The Clockwork Conundrum : A Beatrix Belladonna Tale

A contented smile crossed Beatrix's face when she slumbered. She swished and stirred, moaned and mewled in the silken sheets, still left in the faint throes of ecstasy as tiny stabs of pleasure radiated from the bite wounds all over her, most of them concentrated on her bare breasts. She reclined surrounded by the vampire lovers, who slept more soundly.

Somewhere, a muted voice called to her. “Abadonna?” She murmured to herself and rose almost silently from the bed.

Her partners didn't stir as the witch started to sleepwalk to the door. Its creak was nearly inaudible when she exited into the hallways. The clockwork maids on perpetual duty bowed and curtsied when she passed and made her way down the stairs.

Clocks sounded in the distance. A fire burned in the heart and cast the somnambulist in its ghostly glow.

The unknown force continued its call to her, and she had no choice but to follow. Eventually, she arrived in a vast library, the shelves lined in innumerable books. Yet she was guided to one tome in particular, locked beneath a chained case.

Despite the series of complicated echantments woven into it, clear by the runes that shimmered on her approach, her lips started to chant alien words. Piece-by-piece, she undid the seals, and the layers of chains fell away one at a time with a rattle.

Finally, the lock fell away. She cast a final spell to disarm the magic trap that would alert anyone if the alarm was tripped.

Her hands shook when they were laid on the dark tome. The Necronomicon, its cover layered in the stitched-together flesh of various victims, dried and woven like some grotesque quilt. Thick as it was on the surface, when one opened its cover an infinite number of pages were somehow stored within, each filled with forbidden dark arts and entries on various abominations.

She clutched the book to her bosom and once more followed the voice, which was slightly louder now. A male's voice, harsh and brittle. She carried her prize towards the basement, and wove another series of spells to break the numerous locks.

Her bare feet padded on the stairs that wound their way down, into the abyss of darkness that swallowed her up below.

In the basement she heard another rattle. “Yes,” rasped the male's voice. “Come closer.”

Huddled in shadow sat a bony figure, flesh old and worn on its skeletal frame, hidden by a once vibrant cloak that had faded, tattered, and molded. Bloodshot eyes bulged from his skull-like face when he stretched out his elongated fingers to accept the Necronomicon. She started to hand it over, oblivious to the sorcerer who had invaded her haunted dreams.

His dried lips stretched under his hood, ready to snatch the tome from her grasp.

Light suddenly flooded the chamber, illuminated by torches carried by the automatons that lit them in unison. Beatrix snapped to awareness and shrilly screamed at the monster before her, clutching the toem back to her breast. “Wh-what...?”

“We cannot leave you alone for a single moment,” said Camellia who crossed her arms.

“You almost had us this time,” noted Esmerelda who kept her pistol trained on the chained up prisoner.

Grumbles rose from the man, spittle falling out of his cracked lips. “I see you've captured another slave. You two are no better than me, despite what you like to believe. No matter how much finery you surround yourselves with, you can't escape the stink of your past.” He rattled with a cold, drawn out chuckle, shaken in the robes that clumped around his thin form.

Beatrix swallowed hard with realization. “He's the one who turned you, isn't he? You claimed he was dead...”

“Dead to us,” said Esmerelda who shrugged.

“I taught these two much of what they know,” mused the alchemist turned vampire.

“You exaggerate,” shot back Camellia with a muted huff.

“Nonetheless, I made you two into what you are. Shaped you,” he finished with a rictus grin smile.

Beatrix shivered when she kept the book clutched to her chest. “Why do you keep him here? To spite him?”

“It's more than that,” confessed Esmerelda with a shake of her head. “We used our 'master' in a ritual to help build our fortune. See those chains? They're bound to our mansion, feed it. We realized even a building could take on life.” Her free palm caressed a wall and felt a subtle, heartbeat-like throb. “The 'Womb of Conception' feeds on him to invigorate itself, and thus us!”

Thinking it over, Beatrix's thoughts bounced all over the place. Could this be the same house she now lived in? But how was that possible? From what she knew, that mansion was an eldritch abomination that had escaped imprisonment in the Necronomicon? Her mind railed at the possibilities, reminded that she held the dark tome to her bare bosom.

Her own home needed nourishment from a powerful demon to sustain it. Once it had captured her sister Bellatrix Primadonna, before she had chosen to fuse with it in order to preserve itself. Much of the layout here was also similar to her home.

“I...shouldn't be here,” she mumbled to herself. Her adventures took her across time and space, yet she had always traveled into the future when she returned to a dimension. Yet creatures who also moved between dimensions could always be met out of order, and she dreaded the potential consequences, should she introduce a major paradox to the delicate web of reality.

“Forget what you saw here,” urged Camellia, who wrapped an arm around the witch's waist. “It is for the best.”

“I...I guess so,” she replied dumbly, trying to make sense of it all. Again, it felt like her world had been flipped upside-down. Well, she couldn't complain about a lack of novelty in her life! “S-so...what's his name...?”

“Lord Dhullex,” he announced in a clink of chains. “Oh, how low these two whelps have laid me...”

“You deserve far worse,” assured Camellia who haughtily curled her lip beneath her porcelain mask. She directed Beatrix up the stairs, and Esmerelda blew their former master a kiss with a wink before she and the maids also ascended.

The basement door slammed shut and the locks were replaced. “It's our fault really,” admitted Esmerelda. “We should have known your dreams were vulnerable. It took us years to escape his mental hold. But you? You're not used to him.”

Beatrix looked at the tome and asked, “Where did you get this?”

“It was his,” explained Camellia. “Where he found it, we do not know. He was well-traveled and learned. A master of the blackest arts. This mansion was once his. To enslave him here was a fitting punishment. But we dare not read that book.”

“A wise choice,” admitted Beatrix. The Necronomicon could compel others to read it and binded with their souls, yet she sensed its power here was weak. Perhaps it was early still into the damned book's career, yet she doubted it could be destroyed now.

They returned the tome to its place in the library, then headed to the bathroom where the maids drew them a bath. Soon they were submerged in the soapy, bubbly waters which steamed and surrounded them in its phantasmal vapors.

The pool swished around Beatrix as the lovers soaped her up, the suds left to roll down their glistening wet skin. She closed her eyes and mewled in appreciation. After a fancy breakfast, they would be ready to head out for another hunt.

After she was dressed and her belly filled, Beatrix exited alongside the vampire huntresses into the soft daylight.

*****

Another factory was hit at the brink of dawn. At instructions from Doctor Kilroy, Penny Dreadful and the Dazzlings had varied their routines, the good doctor eager to throw their pursuers off the scent. But she had a different plan. Better to confront them directly, deal with them once-and-for-all, so that the huntresses and the witch could be used in his experiments.

She petted her mechanical octopus who crawled beside her. The whores followed close behind. It was rare for her to operate in broadlight, but by the same token the huntresses were normally nocturnal, too.

“I suppose the poor boy needed a walk,” said Penny who bent down to pet the mechanical animal.

“Got the stuff,” said Aria between huffs, a container clutched to her chest.

“Good girls,” replied Penny who smiled thinly. “We're small in number now, but someday Kilroy will have an army!”

“Excellent,” replied Adagio with a curtsy. “I'm grateful we could prove our worth. After that last debacle...” They lingered in an alley, away from the prying eyes of the public, and watched carriages pulled by clockwork horses and civilians on bicycles ride by in the distance. A reminder of the better life denied the poor sisterly prostitutes by those who ran the city.

“Guess it's time to head home, huh?” Sonata frowned. “I wanted some ice cream.”

“I'll have Kilroy make some for you,” assured Penny and was met by a cheery squeal that made her ears throb. She had desperately hoped the hunters would put in a surprise appearance, but despite how long she lingered was met by disappointment. Perhaps it was for the best, since she certainly didn't want to let their master down.

They headed back towards a manhole, unaware they were watched and pursued...