Our first day of training went until almost twixt time. We were starving when we got to the dining hollow. I searched for Lil and finally found her at a nest-maid table19 — standing at a spotted azure-back Kielian who reminded me of Hoke of Hock. I hadn’t thought about Hoke or Gilda since I had arrived, but now they came to mind again. They were two of the smartest snakes I had ever met and it seemed ridiculous to me that snakes were being used — I might even say misused — as dining tables. They had more to contribute. I was bucking tradition, but I knew I was right.
This particular Kielian snake was sound asleep. I turned to Lillium. “Did it ever strike you that perhaps Kielian snakes could be more than just a surface to eat from or honers in the honing pit, Lillium?”
“Just call me Lil, please.” She blinked prettily and I felt a little riffle in my gizzard.
“What would you propose, old fellow?” said Cadet Skellig. “Want them to be flight instructors?”
Lil churred softly, then spoke. “Well, they don’t have wings, but their heads are very strong. They did hollow out our barracks, after all.”
“No brains, my dear!” Skellig laughed. “No brains at all!”
“Shush!” Lil said. “She can hear you.”
Skellig brushed her off. “She’s sound asleep. You can’t wake her up!” He took a talon and dragged it across the snake’s scales.
“Don’t do that!” Lil nearly spat.
“Don’t fret. She didn’t budge. These old gals have tough hides,” Skellig said.
“It’s disrespectful,” I said rather sharply.
“Sorry, old fellow, but I don’t think respect is the point.”
I was aghast at this remark. Suddenly, I didn’t like Cadet Skellig calling me “old fellow” anymore. How could such a good-natured owl suddenly seem so … so ill-natured, so cynical?
“It’s exactly the point,” I countered. “We should respect Kielian snakes. The snakes could do a lot more than we ask them to.”
“Oh, dear,” Skellig said, suddenly contrite. “Look, I’m sorry, really. I had a bad experience as an owlet with a Kielian snake.”
“You did?” Thora said. She was sitting at the tail end of the snake and had been silent until this point.
“Yes, it was really awful, quite horrendous. She stabbed me with her fangs.”
“Great Glaux!” Lil said.
“Indeed. Here’s the wound.” Skellig lifted his starboard wing, and just where it joined the upper part of his body, there was a bare patch with a ragged scar. “It’s healed now. But it was touch-and-go for a while. She was a mad old thing, but still.” He paused. “It was stupid of me to bring my personal experience to the table.” He stroked the nest-maid rather gently with his wing tip. She slept on.
I have to admit that I found Skellig’s apology, well — touching, for lack of a better word. And sincere. Apparently, Thora was not so quick to forgive. She returned to the barracks after our twixt-time repast, troubled not just so much by Skellig’s harsh words, but by the wound beneath his starboard wing. It was not a wound made by snake fangs. Of this, she told me later, she was certain. The puckered skin bore all the marks of a siege blade, one of the most difficult of all blades to forge. Where would a young owl like Skellig have encountered such a blade? He was a cadet. He had seen no action.
When Cadet Skellig snuck out in late morning to the grog trees, Thora decided to follow him. She would be discreet and lag a good way behind him. There were some puffy clouds overhead that would provide camouflage for her if necessary. She knew Skellig was not a particularly skillful flier, so she had no fear of keeping up with him. But Thora blinked, because as soon as Skellig was out of the barracks, he went into a beautiful, steep banking turn and headed for the isolated cliffs at the far end of Dark Fowl, a place known for its tumultuous winds. He laid on the speed, negotiating the turbulence with a grace she had never seen before from him.
Thora began to feel a kind of blackening dread in her gizzard. Cumulus clouds were building up just south of the point, and she decided to bury herself in them and listen. Skellig’s flying was still not as silent as most, perhaps because of his wound, so she could track him fairly easily. Soon, she picked up another sound, quite distinct. From the whisper of the wind passing over its plummels,20 she could tell there was a Pygmy Owl in the cloud bank as well. She heard a faint churr when the two of them met up, and then the Pygmy turned and flew straight out to sea. Cadet Skellig curved around on a flight path, Thora guessed, toward the grog tree favored by Orf. Listening carefully, Thora could tell that there was something different in Cadet Skellig’s flight. He was flying heavier. Was he carrying a weapon? But no. It didn’t sound that heavy. A botkin of some sort? Thora tipped her head and contracted her facial disc to home in on the sound.
From the way the wind whistled against it, Thora could tell the object Skellig was carrying was not made from metal. It seemed instead to be made from something soft and slightly furry. Moleskins were often used by field medics for transporting powders and unguents for wounds. It must be a moleskin. But if Cadet Skellig needed medicine for his wound, which looked well healed, why wouldn’t he just go to the Academy infirmary?
All this was becoming more and more mysterious, and Thora was determined to find out what was happening. It was still quite early. Owls tended to rest up a bit before hitting the grog trees, and Orf in particular had quite a bit of work to do to dampen his forge at the end of the night. He was meticulous about his tools, and he always started a load of cold coals braising in the moss-lined ice cubbies before he left.
Thora hid herself in the snow-laden boughs of a bushy spruce tree and watched Skellig landing in the grog tree a short distance away. As she suspected, the grog tree wasn’t open for business yet. Tin cups hung on the pegs unattended. Each smith had their own cup with their mark inscribed on it. Thora watched carefully as Skellig approached the branch with the cups, but couldn’t see what he was doing. Something didn’t feel right to her, not at all.
The grog keeper finally appeared.
“Well, ain’t you the early bird, Cadet!”
“I like to be here when the troops arrive,” Skellig said. “I learn more from them than I do in any class.”
“Probably right. Now what’ll it be, bingle or bangle?”21
“Oh, bangle. Like to be able to think straight, you know.”
“Got a lot to think about, eh?”
Skellig suddenly looked a bit nervous, as if he had said too much. “Not really. But I like to be alert for the stories.”
“Here you go.” The grog keeper set out a cup of bangle juice.
By this time, a few more owls had shown up. There were two smiths from down island and then three battle-weary Burrowing Owls back from the front, one with a patch over his eye.
“A double-strength bingle shot will help you with that,” the keeper said, nodding at the owl with the eye patch.
Two enormous Eagle Owls arrived and perched a bit away from the others. Skellig looked around as if expecting someone, but seemed to assiduously avoid the gaze of the Eagle Owls.
“Hail, Orf,” the keeper hooted, and a hooray went up in the tree.
“Here at last!” said a Barn Owl, though one might not have guessed his species, for his white, heart-shaped face was so streaked with soot it looked nearly black.
“I was wrestling with cold fire and cold coals. Takes a while but it’s the season, as you know,” Orf offered.
“You braising already?” the Barn owl asked.
“Ayuh, the best time is when the weather starts to change. The dampness locks in the chill.” He sighed and leaned forward on his perch toward the keep. “Gimme a bingle with a touch of bangle, Jobee. Need to start off with a bit of the soft stuff.”
“Coming right up, sir.”
Thora couldn’t take her eyes off Orf. She worshipped the smith. In her mind, he was more than a blacksmith, more than a weapons monger. He was an artist. Everything he did seemed artistic to Thora ??
? the way he wielded his hammer, the way he held his tongs. Even the way he sipped his juice was special, interesting.
It wasn’t long before the grog tree was crowded. A gadfeather arrived and began to sing a bawdy song:
Me and my mate
We got a date
At the old grog tree tonight.
She used to drink bangle
But I got her to bingle,
And you know what happened then!
For I drank the bingle
And now I ain’t single,
So let’s drink and drink again.
I got my cup hanging in the old grog tree,
She’s got her cup right beside me.
We’ll bingle the bangle
And jangle the jingle,
Then I’ll fly into the night
With my heart’s delight.
And come the morn
Back to the tree again,
Where our cups await
And we’ve got a date.
We’ll start all over again.
The songs got bawdier with “Tickle Me Tail Feathers.” Then romantic — “Got a Lot of Love in This Old Gizzard.” Then the owls sang a rousing fight song:
Hail, hail, warriors valiant,
We’ll conquer them yet.
With our banners flying,
We’ll pursue them to their deaths!
For we are warriors of Kiel.
We don’t give in,
We don’t give up.
We fight to the end
And never bend.
Now let’s raise a cup!
Thora saw Orf lift a talon to his brow as if he were tired or perhaps suffering from a headache. She was downwind of the tree slightly and tipped her head so she could better pick up what he was saying to the keeper.
“Feeling poorly, Orf?” the keeper asked.
“A bit of a headache. Often happens this time a year when I’m braising the cold coals. The fumes, you know. Think I’ll be toddling off.”
It looked more like toddling to Thora than actual flying. Orf flew only a short distance before settling down and trying to get lift again. Thora noticed that he was heading in the opposite direction of his forge, as if he was completely disoriented. She was about to fly out from her spot in the boughs of the fir tree to see if he needed help, when she saw that the two Eagle Owls had flipped their heads around and were following Orf’s progress. There was a lot of boisterous singing and tumult in the tree by this time, and no one noticed the Eagle Owls leave with Skellig.
Thora felt dread building in her gizzard. She knew that Orf was in danger but the two immense Eagle Owls were not birds to trifle with. They were at least twice her size and three times her wingspan. The perfect wingspan for … Oh, great Glaux! It suddenly dawned on her. They were planning a transport vacuum!22
Two more Eagle Owls materialized out of a heavily boughed fir tree just like the one she had been hiding in. Should she scream? Sound an alarm? The owls in the grog tree were too far into the bingle juice to do anything. Should she go back and fetch the others, Lyze, Moss? It was too far and in the opposite direction. Orf would be gone by then.
Thora made a quick decision — she would have to track the Eagle Owls. When she knew where they had taken Orf, she could report back and get help. She was sure they would not kill Orf; his knowledge was too valuable. His cold coals and the ice weapons were superior to anything existing in the Northern Kingdoms. Those weapons alone were responsible for more deaths on the battlefield than any others. Of course the Ice Talons League wanted Orf! They would force him to make his cold weapons and the hot ones as well — the fizblisters, the flails, the ice daggers.
Then it struck Thora. All the times she went to observe Orf working at his forge, who was always there? Cadet Skellig! And this wasn’t the first time she had seen Skellig at a grog tree favored by Orf. She had assumed that Skellig was interested in smithing, just like herself. But she remembered Skellig questioning Orf carefully about when the season for the cold coals would start. Now she knew it was because Skellig wanted to know when to nab him. Skellig must have put a potion in Orf’s cup. That accounted for Orf’s staggering flight from the grog tree. It was no headache from braising cold coals. They had drugged him!
The weather had turned dirty. Clouds rolled in from the north, and the day darkened. There was a mixture of snow, sleet, and hail — perfect weather for making cold coals. The dense cloud cover provided good camouflage for Thora, but she began to worry. She could clearly hear the Eagle Owls talking, but the sound of Orf’s breathing, his heart, and the gurgles of his gizzard were growing dimmer and dimmer. Had they given him too much of the drug? Was Orf dying?
“What? What are you saying?” I asked Thora as she shook me awake.
Moss heard her and began to rouse himself.
“It’s high noon, for Glaux’s sake! What are you doing up at this hour? Have you been drinking the bingle or something?”
“No! No! Come out of the barracks. I have to tell you something — privately!”
Grumbling, Moss and I followed Thora outside. “What is it?” Moss said grouchily. This was one owl who did not like to be wakened.
“Orf — they’ve owl-knapped him,” she said quietly. Our beaks dropped open.
There was dead silence.
“We’ve got to tell someone,” I said. “We better alert the regimental commander.”
“No!” Thora said sharply.
“Why not?” Moss asked.
“There were three other owls, Eagle Owls like the ones who took him, circling around the Academy headquarters and the parliament hollow — well-camouflaged, since the weather stinks.” She tipped her head up at the dark thunderheads hammering across the sky. Hag clouds, we called them. Lightning forked from them like the gnarled talons of a hagsfiend. Seagulls clattered into the sky, seeking refuge from the tumultuous sea.
“They know,” Thora continued with her head tipped toward the sky. “The owls know that when it’s discovered that Orf is missing, an all-out search will be launched. A squadron.” Thora looked at me. “Those Eagle Owls over the parliament will report it immediately.”
“A squadron isn’t right for this. It’s too unwieldly,” I said. In my short time at the Academy, I had learned a thing or two. The one thing that the Academy lacked — indeed, the whole Kielian League lacked — were units with what I thought of as extreme maneuverability. We were fighting an old war, a century-long war, with old tactics. We needed new strategies and we needed them fast — like now! If just a few of us went, we could slip in unnoticed, as a squadron never could.
Thora nodded at us. “Then let’s claw up.”
“Lil — we need her,” I said. “There is nobody better with a hot lance than Lil.”
They knew I was right. Lil had become a fantastic lancer. It was as if Lil was out to prove to Lud-Dud that she was no missy when it came to fighting. She had exhibited such skills that she had won the coveted retractable hot lance in the full-shine games that were held when the moon was at its brightest.
“She’ll bring Miss Hot Point!” Moss exclaimed. They had all been shocked when Lil had given her hot lance this odd nickname. Lil had a wicked sense of humor, and it was her way of getting back at Lud-Dud and showing him just what a Miss Cadet could do with the right weapon in her talons.
The owls who had nabbed Orf had taken him to Elsemere Island, an exceedingly clever move because it was the home of the Glauxian Sisters, a nonviolent meditative order that had taken vows of silence. The one exception to their rule of silence was in treating the sick or wounded. Then they could speak. They were renowned for their skills in the healing arts. The sisters were so peaceful that they didn’t hunt. They existed on little more than kelp and any creatures caught in the seaweed. Snails and bivalves such as clams or oysters were fine for them, for they had no blood.
Thora said the Eagle Owls and Skellig had taken Orf to the cliffs on the opposite side of the island from where the sisters lived, about as fa
r from their retreat as possible. And even if the sisters had known that the Ice Talon operatives had nabbed the greatest blacksmith in the Northern Kingdoms, what would they have been able to say? The sisters didn’t believe in war or weapons. They had stayed neutral throughout the hundred-year history of this war and welcomed all owls to their infirmary for treatment, no matter what side they were on.
Our fear was that Elsemere Island was an interim stop for the treacherous owls. They would undoubtedly move on, skirting the northernmost coast of the Southern Kingdoms, and then head straight for the heart of Ice Talons League territory.
As we approached the island, Lil turned to me. Her eyes glowed such a bright gold in the full sun of the day that I felt a shiver pass through my gizzard. Was this love? I couldn’t think of such things now.
“You realize what’s at stake here?” Lil began. “If we fail, we’ll all be de-commed and thrown out of the Academy, but more important, the war will be over. The Ice Talons League will win. They’re already stronger than we are, and with Orf they’ll have all the best weapons, too.”
I knew this, and I had but one thought: We cannot fail!
As we approached the northeast side of the island, we spotted a few of the sisters below us skimming the kelp beds in a small inlet. Others were combing the beach. They wore snoods on the backs of their heads and, falling to their shoulders, a kind of ornamental net woven from the lacy seaweed native to the island. Across their faces, they draped veils of the same seaweed, but with large eye-openings so they could see.