The War of the Ember (11 page)

I
t was like a current, a current not of wind or of water, but of apprehension and then resolve that swept through the Northern Kingdoms. A polar bear was doing something she had never done before as she plunged into the choppy water, leaving the den she had just cleaned out and fixed for winter. She began swimming out the Bay of Kiel and her usual winter territory in an easterly direction toward the Firth of Fangs, where Svarr, father of her cubs, resided for the winter. The ice was getting thicker as she swam north. She used her hind paws to steer herself around ice floes, which were becoming more numerous. Soon an entire ice field materialized. It was the outer apron of the H’rathghar glacier, a very good seal-hunting ground, and as Sveep turned her boulder-sized head, she caught sight of a tendril of vapor winding up from a hole. Undoubtedly a seal breathing hole. Normally, she would have stopped, hoisted herself out of the water, waited for the seal to
poke its snout out of the hole, and then, springing, she would have grabbed its head in her immense serrated fangs and had herself a nice snack. But she didn’t have time. She had to get up the firth.

“Grischtung issen micht micht.” She muttered the ancient Krakish oath, an oath of wonder and dismay as she swam. It was indeed a wonder that the young puffin had done what she had said he should. The tubby, awkward bird had actually flown to the great tree and, now, unbelievably, a king had come to visit her. Coryn, the three owls with him, and an ancient Kielian snake had arrived on the edges of an early winter storm. It seemed that what the puffin, Dumpy—was that his name? Yes—what Dumpy had witnessed in the cave in the Ice Narrows had much more serious implications than she had thought. Coryn was surprised but infinitely grateful that Sveep had traveled the overland trail to speak with Gyllbane. He had not known about the moon cycles Gyllbane spent with Sveep in her summer den after Cody’s death.

“After your long journey,” Coryn had said hesitantly as he peered into the immense dark pools of Sveep’s eyes, “I feel that I don’t have the right to ask another favor of you. But a war is coming and it will not be just a war between owls. It will touch every place and every
creature in the Southern and the Northern kingdoms. So we need the help of all creatures—be they owls, wolves, or bears. We have to fight for the freedom, the dignity of all animals. If this war comes it will not be won by evacuation, nor will it be won by animals hunkering down in their burrows or their winter dens until the fighting ends. We need to muster an expeditionary force. Sveep, you have done so much already. Do you think you can recruit and lead a fighting force of polar bears?”

The polar bear had agreed. Already she had gathered the non-pregnant females who denned near her to meet her at a designated time on the westernmost shore of the Bay of Kiel, where they would travel the overland route and find their way to Beyond the Beyond. Sveep was not sure why, but the king said that the Beyond would be the battleground. She was just approaching the inlet where Svarr denned and began emitting soft sonorous growls to greet him.

“Aaargh!” The reply came from deep in the den. She had been heard. Sveep rolled on her back, folded her huge paws across her stomach, and floated about while she waited for Svarr to come to the entrance of his cave. Finally, he appeared. He looked cross.

“What in the name of Ursa are you doing here?”

“A visit.”

“It’s not that time.”

“I know. What do you think I am…” She was about to say “a stupid puffin?” but she clamped her mouth shut.

Sveep sighed and then said crisply, “Look, conversation closed about cubs and all that stuff.”

“All that stuff! You’re talking, madam, of my progeny.” Svarr tried to look nobly offended, but only succeeded in looking crotchety.

“Don’t look so crotchety.” She knew this would get him.

“Old bears are crotchety. I’m not an old bear.”

Sveep knew she had him just where she wanted him now. She’d injured his pride. Nothing like a war to make a male polar bear feel fit. She rolled over onto her stomach and paddled to the lip of the ice of his den and rested her elbows on it. She drew her face very close to his. “All right, big guy!” The pleasant odor of the bluescales that she had consumed on her swim north washed over Svarr’s face as she spoke. “Now listen to me. This is the time for all brave bears to come together. Noble bears, bears of valor.” She could see Svarr’s eyes fasten on her. His surliness had dissolved. There was only the black intensity of his eyes. “I have been charged by a
king, King Coryn from the great tree, to form a fighting division of polar bears.”

“You?”

Sveep ignored his dismay. “Listen to me, Svarr. You are a bear of valor, an
ursus maritimus.
A bear of the sea and the land as well. In our world, it has been the noble Guardians of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree that have fought the good fight. We have lived apart in a world bound by ice and sea. But there has never been, in all of time, a chance like this for us polar bears. We can go forth now, to guard our land against a terrible threat from ancient times.” She paused to let that sink in.

“What threat from ancient times?”

“Hagsfiends.” She noted the shock in his dark eyes, like a little flinch in the darkness of a moonless night. “Listen to me, Svarr. We have in our sinew, our muscles, our paws, our sheer size, instruments for shattering power. We possess colossal strength. Now of whom else might this be said? Join me, Svarr. Swim with me and we shall fight the good fight and help the Guardians of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree win this war.”

As Sveep swam out of the Firth of Fangs with her sometime mate following, high overhead, buried in the last of the stria clouds, Coryn, Gwyndor, Kalo,
and her brother, Cory, flew up the firth to visit the old warrior Moss. They took turns carrying Octavia, who did seem to have grown sleeker on the arduous flight. Just before nearing Moss’s territory Gwyndor took Octavia on his back and flew toward Stormfast Island for a parlay with Octavia’s distant relative, Hoke of Hock.

Although infirmed and barely able to fly himself, Moss was still the commander in chief of all the armed owls of the Northern Kingdoms, which included the Frost Beaks, the Glauxspeed division, and an all-female unit of mostly Snowy Owls, many of them former gadfeathers who flew with the deadly ice scimitars. They were ironically known as the Sissies, which was short for Screaming Ice Scimitars. Coryn would ask Moss to provide troops for the war.

After Gwyndor’s departure with Octavia on board, Coryn, Kalo, and Cory continued on course up the firth for some time in silence. Coryn was surprised when a Snowy and a Barred Owl flew out from the lagoon where Moss was said to nest. “We have been expecting you,” they announced.

Coryn blinked in confusion.

“Nut Beam told us,” the Snowy Owl said. “He wanted to get an urgent message to you. He had heard that you
were flying this way. The message is from Otulissa, and Cleve. She says it is imperative that you fly to the Ice Dagger immediately.”

Coryn swiveled his head toward Kalo and blinked. “I think you should go, Coryn,” Kalo said. “We can convey your request to Moss.”

The Barred Owl nodded his head in agreement. “I think Moss knows why you have come. Permit me, Coryn, to escort your companions to Moss. You should feel free to take your leave of us to meet with Otulissa and our old friend Cleve.”

So Coryn turned back. At least the wind had shifted and would be behind him now. It was pretty much a straight shot to the Ice Dagger.
What has Otulissa found out now?
he wondered. Perhaps he could get back to the tree earlier than expected. Time was of the essence.

He didn’t realize quite how essential it truly was.

In another part of the Northern Kingdoms on Stormfast Island, Octavia arranged herself in a coil and held her head erect it as she prepared to address Hoke of Hock. Gwyndor had dropped her on the barren island and made himself scarce to give the old compatriots some time alone. Like Octavia, Hoke was a glistening green-blue snake. He was not, however, blind.

“Octavia, old friend,” he said. “It has been much too long.”

“Yes, Hoke. Too many years.”

“I understand that our dearest comrade Lyze, or Ezylryb as you called him in the Southern Kingdoms, has died.”

Octavia nodded her head slowly.

“Now what brings you here?”

“War,” Octavia said simply.

“I have heard no news of war. I only hear of good things about your king, the one who seized the ember.”

“Yes, and he is good and he has the ember in his power—for now.”

A quiver went through Hoke’s long slender body. He was draped over a pinnacle of ice that jutted out nearly perpendicular from the rock. “For now? Explain! Tell me!”

And so Octavia began to plead eloquently, hoping that Hoke would agree to support the guardians with a squadron of Kielian snakes. “Hoke, you trained the original stealth force of Kielian snakes. It was Lyze who recruited you for the War of the Ice Claws. And now I ask you in the name of Lyze and all the values that noble owl embodied, join us.”

“I am surely too old,” Hoke replied.

“Your body is old but not your mind.”

Hoke wound himself tighter around the ice pinnacle. “Rest assured. You will have all that you need. The elite force commanded by my grandson, Harlo, will be dispatched to the Southern Kingdoms. And you say the king has gone to seek out Moss?”

Octavia nodded.

Hoke slithered down the pinnacle and settled himself on a rock surface. “It’s interesting. I saw a polar bear who frequents this area making her way northward, north and west as if she was going up the Firth of Fangs. Odd time of year to see polar bears out and about. However, I don’t suppose the polar bears know yet of this business.”

“Oh, but they do!” Octavia exclaimed. “A puffin informed them. It was actually a puffin who came and told us about Nyra and the Striga in the Ice Narrows.”

“A puffin!” Hoke hissed in amazement.

“Yes, our reaction as well, but apparently this one is somewhat brighter.”

“An intelligent puffin!” Hoke waggled his head slowly in a wonder. “That would be a sight to see!”

At the very moment Hoke was marveling over the rumored intelligence of Dumpy, forty puffins perched
on the ridge where puffins of the Ice Narrows lived. “Something big is coming,” Dumpy addressed them. “I mean, really big.” Dumpy’s eyes widened as he tried to convey the bigness, the seriousness of what he was going to explain.

“How big? Big as your butt?” one puffin shouted.

“Knock it off,” said another puffin.

“It was a joke,” said the first.

“Well, it’s not funny, so knock it off.” At which point the jokester raised a webbed foot, smacked herself in the head, and succeeded in knocking herself off the ledge into the churning waters. There was a swell of raucous puffin laughter. Dumpy blinked, then shut his eyes for several seconds. This was going to be difficult. He had to figure out a way to catch these birds’ ever-wandering attention.

Dumpy opened his eyes slowly and spoke carefully and distinctly, but in a low voice so they had to lean forward to hear him. “If you be quiet and listen, I will tell you a very big secret.”

“What’s that? What’s that?” They pressed close to him, looking eager and alert.

“The secret is that I have been to the Great Ga’Hoole Tree.”

“Oooh,” they all sighed.

“I have spoken to their king.”

There were more oohs.

“I have spoken to the king’s counselors.”

“What’s a counselor?” someone whispered.

“An ornament,” another said.

Dumpy forged ahead. “And the secret that I have to tell you is that we are not nearly so dumb as we have always thought. Indeed, we each have a brain.”

“We do?” It was the Chubster who spoke now. “Are you sure, Dumpy?”

“Yes, I am sure. And if you use it, it gets better and better, and you get smarter and smarter. And I am going to show you how to use it. Now what do we know best in all the world?”

“Fish,” said a tiny little female named Popo.

“Right you are. See, Popo used her brain. And what do we do most?’”

“Fish,” said another puffin.

“And what happens when we leave a fish out for a long time without our eating it?” Dumpy asked.

“It freezes stiff and you can almost break your beak on it.”

“Mummy says no playing with frozen fish. They’re dangerous,” Popo piped up.

“Exactly, Popo.” Dumpy paused. “Dangerous like swords. Like daggers! They could even be weapons.”

“Weapons!” they exclaimed. They all knew somewhat dimly about weapons. Some of them had seen owls fly through the Ice Narrows with their battle claws gleaming.

“Yes,” Dumpy went on, “and the big thing I was trying to tell you about—the big thing that is coming is bad owls. The Guardians of the great tree are going to fight the bad owls and they need all the help they can get. We are going to help them.”

“But Dumpy, aren’t we just too darned dumb?” the Chubster said.

“No!” Dumpy exploded. “There will be no more D word!”

“D word?” they all said, for not one of them had any notion of letters, their sounds, or what they might signify.

“No more saying the word ‘dumb,’” Dumpy explained. “You are going to become fighting puffins. Fighting the good fight for the noble owls of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree. We can do it. But you must believe that you can think. To fish is to be a puffin. To build an ice hollow is to be a puffin, but to think is also to be a puffin.”

And thus it was that the Dump Brigade began, not just named for its leader Dumpy the Fifteenth, but for three out of four of the puffins, as well, who made up that first brigade and who were also named Dumpy. And their first exercise was target practice with frozen fish. They soon found that the tiny slim capelin were easier to launch and more precise in their trajectory than the rather cumbersome bluescales. Yes, “trajectory.” The puffins did start to speak in such terms as trajectory, velocity, and the speed of the airflow around frozen capelins, bluescales, and herring hurled at distant targets.