Guardians of Ga'Hoole 11 - To Be a King

possibly alone in his hollow!
    “Now, what is this idea of yours, Emerilla?” Hoole said, settling on a perch. She was so excited to finally be alone in his company that she hardly knew how to start. She perched in front of the iron teardrop-shaped container of the ember. The ember’s glow seemed to fill the hollow. Every time she had seen it, it never failed to stir her. It reminded her of her task, of the power that she and Kreeth would have.
    And if, she thought, if I can make him mine forever… She felt a terrible cramp inside her and the ember emitted a low hiss and cast a glowing light. Would he come to me on his own? And would he come to me if he knew who I really was?
    Lutta engaged in endless dialogues like this whenever she was in the presence of the ember. Inner monologuesthat led to no conclusion, except she was left with a confused, unfinished feeling and often a question. Who am I? What am I?
    Finally, she pushed these thoughts from her mind. “Your Majesty, when I was watching you train the young Barn Owl, it came to me that perhaps I might be helpful teaching them to fight with the close blade. I thought maybe I could help my mother with her classes.”
    Hoole’s eyes blinked open and shut several times. “What an excellent idea. I should have thought of it myself. Why, with both you and Strix teaching, we could train an entire squadron of close-bladers. You could be the co-commander.”
    “Really?!”
    “Yes, really. This could prove indispensable. We have many who can fight with the larger ice weapons—scimitars, pikes, swords—and then there are the very smallest of owls—like Phineas—who are terrific with the ice splinters. But how many really good close-blade owls do we have? With a squadron of close-bladers, we’ll have much more range, much more flexibility in every combat situation.” He paused and looked at Lutta with what she felt was a new light in his eyes. “You’re quite clever, Emerilla.”
    “Clever, sir?”
    At that moment, there was a rap on the edge of thehollow. A young Snowy poked his head in. “Coded message, sir. Grank is on his way.”
    “Oh, good. Good!” Hoole turned to Lutta. “Well, thank you so much. You must excuse me now.”
    Lutta remained on the perch. Hoole stared at her. “I said, you must excuse me.”
    “Oh, I do.” But she remained on the perch.
    Hoole cocked his head. “Do you understand what I am saying, Emerilla? It means you have to leave.”
    Grank had just arrived and was observing this peculiar exchange.
    “Oh!” She lofted herself off the perch and flew by Grank, almost knocking him over.
    “Strange one, she is,” Grank murmured.
    “A bit odd. But what is this message?”
    “Well,” Grank said, swiveling his head to make sure that both Emerilla and the young Snowy were gone, “let’s go in there to read it.” He nodded toward a perch that protruded from a crack.
    To the ordinary owl’s eyes, the crack in the wall of the hollow looked like any other crack in the interior of a tree. A perch had been jammed into it. But when Hoole reached up with his talons and yanked the perch, out came a piece of a milkberry vine. With one pull, a panel opened and, through it, the two owls crowded into a smaller space. Theyshut the panel behind them. It was a secret chamber in the tree that Hoole and Grank had worked on for several days and in which they read the coded messages sent by Joss.
    Grank unfurled the piece of birch bark that the message was inscribed on and began to read. “‘The ice worms turn. The lice do swarm. A burning teardrop will set it to rights.’”
    Grank looked at Hoole. “And so the Ice Palace is rotting.”
    “‘Lord Arrin and Elgobad unite and make ready to attack.’ But Grank, is this right? Must I bring the ember? Is that truly what the message means?”
    “To stop the rot, the ember’s power is needed.”
    “But it is foolhardy to travel with it.”
    “Yes.” Grank blinked. “Let me give some thought to this before we leave.”
    “Good, but first the parliament must meet. We must work out a detailed invasion strategy.”
    “The usual passage into the N’yrthghar is through the Ice Narrows.” Hoole was pointing with his talon to a map, which had been etched out on a dried rabbit hide with a stick of charred wood, as he spoke to the members of the parliament. “But now that we number in the hundreds, it seems unwise that our entire force should try to squeezethrough this narrow passage and