Guardians of Ga'Hoole 04 - The Siege

the Northern Kingdoms, they found that they had shared their dislike for the place. “The clan system doesn’t work,” Martin said.
    “Not for racdrops!” Twilight added.
    “There’s no real leader. Everything’s in a constant state of confusion,” Martin said.
    “Yeah,” Twilight said with just the right mixture of gruffness and meekness. “We want a real leader. We are humble owls.”
    Great Glaux, he’s overdoing it! Twilight—humble? Soren tried to imagine such a thing. But here he was, the Great Gray dipping his head submissively to Skench. And most incredible of all, Skench was buying it!
    “This is all very interesting,” Skench said, turning to Spoorn, who had emerged from another crack in the canyon wall while Martin was speaking. “These owls will all need to be debriefed, and then we shall decide on theirnumber designations and their work assignments. But first they must begin the processes of the glaucidium.”
    By “processes of the glaucidium,” Skench meant moon blinking. Soren now hoped fervently that the owls remembered all that Gylfie and he had taught them about the strategies of resistance.
    Already the other five owls had begun remembering their portions of the Ga’Hoolian legend cycle. Ruby began to think of Grank and the time of the endless volcanoes. She pictured the first collier flying high over the exploding cone of the volcano and fielding the fiery debris that scored the sky. Twilight thought of the Battle of the Tigers that happened in the time of the long eclipse when the huge cats that roamed the world in those ancient days went yoicks from lack of sun and began a murderous rampage. It had been a Great Gray named Long Talon who had plunged down from the black one night and killed their leader—a tiger one hundred times his own size.
    The Chaw of Chaws was ready. Ready with their legends burning feverishly in their brains, ready with their courage, ready to fight the evil that was held in this dark, shadowy, skyless place. Their blood boiled, their wits were keen, and their hearts grew bold.

CHAPTER TEN
To Fear the Moon
    T he moon had dwenked, and the nights were completely black. It would be four days until the newing began. Then the first faint glow of moon would appear like the thinnest white strand of down, a mere wisp. But each night it would grow fatter and more brilliant. They would hope for cloud cover, but the skies in the St. Aegolius Canyons were usually clear, as it rarely rained. Their mission, of course, had been planned with this in mind. If they arrived near the end of the dwenking, the Chaw of Chaws would have four dark nights before the moon would, as it began once more to fatten and grow bright, batter their exposed heads, dull their brains, and make still their gizzards. These four days would give them some time to figure things out.
    It was different being an almost mature owl as opposed to an owlet, as Soren and Gylfie were when they had last been at St. Aggie’s. There were only two stone pits fornewly arrived larger owls, whereas there were least a dozen pits to accommodate the hundreds of owlets. Four members of the Chaw of Chaws were together in one pit, and three in another. Twilight, Soren, and Ruby were in a stone pit watched by an Eastern Screech who had just received his name, Mook, and had dispensed with his number. He was quite full of himself, strutting around snapping commands and making dire threats about the consequences of asking questions. Wh words— what, why, when, where, or any question at all—were strictly forbidden at St. Aggie’s. But that did not prohibit Skench from calling the seven owls out of their stone pits at various times day or night to ask them endless questions about the Northern Kingdoms. During these sessions, Soren noticed Otulissa’s struggle to contain her vast knowledge of those kingdoms and their ways.
    Soren had been given the number 82-85. He couldn’t remember what his previous number had been. He did remember, however, his old pit guardian Finny, or Auntie, as she had insisted on being called. She had turned out to be the most brutal owl Soren had encountered at St. Aggie’s. He dreaded meeting up with her again.
    Finny had caused Hortense’s death. Hortense was the most courageous owl Soren and Gylfie had ever met, butwhen they had first arrived, it appeared that Hortense was the most perfectly moon blinked of all the owlets. Her number had been 12-8.
    Odd, Soren thought. He could