Watch Wolf

darkness. And in the background came the wild music of the Watch wolves baying. Never had Faolan and Edme heard such howling. Each cry, each voice enlarged by the other, gaining a deep resonance. It was as if Faolan’s and Edme’s ears were being opened to a new universe of sound. Oddly enough, the howling was not nearly as loud as what they’d heard living with their packs. It was of a lower volume buta more powerful intensity, as if these Watch wolves had discovered a voice composed only of the strongest chords.
    Both Edme and Faolan felt their throats open up. They longed to howl and yet felt it would not be right. As if reading their minds, Twist turned to them. “Your turn to howl will come when you mount the cairns. I know it’s almost irresistible.”
    “But will we ever howl as beautifully?” Edme asked.
    “You will,” Winks said softly. “It takes time, but you will. The music seeps into you and settles in your marrow.”
    “Well, it’s about time!” Snowdon, an ash-colored wolf, leaped down from the cairn that rose directly in front of Stormfast. At first, Snowdon appeared to be an ordinary wolf with no obvious deformity. All of his legs were straight, no paws were turned, he wasn’t missing his eyes, ears, or tail. Faolan and Edme couldn’t conceal their curiosity that this perfectly formed wolf was a member of the Watch. “Can’t figure it out, can you?” Snowdon barked in a harsh voice quite different from his howling. Then he stuck his tongue out. Edme and Faolan both jumped back. It was forked, like a snake’s. Snowdon laughed.
    “He’s all about shock,” Winks muttered. “Loves shocking newcomers.”
    “Snowdon’s going back to his den, and do you know the first thing he’ll do before he sleeps?” Twist said.
    “What?” asked Faolan.
    “He will gnaw a log to record what he observed on his watch — any owls coming for coals, any possible graymalkins. And he will also report on the activity of the volcano. But up you go now, Faolan. This is your cairn, and your watch is Stormfast. Winks will lead Edme to the cairn for Morgan. Scramble up, and I will join you shortly.”
    There was much to learn that first night.
    “I am your
taiga,”
Twistling said, “but so is Stormfast.” He nodded toward the volcano, whose crater was belching great rolling plumes of steam that unfurled and stretched across the night. “You’ll learn how the scent of the sulfurous steams varies through the seasons.
    “Lava flows are rare,” Twist continued, “but you will learn the difference between flows from Stormfast or from Kiel on the opposite side of the Ring.”
    In the eastern sky, the first bright shadow of the moon clawed its way over the horizon and began to climb. It was then that Faolan spotted the owls. Their broad wings printed against the dark, their tip feathers silveredby the moon’s light, the owls of Ga’Hoole came silently through the night — ghostly and majestic.
    “They usually arrive when the moon is rising. And from the cairns of Stormfast and Morgan, you have the best view of them. On the Bone of Bones, you will learn about the truly great owls, beginning with the first more than a thousand years ago.” Faolan felt something in his marrow. His eyes widened and he shoved his ears forward. He, as all wolves in the Beyond, knew of the ember that lay buried in the volcanoes and how it often traveled through the lava tunnels from one crater to another. He had been told the legends of the Ring and was aware that the first King Hoole had known about the ember’s strange power before he retrieved it. The King named it the Ember of Hoole and warned the first collierthat this ember was not for any Rogue smith’s fires.
    “I know,” Faolan said quietly.
    “You know.” Twist cocked his head and looked at Faolan with curiosity. “You’ve already read that part of the Bone.”
    “No. Not yet.”
    “Then how do you know?”
    Faolan looked at Twist. There was confusion in his eyes. “I’m not sure. I just know.”
    Something stirred in Twist. It wasn’t a feeling so much in his marrow as in his heart. He continued, “As I said, you’ll learn about the Fengos as well as the great colliers — like Grank, the first collier.”
    Faolan gave a start as he heard the name.
    “Are you all right?” Twist asked.
    “I’m fine. Please go on.” When Twist had said that name — Grank — there was a shiver deep in Faolan’s marrow. The kind of shiver that wolves felt