Read Mechanized Masterpieces: A Steampunk Anthology Online

Authors: Anika Arrington,Alyson Grauer,Aaron Sikes,A. F. Stewart,Scott William Taylor,Neve Talbot,M. K. Wiseman,David W. Wilkin,Belinda Sikes

Tags: #Jane Austen Charles Dickens Charlotte Bronte expansions, #classical literature expansions into steampunk, #Victorian science fiction with classical characters, #Jane Austen fantasy short stories, #classical stories with steampunk expansion, #steam engines in steampunk short stories, #Cyborgs, #steampunk short story anthology, #19th century British English literature expansion into steampunk, #Frankenstein Phantom horror story expansions, #classical stories in alternative realities, #airships

Mechanized Masterpieces: A Steampunk Anthology (6 page)

BOOK: Mechanized Masterpieces: A Steampunk Anthology
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“Ahready she done two draughts, Cap’n. As I seh, dee bidness she be breesk. Mighty high flyin’ dere be dees night, and da soonah what I geeb ’er takes ’old, the bettah, says I. But, dee physic, she don’t seem to ’fect ’er like she done.”

I glared off into the darkness. Another burst of bawdy laughter filtered to us. “Do what you think best. As you say, we haven’t any time. I mean to be at West End at dawn.”

“Travelin’ t’night, suh? Be dat wise?”

“Better than tomorrow, mate. You’ve business there as much as I.”

“Yes suh, Cap’n. Ye speak de troof. I sees to eet.”

After a moment, Julian returned with two flagons of ale. Rowland eyed it warily. “It’s my private stock, mate. Drink up.”

“Captain of what?”

I shrugged. “Of my airship? My sailboat? Would you prefer ‘Captain of Industry’?”

“You are too full of yourself by half, Fairfax. You cannot control the world.”

“You mistake me, Rowland. I find precious little within my control.”

The vocal protests from three or four men at the far side of the room drew my brother’s attention. Someone had abruptly brought an end to their revelries.

Out of the smoky murk slunk a tall woman as sultry as the night. Although still shapely, her addictions and my attempts at enforced restraint had stripped her of the Rubenesque qualities that had begun to plague her at the onset of our marriage. Her hair hung loose over her bare shoulders and arms. It ranged thick and wild, the soft curls coiling and uncoiling with each movement, as if alive. It caressed her skin and she encouraged the constant stimulation.

She wore a bustier cut of black leather but nothing beneath. Below the tight-cinched waist, a jewel clung to her navel. The cage-work of whalebone stays ended in half-cups in which she nested her ample breasts, although the faulty covering paid scant lip-service to decency.

Leather short-pants rode on her hips and scarcely covered her loins. The head of a cobra tattoo emanated from the open button of her fly. Its tail escaped the pant-leg to wrap twice around her left thigh. Garters held fishnet stockings in place, and stiletto heels added at least four inches to her statuesque height.

She wore a studded leather collar tight around her throat, and encircled her eyes with charcoal, thick and black. Her full lips pulsed a blood red. She walked like a cat in heat and drew just as devoted a following.

A waft of jasmine preceded her, but as she drew near, less pleasant scents bloomed in the mix. Unwashed and unkempt, what appeared seductive in the gloomy distance grew more repugnant with each advancing step.

I pushed my chair back into the deepest recesses of the shadows. She focused so intently upon Rowland, I escaped her notice. She never saw me when I checked on her. She spoke truthfully about one thing: I always knew where she was and who she was with. Always.

Rowland nervously looked to me for some sort of direction. I said nothing. He glanced again at the hellcat closing in on him. He swallowed hard. He turned to face me but kept his eye on the woman’s advance. His breath came in short starts and stops, and he drummed a tattoo on the table. “You . . . I . . . You promised to introduce me to your wife.”

“Indeed, I did.”

“Then what do we here? Show me where you have secreted her away.”

“Understand me, Rowland. Bertha Mason dwells in a prison of her own device. She chooses the where, when and how. I do my duty. I see to her needs. I do my best to keep her safe.”

The vamp reached us, acting as if we strained at the leash to get at her. Every calculated move insinuated sensuality. “You’re new here, no?” She caressed the posts of a chair as she turned it around to face her, then straddled it, leading with her hips as she sat.

Rowland rose to his feet. “Perhaps we should go.”

Bertha looked to him, and then at the corner where he had directed his comment, but she failed to recognize me. Her smile dripped with confidence and determination in the pause of Rowland’s hesitation and my silence. She rose and took him into custody. In her shoes, she towered over him.

“The evening is still young.” She pressed him back down into his seat, then straddled him as she had done the chair. She scraped a long, deadly claw across his jawline. “So pretty,” she purred. “You shall be pure pleasure.” She kissed him long and hard and deep. Rowland resisted for a full two seconds. He made me proud.

I cleared my throat—heavily . . . several times. Rowland drew breath enough to speak, although the trollop on his lap increased her exertions. “Madam,” he gasped. “We . . . have not . . . been . . . introduced.”

Bertha chortled and murmured something in his ear. He cursed beneath his breath, but his hands pursued their own pleasures just the same. Bertha’s powers of persuasion rarely met with resistance.

Julian appeared at Rowland’s shoulder. “For dee ledy, as ye ordeh’d, suh.” Bertha looked up enough to throw back the shot of rum, then renewed her assault with gusto. Rowland groaned. Julian eyed me. I jerked my chin and he retreated.

“Great Scott, woman!” Rowland gasped, his voice thick and guttural. Plea for deliverance or compliment on technique? To this day, I could not say. Bertha’s hands worked his coveralls feverishly, plunging ever lower in search of the deepest buttons.

“By Jove!” Rowland jumped to his feet. His burden fell unceremoniously to the floor. Hands shaking, disheveled, flushed and breathless, he struggled to strip himself of the coveralls, a task already half-completed. “Fairfax! Who is this catamount—this . . . this Jezebel! . . . And what have you done with your wife?”

Still panting and torrid, Bertha slowly emerged from beneath the table, her eyes narrowed and fierce. She peered into my dark corner. “Fairfax?” Her snarl could raise gooseflesh.

I lit my cigar. “Darling,” I said between puffs, “I thank you for greeting my brother so warmly. Allow me to
formally
introduce you. Rowland, you, of course, know my wife.”

Bertha rose to her feet, wild and wary. She glanced from me to my brother and back again. He had cast aside the drudge, yet still fumbled with the buttons and buckles of his more gentlemanly attire. Bertha worked with great efficiency when properly motivated. “Rowland?” she breathed. “Rowland Rochester?”

I chuckled. “In the flesh, as you see.”

Rowland labored frantically. Each fastener restored increased his agitation. “Fairfax, I know not what game you would be at, but either take me to your wife or I will have you in shackles within the hour!”

Bertha spun on him, transformed. Meek and imploring, her eyes wet and shining, she seemed to shrink with each hesitant step toward him. She visibly trembled. Her voice quavered, thick with tears. “Rowland . . . dearest . . . my only friend—my only hope.” She reached for him, but he stepped back, yanking away his hands in disgust.

She wheeled on me, wild-eyed, her face hard and flushed with her downfall. “You tricked me. You knew I wanted him. You brought him here to laugh at me. I hate you, you filthy bastard! Why won’t you die?!”

She launched at me, but I moved aside as she flew across the table. Amidst the clatter of wood on stone, Rowland gaped at the darkness into which she had disappeared. The color had drained from his face. He could no longer deny the truth.

A moment of silence, vacillation, then he stepped toward the wreckage. She crept into the light, rose to her knees. Where she secreted the Daguerreotype of Rowland, I can only imagine, but she produced it, grasped in both hands which she raised in supplication. Tears streamed from her charcoaled eyes in black rivers down her face.

“Dearest brother,” she implored. “My darling Rowland, have pity. See what he has done to me! See what he forces me to do for him to satisfy his perversions! He makes me his whore because he can! Do not abandon me to such cruelty. For the love of God, have mercy upon me.”

She broke down into uncontrollable sobbing and curled in on herself. He rushed to her, fell to his knees, and enfolded her in his embrace. She attempted to push him away, but he would not have it. She hid her face in his neck, clinging to him fiercely. Whether or not Rowland noticed she slipped the picture beneath his waistcoat, I could not say. Suddenly, she fell silent and lax.

Bertha’s head lolled back and she began to snore. Julian appeared with a bundle of clothes. “What have you done to her?” Rowland demanded.

I declined to answer. Rowland attempted to repulse me as I assumed custody of her, but with Julian looming over him, he had no choice but to comply. Together, my friend and I managed to cover my wife’s nakedness. The simple garb of a peasant best served my purpose.

Julian and I propped her between us and struggled to our feet. “Law, dees womon, she geet hebbiah ebey deh,” Julian groaned. “Geet de door, mon,” he chided Rowland. “Cannuh ye see we’s gots our hands fool?”

Julian manned the engine of the vulcanized rubber dinghy as it skipped across the surface of the choppy waves. Encircled with gas-filled envelops, it resembled an airship more than a watercraft. Three electrified iodine lamps mounted on the prow lit the foam-capped peaks before us. The froth glowed in ominous warning.

Rowland gripped the handles embedded in the sides of the skiff, his eyes wide, his knuckles white, his legs braced against the soft hull. It seemed he scarcely drew breath. He apparently cared little for my invention.

“Once one solves the problem of power, anything is possible.”

He glared at me, resentful of the place I had refused him but assumed myself. I reclined against the stern envelope, cradling sleeping Bertha in my arms. I pushed back her damp hair and resituated the slicker to better protect her face from the spray.

“Where are we going?” Rowland spoke at last.

“As I said, to West End.”

“Why? Why tonight, at this hour?”

I smirked. “You truly lack imagination, dear brother.” He glowered at me and I ceded the point. “The storm comes—”

“A storm would have been here by now.”

Julian and I exchanged glances. The skiff made a particularly high leap off the top of a large swell, then landed with a thump in the trough behind it. Rowland nearly flew over the side, then fell into the bottom of the boat, where he chose to remain.

“I go to West End to ensure my people are safe. And, West End is leeward. That has to be something.”

He jerked his chin at my wife. “Explain this abomination in your marriage.”

“Abomination, indeed,” I agreed.

Julian snorted his derision, but Rowland shot him a hateful look and the man retreated.

“My wife is ill. Her addictions of every kind—including copulation—her obsessions have reduced her to a kind of madness.”

“Why have you not sued for divorce?”

“One can escape infidelity, but the deranged are neither the guilty nor innocent party. Without somewhere to lay blame, the Law denies me any hope of reprieve, or even relief. I am shackled for the remainder of my days. This compassion you see—dare I say tenderness? I trust anyone would extend as much to a wounded and helpless animal.”

Rowland attempted to shake off the logic. “No . . . no. You told
no one
you wed. Only Yvette and I ever knew—and that from some slip of the tongue by Rottstieger.”

“Do you suppose I wanted Yvette exposed to this corruption?” I insisted, revealing Bertha’s haggard face.

Rowland’s anger seemed to rise with mention of his wife. “What have you done to Bertha? What did you give her?”

“What I must, as I have done for three years. I keep her as safe as possible without endangering the innocent with her violence.”

“The mad belong in asylums.”

“Rottstieger combed two continents for an acceptable facility and found none. In such a place, Bertha would become an animal because they would treat her thus. I will condemn no-one to such an existence.”

Rowland scowled doom and destruction at me but fell silent, which suited. Shouting over the noise of the engine and the rising storm had grown tedious. Lightning cracked open the scudding clouds and the rain began to fall. I shifted my wife into my brother’s arms and began bailing.

The lighter gray of dawn had crept upon us when Julian hurled the dinghy up onto the beach. His concern for his family broke free of his determined calm as soon as he drove the boat aground. He ran ahead. The rain had stopped for the moment, but the wind and sea continued to roar.

BOOK: Mechanized Masterpieces: A Steampunk Anthology
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