The River of Wind (12 page)

I
t is all in the breath, Twilight. You must first master the zong qui,” the danyk said. She spoke decent Hoolian, but with a slight Krakish burr. This danyk was one of the five senior teachers of the Danyar—all of them female owls. “No move can be accomplished until you master the zong qui.”

Twilight sighed. “This is the hardest battle trick I have ever tried. It’s harder than working with those frinking ice splinters of the Frost Beaks.”

“It is not a trick!” the danyk screeched. “That is what is wrong with you.” She flew up and gave him a cuff that sent him flying across the hollow. “Why do you think we call this the Hollow of Extreme Concentration? We are not practitioners of cheap tricks. We fight bare-taloned with our minds and our gizzards. Why is the hollow of Danyar shaped like a gizzard? Now, before you can erect a zi field for combat, you must learn to breathe properly.”

A small blue object whizzed by Twilight like the tail of a minuscule comet and slammed a much larger owl off its perch. It was a Pygmy Owl. Despite being blue, these owls did seem to be of a familiar species. The owl he had just knocked down seemed to be a Great Gray like Twilight—except he was blue. Twilight blinked. “What was that?” he asked.

“That was Pinyon,” the danyk said, “executing a perfect third-degree Zi Kyan Mu.”

Twilight had done this move before but wondered about the meaning of the words “third degree.” “Third degree?” he asked.

“It simply means that he performed it with his talons turned in, so as not to kill.”

“Oh.” Twilight blinked. It was hard to imagine a Pygmy killing a Great Gray with nothing but his talons.

“Now back to the zong qui,” the danyk ordered.

At first, Twilight had been surprised that the five senior danyks and many of the other teachers were female owls, but he was beginning to understand. In most owl species, females were larger than males. This would give the females an expanded lung capacity and since this breath was crucial to all the Danyar moves, it made sense that so many of the teachers were female. Very few other things, however, were making sense to Twilight.
Not the least confusing was why they refused to call this fighting, but “the way of noble gentleness.” The art of Danyar was every bit as lethal as any battle claws or firebrands he had ever fought with.
Who’re they trying to kid?
he thought. He was then knocked flat on his butt feathers. “You’re not concentrating!” the danyk screeched. “Look at Ruby! She is concentrating. Beautiful focus.” Ruby had just knocked an owl twice her size temporarily senseless.

Meanwhile, in another part of the owlery in the Hollow of Mental Cultivation, Otulissa, Digger, Soren, Gylfie, and Coryn sat with Mrs. Plithiver, huddled with the H’ryth, an owl who, with his featherless legs, most closely resembled a Burrowing Owl. He scratched his ya ni ni, which was the single blue feather that stuck up from the crown of his otherwise featherless head. It seemed to help him think. It was said that the ya ni ni was the point from which the zi emanated and created that incredible field of concentration and energy not just for action but for perception of other birds’ zi fields. Every creature had such a field. A zi field, it was explained to the owls, radiates out from every animal. Some are good, some bad, some treacherous, but the pikyus of the owlery are trained to learn how to use their own and perceive others. The H’ryth was most impressed with Mrs. Plithiver’s zi field. He said he had never seen anything comparable in a creature who was
not a schooled pikyu of the owlery. He now gave his ya ni ni a bit of a jiggle.

“I have tried for so long to decipher the words of the eighth astrologer,” the H’ryth said. “The papers that he wrote are so valuable, yet very obscure in their meaning.”

“Can you explain,” Otulissa asked, “why that astrologer left the Dragon Court?”

“Again, such things are difficult to explain. Our notions and ways are so strange to you. It was during the time of the eighth court that the first H’ryth, Theo—or Theosang, as he became known—came to this kingdom. He was alarmed by the devastation and the futility of war, but he found the Dragon Court an utterly foolish and useless place as well. But, and this is the genius of our first H’ryth, he found a purpose for this very useless court. The Dragon Court, with all its ridiculous extravagance and luxury, offered its owls a semblance of power. It could distract those who might seek power for the wrong reasons. Don’t kill them with battle claws, kill them with luxury and splendor. It became a kind of prison, but one that was never called that by name. Theosang made it even more luxurious. He discouraged hunting by telling these owls that they were too fine for such lowly pursuits. Other owls would hunt for them. He provided servants to cater to their every whim. It was an incredibly clever way of
distracting them and quelling the most dangerous elements that had begun to find their way into the Middle Kingdom after Theo had crossed the Sea of Vastness. The ancient evil ones, those who lusted for power—these were the ones Theosang committed to the Panqua Palace.”

The ancient evil ones
, Digger thought.
Hagsfiends?

The H’ryth continued, “When the court changed with the arrival of Theosang, the last astrologer, the eighth one and the best, was only too happy to leave the palace and go to serve in the owlery, where Theosang was becoming a profoundly respected leader. This astrologer was gifted beyond belief. And during the time of Theosang he made many predictions. However, those predictions are most difficult to interpret.”

Otulissa was at that very moment hunched and squinting over one of these documents. Occasionally, she would jot down a note on a piece of parchment.

Never had she concentrated so hard. In the sputtering light of the yak-butter lamp, she squinted at the letters. She could make out a few words. But they were like fragments of puzzles, and nothing seemed to fit. She raked through her memory for any old Krakish words that might relate. Otulissa prided herself on her skills of interpretation and logic, her great linguistical insights.
But she felt as if she was up against a wall here, an impenetrable wall. Reading the Theo Papers had been easy next to this. But the H’ryth felt it was a matter of some urgency that these writings of the eighth astrologer be understood. He perceived a threat, a danger that was imminent.

Otulissa bent closer to the paper. “And they will—” Her gizzard gave a twitch. At just that moment, Mrs. Plithiver coiled up and hissed. It was the nest-maid hiss of alarm. Two pikyus swooped into the Hollow of Mental Cultivation and announced something in rapid Jouzhen. The H’ryth turned to Coryn.

“Two owls from the west, a Barn Owl and a Pygmy, are flying this way with the red banner.”

“The red banner?”

“The red banner from qui dong Tengshu. It can mean only one thing: We are about to be attacked!”

E
glantine! Primrose!” Soren gasped as his sister swept down through the sky port into the library, the red streamer unfurled behind her. Primrose alighted near the parchment that Otulissa was attempting to decipher. They were both breathing heavily. Gasping and coughing, they gulped for air and tried to speak.

“Slink melf…Nyra…” Eglantine choked out.

Then Primrose took over. “They’re on their way. They got to the River of Wind somehow…not from Bess…”

“Battle stations!” a pikyu commanded, and then the entire Mountain of Time reverberated with the sound of an immense gong.

“This way,” the H’ryth shouted, and flew straight up to the port through which Eglantine and Primrose had just entered. The Chaw of Chaws was right behind him, and as they flew into the gusting winds they spied, surging over the last ranks of jagged peaks, twelve, perhaps fifteen owls,
their battle claws glistening in the light of an almost fullshine moon.

Coryn’s gizzard stilled.
It can’t be. It can’t be!
he thought. But it was. His mother, Nyra, her scarred moon face illuminated by the glare of the stars, flew through the slashing winds, her battle claws extended.

Soren blinked and drew in his breath sharply. He saw the glaring face as well. But there was something different yet eerily familiar about her face. One side of it shone with a truly blinding brilliance.

“It’s the mask of Kludd!” Gylfie said, her voice cold with shock. “She is wearing the mask of Kludd!” Kludd, Nyra’s mate and Coryn’s father, had worn this metal mask to cover his battle-mutilated face. Why would she wear it? Had she been terribly injured? Coryn’s memory reeled back in time to when he was a young owlet being raised by his widowed mother in the canyonlands. To a time when he was so young he did not know her evilness, to a time when he had believed that his uncle Soren had murdered his father. Coryn had attended the Final ceremonies in the cave where Kludd had been killed. He remembered it vividly. It was in the cave where they had burned his father’s bones that he had discovered his ability to read fire and experienced his first insight of the flames that began to reveal the lies—all the lies that he had been told.

“It’s a slink melf,” Eglantine screed as she landed on a parapet of the owlery. “But we sent word to the great tree.”

In the background, Coryn heard the almost tranquil voice of the H’ryth giving commands to his pikyus. Next to him, a member of the circle of the acolytes perched. These acolytes were the H’ryth’s closest advisors. This one, a Spotted Owl, turquoise with deep midnight blue spots, translated. “The H’ryth will give the signal for zong qui and then the first of our Danyks will advance.”

“We have no battle claws,” Soren whispered.

“Yak butter!” Otulissa said, and swooped down to pluck one of the flaming brush torches.

“We use what we have,” the H’ryth said. “The breath of qui, the butter of yak, and our fields of zi will converge.”

There was a sudden gusting sound that was not dissimilar from the wind bong they had experienced on their way to the owlery when the winds had exploded through the notch in the mountains.

The senior danyk from the Danyar caught a glimpse of her stubborn pupil.
He’s doing it,
she thought.
He’s actually doing it!
Twilight had swelled to three times his size with the deep intake of one breath. He felt the zong qui flow through him. His gizzard seemed twice its normal size. He sensed a field of energy surrounding him. And did he feel a buzz or humming?

“Extend coal claws,” Nyra screed.

How have they gotten coal claws?
Soren wondered. Coal claws were the most dangerous of all battle claws. In each tip, a bonk coal burned. The Pure Ones advanced upon them now, the claws glowing red with a tinge of blue—hot fangs in the night.

Fight fire with fire,
Soren thought, and inhaled deeply. He was no master of the zong qui but he did feel himself fly very fast. “Grip, split, and roll,” he shouted. It was a strategic maneuver to divide an attacking unit, particularly useful when that unit had superior weapons. The butter torches seemed made for this job.

“Eeeyawk,” Twilight cried as he saw Nyra spin out. “I’m going to put that mask where it belongs!” he shrieked.

“Do not waste breath of zong qui, young one,” said the danyk who, with a tail move, had severed a Pure One’s wing. A quick death. The glowing talon trailed a wake of sparks as the owl plummeted down into the icy gorge. Twilight, inspired, curled his own talon into the shape known as the deadly blossom. He was on the tail of a Grass Owl who was flying very fast.
Concentrate,
Twilight told himself.
Concentrate!
The Grass Owl suddenly wheeled about in midair. The glowing claws were coming straight toward him. Twilight dodged and heard a crash behind
him. It was the danyk. The Grass Owl plunged toward the ground. “I could have gotten him! I could have!” Twilight shouted.

“Save breath, stupid one!” the danyk barked, and flew off.

From a spire high on the owlery, Mrs. Plithiver perceived the battle. She did not need to see to know what was transpiring. Every sensory fiber in her body was grasping the most minute details. Feathers flew through the air along with detached fire claws. It seemed as if the Pure Ones were losing their edge in this battle despite their numbers. She began calling out commands to the Hoolian owls. She did not know the ways of the Danyar but she knew her owls, the ones of the great tree. She knew their skills and how they fought. “A flying wedge, keep torches down, now loft and hurl.” The commands she had just shouted out were for a classic rocket maneuver that the Bonk Brigade often used. The owls worked in teams of two. One owl launched the flaming missile, in this case torches. The second owl retrieved it after the target had been hit. It took incredible skill and cooperation. Soren had invented it.

The Chaw of Chaws was being very effective right now, but then Mrs. P. began to perceive something profoundly disturbing. Were they about to lose that edge?

“Oh, Great Glaux.” The rocket maneuver was backfiring. Nyra had lured the two-owl team of Soren and Coryn, uncle and nephew, into an indefensible situation. Mrs. P. couldn’t see it, but she knew it. She felt a great stirring in the air.
More Guardians,
she thought. They would now outnumber the Pure Ones. Nyra’s own losses were mounting. But did it matter? The slink melf was with her. The whole purpose of this battle, Mrs. P. suddenly realized, was not to destroy all the Guardians but to assassinate just two.

“It’s the Frost Beaks, the Flame Squadron! They’re coming!” Ruby cried out.
It doesn’t matter,
thought Mrs. Plithiver.
Not if they only want Soren and Coryn.
She knew in the spiraling bones of her spine that Nyra did not care about the lives of her followers but only sought the death of her own son and his uncle, the brother of her mate, Kludd, whose mask she now wore.

Soren swerved in his pursuit of Nyra. He kept the torch low. Coryn flanked his starboard wing, ready to dive at the moment of launch. Nyra was heading toward a break in a cliff. They were closing the gap. Just before the notch, she ducked down, reversing her direction. But the king and his uncle worked smoothly together. No words were exchanged. They knew instinctively how to maneuver. They pivoted, hovered, and dove. The torch
whistled out. But then something flew from the notch, pressing them back against the ice face. It was a Pure Ones’ captain. He caught the torch on the fly. Four Pure Ones now advanced on them.
How did we get outmaneuvered? I should have known!
Coryn thought, and made a wild dive. But the slink melf was on him. Nyra was howling and called him by his hatchling name. “You had your chance, Nyroc! You had it. Now, what’ll it be? The ember or your life?”

Soren now had nothing—no torch, no battle claws, nothing. He saw a reddish streak.
Ruby? Ruby and Twilight?

Save your breath, Twilight, save your breath,
the Great Gray cautioned himself, but in his head a chant began.
Tore your face once, tore it twice, going to smash you up with that ice
…The chant dwindled. He could not even think it. He had to concentrate…
concentrate.
Ruby had the torch. He would try the Zi Phan, the talon like the spiked flower. He spread the four talons of each foot as far as he could. He knew the power came from the downstroke. He felt his zi begin to tingle and was about to strike.

He would get her—get Nyra once and for all. He opened his beak. “Eeeyrrrrk!” The terrible sound tore the clouds from the sky, shattered the light of the moon, peeled the ice from a cliff. There was another blur of blue! A blue owl Twilight had never seen before. Had that terrible sound come from this owl’s throat or his own?
Twilight was confused. Then he saw Nyra lurch in flight. The blue owl hurled himself toward the slink melf. Feathers spun through the air. Blood—so much blood! The ice cliff was streaked with blood. Something bright and shining went flying through the air and there was a metallic clank below. Then silence, a profound silence. Even the wind seemed to have stopped. Soren, Twilight, Ruby, and Coryn alighted on a bloody shelf.

“They’re gone, I think,” Ruby said.

“Look down. There are bodies,” Soren said, breathing heavily. Blood spread in the snow, and in the midst of the red glared a bright metal mask.

“Great Glaux, it’s her!” Soren exclaimed. The four owls lifted into flight and began to hover in descending circles over the carnage. A few seconds later, they landed.

“So much blood,” Twilight said. “I thought these fellows were not about blood. The danyk said that to tear with talons was considered an ignoble way to win at combat.”

They looked at one another, perplexed. “Who did this?” Coryn asked.

“Oh, no.” Soren was slowly walking around the slaughtered owls. Gingerly, he put out his talons and turned the blood-streaked mask over. There was no face beneath it. “There are only three bodies.”

“She got away?” Twilight said.

“I tried,” a voice spoke quietly. It was the blue owl, the one who had so suddenly appeared.

“You tried,” the danyk swooped down. “You call this trying? This is an affront to the entire meaning of Danyar, the way of noble gentleness. This is ignoble.”

The blue owl wilfed. “I am not ignoble. I am not!” He wept. Other owls were gathering. The pikyus gasped in shock at the blood, the torn wings. “It’s death, isn’t it?” the blue owl asked in a trembling voice tinged with desperation.

The H’ryth alighted. “It is death unclean, death with greatest pain. You acted selfishly. You did not kill but murdered. You struck those fatal bloody blows not from the innermost part of your gizzard but from your pride and your anger.”

“But Holy One,” the blue owl now collapsed before the H’ryth, “I have done honorable things.”

“He has,” Doc Finebeak said. “He rescued Bell.”

“Bell?” Soren said. “Bell—what happened to Bell?” Then it came back to him. The terrible dream he had had at the Panqua Palace. That urgency that had coursed through him in his sleep, the feeling that he had to return immediately, that someone very dear to him was in danger.
He blinked at the owl and remembered the blue feather that had in his dream floated near the desert floor.

“She is fine now. She is safe, thanks to this blue owl,” Doc Finebeak said. “And not only that, he guided us here.”

The H’ryth winced at the word “guided.” “He is no pikyu!” the H’ryth spoke harshly. “He is an escaped dragon owl.”

“What?” The Guardians looked nervously at one another and began to mumble among themselves.

“But he saved an owlet,” Soren said passionately. “He saved my daughter.”

“Phonqua byrmong ping tsay phrak.” Slowly, as the H’ryth spoke, the words formed meaning in Otulissa’s mind.

“He says this owl believes he has broken the wheel of life, has made a shortcut to change his fate,” she translated the speech softly to the others.

“I have…I have…” the blue owl said in a shrill voice.

“You are still Orlando,” the H’ryth spoke now in Hoolian.

“Call him what you will, but he is a good and decent owl,” Soren continued to protest. Orlando seemed to swell a bit from his wilfed state.

“I thought his name was Striga,” Doc Finebeak said.

A new light burned in the blue owl’s eyes. “The Striga,” he said softly.

The H’ryth felt a deep agonizing twinge in his gizzard. He turned his gaze on the dragon owl. “You are still a dragon owl. Time will tell if you have satisfied your fate, your phonqua.”

“May he come with us?” Coryn asked.

The H’ryth turned to address them. “You are all noble owls. We have expected you for hundreds of years. And we have the deepest respect for you. We see in you many of the traits of our beloved Theo, our first H’ryth. We have all tried to live up to the values that the first H’yrth, Theosang, taught and practiced. We know you do not understand phonqua, but we do understand that Orlando has proven valuable to you. He is not a noble owl. Nor is he in this phase of phonqua an evil one. It is your decision if he is to go with you to the great tree. But know this: His phonqua has not been satisfied, has not come full circle.” With that, the H’ryth spread his wings. Slowly, majestically, he rose in the air and soared above the icy peaks, spiraling higher and higher until he reached the highest hollow of the Mountain of Time.