Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones

I put a mirror up to her face to see if she was breathing. Of course, there was no mist on the mirror. Seeing as how Bastille was totally and completely dead.

“You were so young,” I said. “Too young to be taken from us. Why did it have to happen to you, of all people, when you are so young? Too young to die, I mean.”

I pricked her finger to make sure she wasn’t faking, but she didn’t even flinch. I pinched her, then slapped her face. Nothing worked.

How many times do I have to explain that she was dead? I looked down at her body, her face turning blue from death, and I wept some more.

She was so dead that I didn’t even realize that this section is in the book for two reasons. First, so that I could have Bastille die somewhere, just like I promised. (See, I wasn’t lying about this! Ha!)

The second reason is, of course, so that if anyone skips forward to the end to read the last page—one of the most putrid and unholy things any reader can do—they will be shocked and annoyed to read that Bastille is dead.

The rest of you can ignore these pages. (Did I mention that Bastille is dead?)

The end.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

Thanks to my agents, Joshua Bilmes and Eddie Schneider, and my editors old and new, Jen Rees and Susan Chang.

Hayley Lazo has again provided great illustrations under the guidance of Dragonsteel’s art director, Iaac Stewart, who also made the map. The cover by Scott Brundage is even better than the first volume’s. The interior design is by Heather Saunders, and the compositing by Westchester Publishing Services. Tireless production work came from Megan Kiddoo, Nathan Weaver, and Karl Gold, and proofreading was by Rafal Gibek, Kyle Avery, and the inconspicuous Peter Ahlstrom.

As ever, many thanks to Emily Sanderson.

The Knights of Crystallia

Chapter 1

So there I was, hanging upside down underneath a gigantic glass bird, speeding along at a hundred miles an hour above the ocean, in no danger whatsoever.

That’s right. I wasn’t in any danger. I was more safe at that moment than I’d ever been in my entire life, despite a plummet of several hundred feet looming below me. (Or, well, above me, since I was upside down.)

I took a few cautious steps. The oversized boots on my feet had a special type of glass on the bottom, called Grappler’s Glass, which let them stick to other things made of glass. That kept me from falling off. (At which point up would quickly become down as I fell to my death. Gravity is such a punk.)

If you’d seen me, with the wind howling around me and the sea churning below, you may not have agreed that I was safe. But these things—like which direction is up—are relative. You see, I’d grown up as a foster child in the Hushlands: lands controlled by the evil Librarians. They’d carefully watched over me during my childhood, anticipating the day when I’d receive a very special bag of sand from my father.

I’d received the bag. They’d stolen the bag. I’d gotten the bag back. Now I was stuck to the bottom of a giant glass bird. Simple, really. If it doesn’t make sense to you, then might I recommend picking up the first two books of a series before you try to read the third one?

Unfortunately, I know that some of you Hushlanders have trouble counting to three. (The Librarian-controlled schools don’t want you to be able to manage complex mathematics.) So I’ve prepared this helpful guide.

Definition of “book one”: The best place to start a series. You can identify “book one” by the fact that it has a little “1” on the spine. Smedrys do a happy dance when you read book one first. Entropy shakes its angry fist at you for being clever enough to organize the world.

Definition of “book two”: The book you read after book one. If you start with book two, I will make fun of you. (Okay, so I’ll make fun of you either way. But honestly, do you want to give me more ammunition?)

Definition of “book three”: The worst place, currently, to start a series. If you start here, I will throw things at you.

Definition of “book four”: And … how’d you manage to start with that one? I haven’t even written it yet. (You sneaky time travelers.)

Anyway, if you haven’t read book two, you missed out on some very important events. Those include: a trip into the fabled Library of Alexandria, sludge that tastes faintly of bananas, ghostly Librarians that want to suck your soul, giant glass dragons, the tomb of Alcatraz the First, and—most important—a lengthy discussion about belly button lint. By not reading book two, you also just forced a large number of people to waste an entire minute reading that recap. I hope you’re satisfied.