Guardians of Ga'Hoole 06 - The Burning

you?” On the word “stolen,” Gragg uncoiled himself and lay flat on the rock so Ifghar could better see what he wanted him to see.
    Now Ifghar leaned farther out on his perch and looked toward the owls practicing fighting techniques. He cleared his eyes with the thin transparent membrane that allowed owls to swipe anything away that might interfere with their vision. “No!” he gasped.
    Oh, but yes! Gragg thought. This was precisely what he wanted the Ifghar to see. The brightly polished, unmistakable battle claws of his brother, Lyze, on the talons of another owl—a Barn Owl, of all things! Gragg had first seenthem two days before when he had hitched a flight on the back of a Great Gray, an old hireclaw friend of his who had turned pirate.
    “No!” Ifghar said again in disbelief. “The claws! My claws. Those battle claws should be mine. He stole them!”
    “Indeed, my liege.”
    Ifghar turned toward the snake and blinked. My liege, he called me “my liege.” A shudder of joy passed through his gizzard. The dim yellow eyes were set a-kindle, like two small sparks that were about to burst into flame.

CHAPTER TWELVE
Stuck on a Dagger
    O ne can think of katabatic winds as the fuel for williwaws.”
    “Oh, great,” muttered Gylfie as Otulissa held forth on the fierce and peculiar winds that had now pinned them onto a shelf on the east side of the Ice Dagger.
    “You see, the density of cold air is higher than that of warm air, thus in the wintertime…”
    “But it’s not really winter yet,” Soren said. There was a twinge of regret in Soren’s voice. He felt terrible. It was Soren who had pushed their departure to the last possible date, hoping that the parliament might decide to meet earlier. The dwenking had come and gone and now a thread of the moon, as fine as the thinnest filament of a downy feather, hung in the pale lavender sky. They had tried to fly out twice already but had been slammed back each time. The winds added insult to Soren’s already deep injuries. He had failed so completely, it would be unimaginably hard to face Ezylryb. It was bad enough that hewould be returning—if indeed they could return—with no assurances, but now with these winds he was really endangering the Chaw of Chaws. It was stupid of him to have waited. And if they did return, what would be waiting for them? There was no hope of victory without the Frost Beaks.
    There was a chance that the four owls of the weather chaw—Soren, Ruby, Martin, and Otulissa—could make it out. They were experienced in flying in any kind of wind. Twilight, because of his size and strength, would have been able to fly it. But for the others it was unlikely. They did not possess the skills of sparring with such tumultuous and violent winds. But all of them were flying heavy, with their botkin bags full of ice weapons, ranging from scimitars to swords, from ice splinters to daggers.
    “Believe me, that owl has more wind than any katabat or whatever in hagsmire you call it,” grumbled Twilight. “Put a mouse in it, Otulissa,” Twilight barked.
    “If only she could,” Ruby sighed. “If only we all could.”
    For three days now they had been virtual prisoners on this narrow shelf of the Ice Dagger. The only food that was available were the fish that were kicked up from the raging sea below them and landed on the so-called hilt of the Ice Dagger. And these owls did not care for fish any more than they had cared for sour lemmings.
    “Good grief, what is that thing that just rode in on the crest of that wave? Look at it flailing its claws down there. It’s been tossed on its back or something.” Digger was staring straight down from the shelf, where they perched, to the hilt.
    “Oh, it’s a lobster—crustacean, of the animal kingdom but part of the subphylum of Arthropodea, as opposed to us, who are of the phylum Chordata, meaning that members of our phylum often have a head and tail, a digestive system with an opening at both ends…” Otulissa began lecturing.
    “Oh, whoopee! Would you kindly put a big fat phylum in your big fat beak, Otulissa! You are frinking me off!” Digger shouted.
    Soren blinked. Things were deteriorating rapidly if Digger, the calmest and the most tolerant owl of them all, was reduced to shouting and cursing. Digger never cursed. Hollow fever was obviously setting in. This happened when owls had been cooped up for too long a time in their hollows. But this was not a hollow with nice fluffy down