Guardians of Ga'Hoole 08 - The Outcast

be a good idea. Go where there are fewer owls and not all the noise of the volcanoes. I think it will help you,” Otulissa said softly and patted his shoulder feathers with her wing.
    Beyond the Sacred Ring, there was a river and it was here that Coryn had gone to think. He needed to be alone. Otulissa was nice, but she talked too much. And Gwyndor didn’t talk enough. It was difficult to get an opinion from him. He remembered this from the first time he had really talked with Gwyndor back in the canyonlands. Ask him a question and he would always say something like “Oh, lad, I can’t tell you what to do…” Or “Laddie, in your gizzard you know the answer.”
    Well, Coryn didn’t know the answer in his gizzard or anywhere else. But he had to think about the meaning of the reflections of what he had seen in the bucket of bonk coals. Yes, he had seen his mother’s face, but he had seen something else, too—the Ember of Hoole. If he was the one destined to retrieve it, there were many questions still to be answered. First, how had he been so wrong inhis thinking to imagine that the egg he had rescued, that of little Coryn, was a prince and that he was to be, like Grank, his tutor, his teacher? What was little Coryn if he wasn’t a prince? Why had there been all those coincidences? Maybe he shouldn’t be thinking about that right now.
    Precisely, a voice said. But it was not out loud. It was in his head.
    The scroom! He knew it! He looked toward the river from the rock where he perched. There was mist rising in swirls. It began to gather itself into a bundle with shimmering bright spots, a Spotted Owl. And through it Coryn could still see the falling snow. It was a most beautiful sight.
    I thought you were nearby when I caught the coals. I think Otulissa thought so, too.
    She did, but she almost denied me. The scroom spoke directly into Coryn’s mind. She is still embarrassed by believing in such things as scrooms. That is why I had to wait until you were alone. I cannot concentrate when there is even a speck of disbelief.
    I’ve seen my mother’s image in the coals. She is near. I’m so scared.
    I know, my dear. But you have seen much more, haven’t you?
    Coryn could not speak.
    Haven’t you, Coryn?
    Yes, I have. I have seen the Ember of Hoole. But it can’t be true that I am the one to retrieve it. Can it?
    If not you, perhaps your mother, then?
    Never!
    You must make sure it is never. Not ever.
    What was she saying? Why were owls and creatures always speaking to him in riddles? Why was it always scraps he got and never the whole answer?
    There is no such thing as a whole answer, Coryn.
    Is there truth?
    One creature’s truth is another’s lie.
    But can’t I believe in anything?
    Yourself, Coryn.
    What?
    There. I just gave you a whole answer, as you call it.
    But it was just one word.
    And you are just one owl.
    But…but…
    The scroom had begun to fade. How will I know in which volcano to dive? Is it Dunmore?
    Suddenly, Coryn heard a sharp crack and then a rustle. Glaux, was it his mother? Had she stalked him all the way to this far edge of the Beyond?

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
In the Eye of the Wolf
    G yllbane had been on the trail for two days. She had slipped out of the Gadderheal the very same night after the “Madame General” had left. This was not a hard quarry to follow. She was one of the noisiest owls she had ever heard. Her wing beats were thunderous. She was, of course, heading for the Sacred Ring of volcanoes by the most direct route. It was getting on toward twilight of the second evening when Gyllbane first picked up the odd scent and then perhaps only seconds later saw the splayed footprint of a wolf. She stopped dead in her tracks. “Brachnockken.” She muttered the ancient dire wolf oath and made a sign with her paw to ward off evil. She then sniffed some more. It was a wolf with the foaming-mouth disease, and he was headed in the exact same direction she was. She would have to change her course. The safest way, and unfortunately the longest, would be to follow the river. Would she get there before the owl, though?
    Gyllbane had no choice. She simply had to. She was fleet, the fleetest of the whole MacHeath clan. It was the only reason the chieftain had allowed her to stay in the clan. Her speed made her not just a good hunter but a great hunter. If the snow was not deep, she could do it. She stretched out her legs, making long slicing strides. She gained speed. Her heart