I felt very sorry for the person who was tricked into giving up their soul for a bad romance novel.
We kept moving. Theoretically Kaz’s Talent was leading us toward Australia, but it seemed to me like we were walking aimlessly. Considering the nature of his Talent, that was probably a good sign.
“Kaz,” I said. “Did you know my mother?”
The short man eyed me. “Sure did. She was … well, is … my sister-in-law.”
“They never divorced?”
Kaz shook his head. “I’m not sure what happened—they had a falling-out, obviously. Your father gave you away to be cared for in foster homes, and your mother took up a position watching over you.” He paused, then shook his head. “We were all there at your naming, Al. That was the day when your father pronounced the Sands of Rashid upon you as your inheritance. We’re still not sure how he got them to you at the right time, in the right place.”
“Oracle’s Lenses,” I said.
“He has a pair of those?”
I nodded.
“Walnuts! The prophets in Ventat are supposed to have the only pair in existence. I wonder where Attica found some.”
I shrugged. “He mentioned them in the letter he sent me.”
Kaz nodded thoughtfully. “Well, your father disappeared a few days after pronouncing your blessing, so I guess there wasn’t time for a divorce. Your mother could ask for one, but she really has no motivation to do so. After all, she’d lose her Talent.”
“What?”
“Her Talent, Al,” Kaz said. “She’s a Smedry now.”
“Only by marriage.”
“Doesn’t matter,” Kaz said. “The spouse of a Smedry gains their husband’s or wife’s same Talent as soon as the marriage is official.”
I’d assumed that Talents were genetic—that they were passed on from parents to children, kind of the same way that skin color or hair color was. But this meant they were something different. That seemed important.
Some things do make more sense now, I thought. Grandpa Smedry said he’d worried that my mother had only married my father for his Talent. I’d assumed that she’d been enthralled with the Talent, much as someone might marry a rock star for his guitar skillz. However, that didn’t sound like my mother.
She’d wanted a Talent. “So, my mother’s Talent is…”
“Losing things,” Kaz said. “Just like your father’s.” He smiled, eyes twinkling. “I don’t think she’s ever figured out how to use it properly. She’s a Librarian—she believes in order, lists, and catalogues. To use a Talent, you have to be able to let yourself be out of control for a while.”
I nodded. “What did you think? When he married her, I mean.”
“I thought he was an idiot,” Kaz said. “And I told him so, as is the solemn duty of younger brothers. He married her anyway, the stubborn hazelnut.”
About what I expected, I thought.
“But, Attica seemed to love her,” Kaz continued with a sigh. “And to be perfectly honest, she wasn’t as bad as many Librarians. For a while it seemed like they might actually make things work. Then … it fell apart. Right around the time you were born.”
I frowned. “But she was a Librarian agent all along, right? She only wanted to get Father’s Talent.”
“Some still think that’s the case. She really did seem to care for him, though. I … well, I just don’t know.”
“She had to be faking,” I said stubbornly.
“If you say so,” Kaz said. “I think you may be letting your preconceptions cloud your thinking.”
I shook my head. “No. I don’t do that.”
“Oh, you don’t?” Kaz said, amused. “Well then, let’s try something. Why don’t you tell me about your grandfather; pretend I don’t know anything about him, and you want to describe him to me.”
“Okay,” I said slowly. “Grandpa Smedry is a brilliant Oculator who is a little bit zany, but who is one of the Free Kingdoms’ most important figures. He has the Talent to arrive late to things.”
“Great,” Kaz said. “Now tell me about Bastille.”
I eyed her, and she shot me a threatening glance. “Uh, Bastille is a Crystin. I think that’s about all I can say without her throwing something at me.”
“Good enough. Australia?”
I shrugged. “She seems a bit scatterbrained, but is a good person. She’s an Oculator and has a Smedry Talent.”
“Okay,” Kaz said. “Now talk about me.”
“Well, you’re a short person who—”
“Stop,” Kaz said.
I did so, shooting him a questioning glance.
“Why is it,” Kaz said, “that with the others, the first thing you described about them was their job or their personality? Yet with me, the first thing you mentioned was my height?”
“I … uh…”
Kaz laughed. “I’m not trying to trap you, kid. But maybe you see why I get so annoyed sometimes. The trouble with being different is that people start defining you by what you are instead of by who you are.”
I fell silent.
“Your mother is a Librarian,” Kaz said. “Because of that, we tend to think of her as a Librarian first and a person second. Our knowledge of her as a Librarian clouds everything else.”
“She’s not a good person, Kaz,” I said. “She offered to sell me to a Dark Oculator.”
“Did she?” Kaz asked. “What exactly did she say?”
I thought back to the time when Bastille, Sing, and I had been hiding in the library, listening to Ms. Fletcher speak with Blackburn. “Actually,” I said, “she didn’t say anything. It was the Dark Oculator who said something like, ‘You’d sell the boy too, wouldn’t you? You impress me.’ And she just shrugged or nodded or something.”
“So,” Kaz said, “she didn’t offer to sell you out.”
“She didn’t contradict Blackburn.”
Kaz shook his head. “Shasta has her own agenda, kid. I don’t think any of us can presume to understand exactly what she’s up to. Your father saw something in her. I still think he’s a fool for marrying her, but for a Librarian, she wasn’t too bad.”
I wasn’t convinced. My bias against Librarians wasn’t the only thing making me distrust Shasta. She had consistently berated me as a child, saying I was worthless. (I now know she had been trying to get me to stop using my Talent, for fear it would expose me to those who were searching for the Sands.) Either way, she’d been my mother all that time, and she hadn’t ever given me even a hint of confirmation.
Though … she had stayed with me, always watching over me.
I pushed that thought aside. She didn’t deserve credit for that—she’d only been hoping for the chance to grab the Sands of Rashid. The very day they arrived, she showed up and swiped them.
“… don’t know, Kaz,” Bastille was saying. “I think that the main reason people think of your height first is because of that ridiculous list of yours.”
“My list is not ridiculous,” Kaz said with a huff. “It’s very scientific.”
“Oh?” Bastille asked. “Didn’t you claim that ‘short people are better because it takes them longer to walk places, therefore they get more exercise’?”
“That one has been clinically proven,” Kaz said, pointing at her.
“It does seem a bit of a stretch,” I said, smiling.
“You forget reason number one,” he said. “‘Don’t argue with the short person. He’s always right.’”