"[i]Ask[/i] her ta turn us back?" The fox raised her head a little, curious at that novel thought. She looked up at the sky, her mouth closing slowly, imagining what it might be like to ask such a thing of the Gold Lady. She shook her head quickly. "No, no, no! I couldn't do that! She's the [i]Gold Lady![/i] The most important person in this whole world! What if I mess up? What'd everyone think of me? Oh, I don't think bein' human is worth that risk."

"[i]I[/i] do," the mouse squeaked defiantly. Dooa wriggled his nose at Riley, and he pointed with a little paw over Riley's clasped hands at the open elevator that stood awkwardly at the edge of the top of the tower. Inside looked nearly identical to the little room that Riley had first arrived in, and had left behind at the horrors' restaurant. "[i]That[/i] can take us to the library -- and the Gold Lady!"

The fox looked far less pleased. "You'd barge in unprepared, then? The horrors'll be guarding her, an' there's no reasoning with [i]them.[/i] Best have a friend and a bit o' glimmerdust, and a bite to eat just in case." She turned a dark eye to Arthur, and very subtly motioned toward the silent robot on the porch of the little house with the broken window and the closed door -- and the windmill that rose beside it, with the great mountain-crystal shining beyond it.

The wind swirled on the grassy tower-top; the windmill's sails caught it and spun slowly with a soothing [i]k-thump, k-thump,[/i] as it had turned for innumerable years. There was a little door in the old stone windmill, which would open with a shove and a push. Inside the windmill was shiny and dusty and warm. As the sails turned high above, a grindstone turned and rolled in the pulverized glimmer of pink crystals, fed into the machine by a perpetual clockwork pulley that ticked and spun through a hole high in the far wall.

The door to the house, similarly, could be opened with a turn and a shove. There was little here besides a few cozy chairs and an unmade bed in the corner, and the kitchen where several cupcakes had been tossed on the floor, but perhaps there was food to be found among the cupboards -- like a fresh carrot pie and a jar of chestnuts and a basket of ripe sweet plums. Beside the front door were two pair of soft boots, a flute and a hatchet.

And the robot -- well, he only needed a winding to be good as new.

The elevator, with a press of the correct coppery button, could easily open upon the very same library where Riley and Nina had very narrowly escaped capture not so long ago -- and had heard the quiet sadness of a woman singing.