Chapter Twenty-Nine. Dorothy
TWENTY-NINE
Dorothy
When I see the empty driveway in front of the provost’s mansion, my heart sinks. Where did everyone go so quickly? They clearly have experience with disappearing when the alarm goes off. They are a well-oiled machine.
With Rook wounded, again, and me in a giant ball gown, neither of us is in any shape to escape on foot. And I can’t imagine the guards who attacked us in the garden are going to give up so easily.
If only I knew why they were after me in the first place. Is it because I killed the witch? I guess I shouldn’t be surprised to hear there are people in Oz who are on the witch’s side.
“Did you hear that, Kansas?”
I come to a stop with Rook still draped over my shoulders. “Hear what?”
“It sounds like horses.” Rook juts his chin to the left of the mansion. “I bet there’s a stable back there.”
I catch the faint sound of a whinny and relief floods my veins.
It’s a way out. And even better, I know how to ride a horse.
“Come on.” Rook pulls away from me, setting his hand on the small of my back, steering me toward the stables. There’s blood on his face, and more of it pooling in a cut on his bottom lip. He was just beat up for trying to save me and yet he seems unfazed by it.
Who is this man?
It strikes me out of nowhere how strange he is and yet how comfortable I am around him, how comforted I am by his protection.
I’m not sure I’d be able to navigate any of this without him.
“Thank you,” I blurt.
“What?” His attention is distant as he checks behind us for the guards.
“Thank you for helping me.”
He finally looks at me, a furrow appearing between his brows. “You helped me, Kansas. It’s the least I can do.”
“But I didn’t get beat up for it.”
The furrow disappears and his expression turns distant again.
Sometimes he is impossible to read. The mystery of him frustrates and excites me in equal measure. He is a language I can’t quite decode.
“We should hurry,” he tells me and pushes me forward.
We make our way across the driveway and from there we find a gravel drive, tucked behind a row of evergreen trees, that winds its way to the back of the provost’s property to a gravel holding area. And there, just beyond in a halo of lamplight, are the stables.
No one is around, not even a stable hand, and the large bay doors are unlatched and propped open. We make our way in without any difficulty at all.
“Which one of you is friendly and fast?” I ask.
There are six stalls on either side, but only half of them are occupied.
I find a bay mare at the end of the aisle with her snout out the half door of her stall. She snuffles when I pause and watches us with wide, dark eyes.
I hold my hand out for her to sniff. “We are in desperate need of a safe escape,” I tell her. She chuffs at my hand, then nuzzles me, so I give her a friendly scratch.
When I was very young, Uncle Henry taught me how to saddle a horse long before he let me ride one alone. “They’re a lot to handle,” he told me as he fed Betsy, our palomino, a carrot. “You can’t show fear. You must show respect.”
“I’ve ridden a horse before,” I told him. I remember that conviction clearly. I didn’t know how to saddle a horse, but I did know how to ride one. It was something left over from my life before the Kansas farm.
“Still,” Henry said as he ran his hand down Betsy’s snout, “it’s best if we take it slow. For your sake, and for Betsy’s.” But before long, I was racing the wind with Betsy and only on her back did I feel like myself in those early years.
I find a nameplate for the mare to the left of her stall. “Sabil?” I say and the horse sighs. “I’d like to saddle you now, if that’s all right?” She chuffs again, which I hope is her consent.
“You’re good with animals,” Rook comments as he slumps against the wall of Sabil’s stall.
“It’s just a matter of being kind, isn’t it?”
He wipes a spot of blood from his chin. “Is it?”
In the soft lamplight of the stables, it’s clear just how much of a beating Rook has taken, yet again.
How much damage can one man handle? He was just starting to heal from his previous wounds.
“Are you familiar with tack?” I ask him.
He searches what knowledge he has. “Yes, I believe I am.”
“Do you think you have the strength to gather the items? If you don’t, that’s okay.”
“I can manage, Kansas. Don’t worry about me.” His grin is just this side of playful, as if he finds my worry amusing.
But I am worried. There’s a bruise appearing across his cheek and his stance is lacking rigidity, as if it hurts him to be upright.
Still, he pushes away from the wall and disappears into the tack room.
I unlatch the half door of Sabil’s stall and ease inside. I’m still in my giant ball gown and it trails on the stone floor, catching shoots of hay as I go. The mare shifts her stance, as if to make room for me.
“I have to be honest,” I tell her, “I don’t know what we’ll encounter out there.”
The alarm has gone silent, which can only mean whoever is entering the Hollow must already be here.
“If you’d rather stay safe and cozy in your stall, you can tell me.”
Sabil bobs her head and neighs, her big dark eyes staring at me.
“If you’re sure?”
She nickers and I can’t help but smile.
Sabil reminds me of Betsy—she fears nothing.
Rook returns just a minute later with a saddle pad and a black leather saddle. Henry taught me I should always brush the horse, then check her over before saddling her, but there’s no time for that. Hopefully Sabil will forgive me.
With Rook on one side of her and me on the other, we situate the pad, then Rook hoists up the saddle. We cinch her in quickly.
“Up you go,” Rook tells me.
“You should go up first. You’re hurt.”
“Am I?” That grin returns.
“Fine.” I put my foot in the stirrup and with Rook’s help taming my dress, I manage to get up. Rook is behind me in the saddle within seconds.
“See?” he says, his mouth now intimately close to the shell of my ear. “I’m fit as a fiddle.”
I snort. “Tell that to your face.”
He chuckles.
Sabil wags her head.
“We should go,” I tell Rook, sensing Sabil’s need to move now that she’s saddled.
Rook takes the reins. “Hold on, Kansas.”
“Do you know how to ride a—”
Rook clicks his tongue and Sabil takes off.
“Oh god!” I shout.
“I told you to hold on,” Rook says.
I wrap my hand around the horn and squeeze with my thighs.
It’s been a while since I’ve ridden—we had to put Betsy down several years back, and decided to invest in more cattle instead—but as soon as we’re free of the stable and following the gravel drive into the night, the thrill immediately returns.
I love being on a horse. I love the wind in my hair and the partnership between human and animal.
It feels right.
Rook tightens his grip on the reins, his arms firmly around me, his body impossibly close.
I’m trying not to think about it, not at a time like this. But not thinking about it makes me think about it, and butterflies emerge from their slumber, taking flight in my belly.
We’re in the mansion’s half-circle drive within seconds. Sabil’s shoes clack loudly on the cobblestones.
“There they are!” someone shouts to our left.
The guards.
They’re making their way down the front lawn, but they’re on foot with no horse or carriage in sight.
One of them lunges forward, arm outstretched, but Sabil dodges him easily and the man falls flat on his face.
The others take off after us, but Sabil is fast and before long, they’re just dark specks in the night.
“That wasn’t too hard,” Rook says, guiding Sabil down the street that got us here.
All the houses and shops are shut tight. There isn’t a single person out.
That’s a bit disconcerting.
Are we too late to find safety before whoever is crossing makes their way into Glimming Hollow?
I wasn’t paying attention to our route when we left the inn, but Rook seems to know the general direction.
The farther we get into the city, the more surreal it is. The stillness is so complete, every one of Sabil’s steps echoes off the surrounding buildings. It feels like a ghost town.
The hair lifts along the back of my neck and I shiver.
Rook leans in closer to me, his chest against my back. His touch is warm, solid, and comforting.
“How much farther do you think?” I ask.
“If I remember correctly, it’s the next street over, but I think we should go around to the back just to be safe.”
Before the street in question comes into view, Rook steers Sabil to the left, down an alley behind the Red Wander. Inside the stable, a stable hand peers out from behind a hay bale and immediately recognizes us.
“Ms. Gale. Rook. Y’all shouldn’t be out here!”
“We were abandoned at the provost’s mansion,” I tell him as he takes Sabil’s reins. “We got here as quickly as we could.”
“You best get inside then. You’ll find all the doors locked so you’ll have to go through the staff entrance. Let me show you.”
He ties off Sabil’s reins to a holding ring and hurries us through a side door to a dusty patch of lawn.
From there, he pulls out a thick iron key ring from his trousers, stopping at an unmarked door on the back of the inn.
He fumbles with the key, metal clanging against metal as he searches for the lock in the dark.
Finally, the iron teeth slip in and the bolt thunks open. The boy pushes the door in.
Only darkness lies beyond.
“In you go,” he tells us.
Rook pushes me forward and the door slams shut behind us, the lock thunking closed again.