There was general cheering. This time, Lenora didn’t shush the crowd. In the midst of the celebration, the king approached Lenora with a laurel wreath and placed it on her head. “You have served me well. I hereby appoint you my Court Librarian!”

The roars grew louder. Lenora felt a humming just above her heart. She looked down at her badge.

LENORA

THIRD ASSISTANT APPRENTICE LIBRARIAN

OFFICIAL COURT LIBRARIAN OF THE KINGDOM OF STARPOINT SEVENTEEN

Third Assistant! thought Lenora happily. Only her first day at her job, and she’d already been promoted. Which reminded her—she really must get back to the Help Desk. She looked about for Bendigeidfran and saw that he had been pulled into a corner by a short elderly woman with dour features and a too-tight overcoat and a black bowler hat jammed onto her head. She was whispering into the robot’s ear and glancing at Lenora.

Lenora started toward the pair, then stopped. Her arm was suddenly covered in goose bumps. The woman in the too-tight overcoat and bowler hat reminded her very much of the man she’d encountered outside the Astrophysics room at the library back home, and she chilled Lenora through and through. Though she had a badge saying LIBRARIAN (spelled correctly this time), Lenora could not imagine what business she had in the court of the King of Starpoint Seventeen.

The woman glanced again at Lenora. For a moment, their gazes locked, and something behind her eyes flickered. Twice. And across her shoulders, something slithered beneath the overcoat. Lenora, to her shame, froze on the spot. The woman spoke to Bendigeidfran for a moment longer, then patted him on the back and trotted down a narrow corridor and out of sight.

Gathering herself, and furious that the woman had frightened her even for a moment, Lenora went to Bendigeidfran. “Who was that?”

“I must say, your boss there is an extremely curious librarian,” said the robot.

“What?” asked Lenora, outraged. That woman was not her boss. Or was she? Lenora didn’t really know much about how the library worked yet. But she was certain that Malachi would have told her about this woman. And Lenora really, really, really did not believe she was a librarian, whatever her badge might say.

Thinking these things, she wasn’t really listening as Bendigeidfran told her the woman said there was an emergency in Lenora’s section, and she should return immediately.

By the time the robot’s words sank in for Lenora, he was already reaching for the time machine on his wrist. “When was it that I got you? Ah yes, she instructed me very specifically—October 5, 1582!” He touched the device.

“NO!” shouted Lenora. She grabbed for the time machine. But it was too late.

She found herself tumbling through a dark void, Bendigeidfran spinning beside her. All around them was nothingness, stretching on forever, and somewhere in the far distance was a faint but growing rumbling.