Alcatraz versus the Evil Librarians (19 page)

“Is that it?” Blackburn asked, brushing off his suit. He smiled, looking down at Grandpa Smedry through his single eye, an eye that now bore no Lenses. They had all dropped to the ground at his feet. “You barely gave a fight, old man.”

Sing reached for another gun. Two beefy Librarians tackled him from behind. Bastille jumped the first one. Six more soldiers rushed at her.

Blackburn continued to chuckle. He walked slowly across the room, his feet crunching on shattered glass. He shook his head. “Do you realize how much trouble it’s going to be to gather up all these broken Lenses, have the shards sorted, then have them all reforged? My Librarians will spend months remaking my collection!”

I have to do something,
I thought. Bastille continued to fight, but more and more Librarian thugs were surrounding her. They already had Quentin and Sing pinned. Nobody, however, seemed to notice me. Perhaps they thought me unthreatening because I had been knocked down.

I scanned the room. There, a short distance away, I saw them – the Lenses of Rashid, lying temptingly in the middle of a pile of discarded monocles. They had fallen to the ground during the blast along with the other Lenses Blackburn had held during the fight.

I gritted my teeth.

I have to use the Lenses of Rashid,
I thought, crawling forward slowly.
I have to –

Wait. I want you to do something for me. Try to recall the very
first
part of my story. It was way back in Chapter One, before I even told you about my name. Back then, I spoke about life-and-death situations, and how they make
people think about some very odd subjects. The prospect of dying – or, in this case, watching someone dear to you die – does strange things to the mind. Makes it think along tangents.

Makes it remember things that it might have otherwise thought unimportant.

Grandpa Smedry was going to die. And, strangely, at that very moment, I noticed the lantern that still stood on a pole at the very center of the room. The lantern holder… it looked something like a rutabaga.

Rutabaga,
I thought.
I’ve heard that word recently. Rutabaga… fire over the inheritance!

I scrambled forward. Blackburn spun. I threw myself toward the Lenses of Rashid – but I didn’t grab them. I grabbed a Lens sitting next to them.

The Firebringer’s Lens.

Blackburn’s foot came down on my arm. I cried out, dropping the Lens, and a pair of Librarian soldiers quickly grabbed me. They yanked me to my feet and pulled me backward, one holding each of my arms.

Blackburn shook his head. From the corner of my eye, I could barely make out a Librarian finally tackling Bastille. She struggled, but three others helped him hold her.

“My, my, my,” Blackburn said. “And here you all are, captured again.” He looked over at Grandpa Smedry, but the old man was obviously no threat. Grandpa Smedry was dazed, his leg bleeding, his face puffing up from bruises he’d apparently been putting off since his torture.

Blackburn bent down, picking up the Firebringer’s Lens. “A Firebringer’s Lens,” He said. “You should have known better than to try and use one of these against me, boy. I’m far more powerful that you.”

Blackburn turned the Lens over in his fingers. “I’m glad you brought me one, however. There weren’t any in my collection – they’re quite rare.” Then he picked up the Lenses of Rashid. “And these. Supposedly the most powerful Lenses ever forged. Didn’t your son spend his entire life gathering the sands to make these, old Smedry?”

Grandpa Smedry didn’t answer.

“What a waste,” Blackburn said, shaking his head. Then he raised the Firebringer’s Lens to his eye. “Now, we’re going to do this one more time. You are going to start answering my questions, old man. You’re going to tell me the secrets of
your order, and you’re going to help me conquer the rest of the Free Kingdoms.”

Blackburn smiled. “If you don’t, I’m going to kill every one of your friends.” He looked around the room. My companions stood, held by Librarian thugs. Only Bastille still struggled – Sing and Quentin looked like they had been punched a few good times in the stomach to keep them quiet.

“No,” Blackburn said, “not one of the Smedrys. Your blasted Talents are too protective. Let’s start with the girl.” He smiled, focusing his single eye on Bastille.

“No!” Grandpa Smedry said. “Ask your questions, monster!”

“Not yet, Smedry,” Blackburn said. “I have to kill one of them first, you see. Then you will understand how serious this all is.”

The Firebringer’s Lens began to glow.

“NO!” Grandpa Smedry screamed.

The Firebringer’s Lens fired…

…directly
back
into Blackburn’s eye.

Taking advantage of the moment, I twisted with a sudden motion, raising my hands and grabbing the arms of my captors. I sent out shocks of Talent and felt bones snap beneath my fingers. My captors cried out, jumping back and cradling broken limbs. Blackburn fell to his knees, and the Firebringer’s Lens fell free, leaving a smoking socket behind. He screamed in pain.

I stepped toward the now powerless Dark Oculator. “When I grabbed the Firebringer’s Lens, Blackburn, I wasn’t trying to use it on you,” I said. “You see, I only needed to touch it for a moment – just long enough to break it.

“It shoots
backward
now.”

I apologize for that last chapter. It was far too deep and ponderous. At this rate, it won’t be long before this story departs speaking of evil Librarians, and instead turns into a terribly boring tale about a lawyer who defends unjustly accused field hands.

What do mockingbirds have to do with that, anyway?

I scooped up the Firebringer’s Lens, spinning toward the thugs who still held my grandfather. The Librarians looked down at the fallen Oculator, then back up at me. I raised the Lens.

The two men dashed away. In the fury of the moment, I didn’t even realize that I’d finally been able to pick up the Lens without it going off.

Grandpa Smedry slumped back against the wall in exhaustion. However, he smiled at me. “Well done, lad. Well done. You’re a Smedry for certain!”

The other thugs in the room backed away, towing their hostages. “There are two of us now,” Grandpa Smedry said, righting himself, staring down at the Librarians. “And your Oculator has fallen. Do you
really
want to make us mad?”

There was a moment of hesitance, and Bastille seized it. She swung up and slammed her feet into the back of the Librarian in front of her. Then she pulled herself free from her surprised captors.

The other thugs dropped Quentin and Sing
, then dashed away. Bastille chased after them, cursing and kicking at one as he rushed out the door. But she let him go, grumbling quietly as she turned to make certain Sing and Quentin were all right. Both seemed well enough.

Blackburn groaned. Grandpa Smedry shook his head, looking down at the Dark Oculator.

“Should we… do something with him?” I asked.

“He’s no threat now, lad,” Grandpa Smedry said. “A
n
Oculator without eyes is about as dangerous as a little girl.”

“Excuse me?” Bastille huffed, rolling over one of the Librarian thugs that she’d knocked out before. She pulled off his sword belt and tied it around her waist.

“I apologize, dear,” Grandpa Smedry said in his tired voice. “It was just a figure of speech. Sing, would you do me a favor…?”

Sing rushed over, steadying Grandpa Smedry. “Ah, very nice,” Grandpa Smedry said. “Quentin, gather up any unbroken Lenses you can find. Bastille, be a dear and watch for danger at the door – there are others in this library who won’t be as easily intimidated as those thugs.”

“And me?” I asked.

Grandpa Smedry smiled. “You, lad, should recover your inheritance.”

I turned, noticing the glasses that still lay on the ground. I walked over, picking them up. “Blackburn seemed disappointed in the
s
e.”

“Blackburn was a man who focused only on one kind of power,” Grandpa Smedry said. “For a man whose abilities depended on seeing, he was remarkable shortsighted.”

“So… what do these do?” I asked.

“Try them on,” Grandpa Smedry suggested.

I took off my Oculator’s Lenses and put on the Rashid Lenses instead. I couldn’t see any difference – no release of power, no amazing revelations.

“What am I looking for?” I asked.

“Quentin,” Grandpa Smedry said, turning toward the small grad student. “What do you think?”

“I really wouldn’t know,” Quentin said. “The legends are all so contradictory.”

I started. “Hey! I understood him!”

“That’s impossible,” Quentin said, still gathering Lenses off the ground. “I have my Talent on. I’m gibberish for the whole day.”

“Actually, you’re not,” I said. “And you weren’t truly gibberish those other times either. Did you know that your Talent can predict the future?”

Quentin’s jaw dropped. “You can
understand
me?”

“That’s what I just said. Thanks for the hint about the rutabaga, by the way.”

Quentin turned toward Grandpa Smedry, who was smiling. “No, Quentin,” Grandpa Smedry said. “I still can’t understand you.”

I stood, shocked.
What in the world…?

Then I turned, rushing over to Sing’s gym bag, which lay on the side of the room. I unzipped it, digging through the ammunition to find a particular object: the book I’d swiped from the Forgotten Language room.

I opened it up to the first page.
The mechanics of forging a Truefinder’s Lens is complex,
it read,
but can be understood by one who takes the proper time to study.

I looked up, staring over at Grandpa Smedry. The old man smiled. “There are a lot of different theories about what the Sands of Rashid do, lad. Your father, however, believed in a specific theory. Translator's Lenses, they were once called – they gave the power to read, or understand, any language, tongue, or code.”

I looked back at the book.

“Yes,” Grandpa Smedry said tiredly. Just wait until we show these to your father – if we can ever find him.”

I spun. “So you
do
think he’s alive?”

“Perhaps, lad,” Grandpa Smedry said. “Perhaps. Now that we have those Lenses, perhaps we can find out for sure. I wish I’d had a way to discover sooner. If I’d known for certain whether he was dead or not, do you think I’d have let you get raised by foster parents?”

I paused.
Well, I guess the Lenses won’t help me when
he
makes no sense.

I opened my mouth to demand more, but Bastille cut me off. “Trouble coming! Librarian – the blond one.”

I rushed over to the corridor and saw Ms. Fletcher striding toward the room, a troop of at least fifty soldiers marching behind her. These men and women were armored with shiny breastplates. A few Alivened lumbered in the background.

“Time to go, I think,” I said, pushing Bastille back. Then I slammed my hand into the ground.

The floor just in front of me fell away, blocks tumbling down to the story below us. I backed away from the hole with Bastille.

“Oh, very clever Alcatraz,” Ms. Fletcher said, stopping at the pit’s edge. “Now you’ve trapped yourself.”

I smiled, raised an eyebrow, then pressed my hand against the
back wall of the room. The bricks separated, mortar cracking. Sing came over and gave the wall a hefty push, topping the bricks into the next room.

I winked at Ms. Fletcher, then reached down to slide a sword from the sheath of a fallen soldier. M
s
. Fletcher stood with arms crossed, regarding Blackburn with a sour expression as I ducked out the broken wall after Sing, who was carrying Grandpa Smedry.

“Quickly, now!” Grandpa Smedry said. “We’re late!”

“For what?” I asked, running beside Sing and Quentin. Bastille, of course, ran ahead of us, watching for danger.

“Why, for our dramatic exit, of course!” Grandpa Smedry said, sounding a bit tired. “Ms. Surly back there will try and cut us off at the front doors of the library.”

“Well, I’ll just make us another door,” I said. “We’ll bust out the back wall.”

“Ah, lad,” Grandpa Smedry said. “Haven’t you realized? This entire building is inside a box of Expander’s Glass – just like the gas station. Expander’s Glass is
very
hard to break, even with a Talent. Besides, if you did, we’d be crushed as the entire library tried to burst out of the hole you’d made.”

“Oh,” I said as we reached a stairwell. “Well, then, I have another idea.”

“What?” Grandpa Smedry asked.

I smiled, then reached into my pocket. I pulled out a small white rectangle: the library card we had taken off of the dungeon guard.