Clockwork Legacy/Line of Succession/Part 1
Autumn was ruminating on the last verse of her latest composition when her carriage made the jarring transition from the packed earth of the country road to the granite sets leading to the city.
"A bit more warning, if you please!" she called to the driver irritably, opening the face on the pocket watch that detailed the state of her internal clockwork. A set of small hands told of a slight arrhythmia within some of her high-precision mechanisms, but that was to be expected after being unwound for so long. It was a small miracle she could be wound-up at all, that she had not ended up like Summer...
But that was a concern for another time. At present, there was the matter of the unknown individual who had done a great deal of damage to Spring and broken Winter entirely. Even more disconcerting, he was fully aware of her and her sisters' secrets and was loose somewhere within the city.
For him to have survived one of Winter's 'visitations' and then negotiated his release with Spring, she imagined he must be a cunning man. But she had matched wits with such men before; and she knew that even without his name or appearance, she would be able to set a trap that no man, regardless of how cunning or clever, could resist. And once she had drawn him out from wherever he might be hiding-
"-Lovelace!"
She started at the sound of her 'family' name, and called for the driver to stop. Cautiously parting the curtain, she peered from her carriage door to see a man in livery being dragged against his will beyond the gate of the Roquefort estate.
"Surely one of your guests must know who she is!" he insisted to his escorts. "And I can pay handsomely for the information!"
The threw him roughly into the street, the footman who oversaw his casting-out allowing himself a discreet sneer of contempt before directing the others back to the estate.
---
Roland stood, assessing the damage done to his servant's uniform. He had purchased it to gain access to the gala, but it had done little to conceal his unfamiliarity with high society. This more than anything else had thwarted his attempts to locate the Lady in Green, a mechanical woman whom he believed to be using the name Spring Lovelace. She had captured him, used him as a trap in a feud with her mechanical 'sister', and then attempted to discard him. But when she was on the verge of being destroyed herself, Roland had intervened and earned her gratitude.
True to the reward she promised when she asked for his aid, she had provided him with a stipend - a single payment consisting of more wealth than he had ever seen, and if she were to stay true, additional income for so long as he chose to remain in the city. But she did not provide him with the means to contact her, and the small bank that had administered the payment was unwilling in the extreme to provide any information regarding the owner of the account.
And so he set out on his own to uncover her whereabouts, but his inquiries had been rebuffed, his appointments refused, and this latest, boldest intrusion had been met with violence. "At this rate," he muttered, tugging off his ruined white gloves, "you're going to get yourself killed."
A polite cough caught his attention - in the shadows of the deserted thoroughfare waited an unremarkable coach pulled by an unremarkable horse, with an unremarkable driver, well-clad against the evening chill, sitting patiently atop. The coach's occupant, however, was very remarkable indeed.
In the silver moonlight, her pale, heart-shaped face almost glowed from within a curtain of raven-black hair, dark eyes and lips accentuating her rare beauty. She wore a fitted, high-collared jacket and matching top-hat of royal purple, favoring him with the trace of smile as she opened the carriage door.
His pace betrayed his eagerness, and he practically leapt into the coach to join her, grinning at his fortune.
"Onward, driver," she called in a languid tone. Though she still wore her curious smile, there was a strange detachment in how she composed herself; though perhaps her half-lidded eyes were simply the symptom of a tiring journey.
Does she even get tired? Roland wondered. She had to be another one of the mechanical women, a sister to Spring and Winter Lovelace. But what lead her to him now? And where was Spring? And why was she so quiet? Ought he make introductions?
"Roland Young.... m'lady... at your... service?" She had an unsettling air about her, and not just from her dark allure.
"Autumn Lovelace," she responded, and he found himself grinning like a child at the confirmation of his suspicions, his concern gone in an instant.
"I knew it! I had hoped one of you might return! I've been searching for Spring since she left... Oh, and not because I'm ungrateful or cross with her or anything of the sort, but... just... I suppose... because I would very much like to see her again."
Autumn gave him a curious look. "She must have made quite the impression."
"That she did, m'Lady. I now have more coin than I know what to do with, but she's all I can think about. Is she... alright?"
"She convalesces at the estate, but concern for her well-being was actually the impetus for my journey."
"Is there anything I can do?" Roland asked.
"As a matter of fact," Autumn said, the faint smile returning while she collected a small handbag from beside her, "...there is...."
---
The nobleman watched as the imposing Mr. Finch questioned the footman who had cast out the rake in borrowed livery. He would rather be questioning the footman himself, but such a display would arouse suspicion from his fellow attendees. Moreover, Mr. Finch had proven himself in matters requiring delicacy in the past; but delicate matters were not the task to which the nobleman customarily applied Mr. Finch's specific talents.
As Mr. Finch concluded the exchange and abruptly left the ballroom, the nobleman excused himself from his half-followed conversation and stepped outside to meet the tall, gaunt man in his employ.
"The bloke who had been asking after Lovelace left in a carriage," Mr. Finch explained in his quiet, gravelly voice. "And this carriage was passengered by a fetching Lady the footman did not recognize, but who seemed to be of high standing. He was also under the impression the man didn't know her either. I just sent Caleb ahead to pursue the both of 'em, and was about to follow myself."
"Then I shall join you," the nobleman concluded, stepping around the broad Mr. Finch toward the carriage house where he could see Caleb hastily readying his horse.
Mr. Finch plodded along behind him. "Joining us, m'Lord?"
"I am certain that Lovelace was a man of greater means than what I have thus far collected - and I suspect this woman may have information on that very subject."
"Very good, m'Lord," Mr. Finch affirmed, before adding. "But if we are to draw from her this information, there may be... unpleasantness."
"If she was in any way involved in withholding from me that old hermit's true fortune," the nobleman answered in a voice absent of concern, "then I would have it no other way."
---
The coach rumbled to a halt on a deserted street. Autumn opened her own door, stepping out without assistance. Roland followed, noting the convenient set of steps that had appeared below the door, folding underneath the carriage as the door closed on its own. "Clever!" Roland remarked to Autumn, but saw that she was already well ahead of him, walking into a dark alley.
"If you're looking for a place to talk," Roland called, following her, "There's always-"
She silenced him with a cold stare and easily opened a large and heavy-looking cellar door, gesturing for him to enter. Roland took the narrow steps cautiously, and just as he reached the bottom the cellar door shut with a bang, casting him into darkness.
"Hey!" he cried, "What-"
An electrical light flared into existence, produce by a thin wand held in Autumn's gloved hand. "You're quite prone to outbursts, aren't you Mr. Young?" she said in an uncaring voice.
"Sorry, just a bit... um... are you taking me to see Spring? Er... Lady Lovelace? I mean... the Baroness?"
"Just 'Spring' will do," Autumn sighed, brushing past him and travelling down the narrow stone hall. Stopping suddenly, she unlocked a door and stepped through. John followed her to find he already knew this chamber. The loosed bonds that had bound him still hung from the bedposts, the mattress still stained with the prodigious fluids Winter Lovelace had lost before her final... climax. The divan similarly marred by Spring. Bits and pieces of clockwork remained strewn about the floor.
Roland walked slowly into the chamber, turning to see Autumn closing the door behind her. The idea that she wasn't here to bring him to Spring suddenly dawned on him, and he asked, "What do you want with me? You mentioned there was a way I could help Spring..."
"Our continued existence, Mr. Young, is only preserved by secrecy."
Roland gave a worried glance at her handbag as a gloved dipped inside. Roland quickly said, "Which is why I haven't told a soul about her!"
Autumn withdrew a small ampoule of green liquid. "You were shouting our name in the street when I found you."
"Was I? Oh, yes, I suppose I was, but you see... well, I reasoned a man might know the name Lovelace and not know it bears any connection to... to... ottomans?"
Autumn gave him an exasperated look, but soon a wry smile crept on to her face. "I may be mechanical, Mr. Young, but I am no Turk."
While Roland puzzled over her words, she seemed to be waiting for a response. Finally, he said, "Er... come again?"
The smile vanished. "The word you were fumbling for is 'Automaton', not the name of the Turkish Empire. And the Mechanical Turk is a chess-playing..." she delivered an irritated sighed. "It was a clever bon mot, wasted on a man I appear to have greatly overestimated." She plunged a needle into the green fluid.
"Now... half a moment, Autumn!" Roland said, backing away. "Spring spared my life because I saved hers!"
"A short-sighted decision that has already put us in jeopardy. Tell me, who else knows about us?"
"No one! I swear on my own mother that I haven't told a single living soul about any of you or what happened here! I... I just want to see her again... please..."
"No one else knows?" Autumn asked, dropping the vial back into her bag.
"No, I promise you!"
Autumn looked relieved. "Then my stay here shall be brief." She strode forward, the needle pinched delicately in her hand as she spoke in a formal tone, "When seasons' secrets fall from keeping, Autumn's scythe is brought to bear..."
Roland backed up and stumbled backward on to the bed. He knew he was no match for her physically, but perhaps if he could get around her to the door...
"...for a harvest ever-reaping, Sewn by need of sisters' care." She stopped in her paces, just a few steps from him.
Roland had never been a student of poetry (or much else for that matter) but he could recognize the verse was amateur, and that again she appeared to be awaiting a response. Perhaps flattery would at least stall her?
"Shakespeare?" Roland offered.
"What? Oh, I...." she tittered slightly, and in the silence Roland believed he could hear the rising sound of clockwork. "...no, it isn't The Bard," she said coyly.
"Keats? Shelley?" Roland struggled for another name. "Uh... Byron?"
"Oh my," she tittered again. "Do you really think-"
"Don't tell me!" Roland said playfully.
"-that it could have been one of-"
"It's yours?!" Roland said, feigning shock.
"I confess!" she squeaked, clasping her hands. The sound of clockwork was easily audible as she seemed to be searching for her next words. "...Most seem to have no appreciation for my poems..."
"Well, is your audience mostly men you intend to kill?"
Autumn glowered, her clockwork quieting.
"Please tell me there's more!" Roland hurriedly added.
"As a matter of fact..." she glared at him. "And you aren't just stalling to come up with some silly plan, are you? I happen to be quicker, stronger, and obviously in possession of the greater intellect..."
"If I'm to die," Roland said in a dramatic voice, "then I only wish for your sweet words be the... things... to carry me off to... death?" he finished lamely.
"Very well!" Autumn said excitedly, but then looked perturbed. "When did it become so insufferably hot in here?" she asked, unbuttoning her riding jacket and slipping it over her bare shoulders. He was surprised to see beneath was only a lavender corset lined with dark lace and a choker of pearls and black silk previously concealed by the jacket's high collar. Flinging the jacket with abandon, she gathered her bag once more and drew out a notebook. Flipping through the pages, she looked up to see him watching her, then turned away while she studied its pages.
Roland leapt to his feet and pushed in on her exposed back - just like her sisters before her, a panel sprang open. Whereas Winter's interior had been functional and Spring's decorative, Autumn's was a work of art: the four major dials were each marked with elaborate carvings depicting the elements, the lattice underneath a trellis covered in gilded ivy and blossoming flowers.
"What?!" Autumn exclaimed, stiffening. Roland grabbed the dial marked 'Air' (a sylph blowing a gust of wind) and wrenched it clockwise. With a sharp twang, it came off in his hand.
She spun around and Roland ducked to the side, a winding-clock sound whirring noisily from her. "Do you have any idea of what you've just done?" she asked, her body beginning to shudder.
"Put you in a mood for something other than murder?" Roland offered, circling her defensively.
"I am Melancholic you half-wit," she said with simmering vitriol, the clockwork beginning to take on a discordant tone. "You've disrupted the delicate balanssssss-" she froze for a moment, and Roland raced around her to adjust the 'opposing' dial - 'Earth' - further clockwise. He heard something rattling inside her.
She gasped. "You're mmmmmaaking it worse!"
He turned 'Water', and hearing no improvement, tried 'Fire', only to hear strange clicking rise to prominence.
"I suppose your deep familiarity with science is what informs your seemingly random groping at my dials?" she said with heavy sarcasm while steam began to puff from the opening.
"What should I be doing?" Roland demanded, watching as the clockwork visible through the open port crackled with electricity.
"If you truly wish to keep ussssss safe," she began. "B-b-bring my b-b-body to my c-c-carriage...."
"I've got a better idea," Roland remarked, finding the dial marked 'Cognisance.' "But when I save you, no more trying to murder me!"
Autumn's head shook, her raven-dark tresses whipping around. "Whatever you're g-going to do, just d-d-do it!"
He turned the dial counter clockwise and immediately Autumn calmed, though her clockwork persisted in its noisy deterioration. She turned and gave Roland a brief and disinterested look, her dark eyes glancing about the room. "Was there something you were intending to do?" she asked tiredly.
"Would you be so good as to bend over the bed?" Roland requested. She sighed and walked around to the other side, leaning over with her chin resting on her crossed arms.
"And?" she said, bored, while the puffs of steam coming from her back became a steady flow.
Roland circled behind her, lifting up her numerous skirts to finally expose her bare legs, standing stiffly and wrapped in dark garters and lace. Her fair skin was flawless and appeared tantalisingly soft, dimpled where the belts held her various undergarments in place. He ran a hand over her thigh and found it just as soft as it appeared, and warm as well. Unlike Winter and Spring, it felt indistinguishable from the real thing.
"Could you get on with it?" she muttered, giving a slight shake to her hips. Roland pulled the skirts up further, uncovering the plush softness of her pert and fair backside. Roland squeezed her with both hands and a curious hissing sound responded, the underwear against her sex darkening with fluid. But Autumn only said, "Does my fanny present some sort of mystery to you, Mr. Young? Just below the cheeks is where you'll find my-"
Roland jerked down his trousers and removed her soaked panties, eagerly mounting her.
"Oh!" she offered in mild surprise. "I see you've managed to find her."
Roland drove himself inside her. Her clockwork only seemed to grow noisier from the act, and though her sex had soon drenched his groin and her thighs in response to his thrusts, she simply lay there, her chin resting on her arms.
"What is that dreadful racket?" she asked, and Roland remembered a particular detail from the events that had lead to Spring's recovery.
"Those noises are coming from you!" Roland grunted, thrusting deeper while massaging her soft cheeks with his hands and struggling to stave off his rapidly approaching climax. "Your an otto... you're a machine, Autumn!"
She looked over her shoulder, frowning, and saw the geyser of steam rushing from her, electricity dancing over her shoulders. She returned her chin to her arms, and gave a disinterested, "Hmmm."
Remembering another factor of Spring's recovery, Roland slipped out from Autumn-
"Are we finished?" she said in an apathetic tone.
-and plunged himself into her ass. A panel immediately sprung open on the small of her back, the machinery inside working at a frantic pace.
"Mmmmist-t-ter Young!" she cried, as a low whistling sounded. "I was not designed f-f-forrrr <click> Why, I was not designed at all, how silly, I was born a girl and now I am g-g-grown autommmmat-t-tonnn and can en-j-j-joyyy any act a human woman c-c-could because I ammmm one, isn't that s-s-sooo?" She pushed herself further on to him, giving a cry as the whistling increased in its pitch.
"Roland, this is not how I typically comport myself, but having your person stuck in my bottom seems to be making me... mmmak-k-king mmmeeee... <click> sssoooo hot, I feel ssssoooo<click> ahhhh!" she continued to push, the whistle at a scream as steam poured from her. "I am ssssooo hot, Roland, s-sshould I b-b-be this hot-t-t? This hhhooo-hhhhAHHH!" With a final push, she compressed her soft, quivering rump against his pelvis and he finally released, pouring into her as she trembled beneath, squealing in joy. He finally finished, but she only grew louder. "Ssssooo hot Roland, I AHHHH!! Ohhh, Roland, please, I'm s-s-sooo HOT-T-T!"
He reached over her and grabbed the dial marked 'Cognisance', only to meet with a stabbing numbness as electricity shot through his hand. He twisted it to its original position, remembering that had been what had finally allowed Spring to make her recovery.
"What is going-" Autumn began in confusion, then looked over her shoulder and saw Roland. "This is your idea of improving matters?!" Autumn shouted over the screeching whistle of escaping steam.
"I'm sorry! It worked with-"
"My body," she interrupted, "the ahhh... the c-c-arriage, b-b-bring me home AHHHH!... get to the workshop, and d-d-don't draw the notice of... of... oh, that's not ri-."
Her body shot back against him in a violent thrust, bowling him over in a tangle of her elaborate dress. Pushing her skirts from his face, he saw she now sat upon him, headless, her arms twitching slightly. As he slid out from her, her body suddenly became animate again and gave him a furious slap before slumping against the bed.
Rubbing where her hand struck him, Roland asked, "Autumn can you still... hear me?"
She rolled her wrist and displayed her palm while hunching her shoulders, the gesture somehow conveying both her understanding and her deep annoyance.
"As I was trying to say earlier,that worked with Spring! Here, let me..." he tucked his hands under her arms and lifted her to a sitting position on the bed. "Now, where did your head get to..."
She folded her arms, fingers tapping irritably on her elbow, while Roland pulled up his trousers and started across the room.
Suddenly, the door flew open and a man in a disheveled suit burst through. He looked around the room in slack-jawed confusion, almost stumbling over Autumn's head.
"Mr. Finch..." he said, nervously prodding her head with his toe. Roland looked back at Autumn's body to see her hesitate for just a moment before slumping motionless to the bed.
Two other men entered the room through the ruined door, clearly a Lord and his servant, and both in possession of a dangerous air. The nobleman was in a military dress uniform compete with sabre and pistol, his fine features quickly taking in the room before settling on Autumn's headless body. The other man was in a plain servant's clothing, but between a broken nose and the way his hand hung near a blade slung low on his hip, Roland knew he was a man of natural violence.
"'E's killed 'er!" the slack-jawed one said, pointing an accusing finger at Roland.
The nobleman picked up Autumn's head and held it before him, mesmerized. "No he hasn't - she wasn't a person at all."
"Who are you?" Roland asked, the first in a long string of questions he doubted he'd receive answers to.
"Viscount Wakefield, rightful inheritor of all lands and property of the late Baron Alan Lovelace." His eyes never left Autumn's head as he turned it over in wonderment in his hands. "I mention Lord Lovelace, as I suspect you know something about the man, or at least..." he turned the head to face Roland "...know something of his properties."
A queasy feeling struck Roland's as he now realized Autumn had every right to worry what trouble would follow his clumsy pursuit of her sister.
(continued in part 2)