Guardians of Ga'Hoole 13 - The River of Wind

down her own son. Nyra flew to where Tarn and Stryker were hovering. She stared at the feather and blinked in disbelief. What luck! “This must be the way. The Guardians have gone this way. Follow me!”
    Nyra started a banking turn and examined the center of the swirl where the black feather rotated. They followed it up and suddenly were caught in a savage crosscurrent of slashing winds. The rest of the Pure Ones had followed their General Mam, the supreme commander of the Tytonic Union of Pure Ones. But they now seemed to be fighting for their lives. Nyra ducked in and out of the rungs of the ladder of confusing windkins. “Follow me!”she cried. Tarn was right on her tail, as were Stryker and Wort, but two Barn Owls were sucked away and a Sooty was fighting to escape the grip of the tumblebones. His dark eyes froze in fear first as he saw the feathers stripped from his wing, and then with the terrible realization that his port wing was separating from his body.
    But, finally, the rest of the Pure Ones were safe at last in the streaming River of Wind. Nyra looked around. Yes, she had lost three officers of the slink melf, but there were fifteen others, including Tarn, thank Glaux, who had survived. “We’re here!” Nyra screamed triumphantly as she tumbled into the racing currents of the Zong Phong. “We’re on their track. Vengeance is ours!”
    Tengshu had sharpened his talons on his flintstone. He knew about battle claws, but there was not a pair to be found in the Middle Kingdom. They were forbidden, and had been ever since the time of the first H’ryth, Theosang, who was the battle claw inventor and had left that world of warring owls behind. If owls needed to fight and to kill they would have to find other ways. This was considered the most sacred proscription of any H’ryth in the history of the Middle Kingdom. But fighting is an instinct among all animals, and often a necessity, although the owls of the Middle Kingdom seldom admitted such, for even thatseemed like a violation of the great first H’ryth’s philosophy. Compared to other owls, these blue ones were quite peaceful. But they had, over the centuries, developed skills that were every bit as effective as battle claws. And as Tengshu squinted into the dawn and saw his prayer qui torn from the sky, he hardened his gizzard and realized that for the first time in a century, he was about to use these skills.
    The sun glinted off the battle claws of the Pure Ones. These owls were armed, but that didn’t bother Tengshu. It was to his advantage. He could fly better, faster, more nimbly, without the additional weight.
    “Eeeyrrrrk!” he screeched, and like a blue bolt of lightning he cracked the noon stillness with his cry. It was not a battle cry, but one that was known as the “zong qui,” literally the breath of the qui, which would expand an owl’s lungs, and when expelled thrust him through the air at blinding speed. Tengshu had been schooled in the fine art of Danyar, the way of noble gentleness. The exercises he had learned those many years ago, which he continued to practice, had one purpose: to develop the entire owl organism—joints, hollow bones, gizzard, lungs, heart, and feathers—so that an owl could strike with great force using every part and fiber of its body. Tengshu repeated the chant of the Danyar. “I am the root of thetree, the breath of the dragon, the clearness of the air, and the brightness of the stars in the pitch of the night.” He could feel the huge wind, the breath of qui, flow through him.
    “What is it?” Stryker gasped as he saw the blue streak hurtling toward him. In the next second, he had been rendered senseless by a blow to his chest. He plummeted unconscious to the ground. There was blood, but it was caused by the rock he lay impaled upon. Danyar was not about spilling blood, but depriving another of their senses, rendering them unconscious. If they were killed or torn apart, it was rarely from the sharpened talons. To tear with talons was considered an undisciplined way to win combat. Although the end result might be the same—death—the less bloodshed the better. Three more Pure Ones fell from the sky, not from a blow but from witnessing what had just transpired. Their wings locked and their gizzards turned to stone: They had simply gone yeep.
    Nyra felt a terrible unease in her gizzard. Was it one owl that was doing this or several? She peeled off in flight. Tengshu, meanwhile, was engaged