Jytte set her eyes on a horizon that was now jumbled with chunks of ice and a jigsaw-fractured frozen sea. “I wished we’d thought to ask Sylvia where we are,” she said with a sigh. “Or at least asked her how to find the Den of Forever Frost.”

“But would a frog know about that?” Third asked. “The Den of Forever Frost is a bear place.”

“I think,” Stellan began slowly, “I think we need to remember what those maps we studied with Skagen looked like.”

Jytte scowled. “The maps would be useless even if we did have them. Nothing looks the same.”

“But the stars are the same,” Third said. “They can guide us to the Den of Forever Frost.”

Jytte looked over her shoulder as they swam. “But it’s midday. Do we have to wait for the stars to return?”

“Of course not! There are stars!” Stellan boomed. His voice was filled with new energy.

“Where?” Jytte challenged.

“The sun. The sun is a star. We know that. Mum told us so. The sun is the only one that shines during the day. And we know that the sun rises in the east and sets in the west. And we know that the Den of Forever Frost is southwest of the straits we swam through.”

“But how far west? We might miss it if we just keep going west.” The despair in Jytte’s voice was clear.

“The coastline might have changed, but there are islands with roots to the very bottom of this sea. Do you remember Skagen showing us Stormfast Island on his map? He said it was called Stormfast because it holds fast to the seafloor through storms. If we pass that island, we’ll know we have gone too far,” Stellan said confidently. “So we have the sun. We have the island, and when night falls, we’ll have the stars.”

Jytte nodded ever so slightly. Her brother was right. Not all of the time. But some of the time. And in the end, didn’t they both want the same thing? To find their father, stop the clock, and rescue Mum. But as Jytte scanned the coastline that resembled nothing they’d seen on Skagen’s maps, none of that seemed possible.

“This has all the markings of a firth,” Third said. “Remember Skagen told us that a firth is a channel of water that connects a bay with a smaller body of water like a pond or a lake. The currents are generally slow-moving, causing firths to freeze earlier. And do you feel how the current here has slowed?” The cubs stopped swimming and began treading water lightly. “Do you?” Third asked. The cubs had tipped back their heads as they suspended themselves in the water and concentrated.

“And that up there!” exclaimed Jytte. “Has all the markings of a spotted owl.” A bird had silently emerged from a low cloudbank. One of Jytte’s favorite lessons from Skagen had been learning how to identify various kinds of owls. Some were spotted. Some were barred. Some had tufts on their heads called horns. Some were big like the great grays, and some, the elf and the pygmy owls, were very tiny.

But what really fascinated Jytte was the silence of owls’ flight and the speed with which they killed. Skagen had told them that from the clouds, an owl could hear the heartbeat of a mouse beneath the snow. Owls seemed as different from bears as any earthbound creature could be. Jytte felt that if, after she died, she could be born one more time, have just one more life, she would choose to be an owl.

High above, a spotted owl named Cleve soared on a billowing draft of air. Tipping his wings to port, he began to carve a slow turn. Fragments of the bears’ conversation drifted up to him. He angled his head ever so slightly, first this way, then that. His unevenly placed ear slits began to home in on the talk. Sound traveled well in this dry air, and his slightly concave facial disc scooped their words from the breeze.

“Must be that way … ,” one cub said, pointing toward the Bay of Fangs.

“It’s a firth,” said the other.

“But which one? The right one?”

Right one, thought Cleve. What are they looking for? They weren’t hurt, that was all he knew. And that was good. So many of the cubs coming down from the Nunquivik had been terribly wounded. Glaux knew what they did to them up there. And these weren’t bear rebels. Too young.

He had to get back. He was late from this surveillance flight and due to report in the parliament at the Great Tree.

He soared straight up and dissolved into the thick cloudbank directly overhead. The last words he picked up were “looks like a firth to me.” It was the voice of a young female. “Firths can be connected to the Den of Forever Frost.”

“But only one,” said another voice, that of a male. “Only one is connected to the Den of Forever Frost, Jytte.”

Now, whyever, thought Cleve, would they want to know about that place? Ancient history!

Jytte tipped her head back farther as she tracked the owl’s flight until it vanished into a cloud. “He’s gone,” she whispered. There was a mournful tinge to her voice.

“It’s as if the clouds swallowed the owl,” Stellan replied as the cubs climbed out of the water, onto the ice.

“I wanted to watch it longer. Did you see how it moved its wings?” Jytte stood up and spread out her front legs and tipped them this way and the other. “I wonder what it’s like to have feathers instead of fur?” she mused.

“Hey!” Third said abruptly. “Look what’s coming our way.”

“Oh no!” Stellan felt a chill run through him as the shapes of four bears appeared in the distance. “Roguers?”

“I don’t think so,” Third said, sounding more curious than frightened.

As the bears came into focus, Stellan began to tremble. “But I see blood on … on …” The Roguer bears often emblazoned their chests with the blood of their prey. Proudly they would stride about with it as a wanton display of their power.

“On his shoulder. Not across his chest,” Jytte replied. She squinted and poked her muzzle forward toward the advancing bears. The black skin of her nose wrinkled and her guard hairs stiffened. “That’s not blood of prey but its own blood,” Jytte said. “That bear is wounded!”

“If this is a wounded bear, let’s help him,” Stellan said as he began to gallop toward the bears. He wasn’t sure how they could help, but he recalled his mum saying that packing snow onto an open wound was the best way to stop the bleeding.

There were four bears in all—large, full-grown male bears. Only one had been wounded. But like most mature bears, they all bore scars from battles during mating seasons, or from fights over food during the Dying Ice Moons when seals grew sparse. The dark slashes exposed their black skin where the fur had never grown back.

“Don’t fuss, don’t fuss. I’m going to be all right, really,” the bleeding bear said.

Third and Jytte looked at Stellan, who was staring intently at the strangers. They could tell he was riddling the four bears’ minds. Stellan possessed the unique ability to pick up the threads of other creatures’ thoughts.

Stellan caught fragmentary glints of the four bears’ thinking. They are wondering if we have seen Roguer bears. If we were captives of the Ice Cap. “You’re rebels, aren’t you?” he said, realizing who these bears must be. “You fought against the Timekeepers.”

“That we were,” replied one bear who had a short black scar across his forehead.

Jytte surveyed the group with awe. These bears had likely fought alongside her father when they stormed the fearsome Ice Cap.

Are, Syril. We are!” the wounded bear corrected him. “We won’t give up the fight.”

“We thought at first you were Roguers,” Jytte said. “But we didn’t see the blood banners across your chests.”

“They wouldn’t wear them here,” the bear called Syril said. “But you young’uns watch out. The Roguers have come south and infiltrated this country. One recognized Abbo here.” He nodded at the wounded bear. “And attacked.”

“Are you from the Nunquivik?” Third asked.

“No, but we are allies with those northern rebels,” Syril said.

“Have you ever heard of a bear by the name of Svern?” Jytte asked.

“Svern!” Syril repeated, while the other bears exchanged looks of surprise.

Syril picked up a fistful of snow, pressed it on his bleeding shoulder, then leaned closer to the cubs. “Have you seen him? So you know where he is?”

“No,” Jytte said. “We thought you might.”

“There’ve been all sorts of rumors.” Syril spoke in a low voice. “Some say he’s gone far, far west to beyond the Beyond to gather a regiment of wolves. Then some say that he’s dead. There are rumors that they captured him and put him in a black ice hole.”

“A black ice hole?” Stellan repeated in a quivering voice.

“Torture site. You see, things have become very bad at the Ice Clock. The Grand Patek has gained vast power. Tell them what you heard, Phynx.” He shot a glance at the bear who stood next to him.

“He’s gone yoickhynn,” Phynx whispered. “Out of his mind. It’s an owl word.”

Jytte felt something curdle in her gut. She almost dared not ask. Finally she said, “Were there any rumors that Svern had gone to the Den of Forever Frost?”

“The Den of Forever Frost?” Phynx repeated, and chuckled to himself. “That’s just a legend. I don’t believe it’s a real place. Or at least, not anymore.”

Syril tilted his head, as if reflecting on what Phynx had just said. “I suppose that ancient time now seems so distant to us that it’s hard to believe such a place really existed. The bear world has changed so much from the time of Svree. It has become … infected by these bears of the Ice Cap. The disease is spreading throughout the kingdoms, from the Nunquivik to the Northern Kingdoms of Ga’Hoole.”

Stellan felt something wither inside him. He glanced at his sister. She was blinking and staring at Syril as if trying to digest what he had just said.

“We are sorry.” Phynx reached out and touched Jytte on her shoulder. “But why would you think that Svern would go to such a place?”

Stellan tensed. Don’t say it, Jytte! The secret is ours to keep. The words Stellan could not say aloud reverberated in his own brain with such a clatter that he felt that Jytte might hear them. She did not, of course, but she looked at him with such intensity that he sensed that she knew to stay quiet.

At this point, Jytte’s mind was as clear to Stellan as water in a still sea. One bear’s myth, thought Stellan, is another’s truth.

“Now, we must go on,” Syril said. “But we suggest that you not go from where we came. That’s where we encountered a bloodryck.

“A what?” Third asked.

“A bloodryck. That is the Nunquivik term for the smallest band of Roguers. They are especially thick around good halibut waters. Our mistake!”

“Better to be hungry but live to eat again,” Phynx offered cheerfully. “If I were you, I’d swim to the other side—over there where the Firth of Grundensphyrr opens up.”

“Grundensphyrr!” Stellan was elated as he heard the word. “That’s the firth our mum came from.”

“It’s not a far piece from here. Go into the Bay of Fangs. Halfway up, you take a port turn and you shall be in the Firth of Grundensphyrr. There might be some fish up there. Not halibut, but smaller stuff. Nothing to attract Roguers.”

The cubs and the four rebel bears said good-bye. As the cubs trudged to the edge of the icy shore and slipped into the water, Jytte muttered, “The Den of Forever Frost is not just a legend. It’s real, and we’re going to find it.”