Guardians of Ga'Hoole 10 - The Coming of Hoole

there any dried-up smee holes around his place that we could get to?”
    Smee holes riddled the N’yrthghar. Some of them dried up over the years and provided snug dens for polar bears. They were known, but only by the bears, to transmit sounds. In the right smee hole one could hear quite clearly a conversation almost a league away.
    “Well, as a matter of fact, I know where to find a mess of them.”
    “Could you take me to one, one that would be especially good to listen to Lord Arrin?”
    “Sure, no problem. Too bad it isn’t mating season. We wouldn’t have to make another trip to meet up.”
    Svenka rolled her eyes. Males! Thank Ursa, one didn’t have to live with them all year round.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
Into a Smee Hole
    “ Y ou say that they call this young owl Hoole?” It was Lord Arrin’s voice they were hearing.
    “Yes, sir,” MacHeath replied.
    “And that Grank claimed this Hoole was Siv’s chick?”
    “Yes, sir,” MacHeath said again.
    Then Svenka and Svarr heard a collective gasp from the other owls and the hagsfiends in the inner sanctum of the stronghold.
    “You know the meaning of this?” A hagsfiend cawed in his ragged voice.
    “I know that the first owl was called Hoole and was said to be a mage,” Lord Arrin said.
    “And not any mage, but a very powerful one,” the hagsfiend replied.
    “An owl would not be given such a name if it were not thought that he might possess these powers,” said the hagsfiend who had spoken first. “It could be the end of all of us.”
    “We must fly immediately to the Beyond. This owl prince, the one called Hoole whose egg was said to be so luminous, must be destroyed—or he must be ours.”
    That was all Svenka had to hear. “See you come mating season, Svarr. I have to go.”
    “Yes, dear.”
    Svenka ran and then swam as she never had before. She could see Lord Arrin’s troops and the hagsfiends rising in the night. She knew that the hagsfiends would not follow the same route as the owls because of all the open water. They, like the wolf, would go due west over the H’rathghar glacier toward Broken Talon Point and then swing south into the Beyond. There was a chance at least that Siv might be able to get there before they did. Svenka knew that she would have gone herself. She could swim all the way to the Southern Kingdoms and then race through the forests, but she couldn’t leave the cubs. Not yet at least. Oh, she thought for perhaps the thousandth time, males are so useless. If only Svarr could be trusted to care for them. It wasn’t as if male polar bears were dim-witted, they just seemed to be missing something when it came to feeling any kind of emotion or attachment to anyone but themselves. And yet they could not be called selfish, not willfully so, at least.
    Svenka arrived at dawn of the following day.
    “You must be exhausted, Svenka,” Siv said.
    How gracious of her, Svenka thought. She inquires about me first. So unlike Svarr. “No, not really. The news is not good. I have confirmed that Hoole is in the Beyond with Grank, and Lord Arrin and the hagsfiends have already set flight.”
    Siv wilfed until she seemed a quarter her original size. “Oh, dear!”
    “The only good news is that the hagsfiends and the wolf are going by the long route because of open water.”
    “You mean across the H’rathghar glacier and then west?”
    “Yes, it will take them a good while especially with the prevailing winds.”
    “So I have a chance of getting there before they do.”
    “Yes, and I don’t think Lord Arrin would strike without the hagsfiends. He’ll wait for them.”
    Siv’s eyes suddenly brightened. “Svenka, I have one more favor to ask of you.”
    “Anything, Siv.”
    “There’s a messenger, Joss, who served the king and me faithfully in the past. I suspect that he is in the region of the Ice Talons. The cubs can swim with you there. It is not so far. You can find him. There are usually lots of gadfeathers around there this time of year, one of their manygatherings. Ask around and when you find Joss, tell him that I live and that my son is in mortal danger. That he must quickly gather what troops he can and any hireclaws he can find and fly to the Beyond.”
    “Yes, madam,” Svenka said.
    “Madam? Why are you calling me ‘madam’?” Siv asked.
    Indeed, the word had just slipped out. But when Svenka looked at Siv now she saw not just a regal Spotted Owl of great elegance, she saw an owl of incomparable