Roger whistled. “This is—I suppose the word would be ‘impressive’?”

“Imposing,” Theo said, neck craned and squinting as he peered up at the machine. “There’s just . . . so much of it.”

“How did they do this in 1872?” Gwen asked, directing the beam of a flashlight to a set of golden gears near the top of the machine. “And how long did it take them?”

“Depends on whether they used magic,” I said. Although I didn’t know what kind of magic could form the components of a giant machine, assemble them with what looked like obvious care and skill. “However they did it, it looks like they did it well.”

“It’s lasted more than a century,” Connor agreed.

“I’m a tech person,” Petra said, glancing around. “But Victorian machinery isn’t my bag. Can anyone else help interpret this?”

“I’m no engineer,” Connor said. “But I work on bikes. I know my way around an engine.”

“Then let’s interpret,” Petra said. She put her hands on her hips, frowned at the machine.

“So,” Connor began, “we’re looking at a machine that generated a pillar of light and sent out lightning when triggered.”

“Keep going,” Petra said.

“You’d need a sensor—something that could identify the demon or Sups in the first place, and possibly track them once the machine is on. And you’d need a source of power.”

“Ley lines,” I said, thinking of Black’s comment. “The wards probably used ley lines to maintain a ready state and power them up if and when she got close.”

“Damn,” Petra said. “I bet you’re right. I think the north-south line runs pretty close to here. But you’d need something to transfer that energy into the machine.” She frowned. “The ley lines are, like, powerful, though. I don’t know how you could just slap a machine on top of one.”

Connor smiled. “So you’d need a transformer—something that could make the energy usable by the machine.”

“Exactly!” Petra said. “And you’d need a component that would change the energy created by the machine into visible light—since that’s its weapon.”

“That’s a lot of tech for the Victorian era,” Roger said. “They were a steam-engine society.”

“Yeah,” Petra said, “but magic cures a lot of ills.”

“Lis,” Connor called out, and I moved to where he stood, pointing at a flat iron panel that covered some other moving parts. Petra was already crouched and taking pictures of the symbols that had been etched into the metal. There were two rows, with maybe twenty symbols in each row, one above the other, and neatly engraved in a tall, spindly script. Each symbol was made up of two or three lines, dots, or circles.

“Part of the spell,” I guessed. “Something used to power the machine or give it instructions or link magic to metal.”

“Agreed,” Petra said. “I don’t recognize the language, though. I’ll run it through SpellCheck.”

It took us all a minute to get that one. “Like, a place to check a spell. That’s seriously a thing?” Theo asked.