Still the Sun

by Charlie N Holmberg

Genres: Fairy Tales, Folk Tales, Legends & Mythology; Fantasy Romance

Synopsis

An ancient machine holds the secrets of a distant world’s past for two intimate strangers in the latest romantic fantasy adventure by Wall Street Journal bestselling author Charlie N. Holmberg.

Pell is an engineer and digger by trade—unearthing and repairing the fascinating artifacts left behind by the mysterious Ancients who once inhabited the sunbaked planet of Tampere. She’ll do anything to help the people of her village survive and to better understand the secrets of what came before.

Heartwood and Moseus are keepers of a forbidding tower near the village of Emgarden. Inside are the remnants of complex machines the likes of which Pell has never seen. Considering her affinity for Ancient tech, the keepers know Pell is their only hope of putting the pieces of these metal puzzles together and getting them running. The tower’s other riddle is Heartwood himself. He is an enigma, distant yet protective, to whom Pell is inexplicably drawn.

Pell’s restoration of this broken behemoth soon brings disturbing visions—and the discovery that her relationship to it could finally reveal the origins of the tower’s strange keepers and the unfathomable reason the truth has been hidden from her.

 

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Release date: July 1, 2024

Publisher: 47North

Sample

Chapter 1

Something is missing.
I turn the brass ball joint over in my hand, tracing the subtly raised edge with my fingernail.
It attaches to a hollow metal cylinder with ridging, suggesting the cylinder once housed a pump.
A lip on the cylinder looks like it connected to something else. If that something else is a track,
then this might be the first evidence I’ve found that the Ancients utilized skidding systems. The
style of metalwork alone denotes the artifact is of Ancient make, but without more pieces, I can’t
confirm my theory. My chest sinks at the thought that I likely never will.
Sighing, I set the damaged piece of machine on my little table. I didn’t see anything else
nearby when I dug up this gem. I suppose I can venture out again and search a little harder, but
doubts keep me here. I found this artifact a year ago, and it was a four-cycle journey to the dig
site. That’s four cycles of food and water strapped to my back, and four cycles of camping on
dust and dry earth. No way stations or people along the way. Just me. So I’m not exactly
brimming with enthusiasm for a return trip.
Rolling my lips together and making a pop sound with my mouth, I push back from the table
and stretch. I’ve been hunching over this thing for too long. I glance at the square clock on the
far wall, one of two I constructed myself. The other hangs in the alehouse. The mist will settle in
soon, but for my work, I prefer it. Keeps me from getting too warm. And if I wait for it to pass, I
won’t finish in time.

Nothing ruins a funeral like an unfinished grave.
I stomp into my shoes, wrap my hands, and tie the front of my hair into a knot on the top of
my head—it isn’t long enough for a proper tail—before stepping out of my single-room home. I
built a little lean-to shed next to it, just large enough for a person to turn around in. From there I
grab my tools—shovel, pick, rock bar—tie them up, and throw them over my shoulder before
heading into town. The sun gleams brightly in my eyes, and I blink a few tears back as I cross the
small village. A person could spit and reach the end of Emgarden, but it isn’t like there’s
anything bigger around. There’s nothing around, except for the amaranthine wall to the east and
the abandoned fortress to the northwest, a giant tower brimming with broken Ancient tech, I’m
sure, but even Arthen hasn’t been able to get those doors open. We stopped trying years ago.
I skirt a random cluster of emilies in the road. The flowers are the fastest-growing things
around and seem to be the only living thing that doesn’t need water. We don’t water them,
anyway, but they thrive, sometimes in the strangest of places. One could pull up an entire patch
of them at first sun and find them regrown a stone’s throw away by late sun. Granted, the only
good reason for pulling up emilies is for the roots. The flowers, though beautiful, are inedible,
but the long, tough roots make good ropes and cording.
The flowers are the only pretty thing in this lonesome desert. The Serpent cast everything
else in shades of brown and rust, save for the farmland, which we tirelessly water to keep green.
The emilies, though, they bloom in pastel pinks, blues, and violets, with centers that glow as soft
as the last breath of an ember. Random splotches of color on a dry and dusty slab. Only the
amaranthine wall can compare, but that thing definitely didn’t grow from the ground, and it’s
certainly never moved. We don’t even know what it’s made of, so we just named the strange,
translucent material after its color.

By the time I pass the alehouse and reach the cemetery, just off the road to the farms, the first
whispers of mist tickle the air. I already marked Entisa’s grave with a few stakes. I brace myself
as I look at them, breathing past the constriction in my throat. I hate crying, even with no one
around to witness. Gritting my teeth, I focus on the technicalities. She’ll be placed in the row
right beside Ramdinee, who died a year ago. While Entisa’s death was expected, Ramdinee’s was
not. The woman had been young and healthy, a baker and builder, but illness plagues the best of
us, and she died quickly. I’d been close to her—I’m close to everyone, even those who’d rather I
dedicate my entire existence to digging and cast my little machines into the fire. Ramdinee’s
grave had been a struggle to dig, like I’d been carving out the resting place for myself.
Ramdinee had believed in my machines, my theories. So had Entisa.
With Entisa gone, there are thirty-eight of us left. There have been no newcomers, no birth—
I lose my train of thought.
Shaking myself, I take the tip of my spade and trace the outline of the grave. It’ll be roughly
a meter and a half long and deep, and only a few decimeters wide, since Entisa was a small
woman. A kind woman, though quiet. Patient, albeit less so in her final years. Still, I think of her
lifeless body, lying on her cot, and damnit I am not going to cry.
Working is a good way to mourn. Makes me focus on the burn in my arms and back. Gives
me purpose. While I’d love to spend the whole sun hunting for artifacts and trying to get them
working again, or tinkering around with new builds to help Emgarden, I’m a digger. I dig graves,
I dig furrows for crops, I dig wells. Bodies aren’t going to bury themselves, and it’s not as
though water can grow on trees or fall from the sky.
The fog settles, slow and comfortable, and I dig.
Don’t think about it.

I fall into the easy and familiar rhythm. After the first layer, my shoulders start to burn, but
that fades after a few minutes. The key is to be careful with breaks; the more often I stop, the
harder it is to get started again. So I dig, that rhythm unrelenting, even when I hit clay. Clay
clears the mind. Clay gives me arms even Arthen can admire.
I’ve toyed with sketches for an earth windlass, something to help pull soil up the way the
other windlass I built brings water up from the well. But we don’t have the supplies, and I’m the
only one who would benefit from such a thing. Still, it comes to mind every time I pierce this
shovel into the hardpan. Entisa had liked the idea, anyway.
By the time I’m halfway through, the fog has settled, like the weather is taking pity on me,
crying on my behalf. The sunlight goes gray, mixing cool droplets with the perspiration beading
on my temples and sliding down my spine. Here, I give myself a moment to drink and stretch.
Here, I breathe in the mists and let them coat and cool my insides. Here, I listen to the hard
thumps of my heart and ponder over Entisa’s never beating again.
My heart aches for Salki. Entisa had been the oldest person in Emgarden, and while her
daughter, Salki, is hardly young, she’s my dearest friend, gracious and kind and hardworking.
Knowing how much she loved her mother, and how much she will miss her, is my truest sorrow.
And I hate that I can do little to help. But I can do this, and this is something.
So I keep digging.
The irony of my job is that I dig holes far deeper than I am tall. I’m strong, but I’m short, and
so once I reach a meter down, since a stool would only get in my way, I start carving little
footholds along the side of the grave. By the time I edge out the bottom, the packed dirt stands
fifteen centimeters over my head. I climb out, tie my tools together, and wander to a clear spot

not far from Amlynn’s home. Lying down, I tuck my hands under my head and stare up into the
fog-choked sky, watching little dots of light play within the mist. Close my eyes.
The mourning will wake me.

***

I clamp my hand on Salki’s shoulder as four men prepare to lower her mother into the grave.
Entisa looks peaceful, though the pallor and stillness of death warps her features, shaping her
into a mere shade of who she was. She wears her favorite homespun dress. Her gray hair, which
had always been pinned up, flows loosely around her shoulders. She wears a long necklace that
I’ve never seen her without, a chain of tin with a poorly hammered pendant at the end of it. A
stone ring speckled with pink flecks weighs down her middle finger.
The graveyard boasts the only section of Emgarden where our pitiful meter-high stone
perimeter hasn’t broken, eroded, or otherwise failed, as though even time itself wanted to show
respect for the dead. It cradles our few fallen as though in midembrace. The sun casts dark
shadows over the nearby alehouse and other homes, setting a mood of solemnity. Not that we
need the help.
Arthen, the town blacksmith, pulls a shroud over Entisa’s features, first on the left, then on
the right, beginning the death wrap. The sun glints off his hairless scalp and catches in the
uneven waves of his beard. Maglon, the alehouse owner, binds the shroud around Entisa’s feet,
while two of our farmers, Balfid and Gethnen, prepare the ropes to lower her down.
Salki’s lip quivers when they finally lift the body toward my newly excavated grave.
Otherwise, she’s a picture of serenity. She’ll cry later, in private. Like me, she hates making a
public fuss, even when there’s good reason to.

The men handle the body delicately; it makes no sound when it touches the bottom of the
grave. Arthen and Balfid take turns covering it with dirt, one shovelful at a time. I want to help
them. I want to do more, but my fingers still tremble faintly from my earlier exertion, and it
would be selfish of me to take this service from these people. Instead, I sing the hymn of
goodbye a little louder, knowing that Salki’s throat is too choked to follow. Her mouth forms the
words, and later I’ll have to assure her it was enough, but she’ll berate herself for not singing
proudly in her mother’s memory. Salki has a soul of amaranthine and a heart of glass.
When it’s finished, I quietly hug Salki and step away so the other townsfolk can offer their
condolences. Salki tearfully smiles at each person, absently thumbing a hammered metal brooch
pinned to her shirt. One by one, the mourners make their way to the tavern, though a few return
to their farm posts. It’s already mid sun, and the plants need tending.
I gather my tools and start back, then notice Casnia kneeling down the road, unaware of the
funeral. She’s small, not any taller than myself, and round, thanks to Salki and Entisa’s care.
Short black hair warms her crown, and clean clothes stretch over her back and thighs. She squats,
her narrow wood tablet against the ground, her little satchel of colored chalks open and half-
spilled beside it. Her tongue peeks out from the corner of her lips.
I approach, making sure she’ll hear my footsteps. “How are you, Cas?”
Though well into adulthood, Casnia has the mind of a child. She bobs her head to the right,
then to the left, never taking her violet eyes off her art. She draws as a child would, often
portraying the people of Emgarden. It always takes me a moment to sort out who she’s trying to
depict; despite many motherly lessons from Salki, Casnia never uses the right colors, merely
whatever she fancies in the moment.
“Is that . . . Salki?”

She often draws Salki with red hair, or pink if there’s no red, though Salki’s hair is a pale
gray with a few strands of blonde. Adjusting the tools on my shoulder, I ask Casnia, “Do you
want to come to the alehouse with me to wait for her?”
Casnia continues drawing, seeming to not have heard me. She starts a new person beside
Salki, sketching a lopsided head and rectangular body in brown. Yellow hair spikes out of the
head. I know this one well—it’s me. The brown is right, at least. I have tan skin, brown eyes, and
usually brown clothes. My short hair is brown, too, though Casnia has always insisted it is not.
After a few more passes of the chalk, she scoops up her things and clasps them tightly to her
chest with one arm, then offers the other to me. I grasp her hand and help her up, then walk at her
slow pace toward the alehouse. If nothing else, I can give Salki a little more time to mourn
before she has to tend to her charge. Casnia is not hers by blood, but she might as well be. Then
again, Entisa wasn’t her mother by blood, either.
By the time I set my tools down and lead Casnia inside, Maglon has already resumed his post
behind the modest counter, wiping glasses. Several people are inside drinking, discussing the
funeral or taking their minds off it. Every death hits hard. Everyone knows everyone in
Emgarden.
“You should be restin’, Pell,” Maglon says over the counter as I situate Casnia at my usual
table, choosing a chair against the wall. Her balance isn’t always steady.
“Rested enough.” I tug absently at my breastband. The hot sun has made it especially
uncomfortable. Serpent knows why I even bother wearing it; I don’t have much to bind. “How
are you holding up?”
Maglon shrugs. “Well as anyone, I suppose. Got a feelin’ I’ll be low in the barrels this sun.”

The alehouse starts to vibrate; my hand finds a wall to steady myself. Maglon leans his
weight on the counter, and Casnia pauses long enough for the quake to stop before continuing
her work. Little tremors like this happen from time to time. Tampere, the name we’ve given this
land, is often restless.
More people enter the alehouse, the ones I’d seen talking with Salki, though she’s not among
them. Good. She should go home. Take a mist or two.
I get an ale and a cup of water, the latter for Casnia. She ignores my offering and sets down
her things, unbuttoning her pouch and spilling the chalk. Two sips of my drink go down before I
lean my head against the wall and rest my eyes. They burn a little when I do. Guess I should get
some water for myself, too.
“. . . trowels aren’t working,” I hear when I open my eyes again. I wonder if I dozed off. The
townsfolk fill the alehouse, leaving only a few chairs empty. Casnia has started a new picture,
drawing me with yellow eyes.
Arthen rubs a hand over his bald head. “I can sharpen it again for you, but it’s all I can do.”
Frantess, another farmer, sighs. “The whole thing will snap in half if you do.”
“Don’t get on his case about it.” Gethnen finishes off a glass. “He can’t do nothing about it.”
“I know that,” Frantess snaps. “I’m just frustrated by it all.”
“We’re all frustrated,” Balfid adds from another table. Amlynn, the town doctor, nods her
agreement.
“Pell’s got scrap metal,” Frantess says. “Just take it from her.”
“No thanks,” I say. By the way her face reddens, I don’t think she noticed me in the corner.
Skin flushed, Frantess leans into the argument. “And what good is the scrap to you? We need
more tools!”

“What good is the windlass on the well?” I ask, picking at dirt beneath my nails. “Or the
clock on the wall, or the flour mill you took from Ramdinee’s?” All of which I constructed by
studying and repurposing Ancient artifacts.
Maglon glances over. “Are you the one with the flour mill?”
Frantess’s blush deepens. “I’m not the one who took it from her house! It’s just been passed
around. And it’s not like Ramdinee’s using it anymore. My point still stands.”
“If you want artifacts”—I lower my hands and meet her eyes from across the room—“then
go dig them up yourself.”
“I’m too busy digging up your dinner,” she snaps.
Maglon slams a cup down on the counter. “That’s enough of that.”
I force a deep breath into my lungs. Frantess has a point, but so do I. In truth, the idea of
Frantess finding something new beneath the red-rock dust, melting it down without even letting
me have a gander, makes me nauseous. I could do so much for this town if only I had more.
More artifacts, more metal, more time. Unfortunately, not everyone shares my view.
In an attempt to keep the peace, I offer, “But if you need to melt down my rock bar, you can
have it.” It’s the long steel lever I use for moving large stones when I dig. “I can use my shovel
handle.”
“We don’t need it,” Balfid says.
“It’s not a bad idea,” Arthen remarks.
The old argument about the Ancients and the pieces of civilization they left behind goes
beyond me and Frantess. It comes down to tools. Emgarden sprouted up in the middle of
nowhere, for reasons no one can remember, and its resources are minimal. Everything is
minimal. We can’t expand, we can’t trade, and we can’t mine. People need tools for mining, and

we don’t have the metal for tools, even if I sacrificed every artifact I have, which at the moment
totals two: the incomplete piece I was just studying and a drafting compass. Any minute now,
someone will bring it up. Again.
Gethnen doesn’t disappoint. “We can try the mountains one more time.”
No one responds. They don’t need to. The mining of the mountains is a paradox; there are
some ore deposits at their base, but we’ve no tools to access them.
“Keep the rock bar,” Balfid says.
“I’d rather lose it than my scraps.” I don’t take offense at the term they use for my piecemeal
artifacts. That’s what they are, brass, steel, and other metal leftovers from an unknown history,
and most in Emgarden see them as old toys from a time long passed. I’ve promised myself to
forfeit all the scrap I have when our options run out, but the thought makes that gaping nothing
in my core open wide and swallow.
Something is missing.
A familiar pang echoes in my chest. Rubbing my hand over my sternum, I take another sip of
ale. Sleep and drink are the only things that keep that strange feeling at bay. The feeling that, like
my broken artifacts, something about me, too, is incomplete. It’s a sentiment I’ve never shared
with anyone, even Salki. How could I put into words something so deeply visceral?
“Keep your rock bar.” Frantess doesn’t sound defeated. It’s a promise of more arguments to
come, perhaps without such an accommodating audience.
She wouldn’t take the rock bar anyway. It’s a necessary tool for digging the wells, and there’s
no water without the wells. Lore—some might call it scripture—claims that Tampere exists as
one land among many, created by the World Serpent, whose discarded skin coils into entire
planets, far beyond what our mortal eyes can see. But when the Serpent shed the skin we call

home, Tampere kept all its water deep inside, so we have to dig for it. Only the hardiest plants
with the longest roots—like the emilies—can survive without intervention. No wells, no food.
The crops are planted where the wells are, which gives our farmland a somewhat eccentric
shape, but who’s around to judge us? There’s only Emgarden. I’ve walked clear to the
amaranthine wall and the Brume Mountains multiple times. If any living thing has built another
village, town, or city, it’s too far to reach. So it’s just us and that old fortified tower. That’s why
no one ever bothered to repair, nor finish, the haphazard stone wall surrounding our little corner
of Tampere. What do we have to keep out?
If I could get enough artifacts, figure out enough pieces, maybe I could find a way to collect
water from the fog. By late mist, it leaves condensation on some things, especially glass and
metal. But that just circles me back to the same problem as before: lack of metal. Lack of tools.
Even Arthen couldn’t spare anything for my experiments. The crops are too important, even if
they’re dug and harvested with brittle trowels.
I glance up at the clock above Maglon’s head, the complement to the one in my home. It’s a
square box with two narrow platforms, the first marked with eight ticks, the second with five, to
mark hours. There are small dots to mark minutes between them, but they’re hard to see from
where the clock hangs. Wider bands on the platforms mark first, mid, and late, for sun and mist,
respectively. It has to be wound, but I timed the bands and springs in a way to align with the
hours so the metal ball bearing that marks the numbers would be accurate. Once the ball reaches
the bottom of the clock, a small plug kicks it back up to the top. Right now, the ball rolls past the
fifth hour, into late sun.
Maybe I should get some food. And then some rest. But I’m not fond of the idea of trading
Maglon for grain when I have some in my own cupboards. Standing, I stretch my back.

As if sensing my thoughts from the next table, Amlynn offers, “I’ll watch her, if you’d like.
Get her to Salki by first mist.”
I glance to Casnia, who’s finished her drawing and occupies herself by freeing a sliver of
wood from the wall. “Thank you.”
As I make my way through the crowd toward the exit, Arthen snags my wrist. “Where’s my
knife, Pelnophe?”
I roll my eyes and pull free. “For the last time, Art, I never borrowed it.” I flick the side of his
head and continue on my way. Next time that man asks me that same blasted question, I’m going
to dump water on his forge.
Outside, I haul up my tools, feeling the soreness waking in my back, and head down the main
road to my house. Mourners have crushed some of the emilies I passed earlier. I can’t tell if their
centers still glow; the sun shines too brightly. Skirting them, I continue on my way. Everyone but
Salki has crowded into the alehouse, so the streets stretch quiet and empty. I’m nearly home
when I hear a soft, distant tone winging through the air. One I might not have heard, were it not
for the funeral pulling everyone from their homes.
I’m no musician. I couldn’t pick the note from a scale or re-create it myself. But I hear it on
the slightest stir of a breeze, as though it calls from the mountains themselves. A single high
tone, softer than a newborn’s breath. Then it’s gone.
Biting my lower lip, I pick up my pace, stow my precious tools in their shed, and slip inside
my little house. Kick off my shoes, soak some grain. Devour it when it’s only half-softened, then
drop into my bed before the ball on my clock can drop to the next platform.

***

I start at the knocking on my door. Stare at my ceiling a long moment while my mind shifts from
dream to reality. I can’t remember what I dreamed. A hand, a tree . . . but even as I try to recall it,
it slips away, as intangible as the mists.
Mists. By the dimness of the room, I can tell it’s high mist. I sit up, listening, wondering
whether my tools fell over and clattered against the side of the house—
Knock knock knock knock knock. Firm, but not desperate.
Stifling a yawn, I slip out of bed, stretch my back, and rub my eyes. “I’m coming,” I mutter,
finger-combing my hair.
The knocking begins again. I wrench open the door, ready with a sharp word if it’s Arthen, or
a soft one if Salki has sought me out.
But as I stare up into the green eyes of an utter stranger, my breath catches.
One coherent thought worms through my mind: He is not one of us.

Chapter 2

I know every soul in Emgarden, every soul of this dry and lonely world, and none compares to
the peculiar creature on my front step. He looks unlike any person I’ve ever seen. He stands tall
and lean, with skin paler than the sun should ever allow. Deep green, like the leaves of a sorghum
plant shrouded in fog, circles his pupils. His hair is even whiter than his skin, hanging long, just
past his waist, and loose, in sharp contrast with his dark, robe-like clothing, fashioned differently
than the simple tunics and trousers the rest of us wear.

“Pelnophe, let me in,” he says, his voice crisp, confident, low. Accented in a way I can’t
define.
I don’t react. My mind struggles to understand his presence, barely able to hear the demand
past the hammering pulse in my ears. And, as he pushes past me, to understand how on earth he
knows my name. Numbly, I close the door behind him, swirling tendrils of fog that seem just as
curious as I am about this stranger’s appearance. He doesn’t acquaint himself with the small
room. Indeed, he seems completely disinterested in it and merely turns to face me.
Are we not as alone as I thought? How far did this man travel to arrive here?
He’s beautiful, in a bizarre way. The way a new artifact is beautiful. Striking and wholly
other.
“I-It’s just Pell,” I try, finding my voice. I’m too shocked to be angry at the intrusion. “How
do you know my name? Who are you?”
He studies me a moment, his face hard. “You’re an engineer, and I’m in need of one.”
I come to myself suddenly, as though I’m one of Casnia’s drawings finally finished. “Excuse
me? How do you know my name and what I do?” I glance at the table, the half-intact artifact
there.
He doesn’t follow my gaze.
“I have made it my business to know,” he replies calmly.
“Who are you?”
“Are you capable or not?”
I turn his question over in my mind. “I’m a mere tinkerer.”
He nods, as though expecting as much. “A mere tinkerer in a village of farmers will do. No
one else understands the machines, and there is no one else, so I need you, Pell.”

I look him up and down again, unabashed in my appraisal. Why shouldn’t I be? This man
barged into my home. I have every right to take a good look, though that robe hides most of him.
He looks middle-aged, and yet somehow ageless.
It takes that long for a specific word of his to catch me. “What machines?” A hint of
breathlessness dilutes the question. Any machine could only come from the Ancients.
“In the tower.”
I lean back against the door. The tower. He could only mean the fortress to the northwest.
“You . . . you’re from there?”
“My companion and I, yes,” he explains. “We’ve dwelled there a short time, and”—he takes
a deep breath—“desperately need it operating again.”
Operating? It’s been a while since I last scouted out that tower, but it’s impenetrable, with
nothing of use on the outside. Five stories tall, composed of three diminutive, cylindrical tiers
and a strange something jutting at a roughly twenty-degree angle from the top tier like a pruned
tree branch.
Was it part of a machine? And that tower, it’s so large, so strong. If the Ancients stored their
tech inside, it must be in order. Far more whole than what I’ve been able to scavenge. The very
thought of beholding such a thing, let alone touching it, springs shivers down my spine. My
fingers twitch. It doesn’t seem real. None of this seems real.
There’s only Emgarden, and—
“Will you—” he begins.
“What is your name? Who are you?” I demand, desperate for clarity.
He exhales slowly. “My name is Moseus. I am one of two keepers of that tower. Will you
assist me, Pell of Emgarden? The tower must be functional again.”

The twitching intensifies. I want to scream YES, but I need more information. “Functional in
what regard? What does it do?”
Moseus’s lips press into a thin line. “That is not something I wish to discuss at this time.”
“But if you want me to—”
“You have not yet agreed,” he points out, the threatening sharpness in his tone betraying his
thinning patience.
I’m aware that I’m stubborn, but our conversation has hardly broached the limits of what I’d
consider tactful. Stepping away from the door, I ask, “How do you know what I do?” I gesture to
the table. Everyone in Emgarden knows my fascination with the Ancients’ tech, but Moseus is
not of Emgarden.
He raises a white eyebrow. “Because I have eyes and a high vantage point. Your digs are
hardly secret.”
Oh, right.
“But you are,” I point out.
Moseus runs the tip of his index finger along his chin, not at all disgruntled. “My companion
and I, we are not . . . local. We are different. It is in our best interest not to make ourselves
known, which is why I’ve come during the mists. Regardless, we need your help, and I would
prefer to escort you to the tower while the fog holds.”
Escort me to the tower. The tower. What did Maglon put in that ale? Gods and Serpent know
how long I’ve wanted to crack open its doors and peek inside.
“You’re unarmed?” I try.

Parting his arms, Moseus shows me the folds of his simple robe and turns out two simple
pockets. He shakes his sleeves. “I’ve no motivation to hurt the only person on this side of the
amaranthine wall who could possibly aid me.”
Call it instinct, or perhaps my own desperation, but I believe him. His features are hard but
not unkind. I lick my lips, playing like I’m still considering. When I can stand to pretend no
longer, I cross to my table. “Let me gather my things.”
“I have the necessary tools there,” Moseus assures me, gesturing in an almost stately manner
to the door. “Again, I beg your discretion. While the mists are high, if you would.”
Glancing back at him, I pause, and in that moment of stillness, I think I hear another high,
muted tone, echoing somewhere beyond the walls of the house. Another mystery from a world
long forgotten. As though it bids me, come.
Disregarding his reassurances, I grab my bag of tools and collect those sitting beside my
latest artifact, then sling the bag over my shoulder. “Lead on.” Though I could pick my way to
the tower with my eyes shut.
If this goes wrong, I remind myself as I step into the chill of high mist, I can defend myself
well enough. I’m small but strong, and as we walk I keep my hand clenched around my biggest
wrench, another tool that Frantess and others have suggested we melt down for farming tools.
Eventually, we might have to. Only a fool values machines over food.
But for me, now, nothing is more important than this.

***

The tower—I know it by no other name—stands in stark contrast to everything else in this
Serpent-shed world. It rises from the dusty, red-flecked earth in regal, tiered prominence, its
white stone exterior bright and tall where everything else sits dull and meager. While our endless

desert sports a number of natural rock protrusions—fins, chimneys, and the occasional
arch—this monolith is entirely man-made, and in a fashion unlike anything to which Emgarden
can aspire. From a distance its three cylindrical tiers look brilliant, nearly glowing, but nearer,
the fortress takes on a more gray hue, powdered with dust and weathered by eons. It is the only
thing left standing of Ancient make, unless the Ancients built the amaranthine wall, too. If they
did, I cannot fathom how. It’s translucent like glass but harder than any metal Arthen can forge.
Slick and . . . radiating, for a lack of a better word. There’s so much of it, horizons of it, and yet
so little to see. Thus my interest has always been in the tower.
The tower has narrow windows with half-circle tops cut right into the stone. Only a few, and
none easily accessible from the outside. Even if they were, they’re too tight for a body to pass
through. The flat ground surrounding the tower offers no vantage points.
The mists clear as we arrive. Gooseflesh rises in uneven lines up my back and down my
limbs. For a moment I wonder if Moseus truly is a keeper of this stronghold. Why have I never
seen him before? How long has he lived here? Where does he get food and water, for surely he
and his companion can’t sustain themselves within its walls? Do these promised machines
harvest what they need from the ground, or do they only venture out when the mists are heaviest,
forever hiding from the rest of us?
The questions roll around my tongue with a sharp flavor. Moseus approaches the tower’s two
south-facing doors—the only entrance to the fortress. With a heavy iron key, he unlocks the one
on the right, and with his narrow shoulder, he shoves.
The heavy door loathes opening, creaking on what must be magnificent hinges, scraping the
stone floor. Stepping beside him, I press my palms to the door and push, and it opens onto a dim
chamber. Shifting inside, I blink rapidly, eager for my eyes to adjust. The only light streams from

the second-story windows and trickles down a spiraling stone stairway just off-center, with no
supporting walls or railing, as though it was built in a hurry. In front of that are two support
pillars, equally spaced, and not ornate in any way. I glimpse the edge of another pillar behind the
stairs as I enter, my careful footsteps echoing in the quiet room. The cool air stirs thickly, so
heavy with dust, oil, and mildew that I can taste it in the back of my throat.
Like the exterior, off-white stone comprises the entirety of the interior, expertly cut but
without decoration or polish. The stone gives it a cold feeling, both in aesthetic and temperature,
and—
Thought evaporates. My body freezes and my lips part as a metallic glimmer to the left snags
my attention.
It’s . . . it’s a machine. The largest I’ve ever seen.
An elongated mew escapes my mouth, but awe overpowers embarrassment as I run to it,
echoes turning my quick footfalls into applause. “Serpent save me,” I whisper as I touch the
machine that stands easily twice my height and ten times my width. I instantly recognize the
Ancients’ handiwork in the intricate loops and coils that coat the exterior like lace. The metal
appears to be primarily steel and . . . and some sort of alloy I can’t name. Peering within, I see a
few bronze pieces as well, and immediately I notice slipped bearings, as well as snapped
fasteners and spines. Walking slowly around the behemoth, I spy sprockets and gears out of place
and belts and chains come loose. There’s a beam deep inside, or maybe an axle of some sort, and
multiple wiring assemblies that will take me suns and suns to sort out. Like someone pieced it
together for decoration only.
“It’s broken,” I murmur. Very broken. But I’ve yet to uncover anything from that era that
isn’t.

“Can you fix it?” Moseus’s low voice hums behind me. “I’ve already done what I can, but as
you can see, it isn’t enough.”
Backing away, I take in the whole machine once more. “I . . . I can try.” I notice a set of
screws, the metal of which doesn’t match the rest. I run my hand over them. “It looks like you’ve
done a good job. I’m not sure my expertise is any greater than yours.”
“Guesswork only.” He sighs. “I must implore you to try. Surely there is something we can
compensate you with. Labor, knowledge, metal—”
I spin around. “Metal?”
He studies me for a few seconds before speaking. “There is surplus in this tower outside the
machines we’ve found that is not necessary to the tower’s operation. I saw your . . . tinkering . . .
at your home. Would these scraps interest you?”
My mouth gapes. “How . . . how much do you have?”
He cocks a pale eyebrow. “Plenty.”
I find myself nodding even as my brain warns me to barter a little more. For dignity’s sake.
“My town needs metal desperately. I’ll take anything you can give me.” A chance to learn
Ancient tech and help Emgarden? I can hardly comprehend it.
“I will see it done. But only in return for your success.”
I glance back to the machine. “Successes. This is a mess. Any improvement should be
rewarded. And . . . you said there were other machines?”
“Three that we’ve found.” Moseus tucks his hands into his robe and walks toward the stairs.
“We’ve been unable to reach the others. The top two stories of the tower are inaccessible, as you
will see.”

I stare at a spot between his shoulder blades as we ascend. Inaccessible? Who builds a
fortress and then makes almost half half of it unusable? And wouldn’t it be better to make the
bottom more stalwart, to stand against an army? But what army would wander out here to attack
this citadel? It’s defending nothing. There’s nothing to defend except, perhaps, the machines
themselves. All of Emgarden couldn’t penetrate this tower.
We reach the second floor, which has windows, which means light. A second machine sits to
my left, almost exactly over Machine One. Whistling, I approach it. At first glance, it looks
identical to the one on the first floor, but studying it closer, I see that’s not the case. Machine One
has a delicate feel to it, intricate like lace. This second machine looks intricate as well, but it
seems . . . I don’t know, heavy. Its casings and coils are thick and robust, and more of the
machine takes on that familiar bronze color I’ve come to associate with the Ancients’ tech,
though this is another unfamiliar alloy. Already I can see where some plates should connect but
don’t, an easy fix. There’s a notable pulley system here as well, though gods know how I’m
going to access it.
“There’s a third upstairs,” Moseus says. I turn to glance at him, then notice part of the ceiling
that’s been cut away to access the third floor. “Cut away” is putting it kindly; it looks like it was
hammered, chiseled, and clawed open. A ladder leans against the wall nearby. I walk toward the
rough unevenness of the hole and peer upward. Above is well lit, but I can only see a ceiling.
“And you . . . can’t do that for the other floors?” I gesture to the malformed hole.
The sharp lines of the stonework soften as the tower quivers in a gentle earthquake. I steady
myself on the stout stone wall. The quake passes, leaving everything still and unscathed.
“No.” Moseus glances out the nearest window. “We have tried.”

I move to the ladder, but then I spot a large lantern beside it. Changing my mind, I grasp it,
light it, and take it back downstairs. I approach Machine One again, holding the lantern high,
peering between the expertly cast loops. When I hear Moseus’s footsteps behind me, I say, “I’m
going to need more light. And a stool.”
“We have them.”
“And those tools you promised.” I walk around the machine, squeezing past where it nearly
meets the wall, and press the lantern to the exterior, squinting at the gears within. “I can start
now, if you’d like.”
“Yes, thank you. The sooner these are functional, the better.”
I turn to reply, but over Moseus’s shoulder I spy a third person standing on the stairs. For a
moment I think I’m seeing double, but no, these two are different. The newcomer radiates
strangeness in precisely the way Moseus does—pale skin, long white hair, odd clothing—but his
hair is loosely fastened in a braid, with another network of braids worked into it that reminds me
of the machine at my side. His clothes are a mix of brown and deep green, mostly leather and a
softer fabric similar to what Moseus wears. His face is broader than Moseus’s, as are his
shoulders, though his countenance is . . . hard. Stony as the tower itself.
He shifts, and light from the second floor hits his face. Like Moseus, he has green eyes, but
they’re bright, nearly acidic in both color and expression. He is bizarre and other and I can’t take
my eyes off him. The need to take a closer look, to prod at him like I have at this machine,
overwhelms and confuses me. A sharp breath brings my thoughts back into focus.
I meet those eyes, and the ensuing tension drives back the chill of the room and kills my
captivation. I can’t really place it—that glare is the look of an enemy, a victim, and a skeptic all
at once. It’s both accusatory and . . . I want to say hurt, but he really isn’t close enough for me to

know. He might just have one of those faces. I certainly do. Still, the discomfort undulates,
smelling like cool, moist clay.
Moseus cracks my mental poetry. “This is my companion, Heartwood. Heartwood, this is
Pell.”
Unsure what else to do, I tip my head in greeting. Heartwood merely turns and takes the
stairs up, and I wonder how much of that four-second exchange was in my head. Unlike mine,
Heartwood’s footsteps don’t echo. Like he’s a ghost and nothing more.
“Charming,” I mutter, resisting the urge to rub the lingering discomfort from my sternum. “Is
he your brother?”
A sardonic half smile pulls on Moseus’s mouth. “Only in purpose. The resemblance is
happenstance. It’s . . . common, among our people.”
Our people. So there are others like them. It makes sense; I doubt the World Serpent just spat
up two quasi clones after building this world. I try to imagine an entire village of Moseuses and
Heartwoods, but my mind can’t conjure it.
“Interesting name.” I glance back to the machine, wondering where I should start.
“We are named for our animus,” Moseus supplies. When I cock my head, he adds, “Our
intendment. Our . . . initial purposes.”
“Heartwood,” I reply. His name weighs oddly heavy on my tongue. “That’s like a tree thing,
yes?” There aren’t many trees around here, and the ones we have are short and bristly. Just like
you, Arthen once said with a laugh, before I poured his ale into his stew.
Moseus nods.
“And what does yours mean?”
His lip ticks upward, a little more sincerely this time. “I am a peacekeeper.”

“Okay, then.” I set the lantern down, face the machine, and plant my hands on my hips.
“Trees and peacekeeping. Got it.”
No wonder they haven’t been able to fix these things on their own.

***

Figuring out where to start proves my biggest challenge. Moseus fetches a small but impressive
toolkit and watches me for a few minutes before blessedly retreating. I’m not used to being
watched while I work. Not when I tinker, and not when I dig. Filling myself with a deep breath, I
circle Machine One a few more times, turning sideways to push through where it nearly kisses
the wall. Something tells me I don’t want to go upstairs, where the bone-chilling Heartwood
lingers. Not a fair assumption, maybe, but he wasn’t exactly thrilled to see me.
Fix your own damned machines, then. But I don’t mean it. I’m twitching again, desperate to
get my hands on this mess, eager to understand how it works. There’s just so much of it.
I decide to start on the southwest side. I prop open one of the heavy outer tower doors with a
stone and find a convenient hook on the wall to hang one lantern. The other one that Moseus
retrieved for me flickers on the floor. I notice some shieldings here—long, slightly curved bars of
metal protecting the machine’s guts—that have been loosened and pushed aside, likely by
Moseus’s hand. It’s a good hunch; this area looks a little more accessible than the others.
I carefully turn hidden screws and loosen fasteners to move some of the shieldings and
spines, then take an hour just familiarizing myself with the exquisite monstrosity of this machine.
A gentle hum builds in my mind, luring me like a bewitching lullaby. I follow cables and test
gears, marking on a slate which direction they turn, though most seem to twist both ways.
Interesting. What did Moseus say this thing was supposed to do, again? Does he even know?

I pull the floor lantern closer, balancing it on a small beam, and run my index finger over a
faint engraving on one of the bars. A simple symbol, but an intentional one. I’ve found them on
about half the artifacts I’ve uncovered, though not this particular design. It’s a half circle, flat
side down, with a bottomless triangle cutting upward through its curve. At first I thought the
markings labeled parts, but after seeing similar symbols on different pieces, I’ve determined it’s
some sort of Ancient signature. A way that the men and women of old said This is mine.
I’m halfway inside Machine One when footsteps approach. I peer back out, past the coils of a
spring, to make out Moseus’s robes. It’s not until I shimmy free that I notice the dimming light
outside. Have I been working so long already?
“You will return?” he asks.
Pulling a rag from my pocket, I wipe my hands. “Yeah, definitely.” Then I remember. “The
metal?”
“On your first success, as agreed. And I have a few requests before you go.” Moseus frowns
at the stone propping the tower door ajar.
“I’m listening.”
“First”—he holds up a finger—“do not do that again.” He points to the door.
Stifling a sigh, I nod.
“Second, do not take anything that isn’t explicitly given to you.”
Leaning my weight on one foot, I answer, “No stealing, got it.”
“Third, do not discuss your work with anyone outside the tower.”
I hold back a frown. “But—”
“Surely you see the value of these things.” He makes a broad gesture to Machine One.
“Please understand. It is my duty to keep this place, and my people, safe.”

A whole two people, I think, but bite it back. “No one in Emgarden is a thief.”
Moseus says nothing at all, only waits.
A sigh pushes past my teeth. “Fine. But I can’t help if someone asks where I’m going.”
“Which brings me to my fourth request,” he replies. “Only come and go in the mists.”
A sinking feeling, almost like hunger, lines my stomach, but I don’t understand it. If he’s
worried about thieves or dangerous people, it makes sense to mask my comings and goings. It
makes sense to avoid questions. And yet the request—more of a rule—sits uncomfortably. It’s
hard to see in the mists, yes, but not impossible. Not dangerous. Scorpions claim the spot as
Tampere’s biggest predator, and they’re delicious. Yet something feels . . . off.
Then I remember that I haven’t really slept for a few cycles.
“They’ll ask where the metal comes from,” I point out.
Moseus mulls over this, his lips rolling tightly together. “True. But try, and reflect on my
third request.”
Don’t discuss the work. “You give in so easily?”
He tips his head. “I am a peacekeeper.”
I blow hair out of my eyes. “Okay. Anything else?”
“Fifth,” Moseus says, and I try not to roll my eyes. I won’t squander this enormous
opportunity. “Give me regular reports of your progress.”
“Oh.” I relax. “Can do. So far I’ve done mostly diagnostics.”
“Thank you.” Glancing at the door, he says, “You may go.”
I retrieve my personal tools—I only used one of them—and reach into the machine to grab
my smallest wrench, which measures just longer than my index finger. As I pull away, however,

my head spins. I blink, and I see the machine in pieces at my feet, strewn across the stone floor,
sprockets and gears and coils, bent and misshapen and—
And . . . then it’s just as it was before. A broken but intact machine, standing twice my height
before me, alloy pieces shimmering in the lantern light.
I . . .
I really need to sleep.
“First sun,” I offer, pocketing the wrench and backing away from the machine, ignoring the
uneasy squirming in my stomach.
“First sun,” Moseus agrees.
And then I depart, into the mists. ...