The Rise of a Legend

The Rise of a Legend



Credits
Author:	Kathryn Lasky
Cover Art:	Richard Cowdrey
Cover Design:	Steve Scott
Details
Publish Date:	2013
ISBN Number:	0545509793

Summary
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The Rise of a Legend is a Guardians of Ga'hoole prequel novel on Ezylryb, when he was known as Lyze of Kiel. It was released on 1st August 2013.

Description[]

THE OWLS TAKE FLIGHT AGAIN

An owlet hatches out into Stormfast Island and into a world torn by war. For one hundred years, his people have fought off enemy owls from the Ice Talons, but the tide has turned. An invasion is coming, one the Kielian League won't have the strength to resist. Soon the tyrant owl Bylyric will rule over everything, and no honorable owl will be safe.

Only the small owl from Stormfast stands between Bylyric and total victory. Lyze is not very impressive to look at, but he has a wild idea for a snake and owl strike unit that just might give the soldiers of the Kielian League the edge they need.

This is his story, the story of an ordinary owl who rose to become Ezylryb of the Great Tree. This is the story of what it takes to make a Guardian of Ga'Hoole.

Plot[]

The book starts as the Band arrive at the Great Tree. Ezylryb decides to put the book he was working on aside to start a new one: The Book of Ezylryb.

The Owlet Moons[]

The book begins with Ezylryb, known as Lyze at the time, hatching on Stormfast Island. His Tantya (aunt) Hanja arrives, which causes worries since whenever she goes somewhere, bad things are believed to follow. His caretaker, Gundesfyrr, soon learns from a messenger that Edvard, Lyze's brother, has died in battle. Lyze then proceeds to have his First Insect, Meat, Fur on Meat, and Meat on Bones Ceremonies. Right before his Meat on Bones Ceremony, his parents, Rask and Ulfa, come home from a battle. Lyze is shocked to see his parents, not because they finally showed up but because his mum was missing an eye and his da had half his whiskers burned off while in battle with Horned soldiers of the League of the Ice Talons. A bit later, Lyze hears his parents talk about how Ulfa had heard of a brutal murder in the Bay of Fangs: a family of three Snowies had been visited by Bylyric, the insane and cunning leader of the Ice Talons, who wished to recruit them into his armies. When they refused, Bylyric murdered the couple in a wild rage before the eyes of their newborn hatchling, who he took to raise as an Ice Talon. This horrific event, furthermore, was not just a rumor, but confirmed to be the truth.

Later, Lyze meets Moss, and the two, though initially rivals, become best friends after the return of Moss's mother, Hrenna, who, like Ulfa, is scarred from war. Moss decides to wait for Lyze to be fledged before making the traditional trip to Dark Fowl Island, despite being fully fledged himself. With his wings slowly getting stronger, Lyze and his da go to Hock, which is on the edge of Stormfast Island. There, they meet Hoke of Hock and his sister, Hellie, then return to Stormfast to find that Ulfa had laid an egg.

A short while later, Lyze and Moss are about to finally make their flight to Dark Fowl Island when Lyze senses something wrong, and decides it is not the proper night to go. This is due to his natural sense for weather, and he had subconsciously sensed the Snurls, a violent type of wind that blew from the Shagdah Snurl.

The next night came around, and with the calmer winds, Lyze and Moss take off with Rask and Moss's father, Arne. Along the way, the group stops by the Ice Dagger, where they and some ice harvesters are the sudden victims of an attack launched by hireclaws from the Ice Talons League, and one of the harvesters, Piet, is slain. The two fathers grab ice shards for weapons and rush into battle, leaving the two owlets with ice hooks in case they are attacked. After a while of waiting for the battle to end, Moss and Lyze are attacked by a Barn Owl with fire claws. The owlets manage to fight him off, stalling him long enough for Arne and the ice harvesters to come in and deliver the finishing blow.

The group, now with the ice harvesters, Aiyunne, Bela and Friedl, make their way to a rocky beach on the lower part of the island to recover. After mourning over the loss of Piet, Rask and Arne decide they need to immediately fly to Dark Fowl Island to warn General Andricus about the Ice Talons coming so far into their territory in an attack force that they feared to have included Bylyric's top lieutenant. At a grog tree, they hear warriors boasting of their achievements in battle, which the pairs' fathers express their disgust over, telling their sons that war in never a thing to brag of. The fathers hand the owlets off to an Elf Owl named Rolf to take them to Orf's forge while they meet with the general, but not before running into Hanja outside a grog tree, who sings a song about peace, much to Rask and Arne's disgust, Rask dismissing his sister-in-law's ideals as 'frinkin notions'. They pass over a honing pit, where Kielian snakes, one such being Gragg, are sharpening blades and tools.

At Orf's forge, the owlets are outfitted with liffen claws (training claws), and the group returns home to Stormfast where all their parents all rush back into battle soon after, with confirmation of the Ice Talons front moving closer. Lyze and Moss train often with their claws, and one day come across Thora in a nearby tree, who had run away from her home and abusive stepmother in the Firth of Canis to become a blacksmith on Dark Fowl and train under Orf. She leads the two owlets to a secret forge, which belonged to a recently deceased Burrowing Owl that was secretly an arms trader on both sides of the war and agrees to make their liffen claws into real battle claws.

When they returned to Lyze's hollow, Gilda, his family temporary nest-maid snake, is angry with them for staying out so late, but comes around and agrees to let them have their secret about Thora's forge. A few days later, the egg that Ulfa had laid hatches, and Lysa is born. Shortly after she yarps her first pellet, Hanja makes a visit to the hollow, striking fear into Lyze and Gilda that something bad may happen.

While out hunting, Lyze and Moss are approached by a panicked Thora who warns of an incoming Ice Talon commando attack. The owls swoop in with fire claws (the coals of which were stolen from Thora's forge), and Lyze and his friends and neighbours leap to combat them, battling a force that ranges from Burrowing Owls to Great Gray Owls, Barn Owls to Barred Owls (the enemy owls, coincidently, consists of three of the four species that the Band consists of), manage to fight them off until a fire ignites the sap in the tree where his hollow is. Lyze rushes in to save his sister, but would have suffocated, had Gilda not saved him. Tragically, however, Gilda was too late when she returns and though Hanja escapes, Lysa and Gundesfyrr are killed.

The Cadet Moons[]

Lyze's parents return shortly after the fire and mourn their lost chick and Gundesfyrr. Lyze is immediately sent to Dark Fowl with Thora and Moss to become cadets, marking the abrupt end to their owlethood, although Lyze suspects that Thora's childhood had ended long before.

The owls meet Loki and Blix, who they become quick friends with, and they make plans to visit the Shagdah Snurl together from which the two new owls came from. The young owls wish they could change the set-in stone ways of the Kielian League through beginning scientific research on coals and types of ice for harvesting from locations other than the Ice Dagger, but for now they must go through their training as planned.

During training one day with the arrogant Captain Ludvigsen Asio Flammeus the Fifth of the Ice Squires, Lyze meets Lillium, who takes the blame for him speaking during class. Lyze is impressed with her calmness in this situation, and her confidence in back-talking to the captain and finds himself infatuated. He goes on to train with ice weapons and flight formation classes, as well as making more friends with other cadets and even sneaking out to visit grog trees and listen to the stories of soldiers from the front. His barracks sergeant, Skellig Bubo Virginianus, a likable Great Horned Owl of distinguished ancestry, allows the owls to sneak out to grog trees past curfew. Lyze later meets up with Lil at mealtime, where she is sitting at a snake table. He comments on how Kielian Snakes are far more useful than to serve simply as tables, to which Skellig appears and interjects, showing his disdain for the snakes and even shamelessly raking a talon over the sleeping snake. He apologies when Lil and Lyze furiously reprimand him and tells them that he was bitten by a mad Kielian Snake, badly scarring and traumatizing him.

Thora doesn't believe Skellig's story though, believing his scars to have all of the signs of being caused by a particularly hard to craft blade known as a "siege blade" but being unable to understand how such an injury could have come to be, as Skellig was only a cadet. Becoming suspicious, she decides to investigate him, following him on his way to a grog tree. Skellig suddenly proves to be a skilled flyer as soon as he is far from sight, and he meets up with a Pygmy Owl to retrieve a mysterious item before heading on his way towards the grog tree. He plants the item, a drugging potion, in Orf's cup, so that when he drinks his bingle juice he would be too disoriented to fight back when Skellig and his team of Eagle Owls owl-knap him. Thora follows stealthily to see where they take him.

Later, she informs Lyze and Moss of Orf's disappearance, and they, along with Lil, head out to rescue him. They follow the owlknappers to Elsemere Island, home of the Glauxian Sisters, and listen in on their conversation within a cave by flying into a smee hole, where the sound is easily transmitted through the steam. They discover that Skellig, though young, is actually a commander in Bylyric's forces sent to infiltrate the academy and intends to get the formula for cold coals from Orf for his master, test the recipe in Thora's secret forge on Stormfast, then dispose of him.

Lil and Thora decide to carry out a plan by dressing up as Glauxian Sisters and sneaking in to help Orf under the guise of being healers. Once inside, Lil draws her retractable hot lance and pierces Skellig's starboard wing. Orf, Moss, and Lyze join the fight, and soon the owls are facing off against the three Eagle Owls. Skellig's head is crushed in by an accidental flail swing from one of the Eagle Owls, and the rest are killed off when Loki and Blix (who were made aware of the four owls leaving due to a gadfeather witness) arrive with ice splinters, performing a spectacular midair reload that allows for quicker attacks.

Upon their return back to Dark Fowl, they are not hailed as heroes, but rather reprimanded for the many rules they broke by Colonel Stellan, Commander Optimus and a smug Ludvigsen. When Orf returns from his debriefing however, he rushes to defend them, and announces that Thora is to be his new apprentice. The group is ordered to meet with General Andricus Tyto Alba, who informs the group that they've been given holiday leave for their good work. He also gives Lyze the news from a letter delivered to his secretary by Lyze's aunt Hanja that his parents have laid another egg, and they've requested his presence at their new hollow in a blue spruce tree on Stormfast. Andricus specifically congratulates Lyze on the fighting technique that Blix and Loki performed which he had thought up, the midair reload, and asks if he has any other inventive ideas. Lyze tells him of his idea to utilize Kielian snakes in combat, and Andricus tells him to come up with a plan, and he may consider it.

As Lyze's first season at the Military Academy came to a close, he returned home to his parents, where his new brother, Ifghar, had hatched. He finds that Ulfa had let Gilda go and was taking care of the new hollow on her own until Mrs. Grinkle returns. Tantya Hanja arrives for Ifghar's First-Meat-on-Bones ceremony, right before Rask leaves to return to the battle front. As Lyze anxiously awaits a letter from Lil, a Great Horned messenger (standing in for a peregrine falcon who had been "intercepted" and most likely killed) instead arrives with a death notice that Rask had fallen in battle by an ice sword to the gizzard. Ulfa is wracked with grief, only managing to distract herself by cleaning the hollow. Lyze, in an attempt to focus her attention on something else, shares his ideas about new battle techniques.

Ifghar's flight to the Hock comes around, so Ulfa and Lyze fly with him to see the snakes. This time around, they arrive when all the snakes are diving for fish, and Lyze sees their ability to control the speed of their fall using a parachute-like ruffle of scales around their necks. This sparks many curious questions, which he asks a particular snake they met named Dylan. During this, to Ulfa and Lyze's anger and incredulity, Ifghar shows he lacks the respect his mother and brother have for the snakes, shamelessly voicing his belief that the owl's spirit of Glaux is better than the serpent's version and silently wondering why Lyze addresses Dylan as an equal.

Lyze returns to Dark Fowl after his break, immediately meeting with General Andricus to further share his ideas. The parliament is very dismissive and skeptical of his ideas, but Andricus finds it fascinating and decides to act on his ideas, creating the Glauxspeed Division (named by Lyze), much to the parliament's confusion and surprise. Andricus tells the council that, for all their efforts, Bylyric is leading his forces to victory after victory and has set his sights of not only destroying them, but also taking the Southern Kingdoms, including Ga'Hoole, for himself. He also mentions Strix Struma, a young Spotted Owl who had fended off against Ice Talons attacking Little Hoole and decides that she should be a member of the Glauxspeed Division. Struma later meets Lyze, and they discuss plans for the division, including an idea to bring in snow leopard recruits for ground troops, especially considering the fact that Bylyric is hated by the snow leopards, who's cubs his followers snatch to satisfy Bylyric's carnivorous hunger for them.

Training and recruitment begins, with Lyze searching for unsatisfied and lazy snakes specifically to challenge them and engage them in something they may become passionate about. In his search, he meets and recruits Octavia. Moss leaves to find snow leopard recruits, and Thora begins work on new and improved quivers for ice splinters. After a few weeks of training, Lyze is given permission to go on a scientific research mission to the Shagdah Snurl, while Lil takes Lyze's place leading the training. Before leaving, Andricus informs Lyze that his brother would be joining the cadets soon.

Lyze, Blix, and Loki later arrive at the Shagdah Snurl, where they meet up with Loki's mother, Wynnifryd. She tells them she has sighted a peregrine falcon recently (a strange sight so far north) and gives them naked rockmunks, cooked over coals harvested from around the volcano's "lava lake". This is the first time Lyze ever eats cooked meat. After visiting with Wynnifryd for a few days, Lyze and his friends visit the Nacht Sted, where Blix decides she wants to show Lyze something she and Loki and discovered a while ago: the frozen body of an Other equipped with mountain climbing gear. The owls take some of its tools including some metal spikes and loops and most notably two flare guns, which the owls load with one of the spikes to fire a flaming projectile.

They were going to take these discoveries back to Orf and Thora on Dark Fowl, but on their way out discovered that Moss had settled on the Nacht Sted as his place to train his snow leopards with the help of several other owls. Two of these owls, a pair of Great Horned owls known as Three Talons and Half Beak for their wounds, Lyze realized, were slipgizzles, as they fit the description of two Ice Talon soldiers his parents had fought and left scarred, but who had given them lifelong injuries of their own. They warned Moss through use of code, but before they could make a move, one of the slipgizzles flew off, returning with a group of Ice Talons and a peregrine falcon. The two groups fought, Lyze making use of the gun to take down a few enemies. In the aftermath of the seconds-long battle, in which all of the Ice Talons and a Great Gray Kielian fighter are slain, Lyze discovers the dying body of the enemy peregrine, Glynnis, a falcon who had been a messenger for the Kielian League, was a turnfeather all along. As she dies, she reveals to him that the Ice Talons know their plans to use snakes and snow leopards in battle.

Lyze also finds that one of his flaming spikes misfired and hit a snow leopard named Patches. As his friends get to work medically assisting the leopard, Lyze flies over the open water, releasing the flare guns and spikes, feeling that the weapons are far too dangerous in the talons of any owl and must be lost forever. As he sentences the weapons to their watery end, Lyze wonders if it was weapons such as these that had been responsible for the disappearance of the Others.

Japanese lil — Lyze and Lil at their wingfast, with Lil wearing her wingfast veil

While Moss, snow leopards and remaining owls (consisting now of a Hawk Owl, Eagle Owl and Great Gray) relocate themselves to another undisclosed location, Lyze and the others return to Dark Fowl to report the treachery. Lyze and Lil, who have already been courting one another, chose to hold their wingfast ceremony before any tragedy could strike. Upon finding Strix Struma, Lyze, impatient, waves aside her concern and belief that Ifghar and Gragg should be separated, and invites her to the wingfast, ignoring the nervous glance Struma shot Ifghar when she discovered this. In a ceremony hosted in General Andricus's hollow, it was officiated by the general himself and attended by Octavia, Blix, Loki, Thora, Orf, Strix Struma and an assortment of other close friends. This includes Ifghar, who wears a stricken expression as he enters after learning from Sergeant Luka the nature of the event.

The War Moons[]

Rise warMoons — Illustration prominently featuring one of the snow leopards; for the third section of the book, titled *The War Moons*

Following the ceremony, Andricus and Lyze discuss how they should act now that the secrecy of the new recruits is out and Andricus resolves to make a sudden and unexpected attack on Bylyric himself, assassinating the Tyrant of the Talons with the Glauxspeed Unit, then crushing his leaderless forces in an invasion. In preparation for this attack, Lyze and his troops commence a doubled training.

At the time, Lyze notes that since Ifghar and Gragg have been reassigned new partners, his brother has gained a far better attitude. However, Lyze remains concerned, as many of the new friends his brother has made seem along the lines of sycophants and easily-influenced youngsters. One evening on their way to Cronin to look over weapons for refitting, Lyze and Thora stop by a grog tree to listen to the tale of the Myschgrad Serpent from a blind Snowy skog. Lyze wonders where his brother is, so after their visit with Cronin they begin making their way back to the grog tree to search, only to be stopped by the sounds of whimpering in a strand of trees. They investigate, and find none other than Ifghar, Gragg, a Spotted Owl, and a second toady harshly bullying and even injuring a whimpering Sooty Owl cadet, Gabi, calling her the child of a hagsfiend and breaking a primary on her port wing, which would render her flightless for a period of time. Horrified, the two swoop to Gabi's rescue, Lyze taking on Gragg whilst Thora forcefully removes Ifghar's battle claws, much to his howled anger. Enraged by such behavior, which is a matter of vroknenplonk (a serious offense) Lyze silences Ifghar's excuses and declares it a matter for the High Military Court. On trial, Ifghar's gang, including Gragg, are dishonorably discharged for their actions, Due to his illustrious parentage, Ifghar is permitted to plead a lesser charge. For the remainder of his training he would be placed in the brig, and would only be allowed to serve in non-combat situations. Ifghar's battle claws, meanwhile, are melted down and Thora sneeringly remarks that they will make a pot for pellet-yarping from the metal.

The few weeks after this, Lyze is sent to a camp on the H'rathghar Glacier, Lav Issen, constructed to house the thousands of owlets who had been left homeless in Ice Talon attacks similar to the raid Lysa had died in. With their parents being occupied in the war and their broodies killed, they were in great need of assistance. There, Lyze reunites with Gilda, who is waiting for her next assignment after the death of her flight-partner, Jonor. Wynnifryd is there as well, having volunteered her services to helping the orphans. The camp leader, Lieutenant Lyngaard Strix Varia, informs him that due to the Kielian League's desperate need for able-bodied soldiers, Ifghar has been recommissioned. With this news, Lyze holds hope for his sibling to be able to redeem himself in battle.

Shortly after their return from Lav Issen, Lyze, Lil, and Strix Struma are sent on a mission to dispatch spies in the region of the Ice Talons to find the precise location of Bylyric. Octavia swims to the shore of the Ice Talons where she meets Wick, a member of the League of Ice Talons. He questions her, and she reveals her cover story: she was a temporary nest maid at the Great Ga'Hoole Tree, but left to return home in the Firth of Fangs for a job. Wick says they could use her to gather fish for their lower-ranking mess hall, and she is allowed access to the passages leading into the stronghold. Within only two days, Octavia is promoted to work in the higher-ranking mess hall. At the offhanded mention that she had worked at the Great Tree, Octavia would soon be escorted to the highest-ranking mess hall, where Bylyric and Jesper were located. At the entryway, her escort is stopped by a guard, and the two owls disappear into the entry crack in the wall, leaving Octavia alone with Bylyric's food tester. This tester, a Kielian snake, is tasked with taking a small bite from all of Bylyric's meals to ensure they aren't poisoned. She lives a miserable life, having her extension plates severed and leaving her unable to shapeshift her head as all Kielian snakes do. With Octavia before her, she begs to be put out of her misery, and Octavia obliges, then flees the bloody scene. The owls pursue her, but to no avail. Octavia successfully escapes and returns to the Kielian League.

With Bylyric located and no word from any other slipgizzle of him leaving the area, they prepare for the assassination mission.

The Long Moons of Retreat[]

Coming soon!

Characters[]

Trivia[]

The Rise of a Legend is the only book to have footnotes, seeing as Ezylryb is the "author" and in the main series it is mentioned that he often uses footnotes in his books.
In A Guide Book to the Great Tree, Ifghar states that Ezylryb was the one who took away his battle claws, but in The Rise of a Legend, they are said to be taken by Thora Plonk. It is unknown if Ezylryb lied to cover up his interaction with his brother, if Ifghar lied to make Ezylryb look bad, or if this is simply an inconsistency.

The Rise of a Legend

Contents