You should have known. I won’t warn you when my big failure is about to arrive. It will hurt far more when it’s a surprise.
You’ll see.
About The Author
Brandon Sanderson is the second leading cause of cancer in domesticated fruit bats. He didn’t write this book; Alcatraz Smedry did. However, as Brandon’s name is synonymous with “big, boring fantasy books nobody wants to read,” Alcatraz figured it would be a good name to put on this book. It might help keep the Librarians from discovering what’s really in here.
Brandon Sanderson is known to be one of those annoying people who always answers questions with other questions. You want to know why? Why does it matter? What do you hope to learn? Why would you want to know more about him? Don’t you realize that he’s a very silly person?
The end. (Finally.).
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About The Illustrator
Hayley Lazo, alleged artist and spokeswoman for orphaned whale sharks, is still undergoing investigation. One agent, cleverly disguised as a desk lamp, reports that she may in fact harbor Librarian sympathies. Assuming there are libraries on Saturn. Her art can be found at art-zealot.deviantart.com.
Acknowledgments
I want to thank my awesome agents, Joshua Bilmes and Eddie Schneider, for being, well, awesome. Thanks also to this book’s first editor, Jennifer Rees, whose pleasant personality and editorial know-how made the process of publishing a book so much easier. At Starscape, thanks to Susan Chang for giving this book a new home, and thanks to Karl Gold and Megan Kiddoo for herding it through production. Also many thanks to Victoria Wallis and the ebook production team for their work on the new electronic version.
The influential Peter and Karen Ahlstrom were kind enough to read the manuscript and give me excellent suggestions. Janci Patterson also gave me feedback that was very valuable, even though her comments were written in glaring pink ink!
This novel would be much diminished without the fabulous interior illustrations by Hayley Lazo and cover illustrations by Scott Brundage. Isaaɕ Stewart’s art direction, cover design, and map are likewise essential.
I’d like to thank my lovely wife, Emily Sanderson, who helped with this book in ways too numerous to list here. Finally, a special thank-you goes to Mrs. Bushman’s sixth-grade students (you know who you are!), who have been so enthusiastic about my books.
Brandon Sanderson
Read on for an excerpt from Alcatraz’s next adventure
Available July 2016
Copyright © 2010 by Dragonsteel Entertainment, LLC
Chapter
2
So there I was, holding a pink teddy bear in my hand. It had a red bow and an inviting, cute, bearlike smile. Also, it was ticking.
“Now what?” I asked.
“Now you throw it, idiot!” Bastille said urgently.
I frowned, then tossed the bear to the side, through the open window, into the small room filled with sand. A second later, an explosion blasted back through the window and tossed me into the air. I was propelled backward, then slammed into the far wall.
With an urk of pain, I slid down and fell onto my back. I blinked, my vision fuzzy. Little flakes of plaster—the kind they put on ceilings just so they can break off and fall to the ground dramatically in an explosion—broke off the ceiling and fell dramatically to the ground. One hit me on the forehead.
“Ow,” I said. I lay there, staring upward, breathing in and out. “Bastille, did that teddy bear just explode?”
“Yes,” she said, walking over and looking down at me. She had on a gray-blue militaristic uniform, and wore her straight, silver hair long. On her belt was a small sheath that had a large hilt sticking out of it. That hid her Crystin blade; though the sheath was only about a foot long, if she drew the weapon out it would be the length of a regular sword.
“Okay. Right. Why did that teddy bear just explode?”
“Because you pulled out the pin, stupid. What else did you expect it to do?”
I groaned, sitting up. The room around us—inside the Nalhallan Royal Weapons Testing Facility—was white and featureless. The wall where we’d been standing had an open window looking into the blast range, which was filled with sand. There were no other windows or furniture, save for a set of cabinets on our right.
“What did I expect it to do?” I said. “Maybe play some music? Say ‘mama’? Where I come from, exploding is not a normal bear habit.”
“Where you come from, a lot of things are backward,” Bastille said. “I’ll bet your poodles don’t explode either.”
“No, they don’t.”
“Pity.”
“Actually, exploding poodles would be awesome. But exploding teddy bears? That’s dangerous!”
“Duh.”
“But Bastille, they’re for children!”
“Exactly. So that they can defend themselves, obviously.” She rolled her eyes and walked back over to the window that looked into the sand-filled room. She didn’t ask if I was hurt. She could see that I was still breathing, and that was generally good enough for her.
Also, you may have noticed that this is Chapter Two. You may be wondering where Chapter One went. It turns out that I—being stoopid—lost it. Don’t worry, it was kind of boring anyway. Well, except for the talking llamas.
I climbed to my feet. “In case you were wondering—”
“I wasn’t.”
“—I’m fine.”
“Great.”
I frowned, walking up to Bastille. “Is something bothering you, Bastille?”
“Other than you?”
“I always bother you,” I said. “And you’re always a little grouchy. But today you’ve been downright mean.”
She glanced at me, arms folded. Then I saw her expression soften faintly. “Yeah.”
I raised an eyebrow.
“I just don’t like losing.”
“Losing?” I said. “Bastille, you recovered your place in the knights, exposed—and defeated—a traitor to your order, and stopped the Librarians from kidnapping or killing the Council of Kings. If that’s ‘losing,’ you’ve got a really funny definition of the word.”
“Funnier than your face?”
“Bastille,” I said firmly.
She sighed, leaning down, crossing her arms on the windowsill. “She Who Cannot Be Named got away, your mother escaped with that book in the Forgotten Language, and—now that they’re not hiding behind the ruse of a treaty—the Librarians are throwing everything they’ve got at Mokia.”
“You’ve done what you could. I’ve done what I could. It’s time to let others handle things.”