The Exarch's audience chamber was a study in provincial pretension – a circular room that had once been the heart of a temple, now awkwardly partitioned into a more conventional rectangular space by brick walls. The original marble floor still bore deep channels that had once carried sacrificial blood to brass drains, now stuffed with rags and poorly concealed beneath a threadbare carpet. Above, the oculus that had once let smoke rise to the gods was now plastered over, though water stains suggested the patchwork was less than perfect.

What had once been an altar platform now served as a raised dais for the Exarch's chair, its ancient stone smoothed by generations of supplicants' knees. Religious frescoes had been halfheartedly painted over with imperial insignia, but the older images bled through like ghostly palimpsests where the cheap pigments had flaked away.

Alexios himself matched his surroundings: tall and well-fed, with an aquiline nose that might have been aristocratic if not for the persistent tick that caused his left eye to squint uncontrollably. He sat in an oversized chair that wasn't quite a throne, regarding their offerings with poorly concealed disappointment.

Rupert watched as Hou reverently laid out their selections on a tattered velvet cloth in front of the Exarch’s chair.

The mechanical cylinder came first, its corroded surface catching the sunlight filtering through the high windows set into the sides of the dome. Rupert had identified its true nature after a few minutes of guesswork. His spectronomy had revealed a wear-resistant chrome alloy in the gears. The internal mechanism was a masterwork of mechanical engineering even through the corrosion: a series of intermeshing wheels, each carrying 27 positions that could be independently set. When he'd carefully cleaned one small section, he'd found letters in Achari script corresponding to numbers.

"It's a cryptographic device," he'd explained to Hou. "For mechanically encoding and decoding messages. See these registration marks? They ensure the wheels maintain alignment during rotation. And these notches – they'd create a polyalphabetic substitution cipher. This is extremely sophisticated!”

Hou had other ideas.

"Most auspicious device, your Divine Excellency," Hou proclaimed to the Exarch dramatically. "Ancient weather calculator. See how numbers align with celestial markings? Once restored, will predict storms, droughts, all manner of atmospheric phenomena."

“Hmph,” Alexios's eye twitched. "And this?" He gestured at the second offering.

The odometer had been simpler for Rupert to identify. The rotating disk's bearings showed wear patterns consistent with regular motion, and the etched markings followed a linear scale that any undergrad engineer would recognize. He had also uncovered wear marks from a missing display dial. It probably had gone on a chariot, or perhaps a military supply cart where measuring distance was important.

"Aiyaaah!" Hou's eyes gleamed. "You have very discerning taste. This is special sundial, Excellency. Not just for boring daytime hours – but for future! When properly aligned, speaks directly to heavenly zodiacal sphere and aligns chi of user with most propitious outcome!"

“‘Propitious,’” Alexios sounded unimpressed. “What’s the wooden thing there?”

The mechanicus had been the real surprise. The bronze components showed tool marks characteristic of screw-driven manufacturing. The gear ratios, though partially destroyed, followed patterns he recognized from basic mechanical advantage calculations. What fascinated him most was the evidence of standardization – these weren't handmade parts, but rather components that had been manufactured in a single place to consistent specifications.

"This was meant to be educational," Rupert had told Hou. "Look at how the gear trains are arranged. It's a demonstration kit for teaching engineers or architects physical principles. These rivets suggest it once had instruction plates attached. Someone probably torn them off for scrap."

Hou presented the mechanicus and the Exarch's expression soured further. The physics display was now grandly reinterpreted as "cosmic model of most mysterious significance and implication." Its broken bronze gears and rotting wood spoke more of decay than destiny.

"These are even worse than last month's," Alexios declared, eye tick accelerating with his irritation. "I require functioning devices, Magister Hou. Not trash! I want weapons! Assistance! The province faces real problems – failed crops, bandits, those damned wolf packs. I need solutions, not broken garbage!"

"Thousand apologies, excellence!" Hou prostrated himself face down on the floor with practiced humility. "Is fault of recent distractions. My barbarian friend from north," he gestured at Rupert, "arrive with many fascinating theories. Takes much time to discuss. But next week! Next week I have line on very special items. Much more suitable for man of your quality."

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The Exarch waved them away with a flick of his wrist that carried both dismissal and threat.

Outside, Hou's theatrical contrition vanished and he turned serious for a moment. "That could have gone worse. We must have something good for him next time or he will have us flogged or worse." Then his expression flipped back to a serene sage, "Come! Must inspect wards. Very important magisterial business."

He led Rupert on a circuitous route around the palace's exterior walls. At regular intervals, Hou would stop and make elaborate gestures while muttering what sounded suspiciously like nonsense syllables:

“Yu–mo–gui–gwai–fai–di–zao, yu–mo–gui–gwai–fai–di–zao…”

It wasn't until the third such performance that Rupert's spectronomy caught something extraordinary – a small metal device mounted high on the wall, its atomic structure unlike anything he'd seen in this world so far.

"What exactly am I looking at?" Rupert asked, looking closer. The device glowed with an internal energy he couldn't quite categorize. The elemental makeup was familiar enough – mostly copper and quartz crystal matrices – but there was something else, something that made his vision blur at the edges when he tried to focus on it.

"Ah!" Hou's eyes twinkled. "Ward nodes. Very old, very reliable. Not sure who made – maybe dwarven, maybe old empire, maybe older. Found in dig-site years ago."

"But how do they..." Rupert gestured vaguely, trying to reconcile the devices with his understanding of physics.

"They know," Hou said simply. "Know who belongs, who doesn't. Send warning if intruder comes. Very clever magic, highly efficient." He patted a pouch at his belt that contained something thrumming with similar energy. "Keep charged with this. Special device for draining power from artifacts we find. Like filling cup from many small streams, yes?"

“That was the battery thing you showed me last night.”

"Correct. Most fascinating thing," Hou continued, making another elaborate gesture for a passing guard, "is how they never fail. Other magic fades, weakens. These?" He shrugged. "Work same as day I found them. If could understand how, could extract power source, but-” he shrugged again, “Afraid to break them. Then Exarch put Hou up on cross.”

The devices seemed to violate the fundamental laws of thermodynamics, yet clearly operated on some consistent principle. The engineer in Rupert desperately wanted to take one apart.

"For now," Hou continued, "we focus on more pressing matters. Like finding better gifts for his excellence. Cannot disappoint such important patron again, eh?"

Rupert paused in his examination of the ward-node, "Hang on a moment. Did you say dwarves made these?"

"I say ‘maybe dwarves,’" Hou corrected. "Could be human work. Could be older. Hard to tell with ancient things. Records from before Year of the Five Emperors all lost when the Great Library burned."

"Dwarves," Rupert repeated flatly. "As in, short, bearded, study creatures that live underground, like to mine things, fond of drink and industry?"

Hou blinked at him. "You not have dwarves where you come from?"

"Only in stories. Books, games..." Rupert trailed off, realizing how absurd it was to be discussing Earth’s conception of fantasy races to a magus while standing in a world with a dying red sun and magical motion detectors.

"Ah." Hou nodded sagely. "Here, they were real enough. Great artificers, great builders. But..." He gestured at the sky. "When old empire fell and sun began to sicken, three centuries or more ago, they retreated deep into mountains. No one seen them since. Some say they found way to deeper realms. Others say they all died. Who can know?"

"Say…" Rupert said, his teenage fantasy novel expertise surfacing. "Do you have elves too?"

"Had elves," Hou corrected. "No sighting in over thousand years. Very mysterious race. Left many warnings about great war and sun's death, then..." He made a vanishing gesture with his fingers. "Poof. Gone to wherever elves go."

Rupert felt a strange disappointment. He'd managed to land in what had to be the lamest possible world – one where all the interesting races had already packed up and left. Just his luck to get transported to a dying earth without even a single elf in sight. More Jack Vance than Tolkien. And an Exarch who liked to crucify people who disappointed him.

Brutal.

"Many stories about why they left," Hou continued, either missing or ignoring Rupert's dismay. "Some say they saw future, knew what was coming. Others say they caused sun's sickness, fled from shame. Most likely explanation?" He tapped the wall meaningfully. "They knew something. Something about old empire magic. Something about why world is dying. Something that we have lost."

"What makes you say that?"

"Look at craftsmanship," Hou gestured at the ward-node. "Perfect marriage of physical form and magical function. Nothing made like this anymore. Dwarves were great builders, yes, but crude compared to this. Modern arcanoscribes clever, but limited." He shook his head. "These work on principles even I not understand."

Rupert studied the device with renewed interest, his spectronomy revealing layers of complexity in its construction. The more he looked, the more he had to agree – there was something biological in its organization, like the difference between a mechanical watch and an amoeba.

"So... was this elvish work then?" Rupert asked, studying the ward-node's inscrutable markings.

"No, no." Hou shook his head definitively. "Writing system all wrong for starter. Closer to Old Achari, language of old empire. And elves..." He seemed to search for the right words. "Elves made beautiful things, but different style entirely. This?" He gestured at the ward-node. "Too practical. My guess, old empire. Or maybe older. Who knows? Ah! Time to check next ward!"