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that discouraged owls of the S’yrthghar Kingdoms from venturing to the N’yrthghar. Theo, however, found the winds bracing and enjoyed the sport they offered. Grank had provided him with the names of the polar bears to contact who might make good slipgizzles. Of special importance was one named Svenka who had been a close friend of the late Queen Siv. She was said at this time of year—autumn—to be making her way from her summer lodge on Dark Fowl Island to a remote firthkin not that far from Theo’s former home in the Firth of Grundenspyrr. His gizzard pinched at the thought of his family. It had not been a happy hollow. His father was so strict. His mum a meek little thing and not that bright. Until his little brother, Shadyk, came along, Theo hadborne the brunt of his father’s rages. His father was a retired H’rathian Guardsman. Although he had never risen to the rank of officer himself, he dreamed that Theo would join the Guard and accomplish what he had not.
    But Theo had had no taste for battle or a soldier’s life. Quiet and studious, he had learned to read by visiting a Glauxian Brother. When his father discovered this, he was furious.
    “They’re cowards, moon calves, the lot of them! Lazy, good-for-nothing owls. Don’t know an ice scimitar from a pile of yarped pellets.”
    “They’re good owls. They just don’t believe in violence,” Theo had argued. “Their nature is that of restraint. Their passion is peace. Their heroism comes from their mercy. Their honor is found in resistance, their dignity in their humility.”
    “Oh, shut up, for Glaux’s sake!” His father had raised a talon and swatted Theo across the hollow.
    There had not been a word of protest from his mum, just a mournful sigh.
    His older sister, Pye, had escaped the hollow as soon as she could and, much to her family’s horror, they discovered that she had joined a troop of gadfeathers. Pye could take care of herself. It was his little brother, Shadyk, that Theo worried about. Undersized, rather clumsy, and with all themeekness of his mum, he had become the favorite target of his da’s anger, who humiliated him in front of others, often beating him. Theo tried to protect the little fellow as best he could. But one night Theo and his da had a terrible row. Theo decided he could take it no longer and so he flew off.
    When Theo had come to the island in the Bitter Sea and met Grank, he had found the father he had always yearned for. Then a few short weeks after his arrival, the egg Grank had kept so carefully sequestered in his hollow hatched and Hoole came into the world. Theo simply could not believe his luck. For him, it was as if he had found a new little brother, indeed almost a whole new family.
    But for all this time, Theo had been haunted with guilt for abandoning his little brother to endure the cruelties of their father all by himself. Then he realized with a start that Shadyk would now be old enough to go off on his own. He must have done so by this time.
    Theo was concentrating so hard that he did not pick up the haggish stench of crow that was but a whiff on the edges of the tearing winds.
    But the hagsfiend of the Ice Narrows rarely missed a creature who passed her way. Kreeth backed quickly into her cave as she saw Theo rounding a bend in the channel.
    “Lutta, get out there. Remember the camouflage lessons I’ve taught you?”
    “Yes, Auntie.” Kreeth had settled upon “Auntie” as the term of endearment Lutta should use when addressing her.
    “Code S-S-S.”
    “Snowy-Slender-Still,” Lutta confirmed.
    “Get out there and do it. Keep one eye closed, the other a slit, and alert your half-hags. Then report back to me.”
    “Yes, Auntie.”
    “Be quick about it. He’s almost here.”
    Lutta didn’t pause to ask who Kreeth wanted her to watch. She immediately turned as white as a Snowy Owl, then stepped outside the cave and arranged herself on the ice shelf. Intentionally wilfing, she narrowed her body