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Politics.
I hate politics. When I’d first learned about the Free Kingdoms, I’d imagined how wonderful and amazing they’d be. I spent two entire books trying to get there, only to find that—despite their many wonders—the people in them were … well, people.* Free Kingdomers had all the flaws of people in the Hushlands, except with sillier clothing.
I thought of Bastille, unconscious. She’d be so embarrassed to be seen that way. Those monarchs had abandoned her, and Mokia, for their own petty games. It made me angry. Angry at the monarchs, angry at the Librarians, angry at the world. I sneered, stepping forward, and slapped my hands against the Communicator’s Glass on the wall.
“Lad?” Grandpa Smedry asked.
The glass beneath my fingers began to glow.
Perhaps I should have been wary, considering what I’d done to Janie’s lights. I just wanted to do something. I powered the wall glass. I threw everything I had into those panels, causing them to shine brightly.
“You can’t call them back,” Kaz said, “not unless they allow you to—”
I pushed something into that glass, something powerful. I had certain advantages, being raised in the Hushlands. Everyone in the Free Kingdoms had expectations about what was and wasn’t possible.
I was too stupid to know what they knew, and I was too much a Smedry to let that bother me.
What I did next defies explanation. But since it’s my job to convey difficult concepts to you, I’m going to try anyway. Imagine jumping off a high building into a sea of marshmallows, then reaching out with a million arms to touch the entire world, while realizing that every emotion you’ve ever had is connected to every other emotion, and they’re really one big emotion, like an emotion-whale that you can’t completely see because you’re up too close to notice anything other than a little bit of leathery emotion-whale skin.
I let out a deep breath.
Wow.
In that moment, the squares of Communicator’s Glass each winked back on. They showed the rooms of the monarchs, most of whom were still there, though they’d stood from their chairs to speak with their attendants. One had gotten a sandwich. Another was playing solitaire.*
They looked at me, and I somehow knew that my face had appeared on each of their panes of glass, large and dominating.
“I,” I told them, “am going to the Highbrary.”
Is that my voice?
“You are worried I’ve started something dangerous,” I said. “You’re wrong. I’m not starting it, I’m finishing it. The Librarians have terrorized us for far too long. I intend to make certain they are the ones who are frightened and they are the ones, for once, who have to worry about what they’re going to lose.
“Some of you are scared. Some of you are selfish. The rest of you are downright ignorant. Well, you’re going to have to put those things aside, because you can’t ignore what’s coming. I know something the Librarians don’t. The end is here. You can’t stop this war from progressing. So it’s time for you to stand up, stop whining, and either help or get out of my way.”
I let go of the glass. The images winked off, the wall turning dark.
“Now that,” Kaz said from behind, “is how you end a conversation with style!”
Chapter
Lilly
Once upon a time there was a boy.
This should come as no surprise, as approximately half the world’s population is—or at one time was—boys.
This boy got into trouble a lot, as should also be no surprise. Everyone gets into a lot of trouble when they are young—well, everyone but that kid Reginald down the street, but nobody likes him anyway.
Something was different about this boy. Often when he got into trouble, it wasn’t his fault. Like, actually not his fault—rather than “My little brother did it” or “I swear I have no idea why that empty cookie bag is under my bed” or “I really didn’t mean to invade Poland.” No, this kid truly did nothing wrong.
Things just broke around him.
Well, a lifetime of being blamed for things he didn’t do beat this kid down pretty hard. He had basically given up on life, until one day something changed.* He became part of a family. He discovered he was famous. He was told that he was special.
From there, an amazing trend began. He started to succeed. Things started to go right for him. This trend should have worried him, because if he’d learned one lesson in life, it was that when things broke around him, they broke really, really badly.
He started to live as if he could do anything, no matter how bold, no matter how outrageous. He went on one last adventure, he struggled and had some tough times, but then everything turned out fine in the end. So that’s nice.
The above is what we call a fairy tale, and it’s a modern one, not one from the past. How do we know the difference?
Because in this one, the ending is a lie.
“So…” Kaz said from the back of the room. “Infiltrating the Highbrary, eh? The Library of Congress?”
“Uh, yeah,” I replied.
“And telling everyone about it,” Kaz continued, “including the Librarian sympathizers on the Council of Kings—who are sure to tell their allies we’re coming.”
“Er, exactly.”
“Bold,” Kaz said. “Almost stupid.”
“The Smedry way?” I said.
Kaz stood up, pulling on his hat. “Close enough.”
“Think of it like this, Son,” Grandpa said to Kaz. “Attica is on his way to the Highbrary too. What young Alcatraz has done is make it far more difficult for his father to get in, giving us more time.”
“Besides,” I said, trying to sort through why I’d said what I had, “if there’s an antidote for the coma that Bastille and the Mokians are in, we should be able to find it at the Highbrary.”
“Sounds almost rational when you two put it that way,” Kaz said. “Well, don’t worry. It shouldn’t matter if the Librarians know we’re coming, as I can simply use my Talent to sneak us into…” He trailed off. For a moment, he’d obviously forgotten that I’d broken the Talents. His face fell. “Right. Slipped my mind. So how are we going to get in?”
“Well,” Grandpa said, “first we engage in a complex campaign of political misdirection. I’ll put forward a motion in the Nalhallan chamber of politics, for discussion by the Council of Kings, with the goal of invoking extended sanctions against Librarian sympathizers.”
“Oh, economic sanctions!” Kaz said. “Fun stuff!”
“Then we will institute a lengthy but determined campaign of political propaganda inside the Hushlands, brewing discontent among the general populace so that we can eventually recruit some of the guards who watch the defenses around Washington, DC.”
“Wow, political propaganda! Just the kind of exciting stuff people want from an action-adventure story.”
“Precisely,” Grandpa said. “Then, after years of toil and effort, we will convince one of the Hushlander malcontents to post a note on the head Librarian’s door, condemning him and creating an international incident. In the chaos that follows, we can get ourselves assigned as ambassadors and move into the city, thereby completing step one of a seventeen-step process of getting into the place unseen!”
“Fantastic!” Kaz said.
We all stood around for a moment looking at each other. The silence in the city was pervasive, at least until something very loud detonated nearby, throwing debris against the outside walls and shaking us all with the blast.
“Huh,” Grandpa said. “I guess, alternatively, we could run away from the unexplained explosion, steal a ship, and fly into the Hushlands with guns blazing.”
“Oh, thank goodness,” I said. “I’m going to be writing my autobiography someday, and all that stuff you described sounds like it would be really boring to write.”
We scrambled out of the room and into the hallway beyond, which was suddenly bustling with activity. The explosion, it seemed, had shocked the life into people.* We pushed through
the rushing Mokians before being confronted by a ring of guards with face paint and spears. In their center stood Queen Kamali, a tall Mokian woman in her late teens.
“We didn’t do it!” Kaz said immediately.
“I didn’t assume you had, Lord Kazan,” the queen replied. “This is a Librarian missile strike. We suffered them periodically during the years before the actual invasion.” She eyed me. “Of course, there’s a chance that something provoked them into sending this particular attack.”
“Uh…” I said. “How do you know…?”
“About your ultimatum? It was displayed on every piece of glass in the palace, Lord Alcatraz.”
It was? Seems I went a little overboard with powering that Communicator’s Glass.
“In the past,” the queen said, “these attacks were merely an annoyance, for we had our protective dome. Without it, the attack could be devastating. I’m ordering everyone into the shelters.” She hesitated. “I don’t suppose you’ll come?”
“Are there snacks?” Kaz asked.
