The eastern crossing should have been a short walk from the market. It took Khepri twice as long because everyone heading in the opposite direction insisted on stopping to tell him what had happened.
The platform had snapped its cable. No, the winch had exploded. Someone had tried to lift a loaded cart with the passenger platform, which was a terrible idea even by Khepri’s standards.
By the time he reached the river, he had heard four versions of the accident and trusted none of them. Farmers used this crossing every day to carry harvests from the upper terraces; Khepri had never given much thought to how thoroughly the community depended on its machinery until it stood silent.
A narrow channel cut through the terraced hills, carrying water towards the fields below. Over it hung a timber platform suspended from two heavy cables. One end connected to a winch beneath a roofed shelter on the upper bank. The platform had stopped partway down, far beyond reach of the nearest bridge.
A man lay on its boards beneath a folded cloth. Two companions crouched beside him, one holding his hand. The other called down to the crowd, demanding to know when they could be lowered.
Khepri inspected the crooked drum before looking up at the stranded platform.
The drum that wound the main cable sat crooked in its housing. Broken iron teeth glittered among the splinters at its base. Workers had gathered around it, arguing over a bent bar.
He ducked beneath somebody’s arm.
“Excuse me.”
The man did not move.
“Has anyone checked the secondary brake?” Khepri asked, slipping through.
Aunt Sẹ́ni stood near the damaged housing with an older workman and a village official. She did not look surprised to see him.
“How is the farmer?” Khepri asked.
“He needs a physician, and he needs one soon,” she answered. “We can do little for him while he’s suspended there.”
“What happened to the winch?”
“A retaining mechanism failed. Someone attempted to force the drum backward.”
The older workman winced at that last detail.
Khepri crouched by the housing. Three locking teeth were gone. Worse, the wood holding the secondary brake had split. The drum had slipped slightly to one side, leaving the whole assembly bearing a load it had never been designed to carry at that angle.
“Who used the lever?”
A worker lifted one hand.
“With the cable under tension?”
“We needed to move the platform.”
“And now you have a damaged mechanism and a bent lever.”
The worker scowled. “Can you fix it or not?”
“Possibly. First we brace the housing. Then I can check the teeth.”
Sẹ́ni gave him a warning look.
Khepri exhaled. “Sorry.”
He walked around the housing, looking from the cable to the auxiliary line and back to the platform. Both cables were intact; that, at least, was encouraging. A pile of iron supports leaned against the storage shed, and a cart nearby sat with its wheels chocked by heavy wooden wedges.
He pointed.
“Those braces. And the wedges.”
The official followed his finger. “Why the wedges?”
“The drum is shifting. We need to hold it steady before anyone touches the brake.”
“They’re holding the cart.”
“Then keep the cart secure and find equivalent wedges.”
A few of the workers muttered, but the older workman called for the materials and began inspecting them.
Khepri stepped forward to take a brace. Sẹ́ni put a hand on his shoulder.
“You direct. They lift.”
“I can carry a piece of iron.”
“I know. And I examined your Chi circulation earlier today.”
“I wasn’t proposing to lift it with Chi.”
“Then you won’t mind giving somebody else the job.”
Her tone ended the argument.
The braces went beneath the damaged housing. Two workers fixed wedges at the base, and the older man checked each support by hand before allowing anyone to approach the brake. Khepri knelt beside the missing teeth and opened his satchel.
He still had a little compatible iron from his earlier experiments.
A very little.
Chi stirred along his fingers. The pieces broke apart into fine metallic fragments and rose above his palm. He guided the motes towards the damaged mechanism, gathering them into the shape of three replacement teeth.
Assembly was not simply a matter of wishing broken things whole. Khepri needed to know exactly how the pieces should fit. The original teeth were worn, and the damaged drum had shifted. He had to measure the gap twice before allowing the first new tooth to take shape.
It seated cleanly. The second required an adjustment at the base. By the third, an ache was spreading up his forearm.
He slowed his Chi.
The final tooth settled into the gear, rougher than the others but aligned well enough to take a measured load.
“There.”
The official leaned over. “It’s fixed?”
“The teeth are replaced. There’s a difference.”
He pointed to the drum. “If you turn it now, the whole thing could shift again. We need to share the weight before anyone releases the brake.”
A worker shook his head. “The smaller line isn’t strong enough to carry the platform.”
“Not alone,” Khepri agreed. “We’ll use it with the main cable and the supports. A little weight at a time.”
The older workman studied the arrangement.
“Those braces can carry some of it,” he said. “If the load stays even.”
“And if it doesn’t,” Khepri replied, “everyone stops.”
The official looked towards the stranded platform. “Are you sure this will work?”
“No.”
He let the answer stand.
“You aren’t?”
“I know what the mechanism should do. I haven’t tested these repairs under this load. Anyone promising you certainty would be lying.”
The older workman gave him a measuring look, then nodded.
“We’ll make the test carefully.”
A cry sounded from above. One of the farmer’s companions was waving. The other kept speaking to the injured man, leaning so close that Khepri could not make out the words over the river.
“Please! He’s getting worse!”
Sẹ́ni called instructions to the companions, then faced the crew.
“Nobody stands beneath the platform,” she ordered. “If anything moves unexpectedly, you stop and tell us. Understood?”
The workers spread out.
Khepri watched as the secondary line tightened and its mechanism began taking a share of the weight. The braces held. With each careful turn, the drum eased fractionally towards its proper position.
Then something cracked.
“Stop!”
The sound rang sharply through the housing.
The workers froze.
Khepri found a split along the outer edge of one of his new teeth. His first impulse was to fix it before the damage could spread. He reached forward, drawing Chi into his hand.
Sẹ́ni caught his wrist.
“No.”
“I can reinforce—”
“With what?”
His fingers trembled beneath hers. The ache had returned with renewed force.
He looked away.
“I have enough for one adjustment.”
“You don’t know that.”
The silence between them lasted only a moment, but he heard the fear beneath her restraint. She had patients to protect. She had him to protect, too, even when he objected to being counted among them.
Khepri released his Chi.
He examined the auxiliary line and the iron supports instead. The load was still resting against the damaged gear.
“Wait,” he said.
The older workman turned.
“Do you have a bar long enough to cross the housing?”
“There are two in the shed.”
“Bring the stronger one.”
A worker fetched a straight iron bar while Khepri traced where it could be seated. There were narrow gaps between the frame and the drum’s rim. With the bar braced across them, the turning force could be held mechanically during the transfer. It would not repair the broken gear; it would make that gear less important for the next few moments.
The older workman examined the placement.
“That might hold.”
“Where would it slip first?” Khepri asked.
“It’ll hold if we keep the load balanced and don’t rush it.”
“Then we won’t.”
They fitted the bar into position. The older man checked it twice, made the crew adjust one wedge and then tested the load with the secondary mechanism.
The iron flexed.
Nobody moved.
It held.
“Take a little more weight,” Khepri instructed.
The secondary cable drew taut. The drum creaked and settled against its supports.
“Hold there.”
The older workman leaned close to the housing, watching how the force passed through its joints.
“Still even.”
“Good. Bring the drum into line.”
For several long moments the only sounds were the winch, the river and the farmer’s companions speaking quietly above them.
Then the drum moved.
Not much. A careful correction.
The platform shifted a handspan towards the ground.
Someone in the crowd cheered. Sẹ́ni held up a hand for silence. The workers continued.
A second handspan.
Then a third.
The bar stayed seated. The brake held. Slowly the platform descended towards the riverside, its movement controlled by the crew rather than the damaged teeth.
When its boards finally reached the landing, Sẹ́ni was already moving.
She and two healers climbed aboard, assessed the farmer and guided the others as they carried him to the waiting shelter. His companions followed so closely that a healer had to ask them to leave room to work.
Khepri remained by the winch.
The older workman was still checking the supports. Nearby, neighbours returned borrowed equipment and carried water to the crew. Nobody seemed interested in claiming credit now that the platform was down.
“You did well, young man,” he said.
Khepri traced the crack in his repaired tooth. “I thought the teeth would carry the load. I was wrong.”
“They held until the weight shifted.”
“I should have seen where the weight was going.”
“The bar was better,” the man continued. “A repair’s useful if it carries the load. Yours didn’t need to do everything.”
He ran a finger along the bar’s seat, then the cracked tooth.
Sẹ́ni returned as he was inspecting the cracked gear.
“He’s with the healers,” she said. “His companions are beside him.”
Khepri nodded.
“Sit. Rest that arm.”
“Can I check the drum first?”
“After you’ve rested.”
He glanced at the damaged drum. “Could I examine it tomorrow? The tooth failed at the outer edge.”
“Khepri.”
“Only the broken parts.”
“Rest.”
“I want to know where the strain went.”
Her expression settled the matter.
He took his satchel and retreated before the negotiation could worsen.
* * *
That evening he sat on the medicine wagon roof with the resonance reader resting on his knee. The caravan’s cooking fires glowed beneath the great tree. Someone was playing a stringed instrument. Nearby, children had gathered around one of Elune’s oldest healers.
“Nàrúmi, the Thousand Hands,” the man announced.
Khepri knew the story, but he listened anyway.
Nàrúmi had travelled as a healer, teaching whatever he knew to people in settlements he could never hope to visit again. His students taught others; those students travelled farther still. In time, there were healers across Tembara who used methods traced to him.
“Did he really have a thousand hands?” a little girl asked.
“Two,” the storyteller said. “He was quite ordinary in that respect.”
“Then why a thousand?”
“Because what he taught reached a thousand places. His hands were not the only hands doing the work.”
The girl thought about this. “So he made more healers?”
“Just so.”
Khepri looked down at the reader.
A machine could lift water. A person could teach another to build a hundred machines.
Below, Sẹ́ni was sorting herbs beside another healer. The ivory bead at her right ear flashed in the firelight.
He touched the bead at his left.
Knowledge. Healing. Protection.
Khepri turned the bead between his fingers. Below him, someone called for clean bandages; Sẹ́ni passed a bundle across without looking up.
He opened the resonance reader again.
The needle slid smoothly across the scale. The retaining ring he had made would wear down eventually, but for now it performed exactly as it should. Perhaps he could improve the housing later. A different alloy would be worth testing.
A voice came from below.
“Khepri.”
He looked over the edge.
Sẹ́ni stood with a bowl in her hands.
“Are you taking that instrument apart again?”
“No.”
She raised her eyes towards the open casing.
“You’ve taken out two screws.”
“I didn’t notice I’d taken them out.”
“Then bring both of them down to supper.”
He closed the case.
“Coming.”
As he climbed down, the small earring brushed his neck. The indigo threads were secure. Sẹ́ni was watching him from beside the fire, and for once she said nothing more about his inventions.
At the fire, Sẹ́ni pushed the bread basket into his hands before he could begin explaining the reader’s improved needle.