3. The Machine Tree (Patreon)

Author's Note: I've decided to move the publish date to Royal Road up. As a result, I'm releasing a chapter on Patreon early. There'll be another on Saturday.

-----

By the third day, Hallon’s convinced that Milo Rabbit is insensitive to the spirit world. As a test, she sends a small magic wafting towards the house—a compulsion to sneeze—and he does, but then goes back to tinkering with the mechanical tree in his parlor. He’s not suspicious at all, and doesn’t even react when Eratosthenes, in the full glory of his dragon shape, looks through the parlor window.

No one’s that good an actor. Not when you have a reptile’s head, a mane of black feathers, and powerful lion’s body occupying your front yard. Blind to the dragon’s spirit outside his window, Milo continues adjusting a control panel in the mechanical tree’s side. All the boy does is work and work and work. He doesn’t even sleep, except for one or two hours a night.

Seems to me he’s ripe for a sleep binding, Hallon says.

Eratosthenes snickers. Lost your patience, have you?

Not at all. It’s just time.

I was just thinking the same thing. Eratosthenes grins and transforms into his human shape. He slicks back his hair and tugs on his sleeves to make sure they’re even before entering the house. The air inside is dense with energy, and he gathers some in his hands to shape into a spell to put the boy to sleep.

Milo yawns. “But I’m not ready,” he says, a wrench falling from his hand. He slides to the ground.

Eratosthenes leans in. The spirit lines in his head are interesting.

But the rest of him is a mess, Hallon says, sharing the dragon’s eyes. It’s likely he barely recognizes his own body.

The mechanical tree is much more impressive than its inventor. A ball of electrical fire sits at its center, fed by the nearby broadcast towers. Complicated lines of energy branch up and root down, although they don’t go deep enough to touch the reservoir under the house. The scar in the universe’s boundary is in the center of the tree, next to its power source.

Hallon licks her lips. I’m joining you inside.

Eratosthenes doesn’t mock her, just sends a vague acknowledgment. He’s already immersed in studying the interplay of energies.

Hallon runs down to the house with her lock picks in hand, but they’re not needed. The front door is unlocked. Inside, it smells like lightning, and there’s a thrum just under her hearing. The foyer’s simply furnished with a stairway leading up and open archways to the kitchen and the parlor. Steadying herself, Hallon opens to the sight. Thin gold lines cover the walls in patterns too dense to pick apart. The air hums with power, and she wonders if this is what it feels like inside a beehive.

Wow.

Eratosthenes winks at her. It’s good, eh?

It’s intoxicating.

Don’t get too caught up, Eratosthenes says. Remember why we’re here.

Ha! I could say the same to you. Hallon feels him grin in response.

The mechanical tree fills the parlor, its branches extending across the ceiling and root-cables spreading across the floor. The cables connect to a platform just big enough for a woman to stand on. Tools and other devices are organized neatly on pegs on the wall. Only the wrench that had fallen from Milo’s hand is out of place.

Taking a closer look, she sees that his is the kind of face you have to grow into, and he hasn’t yet—not with that generous nose and those cheekbones. His hair is black and cut short. His trousers, white shirt, and vest are twenty years out of fashion. Thin wire spectacles sit askew on his face, and a drop of saliva hangs from his sleeping mouth. According to the reporter at the Sacramento Bee, his father was Arabic and his mother German. They sounded like an unlikely pair, but then, the lure of gold brought all kinds of people to California.

Eratosthenes pulls on Hallon’s attention, and she lets him combine their senses. The physical realm disappears, and everything turns to light and heat and cold and dark—a chaotic jumble of forces and connections defying human comprehension. Normally, Eratosthenes filters what he sees for her so that his sight is comprehensible, but this is the universe through the dragon’s unfiltered senses, and Hallon finds herself surrounded by the pull of thought, luck, and karma. She feels the room, the world, all of existence trying to cram itself into her mind.

Woah. Woah. Easy there.

Sorry, he says. Got carried away.

The light fades, except for the tree. She sees it pulse, and with every pulse, the ball of electrical fire at its center compresses and tries to pass through the scar, wearing at it.

The tree’s doing our work for us, Eratosthenes says. Coincidence, guidance, synchronicity? We keep adding on mysteries and not solving any.

The tree's not having much effect though. Hallon watches the process. At this rate, it’d take a century or two to break through. We don’t have that kind of time.

Agreed, Eratosthenes says.

Hallon raises her hands. Let's see if I can speed things up. She extends her will and pushes against the scar. Nothing happens. She might as well be pushing at a mountain.

Eratosthenes raises an eyebrow. You’ll need more than that.

Hallon nods and opens the spirit center inside her called the Gate of the Sun Horse. The spirit fire rises and licks up her spine, raising goosebumps all over her body. To anyone with the sight, she ignites and burns like a bonfire, engulfed in orange and red flames. She wills the fire through her arms and onto the scar. The mechanical tree shivers with the impact. Its branches rustle.

Eratosthenes tilts his head, observing. Nothing.

The spirit fire flowing through Hallon doubles and sweat breaks on her forehead. The tools on the floor stir. Milo Rabbit kicks as if he’s in the middle of a nightmare.

Still nothing.

Do I need to bring the fire into the material world? Hallon asks.

Eratosthenes shakes his head. It’s not materialization that’s the issue, but intensity. You’d need to multiply the effects a thousandfold to have an impact.

Hallon reins in the flames, banking the fire safely. But where would we get that kind of energy?

She and Eratosthenes look down, through the earth, at the reservoir under them.

How convenient, Eratosthenes says. And it occurs to me that we have a tree here and the Green Witch on our side.

Oh, that’s an interesting thought.

Isn’t it? Eratosthenes taps his chin. What would you bet that she’ll be able to influence the tree, even though it’s a machine?

I won’t take that bet. Hmm… her power over the Green, my fire, and you to direct the conjured forces. The magical patterns unfold, shared between their joined minds. It could work, assuming the Green cooperates.

We could use sympathetic magic on the tree, Eratosthenes says.

Ah, good point. Contact Mary and let her know we need to meet.

Eratosthenes is a step ahead. Already done. She says she can be here tomorrow.

Hallon frowns. Her preference is to start sooner than later. So, we wait?

We wait. And train. Eratosthenes gives her a disapproving look. I noticed the spirit lines around your kidneys were stressed when you held the fire. You’ve been eating too many salty foods.

Ugh. Okay. Hallon takes one last look around the workroom before heading for the door.

The sleep binding on Milo Rabbit will dissolve on its own.

###

Mary walks a circle thrice. The first time is happenstance, and she greets the green things around the campsite—the trees and bushes, the flowers and grasses, the mushrooms and lichen. The second circle is coincidence, and she asks them for their help in anchoring her spirit to this world. The third circle is intention, and a green light surrounds her when the compact is complete.

She feels the slow, steady flow of life and sighs. The longest she’s traveled before is six hours. This time, she’s come to the place called Lake Tahoe, and Eratosthenes has asked her to stay for two days. He sits at the crook of two fallen pine trees, together with Hallon, and watches the spell’s conclusion.

Steady on, old girl, Mary tells herself. Don’t let the dragon faze you. She finds a seat opposite the two immortals and asks, “What did you find in the house?”

The vervain brings Mary her new scrying bowl. The old one is buried behind the cottage back home. The vision of the Calamity had damaged it, and she gave it to the earth to heal.

Hallon gestures, and a machine in the shape of a tree appears in the water. Eratosthenes takes over to explain—calmly—their plan to burst through a weak point in this universe to send Hallon—physically—hurtling through to another. Hopefully the one with Dawrtaine in it, but if not there, then an intermediary. They have no plan on how she might return other than to improvise based on what’s found on the other side.

Mary sits back and tries to not show her shock. She is the Green Witch, one of the Eight and a member of the World Coven. She’s a figure of some note on her world and survived more than her fair share of scrapes. The problem is that, at forty-two, she’s the youngest and least experienced person here. By far.

Eratosthenes is at least two thousand years old according to the witches’ lore back home. A dragon with the ability to manipulate the forces underlying the spirit realm, he’d traveled to their universe several times to exchange knowledge of the magical sciences. The ritual she’d just completed is based on those early conversations, and Mary was well aware of the dragon observing her during the construction of the spell. No doubt, he was comparing her technique against those early witches.

As for Hallon Nilsdotter, the lore is silent. She’s at least several hundred years old though. A native of this universe, she’s been acting as Mary’s local guide. Where Eratosthenes is a master of universal forces, Hallon has specialized in opening and refining the spirit centers in her body. Mary wonders if Hallon can even be considered human anymore after several lifetimes’ worth of spirit body manipulation.

Both Eratosthenes and Hallon are formidable alone, but put them together and they’re bolder than what’s sane. And yet—bold as they are, neither of them are fools. They have the power and expertise to back up what they say.

Mary takes a breath to settle her thoughts. Would a machine in the shape of  tree respond to her calling? They seem to think so. And they’re confident in their ability to tap into the ridiculously large pool of energy under the Rabbit’s house.

“I’ll want to talk to the tree,” Mary says. “Assuming it can talk.”

“Of course,” Eratosthenes says.

“What does it do, this mechanical tree?”

“We don’t know,” Hallon says. “The boy mutters to himself, but none of what he says makes sense.”

Mary frowns. “Then what about our defenses? What will we need for the ritual?”

“All the shadows are clustered around Tahoe City,” Hallon says. “We’ll prepare defenses, but I’m not sure we’ll need them.”

“And the timing?”

“Hallon wants to go tonight,” Eratosthenes says, “but tomorrow would be best. There’ll be a full moon then, and we can use the extra energy.”

“What about the boy?”

“A sleep binding,” Hallon says, “to keep him out of the way while we work.”

Mary frowned. “The traveler at Lough Gur said that he was needed.”

Eratosthenes and Hallon look at each other.

“Here’s where we disagree,” Hallon says. “I believe he’s here as a sign and to prepare the way, and that’s all.”

“And I believe that there’s a role for him to play,” Eratosthenes says. “What do you think?”

Mary flashes back to the day she’d tested for the position of Green Witch. The World Coven had looked at her with the same eyes as Eratosthenes does now, curious and wondering at how she’ll perform. She clears her throat. “I’d prefer to be cautious—the traveler said that Dawrtaine needs both Hallon and him.”

“I just don’t see how he’s going to be useful,” Hallon says. She gestures, and the scrying bowl shows Milo Rabbit staring up at the branches of his mechanical tree while eating a slice of toast with jam on it. The jam’s gotten on his nose, but he doesn’t notice. “He’s so wibbly wobbly.”

“We don’t know what we don’t know,” Mary says, “and that includes how helpful he’ll be in the future.”

Hallon sighs, frustrated. “So we kidnap him and send him to another universe? Because he’s not going to agree to come willingly. He’s going to think we’re insane. That I’m insane. He won’t be able to see the two of you.”

“You’ll have to convince him,” Eratosthenes says.

“Right, because that always works,” Hallon says.

“What else can we do?” Mary asks.

“That’s the rub, isn’t it?” Hallon looks to Eratosthenes. “How sure are you?”

“I’d bet on it,” Eratosthenes says.

“Well, that’s that then.” Hallon shakes her head. “We take him, and the gods have mercy on us for it.”

###

The next morning, Hallon runs back to South Tahoe to check out of the hotel and add to her supplies. Her kit now includes a second canvas pack meant for Milo, additional bedroll and blankets, tent, rope, hatchet, small spade, fishing line and hooks, and two weeks of travel bread and preserved foods. She buries her luggage in the woods, and the rest of the day is spent building the necessary magics. They work individually and together until the moon rises over the eastern peaks. The sun in the west is just starting to set.

“The timing smells right,” Eratosthenes says. Only those who know him well would recognize the tension around his eyes.

“A full moon and twilight… now would be the time,” Mary says. She sparkles as if surrounded by green fireflies.

Hallon nods and checks the spirit lines in her body one last time. They’ve been reinforced to handle the power that’ll be flowing through them. She’s wearing pants and a shirt made from good thick cloth, sturdy boots, and an oiled long coat. Tonight, she is the tip of their spear, and she’s as ready as can be. “Let’s go.”

The front door is still unlocked, and they find Milo working on the tree as usual. There’s a pair of goggles on top of his head and grease smeared on his left cheek. His tools are organized around him in a circle.

Hallon has the sleep binding prepared, but first she has some questions. “Hey.”

Milo fiddles with the controls. “Maybe the oscillation overthruster?”

“I said hello.”

Milo runs a hand through his hair. “Getting tired. Hearing things. Sleep? Not yet. Not due for seventeen minutes. Food? Yes. Tea.” He gets up in a daze and walks towards the archway and straight into Hallon. “Ah, excuse me, sorry, didn’t see you.” He walks around her as if she were a lamp post and goes into the kitchen.

This is not how Hallon expected their first encounter to go.

“He does seem preoccupied,” Mary says.

“Well, no use wasting time,” Hallon says. “You two get started while I talk to him.”

“Right,” Eratosthenes says, approaching the tree. “We’ll let you know when we’re ready.”

Milo comes back carrying a tray. There’s a steaming tea pot and two cups, sugar, and milk. He sets the tray between two parlor chairs and sits to pour himself a cup. He looks towards Hallon. “Sit.”

He fixes his tea with too much sugar and a dash of milk. When he’s done, he gestures to Hallon to pour herself a cup. And well, why not? Hallon shrugs and takes a seat. She adds just a little sugar and milk to hers.

Milo’s hand rises, and he takes a sip. Then again ten seconds later, and ten seconds after that. The motion is steady and regular. Is he an automaton? But no, they’d looked at his spirit lines. He’s definitely human.

“The tea’s good,” Hallon says into the silence.

“Yes, it is,” Milo says. “Would you like me to get you some?”

“I already have a cup,” Hallon says, showing him the cup in her hands.

“It’s from Assam,” he says. “Near—”

“Ah, Assam. I know—”

“Eastern Bengal and Bhutan,” Milo says. He sips from his cup and stares into the middle space between them. The conversation falters.

“I don’t know your name,” he says unexpectedly.

“It’s Hallon. Hallon Nilsdotter.”

“And the reason for your visit?” Milo asks.

“I suppose you could say that I’m passing through. Well, it’s more complicated than that.” Hallon puts down her cup. “It’s about your machine tree.”

“The Matter Transmission Engine,” he says.

“Really? Is that what it does?” For a moment, Hallon’s curiosity gets the better of her. “How’s it work?”

“The Engine—” Milo freezes, the rest of his words forgotten.

Hallon wonders if he’s somehow fallen asleep with his eyes open. She’s seen soldiers do it, why not a boy genius? She waits for a handful of breaths and is just about to join Eratosthenes at the tree when Milo recovers. The distracted look that’s been on his face goes away, replaced by an liveliness that wasn’t there before.

“Hold on, who’s asking—” Milo’s eyes dart around the room and lock onto Hallon. “Who are you and what are you doing in my house?”

“I thought I explained. I’m—”

“No wait, I have it,” Milo says. “Nilsdotter. I don’t know any Nilsdotters.”

“I’m—”

“Passing through,” Milo says. “I heard you, but that doesn’t tell me who you are and why you’re curious about my work.”

“Well, that’s—”

“Complicated, yes, but surely not so complicated that you can’t explain.” His eyes narrow when he sees the backpacks loaded with gear. “You’re a spy, aren’t you? The Department of Science sent you to check on me.”

“A what? No! I mean, I do have a habit of poking my nose into other people’s business, but that doesn’t make me a spy.”

“Of course you’d say that. I’m sure that’s the first thing they teach at spy school.” Milo sneers. “Well, you can tell your friends at the DoS not to worry. I’ll keep my promise.”

“So you’re—”

“Not working on time travel.” Milo nods to himself. “I’ve decided to pursue an alternative branch of aetherial physics—matter transmission.”

“Really? That’s amazing. Can you tell me about it?” Hallon asks.

“No.”

Watching Milo—this version, not the blank-faced automaton—is like watching the wind turn on itself. As worked up as he is right now, Hallon’s not sure a sleep binding would hold. She’ll need to calm him down.

“If I’m a spy,” Hallon says, “which I’m not saying I am, but if I were—then wouldn’t it be better to explain what’s going on? Then you wouldn’t be in trouble, right?”

“That—” Milo realizes that he has a tea cup in hand and takes a sip. “That does make sense.”

“So you’ll tell me about your invention?”

He nods. “It all started with Professor Henry Applegate. It occurred to me that he may be right about his theories on the shape and structure of space. Stahlman only mentions him as a cautionary tale on what not to publish, but I wasn’t so sure. Have you ever read his work? Applegate, not Stahlman. Everyone’s read Stahlman.”

“No, I haven’t.”

“That’s all right. It’s just as well. About Applegate, I mean. Most people think he’s mad.” Milo suddenly changes tack. “Once I finish the Engine, it’ll revolutionize transportation. Ships and dirigibles, cars and trains—who’ll need them when you can teleport instantly from one place to another?”

“That’s a lot of people who’ll have to find new work,” Hallon says, thinking of the curly-haired porter.

“Then they should come up with their own invention,” Milo says. “This one’s mine, and it’s going to make me famous.”

“And why is it a tree?”

“The shape’s irrelevant,” Milo says. “My parents believed that one’s work should be beautiful as well as functional. I agree with them.”

“So how does this Engine work?”

Milo’s eyes go wary. “You wouldn’t understand.”

“Well then, is it safe?”

He frowns. “Almost.”

“How can something be almost safe?”

Milo stands to retrieve a tin box filled with a gray sludge. “I’ve been able to get things to disappear and reappear, but the molecules scramble in the process. This was a statue of a man carrying a basket.”

“I’m sorry to tell you, but that’s not very safe at all.”

“Do you think so?” Milo frowns, looking inward. A moment passes and then another, with the boy standing in front of Hallon holding the box. “The problem,” he mutters, the distracted look back on his face, “is bridging the gap between energy states.”

“Ah, hey, hello? Are you all right?”

“Why, yes. Thank you for asking. I could use some sleep though. I’m overdue—” The words trail as Milo nods off.

Hallon has to jump up to catch him and help him into his chair. She hadn’t needed the sleep binding after all. He’d done all the work himself.

Eratosthenes?

Yes?

Is what we’re doing safe?

Not in the slightest.

That’s what I thought.

###

Milo’s Engine is impressive in the way that a bear is. From a distance, you sense the strength in its ungainly body, but up close, that strength is frighteningly real. There’s a solidity to the machine that goes past the purely physical. Hallon’s fingers tingle when they brush against it. The hairs on the back of her neck rise.

“We’re ready for you,” Eratosthenes says.

“All right, let’s do this,” Hallon says, opening to the sight.

Flowering vines surround the room, covering every surface. They’ve circled the mechanical tree’s trunk and woven themselves around its branches. When the Green Witch lifts her staff, the vines help the tree move in response.

Inside the trunk, the electrical fire burns with golden flames thanks to Eratosthenes’s alchemical tinkering. Its pulsing is slow and deep, resonating with the dragon’s thoughts.

Hallon takes a breath to settle her mind and calm her emotions. She drops down into her Place of Power. An image arises in her mind’s eye of a forest at the edge of a cliff. The sea crashes and gulls call to each other just below. Floating in a circle in front of Hallon are twelve objects representing her power—pieces of stone and wood, bone and flowers, a small leather pouch, a wooden flute, a small carving of a horse pulling the sun. Each has been carefully cultivated over the six hundred years of her life.

She nestles an oak staff in the crook of her arm. She touches a piece of quartz. She touches a piece of obsidian. She touches a length of charred bone. She touches the Sun Horse.

Back in Milo’s parlor, Hallon burns—a wick, a torch, a bonfire, a star. She passes the spirit fire on to the tree, and it ignites like lit phosphor. The fire eats its way into the tree’s heart and descends through the trunk down into the roots. Mary’s vines dig into earth, and the fire travels with them. All of Hallon’s will focuses on holding the fire and moving it down the pathways made by Eratosthenes and Mary.

You’re doing well. The thought comes from Eratosthenes.

How’s Mary?

She’s holding.

They must dig over two hundred feet under the Rabbit’s house. At half way, Eratosthenes strengthens his connection to Hallon, and the fire grows brighter. She drops to her knees to better concentrate her attention on the spirit realm.

At a hundred and fifty feet, Mary says, “I’m at my limit.”

Hallon shudders. Her consciousness is stretched along the magical structure they’re building. All the world’s been reduced to holding and holding and holding her share of the magics they’ve conjured.

Eratosthenes says, “We’ll begin the second stage.”

Hallon starts her incantation, the old Swedish still familiar after all these years. Eratosthenes gathers the words and shapes them into more stable structures, bracing the vines so that they can continue their digging.

“Ready,” the Green Witch says, her voice thin.

Hallon shivers. Her body flashes hot, icy, hot. Her spirit threatens to come loose from her body, but Eratosthenes reaches through their connection and grounds her, draining away the excess energy.

“Easy now,” he says.

“The vines are burning,” Mary says.

“Their ashes will show the way,” Eratosthenes says. “We honor their sacrifice.”

“We honor their sacrifice,” Mary says, completing the connection between the vines’ ashes and the fire.

“We’re almost there,” Eratosthenes says.

A spirit moves behind Hallon. “I must’ve dozed off.” Milo’s voice sounds like it comes from far away. “Do you want more tea?”

The tree’s branches tremble. Electricity arcs along their length. The metal body keens, the sound morphing into something impossible to hear. Hallon tastes the color yellow.

“The engine! Did you tamper with the engine?”

Hallon feels Milo’s hands on her shoulders. She has enough control to keep the contact from destroying his mind. As it is, he’s thrown by the magics into the parlor chairs.

Motion in the room. Him standing up. “What did you do? It’s running wild! We have to shut the engine down!”

The fire connects to the reservoir of energy under the house. Hallon’s vision goes white. Her thoughts blank. The energy wants to explode out in a thousand directions, but she grits her teeth and doesn’t let go. The pathways they’d built hold, and the energy rises, brighter even than the fire. The connection is made.

Space rends, and gravity loses its grip. Hallon, Milo, the tools and equipment, the parlor chairs—all hover in space. A vortex builds. The room’s walls distend. The tree’s roots dangle. The air throbs. All sound is muffled. The scar burns away, and the boundary between universes parts.

Hallon reaches out to grab onto the boy. She holds on with all her might before they’re thrown into oblivion.