LENORA

FOURTH ASSISTANT APPRENTICE LIBRARIAN

The badge made Lenora feel very professional, though she was nervous about the Fourth Assistant Apprentice part. It sounded like a rather lowly position, and she sensed she’d need to work hard to move up.

They were in a stately, stone-walled hallway now, big as a subway station and lined with carts covered with jumbled loads of books. Librarians hurried by, pushing more carts, bowing their heads at the woman. Everything was lit by huge skylights overhead. Lenora ran ahead to peer at the tall librarian’s badge. The woman took very long strides, and Lenora had to march double-time just to keep up. She peered at the badge far above her.

MALACHI

CHIEF ANSWERER

Lenora was impressed. She wondered if she had what it took to be Chief Answerer someday. “Malachi,” she said. “That’s an odd name for a woman.”

“Indeed,” replied Malachi. “Very.” She seemed to be thinking hard. “I’m trying to decide where to place you, Lenora. Tell me, what happened in Spain on October 5, 1582?”

Lenora was crestfallen. “I don’t know,” she confessed. Her first question, and she had already failed.

“Then we’ll start you off at the Help Desk for calendars,” Malachi said. “You’ll be answering any and all calendar-related questions.”

“But wouldn’t it make more sense for me to work on things I already know about?” Lenora asked.

“Not at all!” Malachi arched one eyebrow. “Whyever would you want to do THAT? You’d learn absolutely nothing!”

Lenora supposed Malachi had a point. If she never had to answer questions about things she didn’t know, she’d never get better at her job. She’d be a Fourth Assistant Apprentice all her life. Horrifying visions of her gray-haired self plodding these halls as an elderly Fourth Assistant were interrupted as they emerged from the hallway into a corridor as long as the previous room had been tall. It was like a subway tunnel, but ten times as big. All along it in both directions sailed balloons of all colors. Stacks of books tied with string dangled from them. Lenora gawked at this as Malachi hurried her along to the left and down a spiral staircase.

“May I ask a question?” asked Lenora, panting a bit from the hurry.

“Always,” came the crisp reply.

“There were words above that archway I came through—‘Knowledge Is a Light.’”

“Yes, there would have been. And as a curious librarian, you are wondering what they meant.”

“Oh … yes!” said Lenora, wondering just how many of her thoughts Malachi knew.

“It would be best if you figured that out for yourself, Lenora,” Malachi said, and nothing more.