I finally look up.
“Wow,” I say on a breath.
Riding up the driveway, I thought the house was big. But standing in front of it, experiencing the full scale of it, I realize it’s not big, it’s massive.
The provost’s mansion is maybe twenty times the size of our humble farmhouse. There are three stories and two wings with a balcony off the second floor, another off the east wing, probably more around back. Every window is alive with light and moving silhouettes. Laughter tangles up with music, spilling out the open double doors.
A beam of excitement must flash across my face because Rook says, “Do you love parties, Kansas?”
“I didn’t think I did. But this is wonderful, and I’m not accustomed to many wonderful things.”
“I’m so glad to hear that!” Ana claps her hands. “If you’re impressed by this, you’ll be wowed off your feet by the inside. I can’t take credit for the provost’s mansion, of course. It was built over a hundred years ago. But I find myself showing it off like a curator at a museum. I’m just really in love with its beauty.”
“I don’t blame you.”
She heads up the curved stone steps that lead to the house’s main portico.
Giant iron lanterns hang beneath the portico’s roof, installed at even intervals. Flowers in a rainbow of colors are potted in tall black urns on either side of the door. And standing beside them are two staff members dressed in matching aubergine long coats.
“Welcome to the celebration, Provost,” the man on the left says and bows low.
“Welcome to the celebration, Dorothy of Kansas,” the woman on the right says and matches the bow.
“Thank you for having me.”
The music is louder here, and I catch the sound of a violinist, a cellist, maybe a viola. The music is lively and well-timed.
I’m going to get home. I swear it on my heart. But is thereanything wrong with enjoying all the magnificent things this strange land has to offer?
Nervously, I grab my skirt to keep it from gathering beneath my feet, and step inside.
TWENTY-SEVEN
Dorothy
The second I step inside the provost’s mansion, I’m engulfed in gratitude, introductions, celebration, and flattery. Everyone wants to shake my hand and say hello, and I don’t think there is a corner in the mansion that could hide me from any of it.
I lose track of Rook the second we enter the main ballroom, and within minutes, I’m dizzy from the attention and the spectacle.
There are string lights everywhere strung around the ceiling and around doorways and columns. Three huge crystal chandeliers hang from the domed ballroom ceiling. The crystals, as they turn, send rainbows shooting across the wood floor.
I think the Enders have gotten clever with light to help combat some of the melancholy that must come from persistent dark clouds and lack of sun.
Back home, I think I’m more of a spring and autumn girl, life and death, sunshine and cloudiness. But I could never deny the beauty of a warm, sunny summer day. Some of these people, especially the children, were born into a world with no sunlight. They don’t know anything other than darkness. I’m glad they’ve found a way around it. Because the warmth their light imbues into a room is undeniable.
Ana guides me around the room, introducing me to important Ender families. There are the merchants, the other council members and their partners. There are bakers (the most revered trade here in the East End) and scholars, there are historians of magic and experts on Oz. There are artists and authors. And proving my theory about light, Ana introduces me to a table of lightsmiths, the men and women responsible for lighting Glimming Hollow.
This I’m most interested in. I sit at the lightsmiths’ table and they welcome me into their fold. They tell me their reasons for the specific light design for the ball, how important it was that we felt like the room was full of warmth.
They tell me that most of the light is powered by magic pooled by the witches and the wizard.
“But how does it get here?” I ask. “No one knows the wizard, right? So it’s not like he walks into town and waves his wand?”
That makes the entire table laugh. The man on my left, who introduced himself as Darius, is the first one to explain. He seems the most knowledgeable at the table and is easily excited by the conversation of light. Whenever the conversation steers toward the science behind it, his brown eyes widen and glimmer.
“This is truly the best part,” he tells me, his hands moving as he explains. “The electrical grid used to be run by magic when the royal family ruled. But the entire system was destroyed in the war along with everyone who knew how to run it.
“So…” He leans in, his eyes widening. “I, along with this entire table, consulted with the Cardinal Witches to install a new grid system powered by magic.”
