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Digger. Should I tell him about the scrooms — about Metal Beak? The best thing is to be honest, yet…
    “Digger, something is bothering me, but I can’t tell you just now. Do you understand?”
    Digger blinked again. “Of course, Soren. When you’re ready to tell, I’ll listen,” the Burrowing Owl said softly. “No need to say anything until you’re ready.”
    “Thank you, Digger, thank you so much.”
    So the Barn Owl got up, closed the book he was reading, and went to put it on the shelf. The shelf was next to the table where Ezylryb always sat absorbed in his studies, munching on his little pile of dried caterpillars. The library wasn’t the same without the old Screech Owl. Nothing seemed the same without him. Soren slid the book back into its place on the shelf. As he turned to leave, a book on metals caught his eye. Metals! Why hadn’t he thought of this before? He must go to see Bubo, the blacksmith. He must immediately go to Bubo’s forge. Soren might not be ready to tell Digger, but he was ready to tell Bubo—not all of it, but part of it—the part about Metal Beak.
    He flew out of the Great Ga’Hoole Tree, spiraled downtoward its base, and then swept low across the ground to a nearby cave. This was Bubo’s forge. The forge was just outside the entry of the cave and the rock had blackened over the years from Bubo’s fires. It was to this forge that Soren and the other members of the colliering chaw brought the live coals that fed the fires, which smelted the metals used for everything from pots and pans to battle claws and shields for the great tree. If anyone knew about metal beaks, or whatever it was that the scrooms had spoken of in the whispery voices that still swirled in Soren’s head, it would be Bubo. The fire had been dampened down, however, and there was no sign of Bubo. Perhaps he was inside.
    Although Bubo was not a Burrowing Owl, who always made their nests in the ground, he preferred living in a cave to a tree. As he had once explained to Soren, blacksmiths like himself, no matter if they were Great Horned Owls, Snowies, Spotted, or Great Grays, were drawn to the earth where, indeed, the metals lodged.
    Soren now stepped into the shadow of the overhanging rock ledge of the cave’s opening. Deep inside, he could see the glints of the whirlyglasses that Bubo had strung up. These contraptions were made from bits of colored glass and when light crept into the cave and struck the glass, reflections spun through the air and bounced off the walls in swirling dapples of color. There was no moonlighttonight, though. It was the time of the dwenking when the moon disappeared to barely a sliver.
    “Bubo!” Soren called. He waited. “Bubo!”
    “That you, Soren?” A large shadowy bundle of feathers started to melt out of the darkness of the cave. Great Horned Owls like Bubo were large, but Bubo himself was unusually large and towered over Soren. His two ear tufts, which grew straight up over each eye, were exceedingly bushy, giving him a slightly threatening demeanor. But Soren knew that beneath the gruffness there was no owl who had a gentler heart than Bubo. Although, like most Great Horned Owls, his feathers were basically the dull somber grays, browns, and blacks, they had been shot through with bright red and hot yellow like the hottest of fires—the ones said to have “bonk.” Bonk was the word that blacksmiths like Bubo used to describe the strongest and most energetic fires. Such fires have special hues and colors unlike ordinary ones. Bubo also could be said to have bonking colorful plumage. It was as if he had been clothed in the flames of his own forge instead of just the usual drab feathers of his species. “What brings you here, lad?”
    “Metal Beak,” Soren blurted without preamble.
    “Metal Beak!” Bubo gasped. “What’cha know about him, laddie?”
    “Him?” Soren blinked. “It’s a him?” Until that moment, Soren thought that the scrooms of his parents had