Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia

Chapter 13

People tend to believe what other people tell them. This is particularly true if the people who are telling the people the thing that they’re telling them are people who have a college degree in the thing about which they are telling people. (Telling, isn’t it?)

College degrees are very important. Without college degrees, we wouldn’t know who was an expert and who wasn’t. 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?”

That isn’t to say that I don’t like critics. My cousin is one, and—as you have seen—he’s a very nice fellow. All I’m saying is that you should question what others tell you, even if they have a college degree. There are a lot of people who might try to stop you from reading this book. They’ll come up to you and say things like “Why are you reading that trash?” or “You should be doing your homework,” or “Help me, I’m on fire!”

Don’t let them distract you. It’s of vital importance that you keep reading. This book is very, very important.

After all, it’s about me.

“The Royal Archives,” I said, looking up at the vast building in front of me.

“Not a library,” Sing added.

“Thanks, Sing,” I said dryly. “I’d almost forgotten.”

“Glad to help!” he said as we walked up the steps. Bastille followed; she was still barely responsive. She’d come to us because she’d been kicked out of Crystallia. Getting cut off from the knights’ magic rock also required a period of exile from their giant glass mushroom.

(Those of you in the Hushlands, I dare you to work that last sentence into a conversation. “By the way, Sally, did you know that getting cut off from the knights’ magic rock also requires a period of exile from their giant glass mushroom?”)

A dragon crawled along the sides of the castles above me, growling quietly to itself. The Royal Archives (not a library) looked a lot like a building out of Greek history, with its magnificent white pillars and marble steps. The only difference was that it had castle towers. In Nalhalla, everything has castle towers. Even the outhouses. (You know, in case someone tries to seize the throne.)

“It’s been a long time since I’ve been here,” Sing said, happily waddling beside me. It was good to spend time with the pleasant anthropologist again.

“You’ve been here before?” I asked.

Sing nodded. “During my undergraduate days, I had to do research on ancient weapons. This place has books you can’t find anywhere else. I’m actually a little sad to be back.”

“This place is that bad?” I asked as we entered the cavernous main room of the Royal Archives. I didn’t see any books—it looked mostly empty.

“This place?” Sing asked. “Oh, I didn’t mean the Royal Archives, which is not a library. I was talking about Nalhalla. I didn’t get to do as much research in the Hushlands as I wanted! I was deeply engaged in a study on Hushlander transportation when your grandfather got me and we started our infiltration.”

“It’s really not that interesting there,” I said.

“You just say that because you’re accustomed to it!” Sing said. “Each day, something new and exciting happened! Right before we left, I finally managed to meet a real cabdriver! I had him drive me around the block, and while I was disappointed that we didn’t get into a car wreck, I’m sure after a few more days I could have experienced one.”

“Those are kind of dangerous, Sing.”

“Oh, I was ready for danger,” he said. “I made sure to wear safety goggles!”

I sighed, but made no other comment. Trying to curb Sing’s love of the Hushlands was like … well, like kicking a puppy. A six-foot-eight, three-hundred-fifty-pound Hawaiian puppy. Who liked to carry guns.

“This place doesn’t look all that impressive,” I said, glancing about at the majestic pillars and enormous hallways. “Where are the books?”

“Oh, this isn’t the archives,” Sing said, pointing toward a doorway. “The archives are in there.”

I raised an eyebrow and walked to the door, then pulled it open. Inside I found an army.

There were a good fifty or sixty soldiers, all standing at attention in ranks, their metal helmets glistening in the lamplight. At the back of the room there was a set of stairs leading down.

“Wow,” I said.

“Why, young Lord Smedry!” a voice boomed. I turned and was surprised to see Archedis—the big-chinned Knight of Crystallia from Bastille’s trial—walking toward me. “How surprising to see you here!”

“Sir Archedis,” I said. “I could say the same of you, I guess.”

“There are always two full knights on guard at the Royal Archives,” Archedis said.

“Not a library,” one of the soldiers added.

“I was just here overseeing a shift change,” Archedis said, stepping up to me.

He was a lot more intimidating when standing. Silvery armor, rectangular face, a chin that could destroy small countries if it fell into the wrong hands. Sir Archedis was the type of knight that people stuck on recruitment posters.

“Well,” I said. “We came to investigate the Royal Archives—”

“Not a library,” Sir Archedis said.

“—because we think the Librarians might be interested in them.”

“They’re quite well protected,” Archedis said in his deep voice. “A half platoon of soldiers and two Crystin! But I suppose it couldn’t hurt to have an Oculator around too, particularly when there are Librarians in town!”

He glanced over my shoulder. “I see that you’ve brought young Bastille with you,” he added. “Good job—keep her moving about and not wallowing in her punishment!”

I glanced back at Bastille. She’d focused on Sir Archedis, and I thought I was beginning to see some emotion return to her. Likely she was thinking about how much she’d like to ram something long and pointy into his chest.

“I’m sorry we had to meet under such poor circumstances, Lord Smedry,” Archedis said to me. “I’ve been following your exploits.”

“Oh,” I said, flushing. “You mean the books?”

Archedis laughed. “No, no, your real exploits! The battle against Blackburn was reportedly quite impressive, and I would have liked to see that fight with the Alivened. I hear you handled yourself quite well.”

“Oh,” I said, smiling. “Well, thanks.”

“But tell me,” he said, leaning down. “Did you really break a Crystin sword with that Talent of yours?”

I nodded. “Hilt came right off in my hand. I didn’t realize it, but the problem was my emotion. I was so nervous that the Talent activated with a lot of power.”

“Well, I guess I just have to take your word!” Archedis said. “Would you like a knight as guard for your person during this investigation?”

“No,” I said. “I think we’ll be fine.”

“Very well then,” he said, slapping me on the back. (Side note: Getting slapped—even affectionately—on the back by someone wearing gauntlets is not comfortable.) “Carry on, and best of luck.” He turned to the soldiers. “Let them pass and follow their orders! This is the heir of House Smedry!”

The soldiers, en masse, saluted. With that, Archedis marched out the door, armor clinking.

“I like that guy,” I said after he was gone.

“Everyone does,” Sing said. “Sir Archedis is one of the most influential knights in the order.”

“Oh, I don’t think everyone likes him,” I said, glancing at Bastille. She was watching the doorway.

“He’s amazing,” she whispered, surprising me. “He’s one of the reasons I decided to join.”

“But he was one of the ones who voted to have you stripped of your rank!”

“He was the least harsh on me,” Bastille said.

“Only because I convinced him to be.”

She regarded me with an odd expression; it seemed that she was coming out of her funk a little bit. “I thought you liked him.”

“Well, I do,” I said.

Or at least I had liked him—right up until the point that Bastille had started talking about how wonderful he was. Now, quite suddenly, I became convinced that Sir Archedis was plain and dull-witted. I prepared to explain this to Bastille, but was interrupted as the soldiers began to make way for us to pass.

“Ah, nice,” Sing said, walking forward. “Last time I had to spend an hour appeasing their security requirements.”

Bastille followed. She obviously hadn’t recovered completely, even if she was a little more animated. We entered the stairwell, and for a brief moment I was reminded of the Library of Alexandria, with its wraith-like Librarians and endless rows of dusty tomes and scrolls. It had been beneath the ground too.

The similarity soon ended. Not only were the Royal Archives not a library, but the stairwell didn’t end in a strange teleporting darkness. Instead it stretched on for a distance, dusty and dry. When we finally reached the bottom, we found the two Knights of Crystallia standing guard at another set of doors. They saluted, apparently recognizing Sing and me.

“How long will you need access, my lord?” one of the knights asked.

“Oh,” I said. “Um, I’m not really sure.”

“Check back with us in an hour, if you don’t mind,” said the other knight—a stout woman with blonde hair.

“All right,” I said.

With that, the two knights pushed open the doors, letting me, Sing, and Bastille into the archives. “Wow,” I said. That just didn’t seem to cover it. “Wow,” I repeated, this time with emphasis.

You’re probably expecting a grand description here. Something impressive to depict the majestic collection of tomes that made up the archives.

That’s because you misinterpreted my “wow.” You see, like all alphabetically late palindromic exclamations, “wow” can be interpreted a lot of different ways. It’s what we call “versatile,” which is just another way of saying that it’s a dumb thing to say.

After all, “wow” could mean “That’s great!” Or it could mean “That’s disturbing.” It could also mean “Oh, hey, look, a dinosaur is about to eat me!” Or it could even mean “I just won the lottery, though I don’t know what I’ll do with all that money, seeing as how I’m in the stomach of a dinosaur.”

(As a side note to this side note: As we found in book one, it is true that most dinosaurs are fine folk and not at all man-eaters. However, there are some notable exceptions, such as the Quesadilla and the infamous Brontësister.)

In my case, “wow” didn’t mean any of these things. It meant something closer to: “This place is a total mess!”

“This place is a total mess!” I exclaimed.

“No need to repeat yourself,” Bastille grumbled. (Bastille speaks fluent wowese.)

Books were heaped like piles of scrap in an old, run-down junkyard. There were mountains of them, discarded, abused, and in total disarray. The cavern seemed to extend forever, and the piles of books formed mounds and hills, like sand dunes made from pages and letters and words. I glanced back at the knights guarding the doorway. “Is there some kind of organization to all of this?” I asked hopefully.

The knight paled in the face. “Organization? Like … a cataloging system?”

“Yeah,” I said. “You know, so that we can find stuff easily?”

“That’s what Librarians do!” the blonde knight said.

“Great,” I said. “Just great. Thanks anyway.” I sighed, stepping away from the door, which the knights closed behind me. I grabbed a lamp off the wall. “Well, let’s go investigate,” I said to the others. “See if we can find anything suspicious.”

We wandered the room, and I tried not to let my annoyance get the better of me. The Librarians had done some horrible things to the Free Kingdoms; it made sense that the Nalhallans would have an irrational fear of Librarian ways. However, I found it amazing that a people who loved learning so much could treat books in such a horrible manner. From the way the tomes were strewn, it seemed to me that their method of “archiving” books was to toss them into the storage chamber and forget about them.

The piles grew larger and more mountainous near the back of the chamber, as if they’d been systematically pushed there by some infernal, literacy-hating bulldozer. I stopped, hands on my hips. I had expected a museum, or at least a den filled with bookshelves. Instead I’d gotten a teenage boy’s bedroom.

“How could they tell if anything was missing?” I asked.

“They can’t,” Sing said. “They figure if nobody can get in to steal books, then they don’t have to keep them counted or organized.”

“That’s stupid,” I said, holding up my light. The chamber was longer than it was wide, so I could see the walls on either side of me. The place wasn’t infinite like the Library of Alexandria had seemed. It was essentially just one very big room filled with thousands and thousands of books.

I walked back down the pathway between the mounds. How could you tell if anything was suspicious about a place you’d never visited before? I was about to give up when I heard it. A sound.

“I don’t know, Alcatraz,” Sing was saying. “Maybe we—”

I held up a hand, quieting him. “Do you hear that?”

“Hear what?”

I closed my eyes, listening. Had I imagined it?

“Over there,” Bastille said. I opened my eyes to find her pointing toward one of the walls. “Scraping sounds, like…”

“Like digging,” I said, scrambling over a stack of books. I climbed up the pile, slipping on what appeared to be several volumes of the royal tax code, until I reached the top and could touch the wall. It was, of course, made of glass. I pressed an ear against it.

“Yeah,” I said. “There are definitely digging sounds coming from the other side. My mother didn’t sneak in here, she snuck into a nearby building! They’re tunneling into the Royal Archives!”

“Not—” Sing began.

“Yes,” I said, “it’s not a library. I get it.”

“Actually,” he said, “I was going to say ‘Not to disagree, Alcatraz, but it’s impossible to break into this place.’”

“What?” I said, sliding back down the pile of books. “Why?”

“Because it’s built out of Reinforcer’s Glass,” Bastille said. She was looking better, but still somewhat dazed. “You can’t break that, not even with Smedry Talents.”

I looked back at the wall. “I’ve seen impossible things happen. My mother has Translator’s Lenses; there’s no telling what she’s learned from the Forgotten Language so far. Maybe they know a way to get through that glass.”

“Possible,” Sing said, scratching his chin. “Though to be honest, if I were them I’d just tunnel into the stairwell out there, then come through the door.”

I glanced at the wall. That did seem likely. “Come on,” I said, darting over and pulling open the door. The two knights outside glanced in.

“Yes, Lord Smedry?” one asked.

“Someone may be trying to dig into the stairwell,” I said. “Librarians. Get some more troops down here.”

The knights looked surprised, but they obeyed my orders, one rushing up the stairs to do as commanded.

I looked back at Bastille and Sing, who still stood in the room. Soldiers weren’t going to be enough—I wasn’t just going to sit and wait to see what plot the Librarians were going to be putting into effect. Mokia was in trouble, and I had to help. That meant blocking what my mother and the others were doing, perhaps even exposing their double-dealing to the monarchs.

“We need to figure out what it is in here that my mother wants,” I said, “then take it first.”

Bastille and Sing looked at each other, then glanced back at the ridiculous number of books. I could read their thoughts in their expressions.

Find the thing my mother wanted? Out of this mess? How could anyone find anything in here?

It was then that I said something I never thought I’d hear myself say, no matter how old I grew.

“We need a Librarian,” I declared. “Fast.”