Guardians of Ga'Hoole 08 - The Outcast

ever seen. It was an unimaginable landscape and yet he had seen it before—in the fire that Gwyndor had made to burn the bones of Kludd, his father.
    Everything about this place was strange, even its color. There were patches of snow and between these patches of white, the land glistened black for the most part. But oddest of all—and this, too, he had seen in the flames of the fires—were the weird cone-shaped mountains. On top of them were openings like huge mouths that belched steam and occasionally fire into the night. Like streaks of boiling blood, coals spilled down their slopes.
    He saw Rogue colliers in the distance flying over the cone mountains, but none of them flew near the mouths. They dove for the coals most distant from the mountaintops, the ones that were cooling at the edges of the tumbling rivers of embers.
    Although Coryn had arrived only a few hours before, it was not hard to see that weapons were the main business of the Beyond the Beyond. The landscape was dottedwith the glowing forges of Rogue smiths. He supposed it was because so many good coals were available for building fires. The sound of hammers striking anvils rang out constantly. And when he had taken a quick flight over one patch of forges set closely together, he saw Rogue colliers and Rogue smiths haggling over the price of embers and, farther along, hireclaws and Rogue smiths arguing over the price of a set of battle claws. He hadn’t seen this much activity in a long time.
    Returning from this brief foray to his perch on the high ledge, something else drew his attention—a swift silken movement against the horizon. It flowed like a river but clearly was no river. And as it crossed the perching moon it darkened. Soon there were black shadows printed against the silver roundness of the moon. Coryn’s gizzard quickened. He had seen these figures before. These were the weird long-legged creatures loping across the land that he had seen in Gwyndor’s fire. Yes! One turned now to look at him. Even at this distance, Coryn could see the creature’s eyes—two sparkling green slits!
    The creatures were beautiful to watch. They seemed to flow rather than run, to stream like liquid, like a river. The line of animals gradually turned toward the ridge where Coryn perched and he saw the glint of many green eyes, the greenest green he had ever beheld. Not the soft velvetygreen of moss, or the dark green of the fir or pine, or the blue-green of the spruce tree. No, if fire were green, this was what it would look like—sparkling, fizzing with intensity. But where were they going?
    In another second it became clear. While Coryn had been concentrating on the distant view, another strange herd of animals had appeared. Larger than the River Legs, as Coryn now thought of them, and spindly but with odd, branchlike things on top of their heads. Why would an animal wear branches on its head? Coryn wondered.
    One of the River Legs broke away from the group. It circled wide around the Running Trees that had sped up. It seemed to scan the herd and then quickly found one lagging at the rear and steered it away from the rest of the Running Trees. It bolted ahead. Another River Legs suddenly streaked up with an amazing blast of speed on the other side of the bolting animal. Then it slowed down in such a way that the Running Tree could not return to its herd.
    Coryn lifted off the ledge where he perched and began to follow the pursuit. It was fascinating. The River Legs were using a very complicated strategy. He was sure that the two chasing the Running Tree were capable of greater speed, but it seemed as if they deliberately chose to keep their pace steady with their intended prey. Perhaps theywere trying to tire it out so it would not fight so hard at the kill. He knew that certain birds did this. The Running Tree had now slowed considerably as it came to a patch of ground free of snow. It began to graze, casually, as if it did not have a care in the world.
    Is the animal yoicks, or what? Coryn thought. He was dimly aware of another bird flying near him in the vicinity. Not an owl, but most likely a raven, from the sound of its wing beats.
    Now he saw that the other River Legs had drawn closer. They sunk their bodies down close to the grass and were creeping toward the Running Tree. From his vantage point high above, Coryn could see that they were stalking the animal. The Running Tree raised its head and scanned the area. It must be terrifically dumb,