Guardians of Ga'Hoole 11 - To Be a King

off to use as a weapon but, with the ice rot, any such weapon would break immediately. The four owls were armed with ice weapons that either had been cut from healthy ice from the Ice Dagger or somewhere up in the Firth of Fangs. Still, thought Theo, rotten ice might have its uses. I have to act fast. He lofted himself straight up into the air. Theo was a powerful owl with powerful wings. The ceiling of the corridor was low, and the owls were surprised that he would try to fly above them. They raised their ice scimitars, but Theo was a cunning flyer as well as fast. He extended his wings as widely as he could and sheered offthe stanchions of rotting ice, which then fell in heaps on the corridor floor. Next, there was a great creaking as the ceiling began to collapse behind him. The owls’ way was blocked. Suddenly, he saw Emerilla flying toward him. He heard a clatter behind him and turned. One of the smaller guards had managed to fly over the heap of collapsed ice. The corridor had narrowed drastically, and Theo did not have room to turn.
    “Against the wall! Let me pass!” Emerilla shouted to him. He pressed himself against the melting ice wall and gaped as Emerilla charged the guard who had his cutlass raised. There was a small spurt of blood and then disbelief in the guard’s eyes as he looked down and saw his guts hanging out of his belly.
    So this is close fighting! Theo silently exclaimed.
    Now three other guards were scrambling over the pile of ice shards. Emerilla had picked up the cutlass of the fallen guard and tossed it to Theo. Together, the Great Horned and the Spotted Owl advanced on the three remaining assassins. It was as if Theo’s and Emerilla’s minds had become one. Theo knew that his task was to keep the three other owls engaged by quick parrying with his cutlass. For all intents and purposes, Emerilla, the stupid serving lass, did not appear to have a weapon. The three guards, to their mortal detriment, hardly paid herany heed. When the second owl collapsed—minus half of his port wing—the two others looked down in shock. “Kill her!” One screamed. “Shadyk will have our heads.”
    “No!” Theo roared and, picking up the rapier of the fallen owl, powered straight up, a weapon in each talon, stabbing one guard in the gizzard and the other in the heart. The corridor was slick with blood.
    Then there was a huge clapping sound like thunder. “The northeast parapet! It’s falling!” Emerilla cried out. And from a hole in the wall, they saw it tumbling through the night. “Follow me,” Emerilla shouted.
    They flew out through a hole in the corridor wall and headed south toward Stormfast Island. As Theo looked back, havoc reigned in the Ice Palace. Hagsfiends were taking flight as the entire eastern side of the palace caved in. An icy wind came up announcing the first of the serious winter storms driven by the N’yrthnookah, the northeast wind that brought the heaviest of the blizzards. With this wind behind them, they made a short business of the flight to Stormfast. The dawn was just breaking when they arrived.
    “There’s a good ice hollow on the lee side of the island. We’ll get protection from all this,” Emerilla said.
    Once in the hollow, Emerilla looked up at Theo. “So, before you were so rudely interrupted by the guards onyour way to see me, I had been planning to tell you the latest news.”
    “Yes, but how did you know to come down that corridor and not wait for me on the parapet?”
    “Just a feeling in the gizzard. I just suddenly sensed that Shadyk was going to do something tonight.”
    “You fought brilliantly.”
    “Well, you weren’t so bad yourself.”
    “So what is the news?”
    “Lord Arrin is massing a huge force.”
    “But I thought his followers had left him.”
    “They had, but one important one has returned: Lord Elgobad.”
    “Lord Elgobad?”
    “Yes, do you know him?”
    “In a sense. A Snowy. He attacked me some time ago in the Bitter Sea. I wounded him, but I guess not mortally.”
    “Well, he has joined forces with Lord Arrin once again. They plan to lay siege to the Ice Palace.”
    “There won’t be much left of it.”
    “This N’yrthnookah will delay the ice rot.”
    “I guess that’s both good news and bad news,” Theo said.
    “Yes, it buys time for King Hoole,” Emerilla replied. “Is he ready to fight?”
    “I hope so. He had gone on a long mission into the S’yrthghar. He wanted to get colliers and