Guardians of Ga'Hoole 07 - The Hatchling

die for him. And did—murdered by Nyra, who in her very strange way claimed to love him. How could love appear in so many different ways? Did Nyra really believe that she loved him?
    And what of Soren? Had his uncle Soren still loved the brother who had tried to kill him for his own Special ceremony? Is that why Soren had hesitated in the cave during their last battle?
    What was this thing called love? Was it knowing another being so well and trusting what you knew? A kind of believing in someone? Not believing because someone told you to, but believing because you discovered that belief in your gizzard, your heart, your mind, as Gwyndor had said? Yes, belief and love might be wings of the same pair , Nyroc thought. But there was one thing about love that he was sure of and that was that love was stronger than hate. It had been Phillip’s love for him that made him defy his mother. It had been his love for Phillip that had made him say he would never return to the Pure Ones. And perhaps it was love, or the promise of it, that drove him on in his quest for truth that seemed to be leading to his uncle Soren. Whatever love was, it had a power beyond anything he’d ever imagined.
    Nyroc settled into his hollow and his daily diet of bugs. He hid from all other owls, afraid that Nyra had sentscouts out looking for him. He feared spies, too, who might fly to the Pure Ones with news of him. So he became a most unnatural owl—sleeping by night and hunting by day.
    As Nyroc huddled in the tree trunk, each day waiting for dawn when he could emerge to hunt, he would hear owls returning at dawn from their own night’s hunting. He liked this time of the day for he could overhear the pleasant domestic sounds of families preparing for sleep and eating their breaklight meal. Sometimes he would leave his hollow and venture near an owl family and hide behind a tree or bush to listen in. He liked the racket of the young chicks as they were promised a story if they ate all their vole or mouse, and then were coaxed to sleep.
    It was during those short hours between the last of the night and into the breaking of the dawn that he first heard the legends of Ga’Hoole. There was one he had been able to catch only fragments of. He wanted so much to hear it all for it was about King Hoole. At first, it had made him very nervous. For hadn’t his mother said that not since the ancient King Hoole had there been such an owl as himself? He was intrigued and frightened by the notion of Hoole. It seemed as if a winter storm would start to brew, setting the limbs creaking, and soon the words of the story would be blown away like the old dry leaves flying by. Butfinally there came a still night when Nyroc heard more of the story he had learned was called the Fire Cycle of the Ga’Hoolian legend.
    It was in the time of the endless volcanoes. For years and years, in the land known as Beyond the Beyond, flames scraped the sky, turning clouds the color of glowing embers both day and night. Ash and dust blew across the land. It was said to be a curse from the Great Glaux on high. But there was a blessing hidden in the curse, for this was the time when Grank, the first collier, was hatched. This was the time when a few special owls discovered that fire could be tamed…
    The story went on to describe how Grank, a Whiskered Screech, learned how to make all sorts of tools and weapons using the different kinds of coals spewing from the volcanoes. Grank learned all there was to know about fire, flames, coals, and embers. He not only learned about the glowing parts of the volcanoes but the peculiar drafts of air that swirled about them and the pockets of poisonous gases that could instantly kill a bird or any animal that was trapped in them. The collier Grank thought he had seen every flame, fire, coal, and ember a volcano could spew forth from its cone, until one night in the dead of winter in a swirling blizzard, he saw an amazing sight. The snow lay thick on the ground. The volcano that had just erupted was not an especially large or powerfulone. All of the coals had been extinguished immediately upon falling into the deep snow. All except one. This coal was strange in appearance. As she was telling the story to the young’uns the mother owl’s voice suddenly grew soft and mysterious. Nyroc strained to hear from his hiding place. “The coal, like many coals, was orange but at its center there was a most unusual color, a deep sapphire blue. Grank