. Look at what Froya did with that ice splinter. She killed the hagsfiend with one shot. Right into its skull.”

  “Calm down, Jytte,” Stellan said.

  “What do you mean, calm down? We’re wasting time here.”

  “No, we aren’t!” Third said forcefully. “Listen to me, Jytte. Did we waste time when we spent all those moons with Skagen before he was killed? We knew nothing about finding our way out of the Nunquivik to the Northern Kingdoms and your father. We studied maps and navigation with him. We even learned about the innards of clocks, the gears, the movement.” Stellan’s eyes seemed to mist as he thought back on those days spent in the cave of the snow leopard Skagen. Svree’s Cave, Skagen had called it. It was a strange place with arcing ice bridges and endless passages. From the cave’s ceiling, delicate clock pieces quivered in a windless space among the threads of glowworms that created a permanent twilight. And for this reason, in the cubs’ minds it became the Cave of Lost Time.

  Third looked at Stellan and then at the cubs. “I think we must do what Soren said. If war is inevitable, then allies are important. And if we are to convince creatures to join us, we must learn about them and the land they live in.”

  The hollows to which the yosses had been directed each had two entryways. One was from inside the trunk, and the other was from outside. They called them ports. The ports allowed an owl to reach a particular hollow from the interior passageways that wound through the trunk itself, or by flying in from the outside. So it was with these two galls. Outside now, they heard a stirring.

  “First black,” Jytte said.

  “Huh?” Froya turned to Jytte.