He was a monstrous thing, forty feet high, composed of pure darkness, black eyes glittering. Shreds of his suit jacket flapped in tatters on each side, and within the tatters, within the darkness, Lenora could see images rushing past like broken bits of a movie—books piled up in flames, with people rushing to throw more books onto the fire, a hideous blaze with a horrid scent that stung Lenora’s nose, and then there were wooden ships hurling fire at a tower on the edge of the ocean, a tower surrounded by walls of rubble, and then a great city full of domes where men on horseback fired arrows at fleeing people as buildings behind them burned and burned.

And through the streets just ahead of the archers raced a girl, a very tall, thin girl with a very sharp nose, her arms full of scrolls and her face full of terror.

Lenora thrust the ruler before her like a sword. “GET OUT OF MY LIBRARY!” she roared.

The thing rose over her and descended with a bellow, a whirlwind filled with screams. Lenora reared back to fight as the darkness enveloped her. She could no longer see anything, but she could hear shrieks filling her ears and she could feel hot tendrils snaking around her arm, and then—

The tendrils were torn away. Suddenly, there was brilliant, shining light everywhere, and she was surrounded by gentle warmth that covered her like a blanket. Outside the blanket, she sensed furious blows raining down, but the blows could not penetrate the warmth and could not harm her. The stench of burning books faded as light returned and Lenora could see the library again.

“Malachi!” Lenora cried.

“Yes, Lenora,” replied the Chief Answerer, who had her arms around Lenora in a powerful embrace.

Above them the shrieking darkness, furious with rage, folded in on itself until it was nothing more than a dot. The dot vanished with a pop. Daylight returned to the sky.

Malachi released her and stood, staring hard at the spot where the darkness had vanished. The Chief Answerer was pale, and her hand was trembling ever so slightly, and for the first time Lenora realized that she herself was afraid, very afraid. Until just now, she’d been too busy to feel it.

“What was that?” she asked, when she had managed to recover her senses.

Malachi sagged onto the Help Desk, her shoulders slumped. Her hair had come loose from its bun and was down to her shoulders. The pencils in the bun were nowhere to be seen. She looked at Lenora with weary eyes. “Have you ever heard the term Forces of Darkness, Lenora?”

“Yes.”

“Well,” said Malachi, “it has been applied by many people to many things. But there is a true force of darkness, and that was it.”

Lenora gazed at the spot where the darkness had vanished.

And then she knew.

“Knowledge Is a Light,” she whispered.