I turned in shock. A short man, perhaps four feet tall, was walking down the corridor toward us. He most certainly hadn’t been there before and I couldn’t figure out where he’d come from.
The man wore rugged clothing: a leather jacket, his tunic tucked into sturdy pants, a pair of boots. He had a wide face with a broad chin and dark curly hair.
“A fairy!” I said immediately.
The short man stopped, looking confused. “That’s a new one,” he noted.
“What kind are you?” I asked. “Leprechaun? Elf?”
The short man raised an eyebrow, then glanced at Bastille. “Hazelnuts, Bastille,” he swore. “Who’s this clown?”
“Kaz, this is your nephew Alcatraz.”
The short man glanced back at me. “Oh… I see. He seems a bit more dense than I assumed he’d be.”
I flushed. “You’re… not a fairy then?”
He shook his head.
“Are you a dwarf? Like in Lord of the Rings?”
He shook his head.
“You’re just a… midget?”
He regarded me with a flat stare. “You realize that midget isn’t a good term to use, don’t you? Even most Hushlanders know that. Midgets are what people used to call my kind when they stuck us in freak shows.”
I paused. “What should I call you, then?”
“Well, Kaz is preferable. Kazan is my full name, though the blasted Librarians finally named a prison that a while back.”
Bastille nodded. “In Russia.”
The short man sighed. “Regardless, if you absolutely have to reference my height, I generally think that short person works just fine. Anyway, is someone going to explain why we changed course?”
I was still too busy being embarrassed to answer. I hadn’t intended to insult my uncle. (Fortunately, I’ve gotten much better at this over the years. I’m now quite good at insulting people intentionally, and I can even do it in languages you Free Kingdomers don’t speak. So there, you dagblad.)
Thankfully, Bastille spoke up and answered Kaz’s question. “We got word that your father is at the Library of Alexandria. We think he might be in trouble.”
“So we’re heading there?” Kaz asked.
Bastille nodded.
Kaz perked up. “Wonderful!” he said. “Finally, some good news on this trip.”
“Wait,” I said. “That’s good news?”
“Of course it is! I’ve wanted to explore that place for decades. Never could find a good enough excuse. I’ll go get preparing!” He took off down the corridor toward the cockpit.
“Kaz?” Bastille called. He stopped, glancing back.
“Your room is that way.” She pointed down a side corridor.
“Coconuts,” he swore under his breath. Then, he headed the way she’d indicated.
“That’s right,” I said. “His Talent. Getting lost.”
Bastille nodded. “What’s worse is that he generally acts as our guide.”
“How does that work?”
“Oddly,” she said, continuing down the corridor.
I sighed. “I don’t think he likes me very much.”
“You seem to have that effect on people when they first meet you. I didn’t like you very much at first either.” She eyed me. “Still not sure if that’s changed or not.”
“You’re so kind.” As we walked down the dragon’s snakelike body, I noticed a large glow coming from between the shoulder blades of a pair of wings above. The glass here sparkled and shifted, as if there were a lot of surfaces and delicate parts moving about. At the center of the mass was a deep, steady glow – like a smoldering fire. The light was being shaded by occasional moving pieces of glass that weren’t translucent. So, every few seconds, the light would grow darker – then grow brighter again.
I pointed up, “What’s that?”
“The engine,” Bastille said.
“There weren’t any of the noises I had come to associate with a running motor – no hum, no moving pistons, no burning fire. Not even any steam. “How does it work?”
Bastille shrugged. “I’m no silimatic engineer.”
“You’re no Oculator, either,” I noted. “But you know enough about Lenses to surprise most people.”
“That’s because I studied Lenses. Never did care much about silimatics. Come on. Do you want to get to your room or not?”
I did, and I was tired, so I let her lead me away. Turns out, actually, that silimatic engines aren’t really that complex. They’re actually a fair bit more easy to understand than regular Hushlander engines.
It all involves a special kind of sand, named brightsand, which gives off a glow when it’s heated. That light then causes certain types of glass to do strange things. Some will rise into the air when exposed to silimatic light, others will drop downward when exposed to it. So, all you have to do is control which glass sees the light at which time, and you’ve got an engine.
I know you Hushlanders probably find that ridiculous. You ask yourselves, “If sand is that valuable, why is it so commonplace?” You are, of course, the victims of a terrible conspiracy. (Don’t you ever get tired of that?)
The Librarians take great pains to make people ignore sand. They have, at great expense, flooded the Hushlands with dullsand – one of the few types of sand that doesn’t really do anything at all, even when you melt it. What better way is there to make people ignore something than to make it seem commonplace?
Don’t even get me started on the economic value of belly-button lint.
We finally reached my quarters. The body of the dragon-snake was a good twenty feet wide, so there was plenty of room along its length for rooms. I noticed, however, that all of the rooms were translucent.
“Not a lot of privacy here, is there?” I asked.
Bastille rolled her eyes, then placed her hand on a panel on the side of the wall. “Dark,” she said. The wall immediately grew black. She glanced back at me. “We had it on translucent so that it would be easier to hide from people.”
“Oh,” I said. “So, this is technology and not magic?”
“Of course it is. Anyone can do it, after all. Not just Oculators.”
“But Australia is the one flying the dragon.”
“That’s not because she’s an Oculator, it’s because she’s a pilot. Look, I’ve got to get back to the cockpit. My mother’s going to be angry at me for taking so long.”
I glanced back at her. It seemed like something was really bothering her. “I’m sorry I broke your sword,” I said.
She shrugged. “I didn’t ever really deserve it in the first place.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Everyone knows it,” Bastille said, her voice betraying more than a little bitterness. “Even my mother felt that I should never have been dubbed a full knight. She didn’t think that I was ready.”
“She sure is stern.”
“She hates me.”
I looked over at her, shocked. “Bastille! I’m sure she doesn’t hate you. She’s your mother.”
“She’s ashamed of me,” Bastille said. “Always has been. But… I don’t know why I’m talking to you about this. Go take a nap, Smedry. Leave the important things to people who know what they’re doing.”
With that, she stalked away, heading back toward the cockpit. I sighed, but pulled open the glass door and walked into the room. There was no bed, though I did find a rolled-up mattress in the corner. The room, like the rest of the dragon, undulated up and down, each flap of the wings sending a ripple down the entire length of the body.
It had been a bit sickening at first, but I was getting used to it. I sat down, staring out the glass wall of my room. It was still transparent – Bastille had only made the one behind me black.
Clouds spread out below me, extending into the distance, white and lumpy, like the landscape of some alien planet – or perhaps like mashed potatoes that hadn’t been whipped quite long
enough. The sun, setting in the distance, was a brilliant yellow pat of butter, slowly melting as it disappeared.
As that analogy might have indicated, I was getting a bit hungry. Still, I was safe. And I was finally free. Out of the Hushlands, ready to begin my journey to the lands where I’d been born. True, we’d stop in Egypt to pick up my grandfather, but I still felt relieved to be moving.
I was on my way. On my way to find my father, perhaps on my way to discover who I really was.