Clockwork Heart (nanowrimo 2012) Featured in WattNaNo's Top Picks

Clockwork Heart Epilogue

Epilogue

The next few months brought about great changes in Portside. Although no one actually knew what had happened in that small storage room except the trio, rumours spread over the town bringing lightness with it. The Ripper was dead and people would no longer fear the darkness. No longer would they fear the streets and the cold heart killer that wanted to rip out their hearts.

The biggest change was Clancy manor. It had been divided up at the command of the patroness Lady Millicent Clancy and turned into dozens of individual dwellings. She hadn’t seen the works themselves as she had been too frightened to return to her previous dwelling. It was too close to the horror.

The dwellings were swiftly occupied as, even though she hadn’t traversed the areas affected the day after the blaze, she had soon been made aware of the damage the fire had wreaked upon the town. She had been too concerned with her grief at first to do much but after the horror and the trauma had ebbed she had felt guilt like she had never experienced before.  

In that blaze, that had destroyed the factory and which they believe started in her father’s office, many homes had been destroyed. At least ten different families were left homeless and a few others could not return home until the smoke and the ash had been cleared away. She felt that by giving these people a place to live, by letting them stay in her house it was the least she could do for them in reparation. Her father and she may not have lit the fires but they were at the helm of all the trouble that had happened in the past few months, whether she had known it or not. Though she didn’t feel like she was even helping them much by letting them have the house because she would never have stepped foot in their again anyway. It was too painful.

The trio, who had attended to the clockworks fair, were now being hailed as the greatest minds in the industry along with her late father. They couldn’t take all of the credit but, the one thing the three of them agreed upon was that their plans should never be made public. It would not do well for there to be another Ripper on the loose.

They had managed to impart upon the public the sanity behind a fuse that could be triggered remotely – disabling an automaton if they became dangerous. Most of the people that were there had latched onto the idea. Millie thought that there were probably some failed experiments of their own making which they wished to undo. Not every design could be a success and not all of the consequences were harmless.

Titan, her great design, the freethinking automaton that had become their gentle giant, lived. He actually resided with Millie, Percy and his family in her rather large house on the outskirts of Portside. It was an old estate that was three stories tall and almost as large as Clancy manor. Her father had not wanted her to want for anything upon her marriage and she delighted in opening her house and home to her friends.

Titan it turned out, had an aptitude for gardening. An orchard had been planted on the edge of the grounds and a flash of gleaming gold could often be seen amongst the apple trees as the metal man tended to the trees with a peaceful smile upon his face.

The biggest shock in the household was from the staff. She had even been fortunate enough to relocate some of them to houses nearby after the move as they were now further away from the poorer half of Portside. Millie wouldn’t risk the young maids’ lives by making them walk through the streets alone at night. The owner of the Clancy estates was not foolish enough to believe that the world was completely safe now that the Ripper was gone.

Many of them tried to refuse but after plying them all with drink she reasoned with them that it wasn’t charity, it was for own peace of mind. They didn’t seem to believe her but they all seemed to make an extra effort to comply with their mistress’s wishes - even if it irritated her with the over attentiveness.

It had only taken her an entire case of wine to get the deal completed. Then while they were too squint eyed to see much let alone read, she made them sign the deeds and they became proud co-owners of the property.

Millie was particularly proud of the deviousness.

Still, the young Miss Clancy had caused quite a scandal amongst society with this decision. It was only furthered when six months down the line Percy got down on one knee during dinner and with ring in hand, he had proposed to the lady of the house.

Millie who had been nibbling on her asparagus and sneaking glances at Percy over the dinner table, let out a stuttered gasp before she promptly began choking on her vegetable. Cussing, her suitor got to his feet and whacked her on the back several times until the green lump of food tumbled from her mouth and fell upon the freshly laundered table cloths.

“Are you okay?” Percy said, brushing the hair from her face. It had come loose during the ordeal and she was now looking suitably flushed just like she had done after her had kissed her a few weeks back.

“Ask me again.” Millie demanded, grasping the lapels of his jacket to force him closer.

“What?” Percy replied dumbly, as he continued to check that she wasn’t seriously injured after her choking incident.

“I said, ask me again.” She nodded her head at the ring box in hand and raised her brows.

He glanced down and frowned for a few seconds.

“Oh. Oh right.” He exclaimed as realisation struck. Then stroking her face with tenderness she had come to expect from him, she smiled when leaned in close enough for their foreheads to touch. “Millicent Clancy, will you do me the honour of becoming my wife?”

It wasn’t the love of fairy tales but he was her friend, someone who understood her and someone who would never push her for things that she didn’t want. It also helped that he was an amazing kisser. But that was something she would never admit to him.

With a smile on her face, she leapt forwards and wrapped her arms around his neck. She didn’t care what people would think, they both had more talent and more wealth between them in comparison to the so called ‘society’ in Portside.

“Yes, yes forever yes.”

Okay she admitted to herself. Maybe she did love him - just a little.

And so, with a new order within the house and a new kind of peace and contentment settling over the city, things changed and prospered within Portside. It wasn’t perfect and infallible but things definitely changed for the better.

The Portside market was the largest change, it moved from the back alleys to the new town square that was built upon the market field. Even Madame Mo and her love for all things shady had moved into legitimate business, forcing her unruly grandsons to run the shop while she sat outside on her chair and watched the world go by.

It was a strange change but as they city got invested into Clancy’s clockworks once more and the work of those three ruffians she had sold to for many years, the old woman couldn’t see it getting any better - unless someone brought her a whisky and a box of chocolates of course.