“So,” Cousin Dif said. “Is this everyone we’re waiting for?”
“Should be,” I said.
“Excellent,” Dif replied.
Then, using my mother’s gun, he shot Grandpa Smedry in the head.
Chapter
19
I don’t
I just I Can’t
It
he
…
Okay. Yes. He shot Grandpa. Square in the face with a real gun. My grandfather collapsed backward without a sound.
I assume you think there is some trick here. I wish I could tell you something to make you happy.
Instead, let me make it clear: That bullet was real. After all his tricks and close calls, my grandfather—Leavenworth Smedry—finally found an end he could not escape.
Draulin was the first to react. She leaped for Dif, but a hail of glowing shots from right outside the room burst around him, and at least a dozen struck her. I recognized them as blasts from the coma guns used in the siege of Tuki Tuki.
That is to say, a piece of my mind recognized them. The rest of me just stood there stupidly, reeling from the sudden betrayal.
My father was far more alert. He ripped off his Translator’s Lenses and raised the others.
Dif casually shot the spectacles out of Father’s hand, causing the Concussor’s Lens to explode, spraying my father’s skin with shards of broken glass.
“Such brutal weapons, ordinary handguns,” Dif said, striding forward, pistol in hand. His voice had changed. It was more calm, more straightforward, more quiet. “But one uses the tools offered.”
He stopped beside me and placed the gun to my head. I found myself trembling, revealed as a coward once and for all. Draulin had tried to stop him; my father had tried to stop him. All I could do was stare.
Grandpa …
The barrel of the gun felt warm against my forehead.
“Stand down, Attica,” Dif said. “Unless you want to be childless as well as fatherless.”
“You monster,” my father said. He held his bloodied hand before him, but with the other hand had been reaching into his pocket—undoubtedly for another Lens. He stopped as Dif manually cocked the gun’s hammer.
Librarian soldiers flooded across the walkway outside and into the room. These weren’t the ‘bow tie and spectacles’ type I’d seen everywhere else. These were futuristic soldiers with helmets and black special forces gear, like you’d see in a movie.
“You’re one of them,” I whispered at Dif.
“I’ve learned a few things over the years fighting the Smedry clan,” Dif said, stepping away from me as several soldiers grabbed my father by the arms and frisked him, taking his Lenses. “One is the power of a great infiltration. You people are always wriggling in among my agents and teams. I finally realized, why not return the favor?” He looked to me and smiled.
And in his eyes I saw a vastness. Knowledge, danger, and depth beyond anything that had been there before.
“No,” I whispered. “You’re not a Librarian. You’re the Librarian.”
Biblioden the Scrivener had been among us the entire time.
One of the soldiers walked up to him and saluted. “Area secure, my lord.” He proffered a bag full of Lenses taken from my father.
“So you are him, I assume,” Attica said with a sneer. “Or you claim to be him, and these others believe you.”
“I fought your great-great-whatever-grandfather,” Biblioden said, tucking away the pouch of Lenses. “He was almost as much a pain as you are. I knew you were in here somewhere, Attica. But where? And how? I was going to let my people find you, as I was too busy with my work at the Worldspire. But then this chance fell right in my lap! I couldn’t resist.”
He looked to my father. “I find it amazing that you have grown worse while I was away, you Smedrys. Like breeding rats.”
“Your pretend Talent,” I said, realizing it. “You chose it specifically because you knew nobody would be able to prove you didn’t have one. And on the bridge, after we met the dinosaurs, the Dark Oculator fled not because she recognized me—but because she recognized you. I’d told her I worked for you, and she hadn’t believed me, so when you appeared she was terrified that she had offended you.”
Dif smiled.
“You broke my Truthfinder’s Lens,” I whispered. “But how … how did you convince us…?”
“I only had to convince your grandfather,” Dif said. “Years ago, you see. Kill a Smedry boy and his parents living in the Hushlands, years later convince old Leavenworth I was the child, who had survived in the wilds of the Hushlands on my own! It was mostly a way to get me close to the Worldspire. Who would turn away a known Smedry? And now … well, who could have guessed the fruit my work would bear!”
He strolled to my father’s desk and held out his palm, and one of the soldiers scrambled to pick up the notebooks and hand them to him.
“Thank you,” Dif said, “for gathering the Sands of Rashid for me. The codes of the Incarna, such a frustrating puzzle. I … appreciate the work you have done here, little rats. Very, very helpful.”
Biblioden raised Father’s first notebook and riffled through it at high speed. A quick zip. “Ah. I see.”
He offered to join us, I thought, remembering Grandpa explaining that Dif had contacted him. He kept trying to separate me from my mother. He’s been playing us this entire mission.
Dif zipped through a second book just as rapidly, then moved on to the next one. “Yes…”
He can’t possibly be reading them so quickly, can he?
Zip. Another book done.
I needed to do something. They hadn’t searched me, though several soldiers stood with guns trained on me. What did I have? My Shaper’s Lens? Could I use that? I often found that the odd, information-based Lenses my grandfather gave me were surprisingly useful in times of tension.
Grandpa …
Don’t think about that, I told myself forcefully. He might still be alive. People who got shot in the head survived sometimes, didn’t they?
Squeezing my eyes shut as Biblioden continued his super-speed-read of my father’s notes, I reached into my pocket and pulled out the Shaper’s Lens. Shattering Glass! It was almost too hot to touch!
I carefully brought it up, then engaged it, looking through it at Biblioden the Scrivener, to see his deepest desires.
I saw this:
Darkness.
A deep, compelling darkness. Like an ocean at midnight. Or the vast emptiness of space, if all the stars had gone out. There was something alien, empty, and terrible about it that I cannot describe, and won’t try.
I gasped and dropped the Lens.
“Yes,” Biblioden said, setting aside the final notebook, “I was hoping you’d try that.” He smiled.
That smile seemed to be lacking even the faintest shred of humanity. I stumbled back but ran into a soldier, who pressed his weapon between my shoulder blades.
“Thank you,” Biblioden said, “for explaining that the Talents were broken.” He nodded to the soldier behind me, and that man dug in my pocket. He took out the Courier’s Lenses and flung them aside, then pulled out the mobile phone and tossed it to Biblioden.
The Scrivener dialed. “Hello, Cousin Kaz? It’s Dif here!”
His voice had changed back to how it was before, all perky and energetic. I felt sick. I had taken him for a Smedry who was trying too hard, but now I saw what was really going on. This was how Biblioden viewed us, and his exaggerated caricature was his way of trying to imitate us.
I could barely hear Kaz’s voice on the other end of the line. “Dif?” he asked. “What’s going on? I have Himalaya’s team.”
“We’re done in here!” Biblioden exclaimed. “It was awesome. Alcatraz used a lightbulb and two pieces of yak hair to solve the puzzle!”
“Sounds like him,” Kaz said. “You have my brother?”
“Sure do, and a whole pile of Forgotten Language texts. Would you be willing to wait
for us before taking off?”
“It’s going to be hard.…”
“But that’s the Smedry way!” Biblioden exclaimed.
“All right. We’ll do it. I—” An explosion sounded over the line. “Shattering Glass! Penguinator just took a hit! Dif, get here soon.”
“Kaz?” Biblioden asked. “You okay?”
“Blasted thing can’t take off now,” Kaz’s voice said over the line. “We’re taking refuge in the archive room again! Bring Pop here quick. We’ll need another plan.”
“Sure. I can do that,” Biblioden said, then smiled, hanging up. “Guess I needn’t have bothered. The rocket crews did their job.” He tossed the phone to one of his soldiers, who in turn lobbed it out the door and over the edge of the walkway. It plummeted down toward the overworked fans below.
I didn’t even hear it crunch.
“Now, let’s be off,” Biblioden the Scrivener said. “There is much to do yet today.”
“What are you planning, you tyrant?” my father demanded, struggling against his bonds.
“No need for language like that!” Biblioden said. “I’m going to help you, Attica. I’m going to put your research into motion! This is going to be very, very interesting.”
Father’s struggles were pointless; the soldiers marched him from the room. Two of them gathered up my mother, and two others took Draulin under the arms and dragged her away. They left Grandpa’s corpse just lying there.
Draulin.
The cure!
I had it still, in my other pocket. But how in the world could I administer it to her without them seeing? My mind raced as they forced me, at gunpoint, to start following the others along the walkway. There was no getting to Draulin. There were too many guards between me and her.
But maybe …
That’s reckless.
It was the only plan I had. It occurred to me, right then and there, that there was a reason behind the Smedry way. Not recklessness for the sake of being reckless, as Biblioden behaved. We acted like we did because we had no other options.
We were the ones willing to take the risk.
Wind whipping at my robe, I pulled out the bottle of antidote and moved to run back toward the room with Grandfather’s body. I was counting on the guards not wanting to kill me, and I was right, as one slammed the butt of his rifle into my side instead of shooting me.
I gasped in pain and fell to my knees, dropping the bottle of antidote. It bounced once, then rolled off the edge of the walkway.
“No!” I cried, reaching toward it as it fell.
Biblioden walked over as one of the soldiers pulled me to my feet. “Thinking of using that on old Grandpa Smedry? It doesn’t cure death, child.” He smiled at me.
I tried to punch him, but one of the guards took me by the arm before I could. Biblioden nodded, and another guard pulled my robe off and tossed it into the fans beneath. That left me in my tuxedo.
“Face this like a Smedry,” Biblioden said, patting me on the shoulder. “It is a fitting way to end.”
“What…” I gasped in a breath, holding my side where I’d been struck. “What are you going to do with us?”
“Surely you’ve figured that out,” Biblioden said, strolling across the walkway. The soldiers marched me beside him, my father finally sagging in his bonds just ahead. “All of that power. I wondered what glories your father would discover, but even without reading the notebooks, I knew that there was something special about your line. Something I wanted.” He looked to me. “Have you ever watched a bloodforged Lens being made?”
I felt cold. Oh no …
“It’s not as bad as it sounds,” Biblioden said as we walked. “But from what I read in your father’s research, this will be an excellent way to approach the Incarnate Wheel and beseech it for blessings. And beyond that … yes, I do think it will be quite possible to draw the energy source out from inside you and put it to my own use. Your father’s research on the Worldspire tells me that I can transform people from a great distance. What if I made every person in the Free Kingdoms into a power source, like the Smedrys? What would happen to their society?”
He looked at me and smiled a terrible smile. “Why … there would be no more need for a war. Since the Free Kingdoms would go the way of Incarna. They’d simply. Stop. Existing.”
That was the meaning of the darkness. An end to everything Biblioden saw as strange, bizarre, or uncontrollable. I shouted, thrashing, trying to escape as the soldiers hauled me back down the corridor.
We emerged into the central cavern. In the near distance, bathed in light from the open ceiling above, I saw the altar atop its stone peak.
Chapter
20
So there it is; that’s how I finally ended up tied to an altar made from outdated encyclopedias. Yes, I exaggerated a bit about the magma, fire, and sharks, but this part actually happened. I was about to get sacrificed to the dark powers by a cult of evil Librarians.
And that’s how my grandfather got shot.
I lay there, strapped in place, as Biblioden and several Librarians from the Order of the Shattered Lens prepared the ceremony. And I couldn’t help thinking about my parents.
What had gone wrong? Had there been one single event? A moment that drove a wedge between my father and mother? Both, deep down, wanted to be with one another. I’d seen it. Yet neither acted that way.
I wondered what the Shaper’s Lens would show if it were turned on me. What did I want? More than anything?
I turned my head, the only part of my body that I could move. The spire with the altar was big enough for a few dozen people at the top, but I was close enough to the edge to look down the fifty feet or so and spot the place where—surrounded by soldiers—Kaz and Himalaya made their last stand. Penguinator lay in wreckage nearby, a gaping hole in its side.
I looked back toward the open ceiling as Biblioden strolled over to me.
I smiled at him.
“I did not expect you to smile,” he noted, hands clasped behind his back. “Usually when people are approaching sacrifice, they are not happy about it.”
“I’m going to beat you,” I whispered.
“Smedry bravado,” Biblioden said.
“I’ve been in worse situations than this,” I said. “I always make it through unscathed. It will work out. You’ll see.”
“In those other situations, you weren’t facing me,” Biblioden said, then leaned down. “Do you realize what your family is, child? You are the symbol of everything loathsome in the world. Pretending to be one of you was the most difficult thing I’ve ever done. Worse than killing my brother. Worse than sinking a continent full of loyal followers because of the corruption that had spread among them. Worse than anything.”
He grabbed me by the chin, forcing me to look into his eyes as he leaned down. “I am going to relish the chance to remove everything special, interesting, or distinctive about you people. When I’m done you’ll be dead, and the rest of your family will be normal. Fitting, isn’t it?”
He let go of me and stood up, looking toward my father, who was being held by two Librarian soldiers at the edge of the altar’s platform.
“This ceremony,” Biblioden proclaimed, “is more powerful if performed on a willing victim. So I’m going to give you two a chance. Once I’m done, on my word of honor, I will set one of you free. I’d rather you live and know what was done to you anyway.”
What was that scent in the air?
“So which will it be?” Biblioden asked. “Which of you lives, and which dies? I’ll let the two of you choose.”
“Sir,” said one of the soldiers. “Do you smell that? Smells like … cinnamon.”
Biblioden paused.
Down below, the door to Penguinator shook with a resounding bang. Then it exploded open.
A small figure with silver hair stood in the doorway. A thirteen-year-old girl clutching a long crystalline sword.
She looked very, very angry.
“You drop
ped the antidote into the ventilation system on purpose,” Biblioden said with a groan. “I should have seen that. Well, what does it matter? She’s only one person.”
“You,” I said, “have never dealt with Bastille in a bad mood.”
The soldiers started firing. I almost felt sorry for them.
Biblioden watched for a moment, but unfortunately the angle wasn’t right for me to see more of what was happening below. His eyes widened, and then he stepped back.
“All right,” he announced, looking to the others. “Time to speed this up. Roger, knock down the steps leading here. Everyone else, start firing in that direction. Smedrys, make your decision now.”
“Well,” I said, grinning and trying to stall. “I just need a moment to think.…”
Biblioden pulled out my mother’s handgun and pressed it to my temple. “Choose!”
I stammered, trying to delay. But as I did, I started to worry. Bastille had a lot of distance to cover. Even if she did get here, how was she going to fight her way up to us? She was incredible, but she wasn’t omnipotent.
“I’ll count to three,” Biblioden said. “One.”
Stall. I had to stall! “No, listen, I know where you can find much more power—”
“Two.”
There had to be a way out of this. I felt a panic. A sudden, overwhelming panic. “Don’t do this. I know something you don’t. I have secrets!”
“Three.”
“Take me!” my father cried out. Right as I said something.
“Take him.”
Deep down, in that moment of crisis, I didn’t want to die. I can tell myself it was because I thought it would waste more of their time to take me off the altar and put him there instead.
But in the end, I just didn’t want to die.
Chapter
21
They found me huddled up in a ball on the platform, a bloodied altar of books behind me.
I’ll avoid describing what they did to my father. But his corpse was on that altar.
“Alcatraz?” Bastille’s voice.
I stared sightlessly, trying to banish from my mind what I’d just seen.
The Dark Talent Page 15
