It works!

org-ql.el

@@ -194,13 +194,14 @@ See Info node `(org-ql)Queries'."
   ;; the function correctly, apparently because `org-ql-predicates'
   ;; ends up being not defined correctly at expansion time.
 
-  (defmacro org-ql--def-plain-query-fn ()
+  (defun org-ql--def-plain-query-fn ()
     "Define function `org-ql--plain-query'.
 Builds the PEG expression using predicates defined in
 `org-ql-predicates' and `org-ql-predicates-extra-aliases'."
-    (let* ((predicates (--map (symbol-name (plist-get it :name))
+    (let* ((predicates (--map (symbol-name (plist-get (cdr it) :name))
                               org-ql-predicates))
            (aliases (->> org-ql-predicates
+                         (-map #'cdr)
                          (--map (plist-get it :aliases))
                          -non-nil
                          -flatten
@@ -211,7 +212,10 @@ Builds the PEG expression using predicates defined in
                             ;; obscure bug in `peg': when one keyword is a substring of another,
                             ;; and the shorter one is listed first, the shorter one fails to match.
                             (-sort (-on #'> #'length)))))
-      `(cl-defun org-ql--plain-query (input &optional (boolean 'and))
+      (fset 'org-ql--plain-query
+            (byte-compile
+             `(cl-function
+               (lambda (input &optional (boolean 'and))
                  "Return query parsed from plain query string INPUT.
 Multiple predicates are combined with BOOLEAN."
                  (unless (s-blank-str? input)
@@ -241,7 +245,7 @@ Multiple predicates are combined with BOOLEAN."
                      ;; element.  I don't know what it means, but we don't want it.
                      (if (> (length (cdr query)) 1)
                          (cons boolean (nreverse (cdr query)))
-               (cadr query))))))))
+                       (cadr query)))))))))))
 
 ;;;;; Predicate definition