The crater known as the Broken Star glowed like a wound in the earth, its jagged edges crusted with shards of metal that hummed when the moon was high. Twelve-year-old Lyra crept through the rubble, her leather boots crunching on strange, glassy stones that flickered faintly blue. The villagers called this place cursed, but curses paid better than sunberries.

  “One more scrap,” she muttered, prying a twisted coil of copper from the dirt. “Enough to trade for a new hammer. Or…” Her eyes lit up. “A proper wrench!”

  A shadow shifted.

  Lyra froze. The air smelled of ozone and burnt sugar—a smell that meant Old World tech. She’d heard tales of Gearmages who’d sell their grandmothers for a intact circuit from the Broken Star. But this was no Gearmage.

  It was a sphere.

  Polished brass, etched with glowing sigils that pulsed like a heartbeat. It sat half-buried in the dirt, spider-like legs folded tight, a single glass eye the size of Lyra’s fist staring blankly at the sky.

  “Well, aren’t you fancy?” Lyra crouched, brushing dirt from its surface. The sigils flared, and the sphere twitched.

  FWEE!

  It sprang to life, legs unfolding with a chorus of clicks, its eye blinking rapidly. A hatch on its back slid open, releasing a puff of pink smoke that smelled like birthday cake.

  “Designation: Foton. Primary function: Luminosity Core Stabilization. Secondary function: Party Mode Activated. Beep-boop!”

  Lyra burst out laughing. “You’re like a drunk festival lantern!”

  “Error: Drunk protocols not found. Query: Define ‘festival.’”

  “You know—music! Dancing! Cupcakes!”

  The sphere’s eye spun into a heart shape. “Cupcakes: Acceptable. Calculating optimal frosting distribution.”

  Lyra grinned. “I’m keeping you.”

  The Iron Psalmists arrived at sunset.

  Lyra heard their hymns first—deep, distorted chants that made her teeth ache. She peered from the loft of her father’s forge as six figures cloaked in black-and-gold robes marched into Ember Hollow, their faces hidden behind masks of polished steel etched with screaming angels. At their hips hung psalm-casters—Old World relics that channeled sound into searing light.

  This story has been unlawfully obtained without the author's consent. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  “Gearmage scum,” her father spat, hammering a red-hot horseshoe. “Here to steal our scraps again.”

  But Lyra’s gut twisted. These weren’t Gearmages.

  The lead psalmist raised a gloved hand. “By order of Baron Vexis, all Old World artifacts are hereby claimed for the glory of Shatterspire. Resist, and be purified.”

  Lyra’s hand flew to her satchel, where Foton slept in “battery mode” (which looked suspiciously like napping).

  A psalmist pointed to the Broken Star shard embedded in the forge’s anvil—a wedding gift from Lyra’s dead mother. “That one. Seize it.”

  “No!” Lyra lunged, but her father held her back.

  FWOOOM.

  A beam of golden light erupted from the loft, vaporizing the psalmist’s mask.

  Foton hovered in the air, eye blazing, legs splayed like an angry cat. “Threat detected. Activating Party Mode. Suggestion: Dance party or annihilation?”

  The remaining psalmists raised their casters. “Abomination! Purge it!”

  “Annihilation selected.”

  Foton’s hatch snapped open. Not pink smoke this time—a Photon Cannon slid out, humming like a hive of sunbeams.

  Lyra screamed. “Foton, NO—”

  Too late.

  A beam of searing rainbows erupted from the cannon, punching through the psalmists’ golden robes and detonating the roof in a shower of splintered shingles. The forge’s chimney somersaulted through the air like a drunk acrobat before impaling itself in the pigsty. Foton chirped, “Roof recalibration complete! Suggested theme: Open-concept living!”

  The forge’s roof became a very expensive skylight.

  Later, in the cabbage patch (where Lyra was grounded):

  “You blew up our house!”

  Foton’s eye dimmed. “Correction: 62% of house remains functional. Clarification: Party Mode annihilation subroutine engaged hostile entities. Collateral aesthetic adjustments: 38% structural reorganization. Also, confetti deployed.” It ejected a handful of glittering foil strips shaped like tiny explosions.

  Lyra groaned. “You’re supposed to help me, not get me hanged!”

  “Query: What is ‘hanged’?”

  “It’s when Baron Vexis ties a rope around your neck and—”

  “Solution: Delete Baron Vexis.”

  “No deleting!”

  “Alternative: Cupcakes.”

  Lyra buried her face in her hands. “We’re doomed.”

  A shadow fell over them. Old Hendrick, the village’s toothless Gearmage, leaned on his walking stick—a repurposed servo-arm from an Old World automaton.

  “Heard ya found a Core Guardian,” he wheezed, eyeing Foton. “And that ya pissed off Vexis.”

  “It was an accident!”

  Hendrick grinned. “Kid, that tin can’s got a Luminosity Core—only thing powerful enough to overload Vexis’s Golem Titan.” He tossed her a holo-map that shimmered with floating text: Shatterspire Fortress—Weak Points Marked (Probably).

  “You wanna save yer village?” Hendrick jabbed a gnarled finger at Foton. “Teach that thing to aim.”

  Foton’s eye brightened. “Objective Updated: Delete Titan. Cupcakes After?”

  Lyra sighed. “Cupcakes after.”

  “Calculating optimal path for friendship. Conclusion: Hugs required.”

  Foton’s legs wrapped around her in a mechanical bear hug.