THE LIBRARY WOLVES

by James Henry

The Library Wolves are scrawny, and mangy-furred, with yellow broken teeth and glowing red eyes. Just after six o’clock, when the Library closes, the wolves creep out from their dark corners, looking for children who had forgotten the time. The wolves are hungry because they live mostly on apple cores, and sandwich crusts, but every now and then a child will find himself shut in the library after six o’clock, and on those special occasions, the Library Wolves will eat meat.

Isaac had been warned about the Library Wolves many times. He often spent whole days in the library - his mother was creative, and often complained she was unable to paint her pictures of beaches because Isaac read too quietly, which put her off. So Isaac read in the library instead.

The Library was a huge building. So big, no-one knew quite how many floors it had, or quite how long its corridors were. Every now and then, city planners would get out of their smart cars, wearing their smart suits, and walk into the library, carrying clipboards and looking confident. Some hours later they would stagger out again, their suits looking much less smart and considerably less confident, their clipboards sometimes ragged and torn at the edges. Isaac had seen one city planner leave the building at a pace only slightly slower than running, shaking his head in an odd fashion, as though a wasp had stung him in the ear.

The Library closed at six, and because Isaac knew about the Wolves, he was always careful to close his books at half-past five and be out long before the Head Librarian came round. Isaac was an observant child, and had noticed that all the other buildings in the city were closed by someone simply passing a shiny white card through a slot. The Head Librarian, however, jangled heavy iron keys on a heavy iron ring. Isaac knew that this was to give her a chance against the Wolves.

Not that Isaac’s mother always remembered to pick him up from the library. In fact she forgot quite often, and had usually gone out again by the time Isaac had made the long walk home. Sometimes she left out some toast for him, but Isaac had read all the cookery books in the library and was quite capable of making himself a decent three course meal out of leftovers in the fridge and washing up before his mother got home. He was always careful to cut a bit mark out of the toast with scissors though, so as not to hurt his mothers feelings.

Isaac’s watch read a quarter past five. Nearly time to go, but not quite. At the reading table next to him sat an old man with grey hair, wearing a grey coat. He was pretending to do the crossword, though probably he was just trying to stay out of the cold. He was always there when Isaac left the library – usually arguing with the Head Librarian about something. Sometimes when Isaac was leaving, he would hear the Head Librarian threatening to ban him from the Library altogether, but when Isaac went in the next day, the old man would be there as usual, pretending to do the crossword, still wrapped up in his grey coat.

Isaac sat and read books and learned things. He learned that dolphins were once a kind of dog, and that Queen Victoria’s father wasn’t who everyone thought he was, and that when people who have been unpleasant to others all their lives finally die, they come back as supermarket carrier bags. Isaac only believed about two thirds of things he read in books, but even the third of stuff that was clearly wrong was often quite entertaining.

Next, Isaac read about Vikings. He read about the ritual of the Blood Eagle, in which annoyed Vikings would gang up on another Viking and pull his lungs out through his back (disappointingly, there wasn’t a diagram), and about how Thor once had to dress up as a bride to fool some giants, and about how the great wolf Fenrir was chained to a rock a mile underground where he awaited the end of the world.

Isaac suddenly realised that the old man opposite him had gone. Just left, without Isaac hearing a thing. Isaac had never been the last person left in the library before, but he checked his watch, and it read a quarter past five, so he went back to his book.

Then, very slowly, he took another look at his watch. Quarter past five. The same as last time he had looked. The seconds hand had stopped moving. He shook the watch and held it to his ear. Nothing.

Isaac put down his book and looked around him. He was alone, and everything had gone very quiet. The Library was always quiet of course (the Head Librarian was unusually fierce about it, and no-one ever had to be shushed twice), but this was a whole new kind of quiet to Isaac. It was the silence of an empty church, the utter lack of sound a traveller hears in the desert when he is lost, and tips out his water container and not even a drip emerges.

Then there was a ’click’, far in the distance. At the far end of the Library, behind Isaac, a light went out. Another ‘click’, and another light went out, this one a little closer.

Isaac grabbed his coat and raced for the main entrance, heart pounding, feet slipping on the polished wooden floor as he raced against the growing darkness. The lights were going off more quickly now. Whoever was turning off the switches had clearly discovered that using the edge of your hand to turn off a whole row at once was a much more satisfying way of doing things.

He skidded round a corner, nearly knocking over a stand of DVDs (headed by a sign which read ‘Look!!! We now have DVDs!!!’). Finally though, he was gaining ground on the lights, and the double doors to the top of the stairs that led down the main entrance were clearly lit. Isaac picked up speed to a point where he was running faster than he had ever run before in his life, leapt nimbly over a cleaner’s bucket that had been left carelessly in the centre of the floor – and bounced painfully off the locked doors.

The last of the lights went off. It wasn’t totally dark: some of the reading lights had been left on, and a little light shone through the high windows at the top of the wall. Just enough to illuminate the large clock in the children’s section to Isaac’s left (he hardly ever went in there anymore, apart from to check if there were any new Asterix books). The clock was designed to help younger children tell the time, a cartoon seagull using its wings to point to the minutes and hours. The time, it told Isaac, was currently almost ten minutes past six.

From what sounded like a thousand miles away, Isaac heard the jangling of iron keys, and an iron grille shrieking as it was pulled, protestingly, across the main doors, and then the silence returned, this time a thousand times thicker, and heavier, and more final than before.

A small amount of light was reflecting off the water in the cleaner’s bucket. It made a silver circle on the ceiling, which slid smoothly backwards and forwards as the water in the bucket moved very slightly from side to side. The water in the bucket looked as if it had been sloshing around just a few moments ago, and was now gently settling back into just being still again. The light on the ceiling moved less and less and finally was still.

Isaac definitely hadn’t hit the bucket when he had run for the door. Something had moved the water before he came round the corner. Looking carefully around him, Isaac saw something white and gleaming under a spinner of children’s classic paperbacks. It was a trainer, empty, upside down, just a foot or so from the bucket. Maybe it had nothing to do with the bucket. It could have been there for ages. Even so, Isaac decided to find another part of the Library in which to hide until morning came. Also, the Children’s Section was the first place the Wolves would look.

On silent feet, taking care to breathe quietly and evenly, Isaac moved through the Library. He passed Computing, and DIY and nearly tripped down the steps that lead into Fiction. He considered wheeling some of the paperback bookspinners behind him, to block the path, but give up quickly when a trial push made a brief but horrible squeaking noise. Also, he thought, as he dodged sideways into Mind Body and Spirit, as obstacles went, wheeled ones… probably would. Quite easily.

He considered ducking left, into Natural History, but this seemed too obvious somehow, so he took the next flight of stairs down instead. He was below street level now, and the only light came from the blank screens of sleeping computers and the soft red blinking of the scanner guns at the Information Point. Isaac tried one of the telephones, but was completely unsurprised to find a making only a low humming noise. He pressed a few buttons randomly – they beeped, but didn’t seem to actually connect him to anyone. The next section down was Self-Help, which was as far as Isaac had ever gone before.

Isaac took a step towards… then froze. To his left, a couple of scanner lights had gone on, glowing redly in the dark – only these weren’t blinking. Another, smaller pair of lights came on next to it, then another pair to his right. Isaac wasn’t at all surprised to see that he was surrounded.

-You gave us a good chase, said the leader of the pack of Library Wolves. He padded forwards from the shadows and stood just a few feet from Isaac.

The Library Wolves were a little smaller than Isaac had expected. About the same size as a big dog, although a little larger at the shoulders. There were about twelve of them.

-Were you there the whole time? asked Isaac curiously.

-From Natural History- the leader said. He wasn’t the largest of the group, or even the most frightening-looking, but clearly the most intelligent. -You were right not to go in there.

The light in his red eyes had the glint of something almost like humour. But not quite.

-You’re welcome to run, he said. We could give you a head start if you like.

-Would it matter? asked Isaac. The leader shook his head.

-We’re very hungry, he said.

-Ah, said Isaac – I was looking at the map, you see. I thought there might be a gap in the air vents through to next door or something.

The leader frowned a little. Some of the other Library Wolves were clearly getting hungry, and Isaac heard a whine from behind him that made his legs very nearly give way. The leader make a very tiny growling noise in the back of his throat, and the whine was cut off immediately. All the time the leaders gaze had never left Isaac.

-Map? said the leader, sounding a little puzzled.

Isaac pointed to the large town map on the wall behind the Information Point.

-May I? he asked politely. The wolf nodded, and Isaac moved forwards very slowly and carefully. The Library Wolves moved with him, keeping exactly the same distance from him at all times, so that Isaac felt at one point as thought he and the Wolves were keeping still, and it was the Library that was moving around beneath his feet. Finally he reached the map, which turned out to be held to the map with blue-tack. Gently, Isaac removed the map from the wall, and laid it down flat on the floor, between himself and the leader.

The leader of the pack moved forward, his hot breath now just a foot from Isaac’s face, although his attention seemed to be directed downwards, at the map.

Isaac pointed. –That’s where we are, he said. –Where it says ‘Library’.

-Library, said all the other Wolves to themselves. Isaac kept his attention on the lead Wolf. There was a key here, but it wasn’t made of iron.

-And that’s the Shopping Centre, next door, he said, pointing. The Wolf followed the movement, but seemed to have suddenly lost interest.

-It doesn’t start with an ‘L’, said the Wolf, sounding slightly annoyed. ‘Library’ starts with an ‘L’.

-Library, said one of the other Wolves, behind Isaac, but the others were silent.

-Well, said Isaac, -Americans would probably call it a ‘Mall’. And ‘M’ is only one away from ‘L’.

The Wolf seemed to perk up.

-I like the word ‘Mall’, he said. – Why is that?

-Probably because it sounds like ‘maul’, said Isaac, -which means ‘ to beat or bruise’ Or, you know, sort of generally damage. Or destroy.

-Could it mean ‘rend’? asked the Wolf, almost meekly. –Could it mean ‘tear’, and ‘ravage’ and ‘feast’?

Isaac decided to stretch the truth, just a little.

-I expect it could, he said. – If you wanted.

There was a long silence. The Wolf looked down at the map, then up at Isaac, then down at the map again, this time for a long, long time. Isaac hardly dared to breathe.

-What do they keep in this ‘Mall’? asked the Wolf, finally.

-Food, said Isaac, carelessly.

The Wolf blinked, for the first time.

-Food, said the other wolves behind Isaac, but this time they didn’t sound threatening. They sounded sad, and hungry.

-And possibly we can get through the air vents, you say? said the Wolf. He was still looking down at the map. Isaac felt the other Library Wolves move in closer around him, in order to get a better look at the map. Isaac could feel warm bodies on either side of him, keen red eyes following his finger as he carefully traced a curving grey line from one part of the map to another.

-Yes, said Isaac finally. He felt the relieved exhalation of the Library Wolves like a hot cloud around him, and fought the desire to cough.

-Will there be other children there? asked the Wolf. He sounded almost pathetic, as though he hardly let himself dare to believe in such a place. –Fat ones? Fat children in sportswear, with baseball caps?

–Lots of them, said Isaac. -And they won’t be missed.

The Mall Wolves are fit and sleek, with white gleaming teeth and glowing red eyes. Just after ten o’clock, when the Mall closes, the wolves will creep out from their dark corners, looking for children who have foolishly dare each other to hide out after the Mall has closed. The wolves are quick and fierce, and their leader is a human boy called King Isaac who wears a baseball cap stained red in the blood of his enemies. If you are caught after hours by the Mall Wolves, you’d better make sure you know an interesting fact about Vikings, because if you do, King Isaac might just let you go.

But he probably won’t.