When they reached the head of the aisle, the priest went through a 
perfunctory ceremony, praising the Wizard's excellent features and asking for 
its cooperation. As he said these words, lights began to come on and the 
machinery began to whir. Princess Nell saw that this vault was, in fact, 
nothing more than an anteroom for a much vaster space within, and that this 
space was filled with machinery: countless narrow shining rods, scarcely larger 
than pencil leads, laid in a fine gridwork, sliding back and forth under the 
impetus of geared power shafts running throughout the place. All of the 
machinery threw off heat as it ran, and the room was quite warm despite a 
vigorous draught of cold mountain air being pumped through it by windmill-size 
fans.