A Grave Tree

• Cast of Characters
  
• What Has Gone Before
  
• 1. Ghost in the Machine
  
• 2. The Phantom Effect
  
• 3. The Double Slit
  
• 4. Believe it or Not
  
• 5. Pocket Full of Stones
  
• 6. Slip of a Thread
  
• 7. Warm Hollow
  
• 8. Our Common Future
  
• 9. Energy is Not Created
  
• 10. Return of the Light
  
• 11. Hammer of Quinta
  
• 12. Bits and Pieces
  
• 13. Derivatives
  
• 14. Spilling Open
  
• 15. Mad Science
  
• 16. Animal Magnetism
  
• 17. Be Leave
  
• 18. No Observers
  
• 19. Leap of Faith
  
• Author’s Note
  
• Other Books in the Series
  
• Also by Jennifer Ellis
  
• About Jennifer Ellis
  
• Acknowledgements
  

A Grave Tree

THE DERIVATIVES OF DISPLACEMENT BOOK Three

Jennifer Ellis

Moonbird Press

A Grave Tree

Copyright © 2015 Jennifer Ellis

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be used, reproduced or transmitted in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the author, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

This book is a work of fiction. Any references to real people, events, locales or organizations are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are imaginary, and any resemblance to actual places, events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

Cover Design by: Design for Writers

Editing by: David Gatewood

ISBN-13: (ebook) 978-0-9949421-0-4

ISBN-13: (paperback) 978-0-9949421-1-1

Moonbird Press

Book Layout © 2015 BookDesignTemplates.com

To make sure you get the latest information and offers from Jennifer Ellis, sign up for her mailing list. You will receive two free short stories, and the latest updates, information on promotions, and the opportunity to receive Advanced Reader Copies (ARCs) of Jennifer’s books. So make sure you’re subscribed.
Sign up here.

The Sinclairs

ABBEY
–
Fourteen-year-old science genius

CALEB
–
Abbey
’
s twin

SIMON
–
Abbey and Caleb
’
s older brother

PETER
–
Abbey, Caleb, and Simon
’
s father

MARIAN BECKHAM
–
Abbey, Caleb, and Simon
’
s mother

Likely Friends

MARK FORRESTER
–
The Sinclairs
’
twenty-six-year-old map-obsessed neighbor with Asperger
’
s

FRANCIS FORRESTER
–
Mark
’
s mother

SYLVAIN SALVADOR/MANTIS
– Temporary caretaker of the Sinclairs and Mark;
Friend of the family

JAKE HAMMOND
–
High school student from Greenhill; Camel who can use the docks

IAN
– “
Witch
”
rescued from Nowhere living in Forrester house

FRANK AND FRANCIS
–
Ian
’
s hairy and tattooed associates

KASEY
–
Map librarian in the future

MAX
–
Spaceship pilot in the future

RUSSELL ANDREWS
–
Working with Sylvain

Potential Enemies

DR. PAUL FORD
–
Francis Forrester
’
s ex-husband/Sandy
’
s father

SANDY FORD
–
Francis and Paul
’
s daughter rescued from Nowhere

SELENA DARBY
–
Might be leading the
“
bad
”
faction; old friend of Peter Sinclair
’
s

NATHANIEL
–
One of Selena
’
s lackeys

DAMIAN
–
One of Selena
’
s lackeys

QUENTIN STEINAM
–
Unknown investor who seems to be pulling the strings of the
“
bad
”
faction

QUINTA – Witch who is mysteriously changing the future

For those who always wanted to be in Gryffindor…

A note about maps… If you are interested in looking at the maps provided in
A Quill Ladder (Book Two)
go to the
reader bonuses
section of my website and check them out.

In A Pair of Docks and A Quill Ladder
–
Derivatives of Displacement Books One and Two

The Sinclair siblings, Abbey, Caleb, and Simon, discover a set of stones on the hill behind their house that can take them into the future. But the futures seem split, and they
each have
a future dramatically different from the others’. They start using the stones with Mark, their map-obsessed neighbor who has Asperger’s. But they are not the only ones who know about the stones, and they become involved in the schemes of a man named Sylvain to transfer Caleb’s future people from one future to another via a set of docks that can take you laterally between futures.

Those who create paradox by changing the future in the future are sentenced to live in Nowhere, a timeless, placeless purgatory. Only camels, who are dead in all futures, can change the future and use the docks. They meet a mysterious Dr. Ford who claims that they are witches and tries to tell them the rules of the stones.

Abbey’s mother, a camel, rescues all of the witches from Nowhere. Ian, one of the witches from Nowhere, moves in across the street and offers to give the Sinclairs lessons in witchcraft, which consist of cards with strange messages and invisible writing about finding your center.

Ian claims that some of the witches from Nowhere, led by Selena Darby, are intending to find a parallel universe more hospitable to witches and move there using a wormhole. He is determined to stop them because using a wormhole incorrectly can cause a huge burst of destructive energy. Mark’s half-sister, Sandy Ford, who is the daughter of Mark’s mother Mrs. Forrester and Dr. Ford, has also been rescued from Nowhere, and joins the Sinclairs on some of their adventures.

Simon is arrested and sentenced to six weeks in juvie for hacking into the City Hall computers. Sylvain purchases Coventry Hill and has the stones destroyed to prevent others from using them, but lets it slip that there are other sets of stones.

Using three maps of Coventry given to him by Dr. Ford and a fourth map retrieved from the future, Mark and the others determine that the locations of the sets of stones and docks, as well as some tunnels discovered by Mark and Sandy, fit a geometrical pattern—a pentagram—with the statue of a woman, Quinta Francis Merry, at the center in downtown Coventry. Selena and Dr. Ford attempt to steal the maps, and claim there is a fifth map. Jake, a camel who has been used by both Sylvain and Selena, is shot, and Abbey must take him to her own future to save him.

After a visit from Selena, Abbey’s father vanishes, leaving only a text that he is going to deal with something once and for all. Abbey’s mother, who has been using the stones to travel to the future to cure herself of a terminal illness, follows him, leaving Abbey, Caleb, and Mark in the care of Sylvain in a cabin by the Granton Dam, for their safety.

~
Acceleration
is the 2nd derivative of displacement. Acceleration is the rate of change of velocity. ~

Abbey stared out the window at the torrential rain that pummeled Sylvain’s small cabin west of Coventry. Farley sat beside her and let out low whines every few minutes, as if she might have forgotten that he was there and had not yet been walked. Caleb, evidently not nearly as gloomy as Abbey about missing school again this week, sat on the couch staring at his phone. Mark typed away on his computer at the desk in the corner, no doubt researching isogons, maps of constant magnetic declination, which he had told Abbey about rather relentlessly over lunch. Sylvain busied himself with dinner preparations in the elegant country kitchen; the cabin, while small, was extremely well appointed.

“Well, I guess I’m just going to have to walk you by myself, then,” Abbey said loudly to Farley.

“Have fun,” Caleb said.

She could see that he was rather intently snapchatting with someone, and she caught a glimpse of Anna Andrews’s lustrous mahogany hair. Russell, Anna’s older brother, had been up to deliver supplies to the cabin several times over the past three weeks, always regarding Abbey with his hungry, almost feral, pale blue eyes.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Sylvain said. “I’m in the middle of making a roux. I can’t leave right now.”

He emerged from the kitchen wearing his long white chef’s apron over his tall, spindly body. The first time Abbey had seen the apron, she’d been forced to stifle a laugh. Sylvain spent much of his time at the cabin hunching over bubbling sauces and caramelizing onions. Whatever complaints they might lodge regarding their extended isolation, they couldn’t claim they weren’t being well fed. Mark, who apparently preferred that different foods not touch each other, ever, except in sandwich form, would probably beg to differ.

“I’ll just go by myself,” Abbey said. “You’re tracking me anyway.”

She held up her phone, on which Sylvain had installed a tracking device so he would know where they were. There was little need for it, as he hadn’t let them out of his sight in several weeks. He even insisted that they all go together on their Farley walks.

To make matters worse, all of the windows and doors had sensors on them, and if opened, they would emit a beep that would alert everyone in the cabin to someone’s departure or arrival. They were essentially in a prison, albeit a fairly comfortable one. Fortunately Sylvain had not taken away their Internet access. But they were under strict orders to tell everyone that they had gone to New York on a family vacation—except Simon, of course, who would still be at the detention center down in Coventry for a few more days.

“Don’t worry. It’s pouring. I’m just going to go down the trail about a hundred meters. Farley has to get out. You wouldn’t want him to have an accident in the cabin, would you?” Abbey raised her eyebrows at Sylvain.

Sylvain’s eyes widened, and she saw his pupils flick in the direction of the fluffy white sheepskin rugs that adorned the cherry hardwood floors. “Very well,” he said. “Don’t go farther than a hundred meters, and come right back, or we’ll have to come and look for you.”

Abbey put on her raincoat, trying not to roll her eyes, while Farley skittered around her, hopping and howling with joy, his claws clicking on the floors. Sylvain was probably cringing in the kitchen at the sound.

Abbey didn’t know why she couldn’t just go outside alone. This commitment to togetherness—ever since her mother had gone off in search of her father, who had gone who knows where—was beginning to wear a bit. It wasn’t as if Abbey could go anywhere. They were in the middle of nowhere, at the end of a nondescript dirt road that wound its way up the hill and through the woods off the Granton Dam Road. They were at least ten kilometers away from Coventry, and the only means of transport available was Sylvain’s Jag. He couldn’t possibly think she would steal that. Although, technically, she supposed they
had
stolen it before—but she hadn’t driven it.

Thinking about her parents caused Abbey to tear up a bit. Her dad had said he would be gone for a few days, and her mother had said they would be staying with Sylvain for a week, tops. But that was three weeks ago, and there had been no sign of Marian Beckham or Peter Sinclair since. Despite Abbey’s pestering, Sylvain refused to offer any information about where they had gone and what might have happened.