Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia

Chapter 14

Yes, you heard that right. I—Alcatraz Smedry—needed a Librarian.

Now, you may have gotten the impression that there are absolutely no uses for Librarians. I’m sorry if I implied that. Librarians are very useful. For instance, they are useful if you are fishing for sharks and need some bait. They’re also useful for throwing out windows to test the effects of concrete impact on horn-rimmed glasses. If you have enough Librarians, you can build bridges out of them. (Just like witches.)

And unfortunately, they are also useful for organizing things.

I hurried up the stairs with Sing and Bastille. We had to push our way past the soldiers who now lined the steps; the men and women held their swords, looking concerned. I’d sent a soldier with a message for my grandfather and another for my father, warning them of what we’d discovered. I’d also ordered one of the knights to send a contingent to search nearby buildings—maybe they’d be able to find the Librarian base and the other end of the tunnel. I wasn’t counting on that happening though. My mother wouldn’t be caught so easily.

“We need to go fast,” I said. “There’s no telling when my mother will break into that chamber.”

I still felt a little bit sick for needing the help of a Librarian. It was frustrating. Terribly frustrating. In fact, I don’t think I can accurately—through text—show you just how frustrating it was.

But because I love you, I’m going to try anyway. Let’s start by randomly capitalizing letters.

“We cAn SenD fOr a draGOn to cArry us,” SinG saId As we burst oUt oF the stAirWeLL and ruSHED tHrough ThE roOm aBovE.

“ThAT wILl taKe tOO Long,” BaStiLlE saiD.

“We’Ll haVe To graB a VeHiCle oFf thE STrEet,” I sAid.

(You know what, that’s not nearly frustrating enough. I’m going to have to start adding in random punctuation marks too.)

We c!RoS-Sed thrOu?gH t%he Gra##ND e`ntWaY at “A” de-aD Ru)n. OnC$e oUts/iDE, I Co*Uld sEe T^haT the suN wa+S nEar to s=Ett=ING—it w.O.u.l.d Onl>y bE a co@uPle of HoU[rs unTi^L the tR}e}atY RATiF~iCATiON ha,pPenEd. We nEeDeD!! to bE QuicK?.?

UnFOrTu()nAtelY, tHE!re weRe no C?arriA-ges on tHe rOa^D for U/s to cOmMan>

(Okay, you know what? That’s not frustrating enough either. Let’s start replacing some random vowels with the letter Q.)

I lqOk-eD arO!qnD, dE#sPqrA#te, fRq?sTr/Ated (like you, hopefully), anD aNn|qYeD. Jq!St eaR&lIer, tHqr^E hq.d BeeN DoZen!S of cq?RrIqgEs on The rQA!d! No-W tHqRe wA=Sn’t a SqnGl+e oN^q.

“ThE_rQ!” I eXclai$mqd, poIntIng. Mqv=Ing do~Wn th_e RqaD! a shoRt diStq++nCe aWay a sTrANgq gLaSs cqnTrAPtion. I waSN’t CqrTain What it , bUt It w!qs MoV?ing—aND s%qmewhat quIc:=)Kly. “LeT’s G_q gRA?b iT!”

(Okay, you know how frustrated you are trying to read that? Well, that’s about half as frustrated as I was at having to go get a Librarian to help me. Aren’t you happy I let you experience what I was feeling? That’s the sign of excellent storytelling: writing that makes the reader have the same emotions as the characters. You can thank me later.)

We rushed up to the thing walking down the road. It was a glass animal of some sort, a little like Hawkwind or Dragonaut, except instead of flying it was walking. As we rounded it, I got a better view.

I froze in place on the street. “A pig?”

Sing shrugged. Bastille, however, rushed toward the pig in a determined run. She looked less dazed, though she still had a very … worn-out cast to her. Her eyes were dark and puffy, her face haggard and exhausted. I jogged after her. As we approached the enormous pig, a section of glass on its backside slid away, revealing someone standing inside.

I feel the need to pause and explain that I don’t approve of potty humor in the least. There has already been far too much of it in this book, and—trifecta or not—it’s just not appropriate. Potty humor is the literary equivalent of potato chips and soda. Appealing perhaps, but at the same time dreadful and in poor taste. I will have you know that I don’t stand for such things and—as in the previous volumes of my narrative—intend to hold this story to rigorous quality standards.

“Farting barf-faced poop!” a voice exclaimed from inside the pig’s butt.

(Sigh. Sorry. At least that’s another great paragraph to try working into a random conversation.)

The man standing in the pig’s posterior was none other than Prince Rikers Dartmoor, Bastille’s brother, son of the king. He still wore his royal blue robes, his red baseball cap topping a head of red hair.

“Excuse me?” I said, stopping short outside the pig. “What was that you said, Your Highness?”

“I hear that Hushlanders like to use synonyms for excrement as curses!” the prince said. “I was trying to make you feel at home, Alcatraz! What in the world are you doing in the middle of the street?”

“We need a ride, Rikers,” Bastille said. “Fast.”

“Explosive diarrhea!” the prince exclaimed.

“And for the last time, stop trying to talk like a Hushlander. It makes you sound like an idiot.” She jumped into the pig, then extended a hand to help me up.

I smiled, taking her hand.

“What?” she asked.

“Nice to see you’re feeling better.”

“I feel terrible,” she snapped, sliding on her dark sun-glasses—Warrior’s Lenses. “I can barely concentrate, and I’ve got this horrible buzzing in my ears. Now shut up and climb in the pig’s butt.”

I did as ordered, letting her pull me up. Doing so was harder for her than it would have been previously—being disconnected from the Mindstone must have taken away some of her abilities—but she was still far stronger than any thirteen-year-old girl had a right to be. The Warrior’s Lenses probably helped; they’re one of the few types of Lenses that anyone can wear.

Bastille helped Sing up next as the prince rushed through the glass pig—which had a very nice, lush interior—calling for his driver to turn around.

“Uh, where are we going on our amazing adventure?” the prince called.

Amazing adventure? I thought. “To the palace,” I called. “We need to find my cousin Folsom.”

“The palace?” the prince said, obviously disappointed—for him at least, that was a fairly mundane location. He called out the order anyway.

The pig started to move again, tromping down the street. The pedestrians apparently knew to stay out of its way, and despite its large size it made very good time. I sat down on one of the regal red couches and Bastille sat next to me, exhaling and closing her eyes.

“Does it hurt?” I asked.

She shrugged. She’s good at the tough-girl act, but I could tell that the severing still bothered her deeply.

“Why do we need Folsom?” she asked, eyes still closed, obviously trying to distract me from asking after her.

“He’ll be with Himalaya,” I said, then realized that Bastille had never met the Librarian. “She’s a Librarian who supposedly defected to our side six months back. I don’t think she’s to be trusted though.”

“Why?”

“Folsom stays suspiciously close to her,” I said. “He rarely lets her out of his sight—I think he’s worried that she’s really a Librarian spy.”

“Great,” Bastille said. “And we’re going to ask her for help?”

“She’s our best bet,” I said. “She is a fully trained Librarian—if anyone can sort through that mess in the Royal Archives—”

“Not a library!” Rikers called distantly from the front of the pig.

“—it will be a Librarian. Besides, maybe if she is a spy, she’ll know what the Librarians are looking for, and we can force it out of her.”

“So, your brilliant plan is to go to someone you suspect of being our enemy, then bring her into the very place that the Librarians are trying to break into.”

“Er … yes.”

“Wonderful. Why do I feel that I’m going to end this ridiculous fiasco wishing I’d just given up my knighthood and become an accountant instead?”

I smiled. It felt good to have Bastille back. It was hard for me to be too impressed by my own fame with her there pointing out the holes in my plans.

“You don’t really mean that, do you?” I asked. “About quitting the knighthood?”

She sighed, opening her eyes. “No. As much as I hate to admit it, my mother was right. I’m not only good at this, but I enjoy it.” She looked at me, meeting my eyes. “Somebody set me up, Alcatraz. I’m convinced of it. They wanted me to fail.”

“Your … mother was the one who voted most harshly against your reinstatement.”

Bastille nodded, and I could see that she was thinking the same thing that I was.

“We have quite the parents, don’t we?” I asked. “My father ignores me; my mother married him just to get his Talent.”

Marry a Smedry, and you got a Talent. Apparently it didn’t matter if you were a Smedry by blood or by marriage: A Smedry was a Smedry. The only difference was that in the case of a marriage, the spouse got their husband’s or wife’s same Talent.

“My parents aren’t like that,” Bastille said fiercely. “They’re good people. My father is one of the most respected and popular kings Nalhalla has ever known.”

“Even if he is giving up on Mokia,” Sing said quietly from his seat across from us.

“He thinks he’s doing the best thing,” Bastille said. “How would you like to have to decide whether to end a war—and save thousands of lives—or keep fighting? He sees a chance for peace, and the people want peace.”

“My people want peace,” Sing said. “But we want freedom more.”

Bastille fell silent. “Anyway,” she finally said, “assuming my mother was the one to set me up, I can see exactly why she’d do it. She worries about showing favoritism toward me. She feels she needs to be extra hard on me, which is why she’d send me on such a difficult mission. To see if I failed, and therefore needed to go back into training. But she does care for me. She just has strange ways of showing it.”

I sat back, thinking about my own parents. Perhaps Bastille could come up with good motives for hers, but they were a noble king and a brave knight. What did I have? An egotistical rock-star scientist and an evil Librarian who even other Librarians didn’t seem to like very much.

Attica and Shasta Smedry were not like Bastille’s parents. My mother didn’t care about me—she’d married only to get the Talent. And my father obviously didn’t want to spend any time with me.

No wonder I turned out like I did. There is a saying in the Free Kingdoms: “A cub’s roar is an echo of the bear.” It’s a little bit like one we use in the Hushlands: “The apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.” (It figures that the Librarian version would use apples instead of something cool like bears.)

I’m not sure if I ever had a chance to be anything but the selfish jerk I became. Despite Grandpa Smedry’s chastisement, I still longed for the fleeting satisfaction of fame. It had been really nice to hear people talk about how great I was.

My taste of fame sat in me like a corrupt seed, blackened and putrid, waiting to sprout forth slimy dark vines.

“Alcatraz?” Bastille asked, elbowing me.

I blinked, realizing that I’d zoned out. “Sorry,” I mumbled.

She nodded to the side. Prince Rikers was approaching. “I called ahead, and Folsom isn’t at the palace,” he said.

“He isn’t?” I asked, surprised.

“No, the servants said that he and a woman looked over the treaty, then left. But never fear! We can continue our quest, for the servant said that we could find Folsom in the Royal Gardens—”

“Not a park,” Sing said. “Or, er, never mind.”

“—across the street.”

“All right,” I said. “What’s he doing in the gardens?”

“Something terribly exciting and important, I’d guess,” Rikers said. “Eldon, take notes!”

A servant in scribe’s robes appeared from a nearby room as if from nowhere, with a notepad. “Yes, my lord,” the man said, scribbling.

“This will make an excellent book,” Rikers said, sitting down.

Bastille just rolled her eyes.

“So, wait,” I said. “You called ahead? How’d you do that?”

“Communicator’s Glass,” Rikers said. “Lets you talk with someone across a distance.”

Communicator’s Glass. However, something about that bothered me. I reached into my pocket, pulling out my Lenses. I’d once had a pair of Lenses that let me communicate across a distance. I didn’t have them anymore—I’d given them back to Grandpa Smedry. I did have the new set of Disguiser’s Lenses though. What about the power they gave me? If I was thinking about someone, I could make myself look like them.…

(By the way, yes, this is foreshadowing. However, you’ll need to have read the previous two books in the series to figure out what’s going on. So if you haven’t read them, then too bad for you!)

“Wait,” Bastille said, pointing at the Truthfinder’s Lens in my hand. “Is that the one you found in the Library of Alexandria?”

“Yeah. Grandpa figured out that it’s a Truthfinder’s Lens.”

She perked up. “Really? Do you know how rare those are?”

“Well … to be honest, I kind of wish that it could blow things up.”

Bastille rolled her eyes. “You wouldn’t know a useful Lens if you cut your finger on it, Smedry.”

She had a point. “You know a lot more about Lenses than I do, Bastille,” I admitted. “But I think there’s something odd about all of this. Smedry Talents, the Oculator’s Lenses, brightsand … it’s all connected.”

She eyed me. “What are you talking about?”

“Here, let me show you.” I tucked my Lenses away, standing up and scanning the chamber, looking for a likely candidate. On one wall, there was a small shelf with some glass equipment on it. “Your Highness, what’s that?”

Prince Rikers turned. “Ah! My new silimatic phonograph! Haven’t hooked it up yet, though.”

“Perfect,” I said, walking over and picking up the glass box; it was about the size of a briefcase.

“That won’t work, Alcatraz,” the prince said. “It needs a silimatic power plate or some brightsand to—”

I channeled power into the glass. Not breaking power from my Talent, but the same “power” I used to activate Lenses. Early on, I had simply needed to touch Lenses to power them; now I was learning to control myself so that I didn’t activate them unintentionally.

Either way, the box started playing music—a peppy little symphony. It’s a good thing Folsom wasn’t there, otherwise he would have begun to “dance.”

“Hey, how’d you do that?” Prince Rikers asked. “Amazing!”

Bastille regarded me quizzically. I set the music box down, and it continued to play for a time, powered by the charge I’d given it.

“I’m starting to think that Oculatory Lenses and regular technological glass might just be the same thing.”

“That’s impossible,” she said. “If that were so, then you could power Oculator’s Lenses with brightsand.”

“You can’t?”

She shook her head.

“Maybe it’s not concentrated enough,” I said. “You can power the Lenses with Smedry blood, if you forge them using it.”

“Ick,” she noted. “It’s true. But ick anyway.”

“Ah, here we are!” Rikers said suddenly, standing up as the pig slowed.

I shot Bastille a look. She shrugged; we would discuss this more later. We stood and joined Rikers, looking out the window (or, well, the wall) at the approaching gardens. My sense of urgency returned. We needed to grab Himalaya and get back to the Royal, nonlibrary Archives.

Rikers pulled a lever, and the back of the pig unfolded, forming steps. Bastille and I rushed out, Sing hustling along behind. The Royal Gardens were a large, open field of grass dotted occasionally by beds of flowers. I scanned the green, trying to locate my cousin. Of course Bastille found him first.

“There,” she said, pointing. Squinting, I could see that Folsom and Himalaya were sitting on a blanket, enjoying what appeared to be a picnic.

“Wait here!” I called to Sing and Rikers as Bastille and I crossed the springy grass, passing families enjoying the afternoon and kids playing.

“What in the world are those two doing?” I asked, looking at Folsom and Himalaya.

“Uh, I think that’s called a picnic, Smedry,” Bastille said flatly.

“I know, but why would Folsom take an enemy spy on a picnic? Perhaps he’s trying to get her to relax so he can mine her for information.”

Bastille regarded the two of them, who sat on the blanket enjoying their meal. “So, wait,” she said as we rushed forward. “They’re always together?”

“Yeah,” I said. “He’s been watching her like a hawk. He’s always looking at her.”

“You’d say he’s been spending a lot of time with her?”

“A suspicious amount of time.”

“Hanging out at restaurants?”

“Ice cream parlors,” I said. “He claims to be showing her around so that she’ll get used to Nalhallan customs.”

“And you think he’s doing this because he suspects her of being a spy,” Bastille said, her voice almost amused.

“Well, why else would he—”

I froze, stopping on the grass. Just ahead, Himalaya laid her hand on Folsom’s shoulder, laughing at something he’d said. He regarded her, seeming transfixed by her face. He seemed to be enjoying himself, as if …

“Oh,” I said.

“Boys are such idiots,” Bastille said under her breath, moving on.

“How was I supposed to know they were in love!” I snapped, rushing up to her.

“Idiot,” she repeated.

“Look, she could still be a spy. Why, maybe she’s seducing Folsom to get at his secrets!”

“Seductions don’t look so cutesy,” Bastille said as we approached their blanket. “Anyway, there’s a simple method to find out. Pull out that Truthfinder’s Lens.”

Hey, that’s a good idea, I thought. I fumbled, retrieving the Lens and looking through it toward the Librarian.

Bastille marched right up to the blanket. “You’re Himalaya?” she asked.

“Why, yes,” the Librarian said. As I looked through the Lens, her breath seemed to glow like a white cloud. I assumed that meant she was telling the truth.

“Are you a Librarian spy?” Bastille asked. (She’s like that, blunter than a rock and twice as ornery.)

“What?” Himalaya said. “No, of course not!”

Her breath was white.

I turned to Bastille. “Grandpa Smedry warned that Librarians were good at saying half-truths, which might get them around my Truthfinder’s Lens.”

“Are you saying half-truths?” Bastille said. “Are you trying to fool that Lens, trick us, seduce this man, or do anything like that?”

“No, no, no,” Himalaya said, blushing.

Bastille looked at me.

“Her breath is white,” I said. “If she’s lying, she’s doing a really great job of it.”

“Good enough for me,” Bastille said, pointing. “You two, get in the pig. We’re on a tight schedule.”

They jumped to their feet, not even asking questions. When Bastille gets that tone in her voice, you do what she says. For the first time I realized where Bastille’s ability to order people about might have come from. She was a princess—she’d probably spent her entire childhood giving commands.

By the First Sands, I thought. She’s a princess.

“All right,” Bastille said. “We’ve got your Librarian, Smedry. Let’s hope she can actually help.”

We headed back to the pig, and I eyed the setting sun. Not much time left. This next part was going to have to go quickly. (I suggest you take a deep breath.)

Chapter 15

Humans are funny things. From what I’ve seen, the more we agree with someone, the more we like listening to them. I’ve come up with a theory. I call it the macaroni and cheese philosophy of discourse.

I love macaroni and cheese. It’s amazing. If they serve food in heaven, I’m certain mac and cheese graces each and every table. If someone wants to sit and talk to me about how good mac and cheese is, I’ll talk to them for hours. However, if they want to talk about fish sticks, I generally stuff them in a cannon and launch them in the direction of Norway.

That’s the wrong reaction. I know what mac and cheese tastes like. Wouldn’t it be more useful for me to talk to someone who likes something else? Maybe understanding what other people like about fish sticks could help me understand how they think.

A lot of the world doesn’t take this point of view. In fact, many people think that if they like mac and cheese rather than fish sticks, the best thing to do is ban fish sticks.

That would be a tragedy. If we let people do things like that, eventually we’d end up with only one thing to eat. And it probably wouldn’t be mac and cheese or fish sticks. It’d probably be something that none of us likes to eat.

You want to be a better person? Go listen to someone you disagree with. Don’t argue with them, just listen. It’s remarkable what interesting things people will say if you take the time to not be a jerk.

We dashed from the giant glass pig like deployed soldiers, then stormed up the steps to the Royal Archives. (Go ahead, say it with me. I know you want to.)

Not a library.

Bastille in her Warrior’s Lenses was the fastest of course, but Folsom and Himalaya kept up. Sing was in the rear, right beside …

“Prince Rikers?” I said, freezing in place. I’d assumed that the prince would remain with his vehicle.

“Yes, what?” the prince said, stopping beside me, turning and looking back.

“Why are you here?” I said.

“I finally have a chance to see the famous Alcatraz Smedry in action! I’m not going to miss it.”

“Your Highness,” I said, “this might be dangerous.”

“You really think so?” he asked excitedly.

“What’s going on?” Bastille said, rushing back down the steps. “I thought we were in a hurry.”

“He wants to come,” I said, gesturing.

She shrugged. “We can’t really stop him—he’s the crown prince. That kind of means he can do what he wants.”

“But what if he gets killed?” I asked.

“Then they’ll have to pick a new crown prince,” Bastille snapped. “Are we going or not?”

I sighed, glancing at the red-haired prince. He was smiling in self-satisfaction.

“Great,” I muttered, but continued up the stairs. The prince rushed beside me. “By the way,” I said. “Why a pig?”

“Why,” he said, surprised, “I heard that in the Hushlands, it is common for tough guys to ride hogs.”

I groaned. “Prince Rikers, ‘hog’ is another word for a motorcycle.”

“Motorcycles look like pigs?” he asked. “I never knew that!”

“You know what, never mind,” I said. We rushed into the room with the soldiers; it looked like the knights had sent for reinforcements. There were a lot of them on the stairs too. I felt good knowing they were there in case the Librarians did break into the Royal Archives.

“Not a library,” Sing added.

“What?” I asked.

“Just thought you might be thinking about it,” Sing said, “and figured I should remind you.”

We reached the bottom. The two knights had taken up guard positions inside the room, and they saluted the prince as we entered.

“Any Librarians?” I asked.

“No,” the blonde knight said, “but we can still hear the scraping noise. We have two platoons on command here, and two more searching nearby buildings. So far we’ve not discovered anything—but we’ll be ready for them if they break into the stairwell!”

“Excellent,” I said. “You should wait outside, just in case.” I didn’t want them to see what was about to happen. It was embarrassing.

They left and closed the door. I turned to Himalaya. “All right,” I said. “Let’s do it.”

She looked confused. “Do what?”

Oh right, I thought. We’d never actually explained why we needed her. “Somewhere in this room are some books the Librarians really want,” I said. “Your former friends are tunneling in here right now. I need you to…”

I could see Bastille, Folsom, and Sing cringe as I prepared to say it.

“… I need you to organize the books in here.”

Himalaya paled. “What?”

“You heard me right.”

She glanced at Folsom. He looked away.

“You’re testing me,” she said, forming fists. “Don’t worry, I can resist it. You don’t need to do this.”

“No, really,” I said, exasperated. “I’m not testing you. I just need these books to have some kind of order.”

She sat down on a pile. “But … but I’m recovering! I’ve been clean for months now! You can’t ask me to go back, you can’t.”

“Himalaya,” I said, kneeling beside her. “We really, really need you to do this.”

She started trembling, which made me hesitate.

“I—”

She stood and fled the room, tears in her eyes. Folsom rushed after her, and I was left kneeling, feeling horrible. Like I’d just told a little girl that her kitten was dead. Because I’d run it over. And that I’d also eaten it.

And that it had tasted really bad.

“Well, that’s that, then,” Bastille said. She sat down on a pile of books. She was starting to look haggard again. We’d kept her distracted for a time, but the severing was still weighing on her.

I could still hear the scraping sounds, and they were getting louder. “All right then,” I said, taking a deep breath. “We’re going to have to destroy them.”

“What?” Sing asked. “The books?”

I nodded. “We can’t let my mother get what she wants. Whatever it is, I’ll bet it involves Mokia. This is the only thing I can think of—I doubt we can move these books out in time.” I looked toward the mounds. “We’re going to have to burn them.”

“We don’t have the authority to do that,” Bastille said tiredly.

“Yes,” I said, turning toward Prince Rikers. “But I’ll bet that he does.”

The prince looked up—he’d been poking through a pile of books, probably looking for fantasy novels. “What’s this?” he asked. “I have to say, this adventure hasn’t been very exciting. Where are the explosions, the rampaging wombats, the space stations?”

“This is what a real adventure is like, Prince Rikers,” I said. “We need to burn these books so the Librarians don’t get them. Can you authorize that?”

“Yes, I suppose,” he said. “A bonfire might be exciting.”

I walked over and grabbed one of the lamps off the walls. Bastille and Sing joined me, looking at the books as I prepared to begin the fire.

“This feels wrong,” Sing said.

“I know,” I said. “But what does anyone care about these books? They just stuffed them in here. I’ll bet people rarely even come look at them.”

“I did,” Sing said. “Years back. I can’t be the only one. Besides, they’re books. Knowledge. Who knows what we might lose? There are books in here that are so old, they might be the only copies in existence outside the Library of Alexandria.”

I stood with the fire in my hand. Now, I hadn’t meant this to be a metaphor for anything—I’m simply relating what happened. It did seem like the right thing to do. And yet it also felt like the wrong thing too. Was it better to burn the books and let nobody have the knowledge, or take the chance that the Librarians would get them?

I knelt and put the lamp toward a stack of books, its flame flickering.

“Wait,” Bastille said, kneeling beside me. “You have to turn it to ‘burn.’”

“But it’s already burning,” I said, confused.

“Not that argument again,” she said, sighing. (Go read book one.) “Here.” She touched the glass of the lamp, and the flame seemed to pulse. “It’s ready now.”

I took a deep breath, then—hand trembling—lit the first book on fire.

“Wait!” a voice called. “Don’t do it!”

I spun to see Himalaya standing in the doorway, Folsom at her side. I looked back at the books desperately; the flame was already spreading.

Then, fortunately, Sing tripped. His enormous Mokian bulk smashed onto the pile of books, his gut completely extinguishing the flames. A little trickle of smoke curled out from underneath him.

“Whoops,” he said.

“No,” Himalaya said, striding forward. “You did the right thing, Sing. I’ll do it. I’ll organize them. Just … just don’t hurt them. Please.”

I stepped back as Folsom helped Sing to his feet. Himalaya knelt by the pile that had almost gone up in flames. She touched one of the books lovingly, picking it up with her delicate fingers.

“So … uh,” she said, “what order do you want? Reverse timeshare, where the books are organized by the minute when they were published? Marksman elite, where we organize them by the number of times the word ‘the’ is used in the first fifty pages?”

“I think a simple organization by topic will do,” I said. “We need to find the ones about Oculators or Smedrys or anything suspicious like that.”

Himalaya caressed the book, feeling its cover, reading the spine. She carefully placed it next to her, then picked up another. She placed that one in another pile.

This is going to take forever, I thought with despair.

Himalaya grabbed another book. This time she barely glanced at the spine before setting it aside. She grabbed another, then another, then another, moving more quickly with each volume.

She stopped, taking a deep breath. Then she burst into motion, her hands moving more quickly than I could track. She seemed to be able to identify a book simply by touching it, and knew exactly where to place it. In mere seconds a small wall of books was rising around her.

“A little help, please!” she called. “Start moving the stacks over, but don’t let them get out of order!”

Sing, Folsom, Bastille, and I hurried forward to help. Even the prince went to work. We rushed back and forth, moving books where Himalaya told us, struggling to keep up with the Librarian.

She was almost superhuman in her ability to organize—a machine of identification and order. Dirty, unkempt piles disappeared beneath her touch, transformed into neat stacks, the dust and grime cleaned from them in a single motion of her hand.

Soon Folsom got the idea to recruit some of the soldiers to help. Himalaya sat in the center of the room like a multiarmed Hindu goddess, her hands a blur. We brought her stacks of books and she organized them in the blink of an eye, leaving them grouped by subject. She had a serene smile on her face. It was the smile my grandfather had when he spoke of an exciting infiltration, or the way Sing looked when he spoke of his cherished antique weapons collection. It was the expression of someone doing work they perfectly and truly enjoyed.

I rushed forward with another stack of books. Himalaya snatched them without looking at me, then threw them into piles like a dealer dealing cards.

Impressive! I thought.

“All right, I have to say it,” Himalaya said as she worked. Soldiers clinked in their armor, rushing back and forth, delivering stacks of unorganized books to her feet, then taking away the neatly organized ones she placed behind her.

“What is wrong with you Free Kingdomers?” she demanded, ranting as if to nobody in particular. “I mean, I left the Hushlands because I disagreed with the way the Librarians were keeping information from the people.

“But why is it bad to organize? Why do you have to treat books like this? What’s wrong with having a little order? You Free Kingdomers claim to like things loose and free, but if there are never any rules, there is chaos. Organization is important.”

I set down my stack of books, then rushed back.

“Who knows what treasures you could have lost here?” she snapped, arms flying. “Mold can destroy books. Mice can chew them to bits. They need to be cared for, treasured. Somebody needs to keep track of what you have so that you can appreciate your own collection!”

Folsom stepped up beside me, his brow dripping with sweat. He watched Himalaya with adoring eyes, smiling broadly.

“Why did I have to give up who I was?” the Librarian ranted. “Why can’t I be me, but also be on your side? I don’t want to stifle information, but I do want to organize it! I don’t want to rule the world, but I do want to bring it order! I don’t want everything to be the same, but I do want to understand!”

She stopped for a moment. “I am a good Librarian!” she declared in a triumphant voice, grabbing a huge stack of unorganized books. She shook them once, like one might a pepper shaker, and somehow the books all aligned in order by subject, size, and author.

“Wow,” Folsom breathed.

“You really do love her,” I said.

Folsom blushed, looking at me. “Is it that obvious?”

It hadn’t been to me. But I smiled anyway.

“These last six months have been amazing,” he said, getting that dreamy, disgusting tone to his voice that lovesick people often use. “I started out just watching to see if she was a spy, but after I determined that she was safe … well, I wanted to keep spending time with her. So I offered to coach her on Nalhallan customs.”

“Have you told her?” I asked, soldiers bustling around me, carrying stacks of books.

“Oh, I couldn’t do that,” Folsom said. “I mean, look at her. She’s amazing! I’m just a regular guy.”

“A regular guy?” I asked. “Folsom, you’re a Smedry. You’re nobility!”

“Yeah,” he said, looking down. “But I mean, that’s just a name. I’m a boring person when you get down to it. Who thinks a critic is interesting?”

I resisted pointing out that Librarians weren’t exactly known for being the most exciting people either.

“Look,” I said. “I don’t know a lot about things like this, but it seems to me that if you love her, you should say so. I—”

At that moment, Prince Rikers walked up. “Hey, look!” he said, proffering a book. “They have one of my novels in here! Preserved for all of posterity. The music even still works. See!”

He opened the cover.

And so, of course, Folsom punched me in the face.

Chapter 16

Now, I would like to make it clear that violence is rarely the best solution to problems.

For instance, the next time you get attacked by a group of angry ninjas, one solution would be to kick the lead ninja, steal his katana, and proceed to slay the rest of the group in an awesome display of authorial fury. While this might be fulfilling—and a little bit fun—it would also be rather messy, and would earn you the ire of an entire ninja clan. They’d send assassins after you for the rest of your life. (Having to fight off a ninja in the middle of a date can be quite embarrassing.)

So instead of fighting, you could bribe the ninjas with soy sauce, and then send them to attack your siblings instead. That way you can get rid of some unwanted soy sauce. See how easy it is to avoid violence?

Now, there are some occasions when violence is appropriate. Usually those are occasions when you want to beat the tar out of somebody. Unfortunately, “somebody” at this moment happened to be me. Folsom’s punch was completely unexpected, and it hit me full in the face.

Right then I realized something quite interesting: That was the first time I’d ever been punched. It was a special moment for me. I’d say it was a little like being kicked, only with more knuckles and a hint of lemon.

Maybe the lemon part was just my brain short-circuiting as I was tossed backward onto the chamber’s glass floor. The blow left me dazed, and by the time I finally shook myself out of it, the scene in front of me was one of total chaos.

The soldiers were trying to subdue Folsom. They didn’t want to hurt him, as he was a nobleman; they were forced to try to grab him and hold him down. It wasn’t working very well. Folsom fought with a strange mixture of terrified lack of control and calculated precision. He was like a puppet with its strings being pulled by a kung fu master. Or maybe vice versa. A trite melody played in the background—my theme music, apparently.

Folsom moved among the soldiers in a blur of awkward (yet somehow well-placed) kicks, punches, and head-butts. He’d already knocked down a good ten soldiers, and the other ten weren’t doing much better.

“It’s so exciting!” the prince said. “I hope somebody is taking notes! Why didn’t I bring any of my scribes? I should send for some!” Rikers stood a short distance from the center of the fight.

Please punch him, I thought, standing up on shaky knees. Just a little bit.

But it wasn’t to be—Folsom was focused on the soldiers. Himalaya was calling for the soldiers to try to get their hands over Folsom’s ears. Where was Bastille? She should have come running at the sounds of the fight.

“The Alcatraz Smedry Theme” continued to play its peppy little melody, coming from somewhere near the prince. “Prince Rikers!” I yelled. “The book! Where is it? We have to close it!”

“Oh, what?” He turned. “Um, I think I dropped it when the fight started.”

He was standing near a pile of unsorted books. I cursed, scrambling toward the pile. If we could stop the music, Folsom would stop dancing.

At that moment the battle shifted in my direction. Folsom—his eyes wild and wide with worry—spun through a group of soldiers, throwing four of them into the air.

I stood facing him. I didn’t think he’d do me any serious harm. I mean, Smedry Talents are unpredictable, but they rarely hurt people too badly.

Except … hadn’t I used my own Talent to break some arms and cause monsters to topple to their deaths?

Crud, I thought. Folsom raised his fist and prepared to punch directly at my face.

And my Talent engaged.

One of the odd things about Smedry Talents, mine in particular, is how they sometimes operate proactively. Mine breaks weapons at a distance if someone tries to kill me.

In this case, something dark and wild seemed to rip from me. I couldn’t see it, but I could feel it snapping toward Folsom. His eyes opened wide and he tripped, his graceful martial-arts power failing him for a brief moment. It was as if he’d suddenly lost his Talent.

He toppled to the ground before me. At that instant, a book in the pile beside me exploded, throwing up scraps of paper and glass. The music stopped.

Folsom groaned. The trip left him kneeling right in front of me, confettilike scraps of paper falling around us. The beast within me quieted, pulling back inside, and all fell still.

When I’d been young, I’d thought of my Talent as a curse. Now I’d begun thinking of it as a kind of wild super power. This was the first time, however, that I thought of it as something foreign inside me.

Something alive.

“That was incredible!” said one of the soldiers. I looked up and saw the soldiers regarding me with awe. Himalaya seemed stunned. The prince stood with his arms folded, smiling in contentment at finally getting to witness a battle.

“I saw it,” one of the soldiers whispered, “like a wave of power, pulsing out of you, Lord Smedry. It stopped even another Talent.”

It felt good to be admired. It made me feel like a leader. Like a hero. “See to your friends,” I said, pointing at the fallen soldiers. “Give me a report on the wounded.” I reached down, helping Folsom to his feet.

He looked at his shoes in shame, as Himalaya walked over to comfort him. “Well, I give myself nine out of ten points for being an idiot,” he said. “I can’t believe I let that happen. I should be able to control it!”

“I know how hard it is,” I said. “Trust me. It wasn’t your fault.”

Prince Rikers walked over to join us, his blue robes swishing. “That was wonderful,” he said. “Though it’s kind of sad how the book turned out.”

“I’m heartbroken,” I said flatly, glancing about for Bastille. Where was she?

“Oh, it’s all right,” Rikers said, reaching into his pocket. “They have the sequel here too!” He pulled out a book and moved to open the cover.

“Don’t you dare!” I snapped, grabbing his arm.

“Oh,” he said. “Yeah, probably a bad idea.” He glanced at my grip on his arm. “You know, you remind me a lot of my sister. I thought you’d be a little less uptight.”

“I’m not uptight,” I snapped. “I’m annoyed. There’s a difference. Himalaya, how’s the sorting going?”

“Uh, maybe halfway done,” she said. Indeed, the mountains of books were quickly becoming large stacks, like walls. A much smaller stack was particularly interesting to me—it contained books in the Forgotten Language.

There were only four so far, but it was amazing to me that we’d managed to find them among all the other books. I walked over to the stack, fishing in my jacket pocket for my pair of Translator’s Lenses.

I swapped them on in place of my Oculator’s Lenses. I almost forgot that I was wearing those. They were starting to feel natural to me, I guess. With the Translator’s Lenses on, I could read the titles of the books.

One appeared to be some kind of philosophical work on the nature of laws and justice. Interesting, but I couldn’t see it being important enough for my mother to risk so much in order to get.

The other three books were unimpressive. A manual on building chariots, a ledger talking about the number of chickens a particular merchant traded in Athens, and a cookbook. (Hey, I guess even ancient, all-powerful lost societies needed help baking cookies.)

I checked with the soldiers and was relieved to find that none of them were seriously wounded. Folsom had knocked out no fewer than six, and some others had broken several limbs. The wounded left for the infirmary and the others returned to helping Himalaya. None of them had seen Bastille.

I wandered through what was quickly becoming a maze of enormous book stacks. Maybe Bastille was looking for signs of the diggers breaking into the room. The scraping sounds had been coming from the southeast corner, but when I neared I couldn’t hear them anymore. Had my mother realized we were on to her? With that sound gone, I could hear something else.

Whispering.

Curious and a little creeped out, I walked in the direction of the sound. I turned a corner around a wall of books, and found a little dead-end hollow in the maze.

Bastille lay there, curled up on the cold glass floor, whispering to herself and shivering. I cursed, rushing over to kneel beside her. “Bastille?”

She curled up a little bit further. Her Warrior’s Lenses were off, clutched in her hand. I could see a haunted cast to her eyes. A sense of loss, of sorrow, of having had something deep and tender ripped from her, never to be returned.

I felt powerless. Had she been hurt? She shivered and moved, then looked up at me, her eyes focusing. She seemed to realize for the first time that I was there.

She immediately pushed away from me and sat up. Then she sighed and wrapped her arms around her knees, bowing her head between them. “Why is it that you always see me like this?” she asked quietly. “I’m strong, I really am.”

“I know you are,” I said, feeling awkward and embarrassed.

We remained like that for a time, Bastille unresponsive, me feeling like a complete idiot, even though I wasn’t sure what I’d done wrong. (Note to all the young men reading this: Get used to that.)

“So…” I said. “Er … you’re still having trouble with that severing thing?”

She looked up, eyes red like they’d been scratched with sandpaper. “It’s like…” she said in a quiet voice. “It’s like I used to have memories. Fond ones of places I loved, of people I knew. Only now they’re gone. I can feel the place where they were, and it’s a hole ripped open inside of me.”

“The Mindstone is that important?” I asked. It was a dumb thing to say, but I felt I should say something.

“It connects all of the Knights of Crystallia,” she whispered. “It strengthens us, gives us comfort. By it, we all share a measure of who we are.”

“I should have shattered the swords of those idiots who did this to you,” I growled.

Bastille shivered, holding her arms close. “I’ll get reconnected eventually, so I should probably tell you not to be so angry. They’re good people and don’t deserve your scorn. But honestly, I’m having trouble feeling sympathy for them right now.” She smiled wanly.

I tried to smile back, but it was hard. “Someone wanted this to happen to you, Bastille. They set you up.”

“Maybe,” Bastille said, sighing. It appeared that her episode was over, though it had left her weakened even further.

“Maybe?” I repeated.

“I don’t know, Smedry,” she said. “Maybe nobody set me up. Maybe I really did just get promoted too quickly, and really did fail on my own. Maybe … maybe there is no grand conspiracy against me.”

“I guess you could be right,” I said.

You, of course, don’t believe that. I mean, when is there not some grand conspiracy? This entire series is about a secret cult of evil Librarians who rule the world, for the Sands’ sake.

“Alcatraz?” a voice called. Sing wandered around the corner a moment later. “Himalaya found another book in the Forgotten Language. Figured you would want to look at it.”

I glanced at Bastille; she waved me away. “What, you think I need to be babied?” she snapped. “Go. I’ll be there in a moment.”

I hesitated, but followed Sing around a few walls of books to the center of the room. The prince sat, looking bored, on what appeared to be a throne made of books. (I’m still not sure who he got to make it for him.) Folsom was directing the moving of stacks; Himalaya was still sorting, with no sign of slowing down.

Sing handed me the book. Like all of the others in the Forgotten Language, the text on it looked like crazy scribbles. Before he had died, Alcatraz the First—my ultimate ancestor—had used the Talent to break the language of his people so that nobody could read it.

Nobody except for someone with a pair of Translator’s Lenses. I put mine on and flipped to the first page, hoping it wasn’t another cookbook.

Observations on the Talents of the Smedry people, the title page read, and an explanation of what led up to their fall. As written by Fenilious K. Wandersnag, scribe to His Majesty Alcatraz Smedry.

I blinked, then read the words again.

“Guys?” I said, turning. “Guys!”

The group of soldiers hesitated, and Himalaya glanced toward me. I held the book up.

“I think we just found what we’ve been looking for.”

Chapter 17

Things are about to go very wrong.

Oh, didn’t you know that already? I should think that it would be obvious. We’re almost to the end of the book, and we just had a very encouraging victory. Everything looks good. So of course it’s all going to go wrong. You should pay better attention to plot archetypes.

I’d like to promise you that everything will turn out all right, but I think there’s something you should understand. This is the middle book of the series. And as everyone knows, the heroes always lose in the middle book. It makes the series more tense.

Sorry. But hey, at least my books have awesome endings, right?

I dismissed the soldiers, ordering them to return to their posts. Sing and Folsom joined me, looking at the book, even though they couldn’t read it. I figured my mother must have an Oculator with her to read the book—to her alone, the Lenses would be useless.

“You’re sure this is what we’re after?” Sing asked, turning the book over in his fingers.

“It’s a history of the fall of Incarna,” I said, “told by Alcatraz the First’s personal scribe.”

Sing whistled. “Wow. What are the chances?”

“Pretty good, I’d say,” Bastille said, rounding the corner and joining us. She still looked quite the worse for wear, but at least she was standing. I gave her what I hoped was an encouraging smile.

“Nice leer,” she said to me. “Anyway, this is the Royal Archives—”

“Not a—” Folsom began to say.

“—don’t interrupt,” Bastille snapped. She appeared to be in rare form—but then, having a piece of your soul cut out tends to do that to people.

“This is the Royal Archives,” Bastille continued. “A lot of these books have passed down through the Nalhallan royal line for centuries—and the collection has been added to by the Smedrys, the Knights of Crystallia, and the other noble lines who have joined with us.”

“Yes indeed,” Prince Rikers said, taking the book from Sing, looking it over. “People don’t just throw away books in the Forgotten Language. A lot of these have been archived here for years and years. They’re copies of copies.”

“You can copy these scribbles?” I asked with surprise.

“Scribes can be quite meticulous,” Sing said. “They’re almost as bad as Librarians.”

“Excuse me?” Himalaya huffed, walking up to us. She’d finished giving orders to the last couple of soldiers, who were arranging the books she’d just organized. The room looked kind of strange, with the back half of it still dominated by gargantuan piles of books, the front half filled with neatly organized stacks.

“Oh,” Sing said. “Um, I didn’t mean you, Himalaya. I meant Librarians who aren’t recovering.”

“I’m not either,” she said, folding her arms, adopting a very deliberate stance as she stood in her Hushlander skirt and blouse. “I meant what I said earlier. I intend to prove that you can be a Librarian without being evil. There has to be a way.”

“If you say so…” Sing said.

I still kind of agreed with Sing. Librarians were … well, Librarians. They’d oppressed me since my childhood. They were trying to conquer Mokia.

“I think you did wonderfully,” Folsom said to Himalaya. “Ten out of ten on a scale of pure, majestic effectiveness.”

Prince Rikers sniffed at that. “Excuse me,” he said, then handed me the Forgotten Language book and walked away.

“What was that about?” Himalaya asked.

“I think Folsom just reminded the prince that he was a book critic,” Bastille said.

Folsom sighed. “I don’t want to make people mad. I just … well, how can people get better if you don’t tell them what you honestly think?”

“I don’t think everyone wants to hear what you honestly think, Folsom,” Himalaya said, laying a hand on his arm.

“Maybe I could go talk to him,” Folsom said. “You know, explain myself.”

I didn’t think the prince would listen, but I didn’t say anything as Folsom walked after Rikers. Himalaya was watching after the determined critic with fondness.

“You’re in love with him, aren’t you?” I asked her.

Himalaya turned, blushing. Bastille immediately punched me in the arm.

“Ow!” I said. (My Talent never seemed to work when Bastille was doing the punching. Perhaps it thought I deserved the punishment.) “Why’d you do that?”

Bastille rolled her eyes. “You don’t need to be so blunt, Smedry.”

“You’re blunt all the time!” I complained. “Why’s it wrong when I do it?”

“Because you’re bad at it, that’s why. Now apologize for embarrassing the young woman.”

“It’s all right,” Himalaya said, still blushing. “But please don’t say such a thing. Folsom is just being kind to me because he knows I feel so lost in Free Kingdoms society. I don’t want to burden him with my silliness.”

“But he said—gak!”

“He said ‘Gak’?” Himalaya asked, confused. She obviously hadn’t seen Bastille step forcefully on my toe in the middle of my sentence.

“Excuse us,” Bastille said, smiling at Himalaya, then towing me away. Once we were at a safe distance, she pointed at my face and said, “Don’t get involved.”

“Why?” I demanded.

“Because they’ll work it out on their own, and they don’t need you messing things up.”

“But I talked to Folsom and he likes her too! I should tell her about it so they can stop acting like lovesick crocodiles.”

“Crocodiles?”

“What?” I said defensively. “Crocodiles fall in love. Baby crocodiles come from somewhere. Anyway, that’s beside the point. We should talk to those two and settle this misunderstanding so they can get on with things.”

Bastille rolled her eyes. “How can you be so clever sometimes, Smedry, but such an idiot other times?”

“That’s unfair, and you—” I stopped. “Wait, you think I’m clever?”

“I said you’re clever sometimes,” she snapped. “Unfortunately, you’re annoying all the time. If you mess this up, I’ll … I don’t know. I’ll cut off your thumbs and send them to the crocodiles as a wedding present.”

I crinkled my brow. “Wait. What?”

She just stalked away. I watched her go, smiling.

She thought I was clever.

I stood in a happy stupor for a few minutes. Finally I wandered back over to Sing and Himalaya.

“… think about it,” Himalaya was saying. “It’s not the Librarian part that’s a problem, it’s the evil part. I could start a self-help program. World-Dominating Cultists Anonymous or something like that.”

“I dunno,” Sing said, rubbing his chin. “Sounds like you have an uphill battle.”

“You Free Kingdomers need to be educated about this as much as the Librarians do!” She smiled at me as I arrived. “Anyway, I feel that we should organize the rest of these books. You know, for consistency’s sake.”

I looked down at the book in my hands. “Do what you want,” I said. “I intend to take this someplace safe. We’ve probably wasted too much time as it is.”

“But what if there are other books in here that are important?” Himalaya asked. “Maybe that’s not the one your mother wants.”

“It is,” I said. Somehow I knew.

“But how would she even know it was in here?” Himalaya asked. “We didn’t.”

“My mother’s resourceful,” I said. “I’ll bet she—”

At that moment, Sing tripped.

“Oh dear!” Himalaya said. “Are you all right—gak!”

She said this last part as I grabbed her by the arm and dived for cover behind a stack of books. To the side, I could see Bastille doing the same with the prince and Folsom. Sing rolled over to my hiding place, then got to his knees, looking nervous.

“What are you all doing?” Himalaya asked.

I put a finger to my lips, waiting tensely. Sing’s Talent, like all of them, couldn’t be trusted implicitly—however, he had a good track record of tripping right before dangerous events. His foresight—or, well, his clumsiness—had saved my life back in the Hushlands.

I almost thought that this one was a false alarm. And then I heard it. Voices.

The door to the room opened, and my mother walked in.

Oh, wait. You’re still here? I thought that last line was going to end the chapter. It seemed like a nice, dramatic place.

Chapter isn’t long enough yet? Really? Hum. Well, guess we’ll move on, then. Ahem.

I stared in shock. That really was my mother, Shasta Smedry. She’d ditched the wig she’d been wearing at the party and wore her usual blonde hair up in a bun, along with standard-issue horn-rimmed glasses. Her face was so hard. Emotionless. Even more so than what I’d seen from other Librarians.

My heart twisted. Other than the faint glimpses of her I’d caught earlier in the day, this was the first time I’d seen her since the library in my hometown. The first time I’d seen her since … learning that she was my mother.

Shasta was accompanied by a dangerously large group of Librarian thugs—oversized, muscle-bound types that wore bow ties and glasses. (Kind of like a genetic mutant created by mixing nerd DNA with linebacker DNA. I’ll bet they spend their free time giving themselves wedgies, then stuffing themselves in lockers.)

Also with her was a young, freckled man about twenty years old. He wore a sweater vest and slacks (Librarian-type clothing) and had on glasses. Tinted ones.

A Dark Oculator, I thought. So I was right. He would be there to use the Translator’s Lenses for her, but this guy didn’t seem nearly as dangerous as Blackburn had been. Of course, my mother more than made up for the difference.

But how had they gotten past the soldiers on the stairs? It looked like Sing had been right, and they’d been tunneling into the stairwell. Shouldn’t we have heard sounds of fighting? What of the two knights on duty? I itched to rush out and see what had happened.

The group of Librarians stopped at the front of the room. I remained hidden behind my wall of books. Bastille had successfully pulled the prince and Folsom behind another wall of books, and I could just barely see her peeking around the corner. She and I met each other’s eyes, and I saw the questions in her face.

Something very odd was going on. Why hadn’t we heard any sounds of fighting from the stairwell?

“Something very odd is going on here,” my mother said, her voice echoing in the quiet room. “Why are all these books stacked like this?”

The freckled Oculator adjusted his spectacles. Fortunately, they weren’t red-tinted Oculator’s Lenses—which would have let him notice me—but were instead tinted with orange-and-blue stripes. I didn’t recognize that type.

“The scholars I interviewed said the place was messy, Shasta,” he said in a kind of nasal voice, “but who knows what they consider clean or messy? These stacks look like they were arranged and organized by a buffoon!”

Himalaya huffed in outrage, and Sing had to grab her by the arm to keep her from marching out to defend her cataloging abilities.

“All right,” Shasta said. “I don’t know how long it will be before someone notices what we’ve done. I want to find that book and get out of here as soon as possible.”

I frowned. That made it seem like they had gotten into the room by stealth. It was a good plan; if a book disappeared from the Royal-Archives-Not-a-LibraryTM, then it would probably be centuries before anyone realized it was gone. If they even realized it at all.

But that meant my mother and a group of about thirty Librarians had managed to sneak past the archives’ defenses. That seemed impossible.

Either way, we were in trouble. I didn’t have any offensive Lenses, and Bastille’s severing had her on the brink of collapse. That left us with Folsom. I’d just seen him do some serious damage, but I hated trusting a Smedry Talent as unpredictable as his.

It seemed a far, far better idea to get out and grab our army, then come back for a fight. I liked that idea a whole lot, particularly since we’d probably be able to send to the palace for Grandpa Smedry. (And maybe the Free Kingdomer version of a Sherman tank or two.)

But how to get out? The Librarians were beginning to move through the stacks. We were near the middle of the room, our position shadowed by a lack of lamplight, but we obviously couldn’t remain hidden for long.

“All right,” I whispered to Sing and Himalaya, “we need to get out of here! Any ideas?”

“Maybe we could sneak around the outside of the room,” Himalaya said, pointing at the mazelike corridors.

I didn’t like the idea of risking running into one of those thugs. I shook my head.

“We could hide in the back,” Sing whispered. “Hope they get frustrated and leave.…”

“Sing, this is a whole group of Librarians,” I said. “They’ll all be able to do what Himalaya did. They’ll sort through this room in minutes!”

Himalaya snorted quietly. “I doubt it,” she said. “I was one of the Wardens of the Standard—the best sorters in all the world. Most of those are just basic acolytes. They’ll barely be able to alphabetize, let alone sort based on the Sticky Hamstring methodology.”

“Either way,” I whispered, “I doubt they’re going to leave without this.” I glanced down at the volume I still carried, then looked across the central aisle to Bastille. She looked tense, poised. She was getting ready to fight—which tended to be her solution to a lot of things.

Great, I thought. This is not going to end well.

“If only my sister were here,” Sing said. “She could make herself look like one of those thugs and slip away.”

I froze. Sing’s sister, Australia, would be back with the Mokian contingent trying to lobby the Council of Kings to make the right decision. She had the Talent to go to sleep, then wake up looking really ugly. That usually meant looking like someone else for a short time. We didn’t have her, but we did have the Disguiser’s Lenses. I hurriedly retrieved them. They could get me out—but what about the others?

I looked across the corridor. Bastille met my eyes, then saw the Lenses in my hands. I could tell she recognized them. She nodded.

Go, the look said. Take that book to safety. Don’t worry about us.

If you’ve read through my series this far, then you know at that age I considered myself too noble to abandon my friends. I was starting to change, however. My nibble of fame—one I still secretly longed to taste again—had begun to work inside me.

I put on the Lenses and focused, imagining the image of a Librarian thug. Himalaya gasped quietly as I changed, and Sing raised an eyebrow. I glanced at them.

“Be ready to run,” I said. I looked at Bastille and held up one finger to indicate that she should wait. Then I pointed at the door. She seemed to get my meaning.

I took a deep breath, then stepped out. The center of the room was poorly lit, since we’d obscured a lot of the lamps with book walls. Those lamps were hung back in their places on the walls, even the one I’d tried to use to burn the place down.

I walked forward, holding my breath, expecting the Librarians to raise an alarm against me, but they were too busy searching. Nobody even turned. I walked right up to my mother. She glanced at me. The woman I’d always known as Ms. Fletcher, the woman who had spent years berating me as a child.

“Well, what is it?” she snapped, and I realized I’d just been standing there staring.

I held up the book, the one she was searching for. Her eyes opened wide with anticipation.

And so I handed the book to her.

Is this a good place? Can I stop here now? Okay, finally. About time.

Chapter 18

I’d like to apologize. Way back in my first book of this series, near the end, I made fun of the fact that readers sometimes stay up way too late reading books. I know how it is. You get involved in a story and you don’t want to stop. Then the author does very unfair things, like confront his mother face-to-face at the end of the chapter, forcing you to turn to the next page and read what happens next.

This sort of thing is terribly unfair, and I shouldn’t be engaging in such activities. After all, there is one thing that every good book should have in it: that, of course, is a potty break.

Sure, we characters can go between chapters, but what about you? You have to wait until there’s a portion of the book that is slow and boring. And since those don’t exist in my books, I force you to wait until the story is done. That’s just not fair. And so get ready, here’s your chance. It’s time for the slow, boring part.

The furry panda is a noble creature, known for its excellent chess-playing skills. Pandas often play chess in exchange for lederhosen, which make up a large chunk of their preferred diet. They also make a fortune off their licensing deals, in which they shrink and stuff members of their clan and sell them as plush toys for young children. It is often theorized that one day all of these plush pandas will decide to rise up and rule the world. And that will be fun, because pandas rock.

Okay, done doing your business? Great. Now maybe we can finally get on with this story. (It’s really annoying to have to wait for you like that, so you should thank me for my patience.)

My mother took the book from me and waved eagerly to the freckled Dark Oculator. “Fitzroy, get over here.”

“Yes, yes, Shasta,” he said a little too eagerly. He regarded her adoringly. “What is it?”

“Read this,” she said, handing him the book and the Translator’s Lenses.

The young man grabbed the book and the Lenses; it disgusted me how eager he was to please my mother. I inched away, raising my hand toward the nearby wall.

“Hum, yes…” Fitzroy said. “Shasta, this is it! The very book we wanted!”

“Excellent,” my mother said, reaching for the book.

At that moment, I touched the glass wall and released a powerful blast of breaking power into it. Now, I knew I couldn’t break the glass—I was counting on that. In previous circumstances, I’d been able to use things like walls, tables, even smoke trails as a conduit. Like a wire carried electricity, an object could carry my breaking power within it, shattering something on the other end.

It was a risk, but I wasn’t going to leave my allies alone in a room full of Librarians. Particularly not when one of those allies was the official Alcatraz Smedry novelist. I had my legacy to think about.

Fortunately, it worked. The breaking power moved through the wall like ripples on a lake. The lamps on the walls shattered.

And everything plunged into darkness.

I leaped forward and snatched the book, which was being passed between Shasta and Fitzroy. Voices called out in shock and surprise, and I distinctly heard my mother curse. I rushed for the doorway, bursting out into the lit hallway beyond and quickly taking off my Disguiser’s Lenses.

There was a sudden crash from inside the room. Then a face appeared from the darkness. It was a Librarian thug. I cringed, preparing for a fight, but the man suddenly grimaced in pain and fell to the ground. Bastille jumped over him as he groaned and grabbed his leg; her brother, the prince, ran along behind her.

I ushered Rikers through the door, relieved that Bastille had understood my hand gestures. (Though I used the universal signal for “Wait here for a sec, then run for the door,” that signal also happens to be the universal hand sign for “I need a milk shake; I think I’ll find one in that direction.”)

“Where’s Folsom—” I began, but the critic soon appeared, carrying Rikers’s novel in his hand, prepared to open the cover and start dancing at a moment’s notice. He puffed, coming through the door as Bastille knocked aside another thug who was clever enough to make for the light. Only a few seconds had passed, but I began to worry. Where were Sing and Himalaya?

“I give this escape a three and a half out of seven and six-eighths, Alcatraz,” Folsom said nervously. “Clever in concept, but rather nerve-wracking in execution.”

“Noted,” I said tensely, glancing about. Where were those soldiers of ours? They were supposed to be out in the stairwell here, but it was empty. In fact, something seemed odd about the stairwell.

“Guys?” Rikers said. “I think—”

“There!” Bastille said, pointing as Sing and Himalaya appeared from the shadows of the room. The two rushed through the door, and I slammed it closed, using my breaking power to jam the lock.

“What was that crash?” I asked.

“I tripped into a couple rows of books,” Sing said, “throwing them down on the Librarians to keep them distracted.”

“Smart,” I said. “Let’s get out of here.”

We began to rush up the stairwell, the wooden steps creaking beneath our feet. “That was risky, Smedry,” Bastille said.

“You expected less of me?”

“Of course not,” she snapped. “But why hand the book over to the Librarian?”

“I got it back,” I said, holding it up. “Plus, now we know for sure that this is the volume they wanted.”

Bastille cocked her head. “Huh. You are clever sometimes.”

I smiled. Unfortunately, the truth is, none of us were being very clever at that moment. None of us but Rikers, of course—and we’d chosen to ignore him. That’s usually a safe move.

Except of course when you’re rushing up the wrong stairwell. It finally dawned on me, and I froze in place, causing the others to stumble to a halt.

“What is it, Alcatraz?” Sing asked.

“The stairs,” I said. “They’re wooden.”

“So?”

“They were stone before.”

“That’s what I’ve been trying to say!” Prince Rikers exclaimed. “I wonder how they turned the steps to a different material.”

I suddenly felt a sense of horror. The door was just above us. I walked up nervously and pushed on it.

It opened into a medieval-looking castle chamber completely different from the one that had held our soldiers. This room had red carpeting, library stacks in the distance, and was filled with a good two hundred Librarian soldiers.

“Shattering Glass!” Bastille cursed, slamming the door in front of me. “What’s going on?”

I ignored her for the moment, rushing back down the steps. The Librarians locked inside the archives room were pounding on the door, trying to break it down. Now that I paused to consider, the landing right in front of the door looked very different from the way it had before. It was far larger, and it had a door at the left side.

As the others piled down the steps after me, I threw open the door to my left. I stepped into an enormous chamber filled with wires, panes of glass, and scientists in white lab coats. There were large containers on the sides of the room. Containers that I’m sure were filled with brightsand.

“What in the Sands is going on?” Folsom demanded, peeking in behind me.

I stood, stunned. “We’re not in the same building anymore, Folsom.”

“What?”

“They swapped us! The archive filled with books—the entire glass room—they swapped it for another room using Transporter’s Glass! They weren’t digging a tunnel to get in, they were digging to the corners so they could affix glass there and teleport the room away!”

It was brilliant. The glass was unbreakable, the stairwell guarded. But what if you could take the whole room and replace it with another one? You could search out the book you needed, then swap the rooms back, and nobody would be the wiser.

The door behind us broke open, and I turned to see a group of muscular Librarians force their way into the stairwell. I could just barely make out Bastille tensing for combat, and Folsom moved to open the novel with the music.

“No,” I said to them. “We’re beaten. Don’t waste your energy fighting.”

Part of me found it strange that they listened to me. Even Bastille obeyed my command. I would have expected the prince to preempt me and take charge, but he seemed perfectly content to stand and watch. He even seemed excited.

“Wonderful!” he whispered to me. “We’ve been captured!”

Great, I thought as my mother pushed her way out through the broken door. She saw me and smiled—a rare expression for her. It was the smile of a cat who’d just found a mouse to play with.

“Alcatraz,” she said.

“Mother,” I replied coldly.

She raised an eyebrow. “Tie them up,” she said to her thugs. “And fetch that book for me.”

The thugs pulled out swords and herded us into the room with the scientists.

“Why’d you stop me?” Bastille hissed.

“Because it wouldn’t have done any good,” I whispered back. “We don’t even know where we are—we could be back in the Hushlands, for all we know. We have to get back to the Royal Archives.”

I waited for it, but nobody said the inevitable “not a library.” I realized that nobody else could hear us—which is kind of the point of whispering in the first place. (That and sounding more mysterious.)

“How do we get back, then?” Bastille asked.

I glanced at the equipment around us. We had to activate the silimatic machines and swap the rooms again. But how?

Before I could ask Bastille about this, the thugs pulled us apart and bound us with ropes. This wasn’t too big a deal—my Talent could snap ropes in a heartbeat, and if the thugs assumed that we were tied up, then maybe they’d get lax and give us a better chance for escaping.

The Librarians began to rifle through our pockets, depositing our possessions—including all of my Lenses—on a low table. Then they forced us to the ground, which was sterile and white. The room itself bustled with activity as Librarians and scientists checked monitors, wires, and panes of glass.

My mother flipped through the book on Smedry history, though of course she couldn’t read it. Her lackey, Fitzroy, was more interested in my Lenses. “The other pair of Translator’s Lenses,” he said, picking them up. “These will be very nice to have.”

He slid them into his pocket, continuing on to the others. “Oculator’s Lenses,” he said, “boring.” He set those aside. “A single, untinted Lens,” he said, looking over the Truthfinder’s Lens. “It’s probably worthless.” He handed the Lens to a scientist, who snapped it into a spectacle frame.

“Ah!” Fitzroy continued. “Are those Disguiser’s Lenses? Now these are valuable!”

The scientist returned the spectacles with the single Truthfinder’s Lens in them, but Fitzroy set this aside, picking up the violet Disguiser’s Lenses and putting them on. He immediately shifted shapes, melding to look like a much more muscular and handsome version of himself. “Hum, very nice,” he said, inspecting his arms.

Why didn’t I think of that? I thought.

“Oh, I almost forgot,” Shasta said, pulling something out of her purse. She tossed a few glass bands to her Librarian thugs. “Put those on that one, that one, and that one.” She pointed at me, Folsom, and Sing.

The three Smedrys. That seemed ominous. Perhaps it was time to try an escape. But … we were surrounded and we still didn’t know how to use the machines to get us back. Before I could make up my mind, one of the thugs snapped a band on my arm and locked it.

I didn’t feel any different.

“What you aren’t feeling,” my mother said offhandedly, “is the loss of your Talent. That’s Inhibitor’s Glass.”

“Inhibitor’s Glass is a myth!” Sing said, aghast.

“Not according to the Incarna people,” my mother said, smiling. “You’d be amazed what we’re learning from these Forgotten Language books.” She snapped the book in her hands closed. I could see a smug satisfaction in her smile as she pulled open a drawer beneath the table and dropped the book in it. She closed the drawer, then—oddly—she picked up one of the rings of Inhibitor’s Glass and snapped it onto her own arm.

“Handy things, these rings,” she said. “Smedry Talents are far more useful when you can determine exactly when they are to activate.” My mother had my father’s same Talent—losing things—which she’d gained by marriage. My grandfather said he thought she’d never learned to control it, so I could guess why she’d want to wear Inhibitor’s Glass.

“You people,” Sing said, struggling as the thugs snapped a ring on his arm. “All you want to do is control. You want everything to be normal and boring, no freedom or uncertainty.”

“I couldn’t have said it better myself,” my mother said, putting her hands behind her back.

This was getting bad. I cursed. I should have let Bastille fight, then tried to find a way to activate the swap during the confusion. Without our Talents, we were in serious trouble. I tested my Talent anyway, but got nothing. It was a very odd feeling. Like trying to start your car, but only getting a pitiful grinding sound.

I wiggled my arm, trying to see if I could get the ring of Inhibitor’s Glass off, but it was on tight. I ground my teeth. Maybe I could use the Lenses on the table somehow.

Unfortunately, the only Lenses left were my basic Oculator’s Lenses and the single Truthfinder’s Lens. Great, I thought, wishing—not for the first time—that Grandpa Smedry had given me some Lenses that I could use in a fight.

Still, I had to work with what I had. I stretched my neck, wiggling to the side, and finally managed to touch the side of the Truthfinder’s spectacles with my cheek. I could activate the Lens as long as I was touching the frames.

“You are a monster,” Sing said, still talking to my mother.

“A monster?” Shasta asked. “Because I like order? I think you’ll agree with our way, once you see what we can do for the Free Kingdoms. Aren’t you Sing Sing Smedry the anthropologist? I hear that you’re fascinated by the Hushlands. Why speak such harsh words about Librarians if you’re so fascinated by our lands?”

Sing fell silent.

“Yes,” Shasta said. “Everything will be better when the Librarians rule.”

I froze. I could just barely see her through the side of the Lens by my head on the table. And those words she’d just spoken—they weren’t completely true. When she’d said them, to my eyes she’d released a patch of air that was muddied and gray. It was as if my mother wasn’t sure that she was telling the truth.

“Lady Fletcher,” one of the Librarian thugs said, approaching. “I have informed my superiors of our captives.”

Shasta frowned. “I … see.”

“You will of course deliver them to us,” the Librarian soldier said. “I believe that is Prince Rikers Dartmoor—he could prove to be a very valuable captive.”

“These are my captives, Captain,” Shasta said. “I’ll decide what to do with them.”

“Oh? This equipment and these scientists belong to the Scrivener’s Bones. All you were promised was the book. You said we could have anything else in the room we wanted. Well, these people are what we demand.”

Scrivener’s Bones, I thought. That explains all the wires. The Scrivener’s Bones were the Librarian sect who liked to mix Free Kingdoms technology and Hushlander technology. That was probably why there were wires leading from the brightsand containers. Rather than just opening the containers and bathing the glass in light, the Librarians used wires and switches.

That could be a big help. It meant there might be a way to use the machinery to activate the swap.

“We are very insistent,” the leader of the Librarian soldiers said. “You can have the book and the Lenses. We will take the captives.”

“Very well,” my mother snapped. “You can have them. But I want half of my payment back as compensation.”

I felt a stab inside my chest. So she would sell me. As if I were nothing.

“But Shasta,” the young Librarian Oculator said, stepping up to her. “You’ll give them up? Even the boy?”

“He means nothing to me.”

I froze.

It was a lie.

I could see it plain and clear through the corner of the Lens. When she spoke the words, black sludge fell from her lips.

“Shasta Smedry,” the soldier said, smiling. “The woman who would marry just to get a Talent, and who would spawn a child just to sell him to the highest bidder!”

“Why should I feel anything for the son of a Nalhallan? Take the boy. I don’t care.”

Another lie.

“Let’s just get on with this,” she finished. Her manner was so controlled, so calm. You’d never have known that she was lying through her teeth.

But … what did it mean? She couldn’t care for me. She was a terrible, vile person. Monsters like her didn’t have feelings.

She couldn’t care about me. I didn’t want her to. It was so much more simple to assume that she was heartless.

“What about Father?” I found myself whispering. “Do you hate him too?”

She turned toward me, meeting my eyes. She parted her lips to speak, and I thought I caught a trail of black smoke begin to slip out and pour toward the ground.

Then it stopped. “What’s he doing?” she snapped, pointing. “Fitzroy, I thought I told you to keep those Lenses secured!”

The Oculator jumped in shock, rushing over and grabbing the Truthfinder’s Lens and pocketing it. “Sorry,” he said. He took the other Lenses and placed them in another pocket of his coat.

I leaned back, feeling frustrated. What now?

I was the brave and brilliant Alcatraz Smedry. Books had been written about me. Rikers was smiling, as if this were all a big adventure. And I could guess why. He didn’t feel threatened. He had me to save him.

It was then that I understood what Grandpa Smedry had been trying to tell me. Fame itself wasn’t a bad thing. Praise wasn’t a bad thing. The danger was assuming that you really were what everyone imagined you to be.

I’d come into this presuming that my Talent could get us out. Well, now it couldn’t. I’d brought us into danger because I’d let my self-confidence make me overconfident.

And you all are to blame for this, in part. This is what your adoration does. You create for yourselves heroes using our names, but those fabrications are so incredible, so elevated that the real thing can never live up to them. You destroy us, consume us.

And I am what’s left over when you’re done.

Chapter 19

Oh, wasn’t that how you expected me to end that last chapter? Was it kind of a downer? Made you feel bad about yourself?

Well, good.

We’re getting near the end, and I’m tired of putting on a show for you. I’ve tried to prove that I’m arrogant and selfish, but I just don’t think you’re buying it. So, maybe if I make the book a depressing pile of slop, you’ll leave me alone.

“Alcatraz?” Bastille whispered.

I mean, why is it that you readers always assume that you’re never to blame for anything? You just sit there, comfortable on your couch while we suffer. You can enjoy our pain and our misery because you’re safe.

Well, this is real to me. It’s real. It still affects me. Ruins me.

“Alcatraz?” Bastille repeated.

I am not a god. I am not a hero. I can’t be what you want me to be. I can’t save people, or protect them, because I can’t even save myself!

I am a murderer. Do you understand? I KILLED HIM.

“Alcatraz!” Bastille hissed.

I looked up from my bonds. A good half hour had passed. We were still captive, and I’d tried dozens of times to summon my Talent. It was unresponsive. Like a sleeping beast that refused to awaken. I was powerless.

My mother chatted with the other Librarians, who had sent in teams to rifle through the books and determine if there was anything else of value inside the archives. From what I’d heard when I cared enough to pay attention, they were planning to swap the rooms back soon.

Sing had tried to crawl away at one point. He had earned himself a boot to the face—he was already beginning to get a black eye. Himalaya sniffled quietly, leaning against Folsom. Prince Rikers continued to sit happily, as if this were all a big exciting amusement park ride.

“We need to escape,” Bastille said. “We need to get out. The treaty will be ratified in a matter of minutes!”

“I’ve failed, Bastille,” I whispered. “I can’t get us out.”

“Alcatraz…” she said. She sounded so exhausted. I glanced at her and saw the haunted fatigue from before, but it seemed even worse.

“I can barely keep myself awake,” she whispered. “This hole inside … it seems to be chewing on my mind, sucking out everything I think and feel. I can’t do this without you. You’ve got to lead us. I love my brother, but he’s useless.”

“That’s the problem,” I said, leaning back. “I am too.”

The Librarians were approaching. I stiffened, but they didn’t come for me. Instead, they grabbed Himalaya.

She cried out, struggling.

“Let go of her!” Folsom bellowed. “What are you doing?”

He tried to jump after them, but his hands and legs were tied, and all he managed to do was lurch forward onto his face. The Librarian thugs smiled, shoving him to the side, where he caused the table next to us to topple over. It scattered our possessions—some keys, a couple of coin pouches, one book—to the floor.

The book was the volume of Alcatraz Smedry and the Mechanic’s Wrench that Folsom had been carrying earlier, and it fell open to the front page. My theme music began to play, and I tensed, hoping for Folsom to attack.

But of course he didn’t. He wore the Inhibitor’s Glass on his arm. The little melody continued to sound; it was supposed to be brave and triumphant, but now it seemed a cruel parody.

My theme music played while I failed.

“What are you doing to her?” Folsom repeated, struggling uselessly as a Librarian stood with his boot on Folsom’s back.

The young Oculator Fitzroy approached; he still wore my Disguiser’s Lenses, which gave him an illusory body that made him look handsome and strong. “We’ve had a request,” he said. “From She Who Cannot Be Named.”

“You’re in contact with her?” Sing demanded.

“Of course we are,” Fitzroy said. “We Librarian sects get along far better than you all would like to think. Now, Ms. Snorgan … Sorgavag … She Who Cannot Be Named was not pleased to discover that Shasta’s team had planned to steal the Royal Archives—definitely a library—on the very day of the treaty ratification. However, when she heard about a very special captive we’d obtained, she was a little more forgiving.”

“You shall never get away with this, foul monster!” Prince Rikers suddenly exclaimed. “You may hurt me, but you shall never wound me!”

We all stared at him.

“How was that?” he asked me. “I think it was a good line. Maybe I should do it over. You know, get more baritone into it. When the villain talks about me, I should respond, right?”

“I wasn’t talking about you,” Fitzroy said, shaking Himalaya. “I’m talking about She Who Cannot Be Named’s former assistant. I think it’s time to show you all what happens when someone betrays the Librarians.”

I had sudden flashbacks to being tortured by Blackburn. The Dark Oculators delighted in pain and suffering.

It didn’t seem that Fitzroy was even going to bother with the torture part. The thugs held Himalaya back, and Fitzroy produced a knife. He pressed it to her neck. Sing began to cry out, requiring several guards to hold him down. Folsom was bellowing in rage. Librarian scientists just continued monitoring their equipment in the background.

This is what it came down to. Me, too weak to help. I was nothing without my Talent or my Lenses.

“Alcatraz,” Bastille whispered. Somehow I heard her over all the other noise. “I believe in you.”

It was virtually the same thing others had been telling me since I’d arrived in Nalhalla. But those things had all been lies. They hadn’t known me.

But Bastille did. And she believed in me.

From her, that meant something.

I turned with desperation, looking at Himalaya, who was held captive, weeping. Fitzroy seemed to be enjoying the pain he was causing the rest of us by holding that knife to her throat. I knew at that moment that he really intended to kill her. He would murder her in front of the man who loved her.

Who loved her.

My Lenses were gone. My Talent was gone. I only had one thing left.

I was a Smedry.

“Folsom!” I screamed. “Do you love her?”

“What?” he asked.

“Do you love Himalaya?”

“Of course I do! Please, don’t let him kill her!”

“Himalaya,” I demanded, “do you love him?”

She nodded as the knife began to cut. It was enough.

“Then I pronounce you married,” I said.

Everyone froze for a moment. A short distance away my mother turned and looked at us, suddenly alarmed. Fitzroy raised an eyebrow, his knife slightly bloodied. My theme music played faintly from the little book on the floor.

“Well, that’s touching,” Fitzroy said. “Now you can die as a married woman! I—”

At that instant, Himalaya’s fist took him in the face.

The ropes that bound her fell to the ground, snapped and broken, as she leaped into the air and kicked the two thugs beside her. The men went down, unconscious, and Himalaya spun like a dancer toward the group standing behind. She cleared them all with a sweeping kick delivered precisely, despite the fact that she seemed to have no idea what she was doing.

Her face was determined, her eyes wide with rage; a little trickle of blood ran down her neck. She twisted and spun, fighting with a beautiful, uncoordinated rage, fully under the control of her brand-new Talent.

She was now Himalaya Smedry. And as everyone knows (and I believe I’ve pointed out to you), when you marry a Smedry, you get their Talent.

I rolled to where Fitzroy had fallen. More importantly, where his knife had fallen. I kicked it across the floor to Bastille, who—being Bastille—caught it even though her hands were (literally) tied behind her back. In a second she’d cut herself free. In another second, both Sing and I were free.

Fitzroy sat up, holding his cheek, dazed. I grabbed the Disguiser’s Lenses off his face, and he immediately shrank back to being spindly and freckled. “Sing, grab him and make for the archives room!”

The hefty Mokian didn’t need to hear that again. He easily tucked the squirming Fitzroy under his arm while Bastille attacked the thugs who were holding Folsom down, defeating them both. But then she wavered nauseously.

“Get to the room, everyone!” I yelled as Himalaya kept the thugs at bay. Bastille nodded, wobbling as she helped the prince to his feet. Shasta watched from the side, yelling for the thugs to attack—but they were wary of engaging a Smedry Talent.

After struggling for a second to get that band of glass off my arm—it wouldn’t budge—I pulled open the drawer of the table and snatched the book my mother had stowed there.

That left us with one major problem. We were right back where we’d been when I’d made us surrender. Retreating into the archives room wouldn’t help if we remained surrounded by Librarians. We had to activate the swap. Unfortunately, there was no way I’d be able to reach those terminals. I figured I only had one chance.

Folsom rushed past, grabbing the still-playing music book off the ground and snapping it closed so Himalaya could come out of her super-kung-fu-Librarian-chick trance. She froze midkick, looking dazed. She had dropped all the thugs around her. Folsom grabbed her by the shoulder and spun her into a kiss. Then he pulled her after the others.

That only left me. I looked across the room at my mother, who met my eyes. She seemed rather self-confident, considering what had happened, and I figured that she figured that I couldn’t escape. Go figure.

I grabbed the pile of electrical cords off the ground and—pulling as hard as I could—yanked them out of their sockets in the containers of brightsand. Then I raced after my friends.

Bastille waited at the door that led into the archives room. “What’s that?” she said, pointing at the cords.

“Our only chance,” I replied, ducking into the room. She followed, then slammed the door—or, at least, what was left of it. It was pitch dark inside. I’d broken the lamps. I heard the breathing of my little group, shallow, worried.

“What now?” Sing whispered.

I held the cords in my hands. I touched the tips with my fingers, then closed my eyes. This was a big gamble. Sure, I’d been able to make the music box work, but this was something completely different.

I didn’t have time to doubt myself. The Librarians would be upon us in a few moments. I held those cords, held my breath, and activated them like I would a pair of Oculator’s Lenses.

Immediately, something drained from me. My strength was sapped away, and I felt a shock of exhaustion—as if my body had decided to run a marathon when I wasn’t looking. I dropped the cords, wobbling, and reached out to steady myself against Sing.

“You’re all dead, you know,” Fitzroy sputtered in the darkness; he was still held—I assumed—under Sing’s arm. “They’ll burst in here in a second and then you’re dead. What did you think? You’re trapped! Sandless idiots!”

I took a deep breath, righting myself. Then I pushed the door open.

The blonde Knight of Crystallia standing guard was still outside. “You all right?” she asked, peeking in. “What happened?” Behind her I could see the stone stairwell of the Royal Archives, still packed with soldiers.

“We’re back!” Sing said. “How…?”

“You powered the glass,” Bastille said, looking at me. “Like you did with Rikers’s silimatic music box. You initiated a swap!”

I nodded. At my feet, the cords to the Librarian machinery lay cut at the ends. Our swap had severed them where they’d poked through the door.

“Shattering Glass, Smedry!” Bastille said. “How in the name of the first Sands did you do that?”

“I don’t know,” I said, rushing out the doorway. “We can worry about it later. Right now, we’ve got to save Mokia.”

Chapter 20

Questions.

We’re at the end, and you probably have a few of them. If you’ve been paying attention closely, you probably have more than just “a few.”

You should probably have more than you do.

I’ve tried to be honest, as honest as I can be. I haven’t lied about anything important.

But some of the people in the story … well, they’re lying for certain.

No matter how much you think you know, there is always more to learn. It all has to do with Librarians, knights, and of course fish sticks. Enjoy this next part. I’ll see you in the epilogue.

“Aha!” I said, pulling not one but two pairs of Translator’s Lenses from Fitzroy’s jacket. The Dark Oculator lay tied up on the floor as we rode in the prince’s giant glass pig. I’d told my soldiers to get some sort of equipment and dig to the corner of the archives room and remove the glass there, so that the Librarians couldn’t swap the room back and steal any of the other books.

“I still don’t understand what happened,” Sing said, sitting nervously as our vehicle plodded toward the palace.

“Oculators can power glass,” I said. “Like Lenses.”

“Lenses are magic,” Sing said. “That Transporter’s Glass was technology.”

“The two are more similar than you think, Sing. In fact, I believe all of these powers are connected. Do you remember what you said when you and I were hiding down there a few moments ago? The thing about your sister?”

“Sure,” Sing said. “I mentioned that I wished she’d been there, because she could have imitated one of the Librarians.”

“Which I could do with these,” I said, holding up the pair of Disguiser’s Lenses that we’d retrieved from Fitzroy. “Sing, these work just like Australia’s Talent does. If she falls asleep thinking about somebody, she wakes up looking just like them. Well, if I wear these and concentrate, I can do the same thing.”

“What are you saying, Alcatraz?” Folsom asked.

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “It just seems suspicious to me. I mean, look at your Talent. It makes you a better warrior when you hear music, right?”

He nodded.

“Well, what do Bastille’s Warrior’s Lenses do?” I said. “They make her a better fighter. My uncle Kaz’s Talent lets him transport people across great distances, which sounds an awful lot like what that Transporter’s Glass did.”

“Yes,” Sing said. “But what about your grandfather’s Talent? It lets him arrive late to things, and there aren’t Lenses that do that.”

“There are lots of types of glass we don’t know about,” I said. I picked up one of the rings of Inhibitor’s Glass, which we’d managed to get off our arms using a set of keys in Fitzroy’s pocket. “You thought these were mythical.”

Sing fell silent, and I turned, watching through the translucent walls as we approached the palace. “I think this is all related,” I said more softly. “The Smedry Talents, silimatic technology, Oculators … and whatever it is my mother is trying to accomplish. It’s all connected.”

She didn’t believe what she said about the Librarians ruling everything. She wasn’t certain.

She has different goals from the other Librarians. But what are they?

I sighed, shaking my head, and reached over to pick up the book we’d brought from the archives. At least we had it, as well as both pairs of Translator’s Lenses. I slipped the Lenses on, then glanced at the first page.

Soups for everyone, it read. A guide to the best Greek and Incarna cooking.

I froze. I flipped through the book anxiously, then took off the Lenses and tried the other pair. Both showed the same thing.

This wasn’t the right book.

“What?” Sing asked. “Alcatraz, what is it?”

“She switched books on us!” I said, frustrated. “This isn’t the book on Incarna history—it’s the cookbook!” I’d seen her work with deft fingers before, when she’d snatched the Sands of Rashid right out from under my nose back in my room in the Hushlands. Plus she had access to my father’s Talent of losing things. It might be of help in hiding stuff.

I slammed the book back down on the table. Around me, the rich, red-furnished room shook as the glass pig continued on its way.

“That’s not important right now,” Bastille said in an exhausted voice. She sat on the couch beside Folsom and Himalaya, and she looked like she’d gotten even worse since we’d left the Librarians. Her eyes were unfocused, as if she’d been drugged, and she kept rubbing her temples.

“We need to stop the treaty first,” she said. “Your mother can’t do anything with that book as long as you have both pairs of Translator’s Lenses.”

She was right. Mokia had to be our focus now. As the pig pulled up to the palace, I took a deep breath. “All right,” I said. “You all know what to do?”

Sing, Folsom, Himalaya, and Prince Rikers each nodded. We’d discussed our plan during the chapter break. (Neener neener.)

“The Librarians aren’t likely to let this go smoothly,” I said, “but I doubt there will be much they can do with all of the soldiers and knights guarding the palace. However, they’re Librarians, so be ready for anything.”

They nodded again. We prepared to go, and the door on the pig’s butt opened. (I think that undermined our dramatic exit.) Bastille stood to go with us, wobbling on unsteady feet.

“Uh, Bastille,” I said. “I think you should wait here.”

She gave me a stiff glance—the kind that made me feel like I’d just been smacked across the face with a broom. I took that as her answer.

“All right,” I said with a sigh. “Let’s go, then.”

We marched out of the pig and up the steps. Prince Rikers called for guards immediately—I think he just liked the drama of having a full troop of soldiers with us. Indeed, our entrance into the hallway with the wall-hanging panes of glass was rather intimidating.

The Knights of Crystallia standing at attention in the hallway saluted us as we passed, and I felt significantly more safe knowing they were there.

“Do you think your mother will have warned the others of what happened?” Sing whispered.

“I doubt it,” I said. “Mother’s allies contacted She Who Cannot Be Named to gloat over having captured some valuable prisoners. You don’t call to gloat over having lost those same prisoners. I think we’ll surprise them.”

“I hope so,” Sing said as we approached the doors to the council room. We nodded to the pair of knights, and then I stepped aside.

“Time for your big entrance, Your Highness,” I said, gesturing for Prince Rikers.

“Really?” he said. “I get to do it?”

“Go ahead,” I said.

The prince dusted himself off. He smiled broadly, then strode through the doors into the chamber and bellowed in a loud voice, “In the name of all that is just, I demand these proceedings to be halted!”

Down below, the monarchs sat around their table, a large document set out before them. King Dartmoor held a quill in his hand, poised to sign. We’d arrived in the nick of time. (What the heck is a nick anyway?)

The monarchs’ table sat in the open area in the center of the room, between the two raised sets of seats that were filled with patrons. Knights of Crystallia stood in a ring around the floor, between the people and the rulers. They were most concentrated, I noticed, near where the Librarians sat.

She Who Cannot Be Named sat at the front of the Librarian group, pleasantly knitting an afghan.

“What is this?” King Dartmoor asked as the rest of my team piled into the room.

“The Librarians are lying to you, Father!” Rikers declared. “They tried to kidnap me!”

“Why, that’s the most distressing thing I’ve ever heard,” said She Who Cannot Be Named. (You know what? That name is really too hard to type all the time. From here on, I’m going to call her Swcbn.)

My companions looked at me. I wore the Truthfinder’s spectacles, one eye closed to look through the single Lens. Unfortunately, Swcbn hadn’t said anything that was false—she’d avoided doing so deliberately, I’m sure.

“Father,” Prince Rikers said, “we can provide proof of what happened!” He waved behind him, and the two knights we’d brought with us entered, carrying the tied and gagged Fitzroy. “This is a Librarian of the Order of the Dark Oculators! He was involved in a plot to steal books from the Royal Archives—”

“Mumf mu mumfmumf,” Fitzroy added.

“—which turned into a plot to kidnap me, the royal heir!” Rikers continued.

Rikers certainly did know how to get into a part. He didn’t seem as much a buffoon now that he was in his element of the court.

“Lady Librarian,” King Dartmoor said, turning to Swcbn.

“I’m … not sure what is happening,” she said. Another half-truth that didn’t come out as lie.

“She does, Your Majesty,” I declared, stepping up. “She ordered the death of Himalaya, who is now a member of the Smedry clan.”

That caused a stir.

“Lady Librarian,” the king said, red-bearded face growing very stern. “Is what he says true, or is it false?”

“I’m not sure if you should be asking me, dear. It’s quite—”

“Answer the question!” the king bellowed. “Have Librarians been plotting to kidnap and steal from us while these very treaty hearings have been occurring?”

The grandmotherly Librarian looked at me, and I could tell that she knew she was caught. “I think,” she said, “that my team and I should be granted a short recess to discuss.”

“No recess!” the king said. “Either you answer as asked, or I’m tearing this treaty in half this instant.”

The elderly Librarian pursed her lips, then finally set down her knitting. “I will admit,” she said, “that some other branches of the Librarians have been pursuing their own ends in the city. However, this is one of the main reasons we are signing this treaty—so that you can give my sect the authority it needs to stop the other sects from continuing this needless war!”

“And the execution of my beloved?” Folsom demanded.

“In my eyes, young man,” Swcbn said, “that one is a traitor and a turncoat. How would your own laws treat someone who committed treason?”

The room fell still. Where was my grandfather? His seat at the table was noticeably empty.

“Considering this information,” said King Dartmoor, “how many of you now vote against signing the treaty?”

Five of the twelve monarchs raised their hands.

“And I assume Smedry would still vote against the signing,” Dartmoor said, “if he hadn’t stormed out in anger. That leaves six against six. I am the deciding vote.”

“Father,” the prince called. “What would a hero do?”

The king hesitated. Then, embarrassingly, he looked up at me. He stared me in the eyes. Then he ripped the treaty in two.

“I find it telling,” he declared to Swcbn, “that you cannot control your own people despite the importance of these talks! I find it disturbing that you would be willing to execute one of your own for joining a kingdom with which you claim you want to be friends. And most of all, I find it disgusting what I nearly did. I want you Librarians out of my kingdom by midnight. These talks are at an end.”

The room exploded with sound. There were quite a number of cheers—many of these coming from the section where the Mokians, Australia included, were sitting. There were some boos, but mostly there was just a lot of excited chatter. Draulin approached from the ranks of knights, laying a hand on the king’s shoulder, and—in a rare moment of emotion—nodded. She actually thought that ripping up the treaty was a good idea.

Maybe that meant she’d see Bastille’s help in this mess as validation for restoring her daughter’s knighthood. I glanced about for Bastille, but she wasn’t to be found. Sing tapped my arm and pointed behind. I could see Bastille in the hallway, sitting in a chair, arms wrapped around herself, shivering. She’d lost her Warrior’s Lenses back when we’d been captured, and I could see that her eyes were red and puffy.

My first instinct was to go to her, but something made me hesitate. Swcbn didn’t seem particularly disturbed by these events. She’d turned back to her knitting. That bothered me.

“Socrates,” I whispered.

“What’s that, Alcatraz?” Sing asked.

“This guy I learned about in school,” I said. “He was one of those annoying types who always asked questions.”

“Okay…” Sing said.

Something was wrong. I began asking questions that should have worried me long before this.

Why was the most powerful Librarian in all of the Hushlands here to negotiate a treaty that the monarchs had already decided to sign?

Why wasn’t she concerned at being surrounded by her enemies, capable of being captured and imprisoned at a moment’s notice?

Why did I feel so unsettled, as if we hadn’t really won after all?

At that moment, Draulin screamed. She collapsed to the ground, holding her head. Then every Knight of Crystallia in the room dropped to the ground as well, crying out in pain.

“Hello, everyone!” a voice suddenly cried. I spun to find my grandfather standing behind us. “I’m back! Did I miss anything important?”

Chapter 21

At that instant, a lot of things happened at once.

The common people in the crowd began to scream in fear and confusion. A group of Librarian thugs pushed their way down to the floor around Swcbn, who continued to sit and knit.

King Dartmoor unsheathed his sword and turned to face the thugs. Grandpa Smedry and I tried to rush down the stairs to get to the monarchs, but were blocked by the crowds trying to flee.

“Hiccupping Huffs!” Grandpa Smedry cursed.

“Follow me, Lord Smedry!” Sing said, muscling up to the top of the stairs beside us. Then he tripped.

Now, I don’t know how you’d react if a three-hundred-pound Mokian tripped and began to roll down the stairs toward you, but I safely say that I’d either:

Scream like a girl and jump out of the way.

Scream like a gerbil and jump out of the way.

Scream like a Smedry and jump out of the way.

The people on the steps chose to scream like a bunch of people on some steps, but they did get out of the way.

Grandpa Smedry, Folsom, Himalaya, and I charged down the stairs behind the Mokian. Prince Rikers stayed behind, looking confused. “This part actually looks dangerous,” he called. “Maybe I should stay here. You know, and guard the exit.”

Whatever, I thought. His father at least proved to have a spine. King Dartmoor stood over his fallen wife, facing down the group of Librarian thugs, sword held before him. The other monarchs were in the processes of scattering.

It looked as if the Librarians would easily cut down the king before we could reach him.

“Hey!” a voice yelled suddenly. I recognized my aunt Patty standing in the audience, pointing. As always, her voice managed to carry over any and every bit of competition. “I don’t mean to be rude,” she bellowed, “but is that toilet paper stuck to your leg?”

The Librarian thug at the front immediately looked down, then blushed, realizing that he did indeed have toilet paper stuck to him. He bent down to pull it off, causing the others to bunch up behind him awkwardly.

That distraction gave us just enough time to cover the distance to the king. Grandpa Smedry whipped out a pair of Lenses. I recognized the green tint to the glass, marking them as Windstormer’s Lenses. Sure enough, the Lenses released a blast of air, knocking back the Librarians as they tried to rush the king.

“What happened to the knights?” the king yelled, desperate.

“Librarians must have corrupted the Mindstone, Brig,” Grandpa Smedry said.

That’s the problem with having a magic rock that connects the minds of all of your best soldiers. Take down the stone, and you take down the soldiers. Kind of like how taking out one cell phone tower can knock out the texting ability of an entire school’s worth of teenage girls.

Grandpa Smedry concentrated on blasting the Librarians with his Lenses, but they got smart quickly. They spread out, forcing their way around the perimeter of the floor, trying to get at the king. Grandpa Smedry couldn’t focus on all the different groups; there were too many.

The room was a chaotic mess. People screaming, Librarians pulling out swords, wind blowing. The monarchs were trying to escape, but the stairs were clogged again. Sing sat dazed from his roll down the stairs. He wouldn’t be able to help again anytime soon.

“Alcatraz, get those monarchs out!” Grandpa Smedry said, pointing toward the wall. “Folsom, if you’d help me…”

And with that, Grandpa Smedry began to sing.

I stared at him, dumbfounded, until I realized this gave Folsom the music he needed to dance. Both Folsom and Himalaya spun toward the Librarians, knocking down those who had tried to push around the outsides of the room.

I turned and dashed up a section of the elevated seats. “Monarchs, up here!” I said. The seats here were empty, their occupants all trying to crowd out the other door.

Several of the monarchs turned toward me as I reached the far wall. I placed two hands against it and blasted it with breaking power. The entire wall fell away as if it had been shoved by the hand of a giant.

Monarchs rushed up the steps, wearing a variety of outfits and crowns: A man with dark skin in red African-style clothing. The Mokian king in his islander wrap. A king and queen in standard European crowns and robes. I counted them off, but didn’t see Bastille’s father.

That was apparently because he was still down below. I could see that he was trying to pull Draulin to safety—unfortunately, she weighed like a bazillion pounds with all that armor on, not to mention the awkward sword strapped to her back. The king must have come to the same conclusion, as he pulled free her sword and tossed it aside, then began to work off the armor.

I moved to go help, but the crowds had seen my new exit and were swarming around me. I had to fight against them, and it really slowed me down.

“Grandpa!” I yelled, pointing.

Below, my grandfather turned toward the king, then cursed. Folsom and Himalaya were holding off the Librarians pretty well, so Grandpa Smedry rushed over to help the High King. I tried to do likewise, but it was slow going with the crowd in my way. Fortunately, it looked like I wouldn’t be needed.

People escaped out of the broken hole in the wall. Folsom and Himalaya handled the Librarians. My grandfather helped the High King pick up Draulin. Everything seemed good.

Swcbn continued to knit quietly.

Questions. They still itched at me.

How exactly, I wondered, did the Librarians get to the Crystin Mindstone? That thing must be freakishly well guarded.

Why was Swcbn acting so content? Who had blown up Hawkwind? It had to have been someone who would have been able to get Detonator’s Glass into Draulin’s pack. Hers was the room that had exploded.

I glanced at Himalaya, who fought beside her new husband, knocking down enemy after enemy as my grandfather sang opera. It occurred to me that perhaps we’d overlooked something. And at that moment, I asked the most important question of all.

If there could be such a thing as a good Librarian, might there also be such a thing as an evil Knight of Crystallia? A knight who could get to the Mindstone and corrupt it? A knight who could slip a bomb into Draulin’s pack? A knight who had been involved in sending Bastille out to fail?

A knight whom I had personally seen hanging around the Royal Archives within a few hours of the swap?

“Oh no…” I whispered.

At that moment, one of the “unconscious” knights near Grandpa Smedry began to move. He lifted his head, and I could see a deadly smile on it. Archedis, otherwise known as Mr. Big Chin, supposedly the most accomplished of all the Knights of Crystallia.

I should have listened more to Socrates.

“Grandfather!” I screamed, trying to fight the crowd and run forward, but they were so frightened that I barely got a few steps before being pushed back again.

Grandpa Smedry turned, still singing, looking up at me and smiling. In a flash Archedis rose, pulling free his crystalline sword. He slammed the pommel against Grandpa Smedry’s head.

The old man went cross-eyed—his Talent unable to protect him from the power of a Crystin blade—and he fell to the side. With his singing gone, Himalaya and Folsom immediately stopped fighting and froze in place.

The Librarians tackled them.

I struggled against the flow of people again, trying desperately to get down. The seats on the north side were now completely empty, save for Swcbn. The grandmotherly woman looked up at me, smiling. She held up the afghan she’d been knitting.

It depicted a bloody skull. Archedis turned toward King Dartmoor.

“No!” I screamed.

The corrupted knight raised his sword. Then he froze as a small, quiet figure stepped between him and the king.

Bastille. She hadn’t been affected by the fall of the Mindstone … because the knights themselves had cut her off from it.

Bastille raised her mother’s sword. I don’t know where she’d gotten it—I don’t even know how she’d gotten into the room. She had found a pair of Warrior’s Lenses, but I could see from her profile that she was still exhausted. She looked tiny before the figure of the enormous knight, with his silvery armor and heroic smile.

“Come now,” Archedis said. “You can’t stand against me.”

Bastille didn’t reply.

“I maneuvered you into obtaining knighthood,” Archedis said. “You never really deserved it. That was all a ploy to kill the old Smedry.”

Kill the old Smedry … Of course. Bastille and I had assumed that someone had been setting her up to fail so that she or her mother would be disgraced. We’d completely missed that Bastille had been acting as Grandpa Smedry’s bodyguard.

It hadn’t been a plot against her at all. It had been a plot against my grandfather. (And if you’re wondering, no—I couldn’t actually hear what they were saying down there. But someone repeated it to me later, so give me a break.) I continued to fight against the crowd, trying to get to Bastille. It was all happening so quickly—though pages have passed in this narrative, it had only been moments since Archedis had stood up.

I was forced to watch as Bastille raised her mother’s sword. She seemed so tired, her shoulders slumping, her stance uncertain.

“I’m the best there’s ever been,” Archedis said. “You think you can fight me?”

Bastille looked up, and I saw something showing through her fatigue, her pain, and her sorrow. Strength.

She attacked. Crystal met crystal with a sound that was somehow more melodic than that of steel against steel. Archedis pushed Bastille back with his superior strength, laughing.

She came at him again.

Their swords met, pinging again and again. As before, Archedis rebuffed Bastille.

And she attacked again.

And again.

And again.

Each time her sword swung a little faster. Each time the ringing of blades was a little louder. Each time her posture was a little more firm. She fought, refusing to be beaten down.

Archedis stopped laughing. His face grew solemn, then angry. Bastille threw herself at him repeatedly, her sword becoming a flurry of motion, the crystalline blade flashing with iridescence as it shattered light from the windows, throwing out sparkling colors.

And then Bastille actually started to push Archedis back.

Few people outside of Crystallia have seen two Crystin fight in earnest. The fleeing crowd slowed, its members turning back. Librarian thugs stopped beating on Himalaya and Folsom. Even I hesitated. We all grew still, as if in reverence, and the once chaotic room became as quiet as a concert hall.

We were an audience watching a duet. A duet in which the violinists tried to ram their violins down each other’s throats.

The massive knight and the spindly girl circled, their swords beating against each other as if in a prescribed rhythm. The weapons seemed things of beauty, the way they reflected the light. Two people trying to kill each other with rainbows.

Bastille should have lost. She was smaller, weaker, and exhausted. Yet each time Archedis threw her down, she scrambled back to her feet and attacked with even more fury and determination. To the side her father, the king, watched in awe. To my surprise, I even saw her mother stir. The woman looked dazed and sick, but she seemed to have regained enough consciousness to open her eyes.

Archedis made a mistake. He tripped slightly against a fallen Librarian thug. It was the first error I’d seen him make, but that didn’t matter. Bastille was on him in a heartbeat, pounding her sword against his, forcing him backward from his precarious position.

Looking dumbfounded, Archedis tripped backward and fell onto his armored butt. Bastille’s sword froze at his neck, a hair’s width from slicing his head free.

“I … yield,” Archedis said, sounding utterly shocked.

I finally managed to shove my way through the crowd, which had been stunned by the beautiful fight. I skidded to a stop beside my grandfather. He was breathing, though unconscious. He appeared to be humming to himself in his sleep.

“Alcatraz,” Bastille said.

I looked over at her. She still had her sword at Archedis’s neck.

“I have something for you to do,” she said, nodding to Archedis.

I smiled, then walked over to the fallen knight.

“Look, hey,” he said, smiling. “I’m a double agent, really. I was just trying to infiltrate them. I … uh, is it true that you have a Truthfinder’s Lens?”

I nodded.

“Oh,” he said, knowing that I’d been able to see that he was lying.

“Do it,” Bastille said, nodding toward the ground.

“Gladly,” I said, reaching down to touch Archedis’s blade. With a magnificent crackling sound, it shattered beneath the power of my Talent.

Swcbn finally put down her knitting. “You,” she said, “are very bad children. No cookies for you.”

And with that, she vanished—replaced with an exact statue of herself, sitting in that very position.

Royal Epilogue (Not a Chapter)

There comes a time in every book when a single important question must be asked: “Where’s my lunch?”

That time isn’t right now. However, it is time to ask another question, almost as important: “So, what’s the point?”

It’s an excellent question. We should ask it about everything we read. The problem is, I have no idea how to answer it.

The point of this book is really up to you. My point in writing it was to look at my life, to expose it, to illuminate it. As Socrates once said, “The unexamined life is not worth living.”

He died for teaching that to people. I feel I should have died years ago. Instead, I proved myself to be a coward. You’ll see what I mean eventually.

This book means whatever you make of it. For some it will be about the dangers of fame. For others it will be about turning your flaws into talents. For many it will simply be entertainment, which is quite all right. Yet for others it will be about learning to question everything, even that which you believe.

For, you see, the most important truths can always withstand a little examination.

One week after the defeat of Archedis and the Librarians, I sat in the chamber of the Council of Kings. Grandpa Smedry sat to my left, dressed in his finest tuxedo. Bastille sat to my right, wearing the plate armor of a full Knight of Crystallia. (Yes, of course she got her knighthood back. As if the knights could refuse after watching her defeat Archedis while they lay on the ground drooling.)

I still wasn’t clear on what Archedis had done. From what I gather, the Mindstone was cut from the Worldspire. Like the spire, the Mindstone has the power to radiate energy and knowledge to everyone connected to it. Archedis had been able to resist the sundering as he’d cut himself off from the Mindstone earlier.

Either way, with both Bastille and Archedis being cut off—and with both wearing Warrior’s Lenses—their speed and strength had been equalized. And Bastille had beaten him. She’d won because of her skill and her tenacity, which I’d say are the more important indicators of knighthood. She’d worn her silvery armor virtually nonstop since it had been given back to her. A crystal sword hung from her back, newly bonded to Bastille.

“Can’t we get on with this?” she snapped. “Shattering Glass, Smedry. Your father is such a drama hog.”

I smiled. That was another sign she was feeling better—she was back to her usual charming self.

“What’s wrong with you?” she said, eyeing me. “Stop staring at me.”

“I’m not staring at you,” I said. “I’m having an internal monologue to catch the readers up on what has happened since the last chapter. It’s called a denouement.”

She rolled her eyes. “Then we can’t actually be having this conversation; it’s something you just inserted into the text while writing the book years later. It’s a literary device—the conversation didn’t exist.”

“Oh, right,” I said.

“You’re such a freak.”

Freak or not, I was happy. Yes, my mother escaped with the book. Yes, Swcbn escaped as well. But we caught Archedis, saved Mokia, and got back my father’s pair of Translator’s Lenses.

I’d shown them to him. He’d been surprised, had taken them back, then had returned to whatever important “work” it was he’d been doing this whole time. We were supposed to find out about it today; he was going to present his findings before the monarchs. Apparently he always revealed his discoveries this way.

So of course the place was a circus. No, literally. There was a circus outside the front of the palace to entertain the kids while their parents came in to listen to my father’s grand speech. The place was almost as packed as it had been during the treaty ratification.

Hopefully this time there would be fewer Librarian hijinks. (Those wacky Librarians and their hijinks.)

There were a large number of reporter types waiting in the outer reaches of the room, anticipating my father’s announcement. As I’d come to learn, anything involving the Smedry family was news to the Free Kingdomers. This news, however, was even more important.

The last time my father had held a session like this, he’d announced that he had discovered a way to collect the Sands of Rashid. The time before that, he’d explained that he’d broken the secret of Transporter’s Glass. People were expecting a lot from this speech.

I couldn’t help but feel that it was all just a little … bad for my father’s ego. I mean, a circus? Who gets a circus thrown for them?

I glanced at Bastille. “You dealt with this kind of stuff most of your childhood, didn’t you?”

“This kind of stuff?” she asked.

“Fame. Notoriety. People paying attention to everything you do.”

She nodded.

“So how did you deal with it?” I asked. “And not let it ruin you?”

“How do you know it didn’t ruin me?” she asked. “Aren’t princesses supposed to be nice and sweet and stuff like that? Wear pink dresses and tiaras?”

“Well…”

“Pink dresses,” Bastille said, her eyes narrowing. “Someone gave me a pink dress once. I burned it.”

Ah, I thought. That’s right; I forgot. Bastille got around fame’s touch by being a freaking psychopath.

“You’ll learn, lad,” Grandpa Smedry said from beside me. “It might take some time, but you’ll figure it out.”

“My father never did,” I said.

Grandpa Smedry hesitated. “Oh, well, I don’t know about that. I think he did for a while. Back around the time he got married. I just think he forgot.”

Around the time he got married. The words made me think of Folsom and Himalaya. We’d saved them seats, but they were late. As I looked around, I caught a glance of them working their way through the crowd. Grandpa Smedry waved enthusiastically, though they’d obviously already seen us.

But then, that’s Grandpa.

“Sorry,” Folsom said as he and his new wife seated themselves. “Getting some last-minute packing done.”

“You still determined to go through with this?” Grandpa Smedry asked.

Himalaya nodded. “We’re moving to the Hushlands. I think … well, there isn’t much I can do here for my fellow Librarians.”

“We’ll start an underground resistance for good Librarians,” Folsom said.

“Lybrarians,” Himalaya said. “I’ve already begun working on a pamphlet!”

She pulled out a sheet of paper. Ten steps to being less evil, it read. A helpful guide for those who want to take the “Lie” out of “Liebrarian.”

“That’s … just great,” I said. I wasn’t certain how else to respond. Fortunately for me, my father chose that moment to make his entrance—which was particularly good, since this scene was starting to feel a little long anyway.

The monarchs sat behind a long table facing a raised podium. We all grew quiet as my father approached, wearing dark robes to mark him as a scientist. The crowd hushed.

“As you may have heard,” he said, his voice carrying throughout the room, “I have recently returned from the Library of Alexandria. I spent some time as a Curator, escaping their clutches with my soul intact by the means of clever planning.”

“Yeah,” Bastille muttered, “clever planning, and some undeserved help.” Sing, who sat in front of us, gave her a disapproving look.

“The purpose of all this,” my father continued, “was to gain access to the fabled texts collected and controlled by the Curators of Alexandria. Having managed to create a pair of Translator’s Lenses from the Sands of Rashid—”

This caused a ripple of discussion in the crowd.

“—I was able to read texts in the Forgotten Language,” my father continued. “I was taken by the Curators and transformed into one of them, but still retained enough free will to sneak the Lenses from my possessions and use them to read. This allowed me to study the most valuable contents of the library.”

He stopped, leaning forward on the podium, smiling winningly. He certainly did have a charm about him, when he wanted to impress people.

In that moment, looking at that smile, I could swear that I’d seen him somewhere, long before my visit to the Library of Alexandria.

“What I did,” my father continued, “was dangerous; some may even call it brash. I couldn’t know that I’d have enough freedom as a Curator to study the texts, nor could I count on the fact that I’d be able to use my Lenses to read the Forgotten Language.”

He paused for dramatic effect. “But I did it anyway. For that is the Smedry way.”

“He stole that line from me, by the way,” Grandpa Smedry whispered to us.

My father continued. “I’ve spent the last two weeks writing down the things I memorized while I was a Curator. Secrets lost in time, mysteries known only to the Incarna. I’ve analyzed them, and am the only man to read and understand their works for over two millennia.”

He looked over the crowd. “Through this,” he said, “I have discovered the method by which the Smedry Talents were created and given to my family.”

What? I thought, shocked.

“Impossible,” Bastille said, and the crowd around us began to speak animatedly.

I glanced at my grandfather. Though the old man is usually wackier than a penguin-wrangling expedition to Florida, occasionally I catch a hint of wisdom in his face. He has a depth that he doesn’t often show.

He turned toward me, meeting my eyes, and I could tell that he was worried. Very worried.

“I anticipate great things from this,” my father said, hushing the crowd. “With a little more research, I believe I can discover how to give Talents to ordinary people. I imagine a world, not so distant in the future, where everyone has a Smedry Talent.”

And then he was done. He retreated from the podium, stepping down to speak with the monarchs. The room, of course, grew loud with discussions. I found myself standing, pushing my way to the floor of the room. I approached the monarchs, and the knights standing guard there let me pass.

“… need access to the Royal Archives,” my father was saying to the monarchs.

“Not a library,” I found myself whispering.

My father didn’t notice me. “There are some books there I believe would be of use to my investigations, now that I’ve recovered my Translator’s Lenses. One volume in particular was conspicuously missing from the Library of Alexandria—the Curators claimed their copy had been burned in a very strange accident. Fortunately, I believe there may be another one here.”

“It’s gone,” I said, my voice soft in the room’s buzzing conversations.

Attica turned to me, as did several of the monarchs. “What is that, son?” my father asked.

“Didn’t you pay attention at all to what happened last week?” I demanded. “Mother has the book. The one you want. She stole it from the archives.”

My father hesitated, then nodded to the monarchs. “Excuse us.” He pulled me aside. “Now, what is this?”

“She stole it,” I said. “The book you want, the one written by the scribe of Alcatraz the First. She took it from the archives. That’s what the entire mess last week was about!”

“I thought that was an assassination attempt on the monarchs,” he said.

“That was only part of it. I sent you a message in the middle of it, asking you to come help us protect the archives, but you completely ignored it!”

He waved an indifferent hand. “I was occupied with greater things. You must be mistaken—I’ll look through the archives and—”

“I looked already,” I said. “I’ve looked at the title of every single book in there that was written in the Forgotten Language. They’re all cookbooks or ledgers or things. Except that one my mother took.”

“And you let her steal it?” my father demanded indignantly.

Let her. I took a deep breath. (And next time you think your parents are frustrating, might I invite you to read through this passage one more time?)

“I believe,” a new voice said, “that young Alcatraz did everything he could to stop the aforementioned theft.”

My father turned to see King Dartmoor, wearing his crown and blue-gold robes, standing behind him. The king nodded to me. “Prince Rikers has spoken at length of the event, Attica. I expect there will be a novel forthcoming.”

Wonderful, I thought.

“Well,” my father said, “I guess … well, this changes everything.…”

“What is this about giving everyone Talents, Attica?” the king asked. “Is that really wise? From what I hear, Smedry Talents can be very unpredictable.”

“We can control them,” my father said, waving another indifferent hand. “You know how the people dream of having our powers. Well, I will be the one to make those dreams become a reality.”

So that was what it was about. My father sealing his legacy. Being the hero who made everyone capable of having a Talent.

But if everyone had a Smedry Talent … then, well, what would that mean for us? We wouldn’t be the only ones with Talents anymore. That made me feel a little sick.

Yes, I know it’s selfish, but that’s how I felt. I think this is perhaps the capstone of this book. After all I’d been through, after all the fighting to help the Free Kingdoms, I was still selfish enough to want to keep the Talents for myself.

Because the Talents were what made us special, weren’t they?

“I will have to think on this more,” my father said. “It appears that we’ll have to search out that book. Even if it means confronting … her.”

He nodded to the kings, then walked away. He put on a smiling face when he met with the press, but I could tell that he was bothered. The disappearance of that book had fouled up his plans.

Well, I thought, he should have paid better attention!

I knew it was silly, but I couldn’t help feeling that I’d let him down. That this was my fault. I tried to shake myself out of it and walked back to my grandfather and the others.

Had my parents been like Folsom and Himalaya once? Bright, loving, full of excitement? If so, what had gone wrong? Himalaya was a Librarian and Folsom was a Smedry. Were they doomed to the same fate as my parents?

And Smedry Talents for everyone. My mind drifted back to the words I’d read on the wall of the tomb of Alcatraz the First.

Our desires have brought us low. We sought to touch the powers of eternity, then draw them down upon ourselves. But we brought with them something we did not intend.…

The Bane of Incarna. That which twists, that which corrupts, and that which destroys.

The Dark Talent.

Wherever my father went on his quest to discover how to “make” Smedry Talents, I determined that I would follow after him. I would watch and make certain he didn’t do anything too rash.

I had to be ready to stop him, if need be.

The Last Pages

Alcatraz walks onto the stage. He smiles at the audience, looking right into the camera.

“Hello,” he says. “And welcome to the after-book special. I’m your host, Alcatraz Smedry.”

“And I’m Bastille Dartmoor,” Bastille says, joining Alcatraz on the stage.

Alcatraz nods. “We’re here to talk to you about a pernicious evil that is plaguing today’s youth. A terrible, awful habit that is destroying them from the inside out.”

Bastille looks at the camera. “He’s talking, of course, about skipping to the ends of books and reading the last pages first.”

“We call it ‘Last-Paging,’” Alcatraz says. “You may think it doesn’t involve you or your friends, but studies show that there has been a 4,000.024 percent increase in Last-Paging during the past seven minutes alone.”

“That’s right, Alcatraz,” Bastille says. “And did you know that Last-Paging is the largest cause of cancer in domesticated fruit bats?”

“Really?”

“Yes indeed. Also, Last-Paging makes you lose sleep, grow hair in funny places, and can decrease your ability to play Halo by forty-five percent.”

“Wow,” Alcatraz says. “Why would anyone do it?”

“We’re not certain. We only know that it happens, and that this terrible disease isn’t fully understood. Fortunately, we’ve taken actions to combat it.”

“Such as putting terrible after-book specials at the backs of books to make people feel sick?” Alcatraz asks helpfully.

“That’s right,” Bastille says. “Stay away from Last-Paging, kids! Remember, the more you know…”

“… the more you can forget tomorrow!” Alcatraz says. “Good night, folks. And be sure to join us for next week’s after-book special, where we expose the dangers of gerbil snorting!”

Author’s Afterword

No, we’re not done yet. Be patient. We’ve only had three endings so far; we can stand another one. Both of my other books had afterwords, so this one will too. (And if we need to send someone to Valinor to justify this last ending, let me know. I’m not going to marry Rosie, though.)

Anyway, there you have it. My first visit to Nalhalla, my first experience with fame. You’ve seen the actions of a hero and the actions of a fool—and you know that both hero and fool are the same person.

I know I said that this was the book where you’d see me fail—and, in a way, I did fail. I let my mother escape with the Incarna text. However, I realize this wasn’t as big a failure as you might have been expecting.

You should have known. I won’t warn you when my big failure is about to arrive. It will hurt far more when it’s a surprise.

You’ll see.

About The Author

Brandon Sanderson is the second leading cause of cancer in domesticated fruit bats. He didn’t write this book; Alcatraz Smedry did. However, as Brandon’s name is synonymous with “big, boring fantasy books nobody wants to read,” Alcatraz figured it would be a good name to put on this book. It might help keep the Librarians from discovering what’s really in here.

Brandon Sanderson is known to be one of those annoying people who always answers questions with other questions. You want to know why? Why does it matter? What do you hope to learn? Why would you want to know more about him? Don’t you realize that he’s a very silly person?

The end. (Finally.).

You can sign up for email updates here and here.

About The Illustrator

Hayley Lazo, alleged artist and spokeswoman for orphaned whale sharks, is still undergoing investigation. One agent, cleverly disguised as a desk lamp, reports that she may in fact harbor Librarian sympathies. Assuming there are libraries on Saturn. Her art can be found at art-zealot.deviantart.com.

Acknowledgments

I want to thank my awesome agents, Joshua Bilmes and Eddie Schneider, for being, well, awesome. Thanks also to this book’s first editor, Jennifer Rees, whose pleasant personality and editorial know-how made the process of publishing a book so much easier. At Starscape, thanks to Susan Chang for giving this book a new home, and thanks to Karl Gold and Megan Kiddoo for herding it through production. Also many thanks to Victoria Wallis and the ebook production team for their work on the new electronic version.

The influential Peter and Karen Ahlstrom were kind enough to read the manuscript and give me excellent suggestions. Janci Patterson also gave me feedback that was very valuable, even though her comments were written in glaring pink ink!

This novel would be much diminished without the fabulous interior illustrations by Hayley Lazo and cover illustrations by Scott Brundage. Isaaɕ Stewart’s art direction, cover design, and map are likewise essential.

I’d like to thank my lovely wife, Emily Sanderson, who helped with this book in ways too numerous to list here. Finally, a special thank-you goes to Mrs. Bushman’s sixth-grade students (you know who you are!), who have been so enthusiastic about my books.

Brandon Sanderson

Read on for an excerpt from Alcatraz’s next adventure

Starscape Reading and Activity Guide to the Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians Series By Brandon Sanderson

Ages 8–12; Grades 3–7

The questions and activities that follow are intended to enhance your reading of Brandon Sanderson’s Alcatraz novels. The guide has been developed in alignment with the Common Core State Standards; however, please feel free to adapt this content to suit the needs and interests of your students or reading group participants.

Brandon Sanderson turns readers’ understanding of literary genres upside down and backward in this lively adventure series. In the world of thirteen-year-old Alcatraz Smedry, “Librarians,” with their compulsions to organize and control information, are a source of evil, and “Talents” can include breaking things, arriving late, and getting lost. Add an unlikely teenage knight named Bastille, flying glass dragons, wild battles, references to philosophers and authors from Heraclitus to Terry Pratchett, and plenty of hilarious wordplay, and you have a series to please book lovers of all ages. And one that will have readers reflecting deeply about the nature of knowledge, truth, family, and trust, all while laughing out loud.

Genre Study: Fantasy

In the introduction to the first book in the series, Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians, the narrator, Alcatraz Smedry, claims that his story is true, even though it will be shelved as “fantasy” in the world to which his readers (you) belong.

Fantasy is a literary genre that often includes:

• Characters who are magical, inspired by mythology, or who have special powers.

• Settings that include unexplored parts of the known world, or new and different worlds.

• Plot elements (actions) that cannot be explained in terms of historical or scientific information from our known world.

While reading the books in this series, note when the author uses some of these elements of fantasy to tell his story. Students can track their observations in reading journals if desired, noting which elements of the fantasy genre are most often used by the author.

Older readers (grades 6 and 7) may also consider the way the author incorporates elements of the following genres into his novels, as well as how these genres relate to the fantasy components of the series:

Science fiction, which deals with imaginative concepts such as futuristic settings and technologies, space and time travel, and parallel universes. Science fiction stories frequently explore the effects of specific scientific or technological discoveries on governments and societies.

Steampunk, a subgenre of science fiction, which is often set in an alternative history or fantasy and features the use of steam as a primary power source. Steampunk features technologies which seem simultaneously futuristic and old-fashioned, or beings which are combinations of mechanical and biological elements.

After reading one or more of the Alcatraz books, invite students to reread the “Author’s Foreword” to Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians and discuss why they think the author chose to begin the series by explaining where the books will be shelved in a library.

Technical Study: Structure and Literary Devices

The Alcatraz series can be viewed as the author’s exploration of the idea, concept, and value of books themselves as both a way information is shared, and the way it is contained. One way Brandon Sanderson accomplishes this is to question the very structure of the novel. Invite students to look for the following elements in the stories and share their reactions to these literary devices and structures.

• Point of View. In this series, the point of view through which the reader sees the story is in the first-person voice of Alcatraz Smedry. He also claims that he is using the name Brandon Sanderson as a pseudonym, thus this is an autobiography or memoir. Is Alcatraz Smedry a reliable narrator, giving readers an unbiased report of the events of the story, or is Al an unreliable narrator, making false claims or telling the story in such a way as to leave doubts in the reader’s mind? In what ways is Alcatraz reliable and/or unreliable? How might the series be different if Bastille or another character were telling the story? (Hint: For further examples of unreliable narrators in children’s and teen fiction, read Jon Scieszka’s The True Story of the Three Little Pigs, E. Nesbit’s The Story of the Treasure Seekers, Justine Larbalestier’s Liar, or Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird.)

• Asides. At times, the narrator directly addresses the reader, suggesting how s/he should interpret a comment or how to best enjoy the novel (e.g. reading aloud or acting out scenes). Does this change the reader’s sense of his or her relationship with the book? If so, how does this relationship feel different?

• Chapter Breaks. Discuss the unusual ways the author begins, ends, numbers, and sequences chapters. Is this pleasant or unpleasant? Have readers read any other works of fiction (or nonfiction) that explore chapters in this way?

• Wordplay in World-Building. To explain Free Kingdoms ideas, technologies, and objects in terms of the Hushlander (readers’) world, the author uses similes, metaphors, and analogies. To reflect protagonist Alcatraz’s own confusion and frustration, Brandon Sanderson employs invented words, puns, and even text written backwards or in other unusual ways. Find examples of these uses of wordplay in the text. How does the use of these literary devices enrich the text?

Character Study: Families and Friends

Having been raised in foster homes convinced that both of his parents were horrible people, Alcatraz Smedry is often uncertain as to what it means to like, love, and trust other people. Since he is the narrator of the series, Alcatraz’s uncertainty affects readers’ perceptions of the characters he describes. In a reading journal or in class discussion, have students analyze the physical traits, lineage (parents, relationships), motivations, and concerns of major characters in the novel. How is each character related to Alcatraz? What is especially important about the idea of family relationships in this series? Does Alcatraz’s view of certain characters change in the course of single books? Do recurring characters develop or change over the course of more than one book in the series? If so, how and why do the characters evolve?

English Language Arts Common Core Reading Literature Standards

RL.3.3-6, 4.3-6, 5.3-6, 6.3-6, 7.3-6

Sanderson’s Alcatraz novels can be read on many levels, including as adventure stories, as musings on the nature of knowledge, and as fantasies incorporating elements of science fiction and steampunk. Here are some themes you may want to watch for and explore with your classmates or students.

• Talent. How does Sanderson use the word talent in traditional and nontraditional ways? Is talent important, valuable, even essential? What does Sanderson really mean by “talent”? How might students incorporate Sanderson’s unique interpretation of the word talent into their own sense of self?

• Heroism. Throughout the novel, Alcatraz claims to be “bad,” “a liar,” “a coward,” and “not a hero.” What makes a “hero” in a novel, a movie, and in real life? Does it matter if a person acts heroically on purpose or by accident? What do you think is the most important reason Alcatraz denies his heroism?

• Knowledge, Learning, Thinking. Find instances in the stories when Alcatraz admits to acting before thinking ahead to consider all possible outcomes of his plans. In these instances, is he simply being careless or does he lack some important information since he was raised in the Hushlands? Compare and contrast the way people acquire knowledge in the Hushlands versus the Free Kingdoms.

• Opposites. Throughout the novels, the narrator refers to the ideas of the ancient Greek philosopher Heraclitus, whose doctrines included (1) universal flux (the idea that things are constantly changing) and (2) unity of opposites (the idea that opposites (objects, ideas) are necessary and balance each other). The philosopher also believed that “Much learning does not teach understanding,” (The Art and Thought of Heraclitus, ed. Charles H. Kahn, Cambridge University Press, 1981). How might the series be read as an exploration of Heraclitus’s doctrines?

English Language Arts Common Core Speaking and Listening Standards

SL.3.1, 4.1, 5.1, 6.1, 7.1

SL.3.3, 4.3, 5.3, 6.3, 7.3

Keep a Reading Journal.

Use the journal to record:

• Favorite quotations, funny lines, exciting scenes (note page numbers).

• Situations in which the main character is in crisis or danger, and notes on what advice readers might offer.

• New vocabulary words and/or a list of invented words.

• Sketches inspired by the novels.

• Questions readers would like to ask the author or characters from the novels.

Explore Glass.

From Oculator’s Lenses to unbreakable glass buildings, glass is a core substance throughout the series. Go to the library or online to learn more about glass. Create a PowerPoint or other multimedia presentation discussing the physical properties, history, practical, and creative uses of glass. Or create a presentation explaining how glass works in the Free Kingdoms. Include visual elements, such as photographs or drawings, in your presentation.

Silimatic Technology.

This part scientific, part magical technology powers much of the Free Kingdoms. Using details from the novels, create an outline or short pamphlet explaining the rules and functions of silimatic technology as you understand it. If desired, dress as you imagine a Free Kingdoms scientist might choose to dress and present your findings to classmates.

Choose a Talent.

Many of the characters in the Alcatraz series have talents that seem more like problems. Think of a personality or quality you consider a fault in your own life, such as messy penmanship, bad spelling, or the inability to catch a baseball. Imagine how that talent might prove useful in the world of Alcatraz. Write a 3–5 page scene in which you encounter Alcatraz and help him using your “talent.”

English Language Arts Common Core Writing Standards

W.3.1-3, 4.1-3, 5.1-3, 6.1-3, 7.1-3

W3.7-8, 4.7-9, 5.7-9, 6.7-9, 7.7-9

The Knights of Crystallia

Can Alcatraz handle the realization that, in the Free Kingdom city of Crystallia, he is incredibly famous? How will that change his friendship with Bastille, who has been stripped of her knighthood for failing to protect the “great” Al? And can either of them save the historic city from the Evil Librarians?

QUOTES

Discuss the following quotations in terms of what they mean in the novel; in terms of your thoughts about books and libraries; and in terms of their relevance to the real lives of readers.

Summarizing is when you take a story that is complicated and interesting, then stick it in a microwave until it shrivels up into a tiny piece of black crunchy tarlike stuff. A wise man once said, “Any story, no matter how good, will sound really, really dumb when you shorten it to a few sentences.”

People tend to believe what other people tell them.… And if we didn’t know who was an expert, we wouldn’t know whose opinion was the most important to listen to.

Or, at least that’s what the experts want us to believe. Those who have listened to Socrates know that they’re supposed to ask questions. Questions like, “If all people are equal, then why is my opinion worth less than that of the expert?” or “If I like reading this book, then why should I let someone else tell me that I shouldn’t like reading it?”

I mean, why is it that you readers always assume you’re never to blame for anything? You just sit there, comfortable on your couch while we suffer. You can enjoy our pain and misery because you’re safe.

Reading Journal Entry: Fame

Upon arriving in the Free Kingdon city of Crystallia, Alcatraz discovers that he is famous. In the character of Al, write a journal entry describing how you came to this discovery, your emotions, and any planned actions you might take since discovering this new fame and its power.

Explanatory Text: Knighthood

Write a short essay explaining the roles, responsibilities, and sacrifices made by members of the Knights of Crystallia. Is Bastille an ordinary or unusual knight? Why or why not?

Explanatory Text: Socrates

With friends or classmates, go to the library or online to learn more about the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates and the “Socratic method” of teaching and learning. Compile your information into a short report. Conclude with 1–3 paragraphs explaining why Brandon Sanderson references Socrates in the novel.

Literary Analysis: Space, Time, Knowledge, and the Physical World

Alcatraz is told that talents can have impact on space, time, knowledge, and the physical world, and that his talent (breaking things) is the one ability that can impact all four areas. Make a four-column list to analyze these areas, noting the names and talents of various story characters whose abilities fall under each category, brainstorming other possible talents that could be included in each column and, finally, writing a short paragraph explaining the breaking talent and its breadth of impact.

English Language Arts Common Core Standards

RL.3.1-4, 4.1-4, 5.1-4, 6.1-4, 7.1-4

SL.3.3-4, 4.3-4, 5.3-4, 6.3-4, 7.3-4

W.3.1-3, 4.1-3, 5.1-3, 6.1-3, 7.1-3; W3.7-8, 4.7-9, 5.7-9, 6.7-9, 7.7-9

Read all the books in the Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians series!

Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians

The Scrivener’s Bones

The Knights of Crystallia

The Shattered Lens

The Dark Talent

By Brandon Sanderson

Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians

The Scrivener’s Bones

The Knights of Crystallia

The Shattered Lens

The Dark Talent (forthcoming)

The Rithmatist

Mistborn

The Well of Ascension

The Hero of Ages

Delacorte

Steelheart

Firefight

Calamity

Praise for the Alcatraz Series

“This is an excellent choice to read aloud to the whole family. It’s funny, exciting, and briskly paced.”

—NPR on Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians

“Genuinely funny … Plenty here to enjoy.”

—Locus on Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians

“Like Lemony Snicket and superhero comics rolled into one (and then revved up on steroids), this nutty novel … [is] also sure to win passionate fans.”

—Publishers Weekly (starred review) on Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians

“The conventional trappings of the middle-school fantasy get turned upside down in this zany novel.… Readers who prefer fantasy with plenty of humor should enjoy entering Alcatraz’s strange but amusing world.”

—School Library Journal on Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians

“In this original, hysterical homage to fantasy literature, Sanderson’s first novel for youth recalls the best in Artemis Fowl and A Series of Unfortunate Events. The humor, although broad enough to engage preteens, is also sneakily aimed at adults.… And as soon as they finish the last wickedly clever page, they will be standing in line for more from this seasoned author.”

—VOYA on Alcatraz vs. the Evil Librarians

“A thoroughly thrilling read.”

—The Horn Book on The Scrivener’s Bones

“Those who enjoy their fantasy with a healthy dose of slapstick humor will be delighted. Give this novel to fans of Eoin Colfer’s Artemis Fowl and Catherine Jinks’s Cadel Piggott in Evil Genius. They will appreciate Sanderson’s cheerful sarcastic wit and none-too-subtle digs at librarians.”

—School Library Journal on The Scrivener’s Bones

“Every bit as clever, fast-paced, and original as [the first book] … Howlingly funny for adults, older teens who can be persuaded to read a ‘juvenile’ novel, and exceptionally bright middle schoolers.”

—VOYA on The Scrivener’s Bones

“With comical insight into human nature and just enough substance to make it all matter, the plot offers up plenty of action, gadgetry, metafictional humor, grudgingly dispensed hints of the Librarians’ endgame, and counterintuitive Smedry Talents to keep the old fans and new readers alike turning pages.”

—The Horn Book on The Knights of Crystallia

“Offbeat humor, a budding romance, plenty of magic, creative world-building, smart references to science fiction luminaries, clever wordplay, and good action scenes make this one a strong choice for young teen boys and adult fans of the SF genre.… Hard to imagine it being any better written.”

—VOYA on The Knights of Crystallia

“Lives up to its predecessors with vivid action and high drama.”

—Midwest Book Review on The Knights of Crystallia

“Beneath the wild humor, there are surprisingly subtle messages about responsibility and courage.”

—School Library Journal on The Knights of Crystallia

“As goofy randomness streamlines into compelling narration, even readers who don’t find giant robots reason alone to pick up a book will be drawn into Alcatraz’s cohesive world, with its unique form of magic.”

—The Horn Book on The Shattered Lens

“I love this series! Sanderson’s one of the few writers of adult fiction I’ve read who can also write effortlessly and dead-on true for kids as well. This is a fabulous book to read aloud! It’s not only funny and has plenty of action, but the series has got heart as well. Highly recommended!”

—YA Books Central on The Shattered Lens

Thank you for buying this Tom Doherty Associates ebook.

To receive special offers, bonus content,

and info on new releases and other great reads,

sign up for our newsletters.

Or visit us online at us.macmillan.com/newslettersignup

For email updates on the author, click here.

The author and publisher have provided this e-book to you without Digital Rights Management software (DRM) applied so that you can enjoy reading it on your personal devices. This e-book is for your personal use only. You may not print or post this e-book, or make this e-book publicly available in any way. You may not copy, reproduce, or upload this e-book, other than to read it on one of your personal devices.

Copyright infringement is against the law. If you believe the copy of this e-book you are reading infringes on the author’s copyright, please notify the publisher at: us.macmillanusa.com/piracy.

This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

THE KNIGHTS OF CRYSTALLIA

Copyright © 2009 by Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC

Illustrations copyright © 2016 by Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC

Reading and Activity Guide copyright © 2016 by Tor Books

All rights reserved.

Illustrations by Hayley Lazo

Map by Isaac Stewart

Cover art by Scott Brundage

A Starscape Book

Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC

175 Fifth Avenue

New York, NY 10010

www.tor-forge.com

The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.

ISBN 978-0-7653-7900-9 (hardcover)

ISBN 978-1-4668-6555-6 (e-book)

e-ISBN 9781466865556

Our e-books may be purchased in bulk for promotional, educational, or business use. Please contact the Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department at 1-800-221-7945, extension 5442, or by e-mail at MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.

First published in the United States by Scholastic Press, an imprint of Scholastic Inc.

First Starscape Edition: April 2016