by Althea Blue
Ada smiled and kissed Patience until she forgot to feel ashamed. When Patience smiled into Ada’s mouth, the girl rocked towards her and began to inch down Patience’s body, kissing as she went. She momentarily paused at Patience’s breasts, tasting each one in turn and then continued to kiss down to her stomach and further, past crinkly hair to the juncture of Patience’s legs. She stopped and looked at where she was, using her hand to push Patience’s legs apart so she could see better.
Patience’s face burned, though only part of it was from embarrassment. A small portion of her mind was sure no one was supposed to be looking at her there, but the rest of her was anticipating what Ada would do next.
The girl's fingertips lightly stroked Patience, pushing the hair aside and peering closer. Ada bit her lip, apparently lost in thought. Involuntarily, Patience’s body jerked when Ada stroked the right place and she let out her breath with a sigh. Then Ada bent down and kissed Patience in that same spot, then touched it with her tongue. Patience almost flew off the bed. Nothing had ever felt like that. She wasn't sure she could survive it.
Ada stroked again, more firmly now that she was sure of herself. Her tongue swirled around Patience’s sex. The heat and wetness were everywhere. Patience felt the warm muscle inside her and then it withdrew, repeating a number of times until Patience’s eyes were screwed tight and she didn’t know which way was up. Then it returned to the first spot and ran in circles around her.
Patience couldn’t catch her breath. She never wanted to breathe again if it would make this go away. Something built up in her and she lost control, straining to meet Ada’s tongue time after time. A bright explosion caused Patience to see stars but she didn’t care. All she wanted was for Ada to stay right where she was until finally something cascaded within her and she cried out louder than she had ever done before.
When her vision cleared, Ada was watching her, looking quite pleased with herself. Patience put her arms around Ada’s shoulders and lifted her so she could reach her mouth. She could taste a salty flavor that she knew was her own essence and beyond that something that was quintessentially Ada.
She’d never felt so at home.
For the rest of the night the girls took turns exploring each other’s bodies, and resting and giggling together in between. In the morning Patience couldn’t remember what they had talked about, but she felt she knew Ada better than she knew herself. She certainly knew Ada’s body better than she knew her own. She had a vague memory of Ada admitting to reading a book her father had hidden away, and that was where she got the idea to try her mouth on Patience, an idea for which she was thoroughly thanked several times.
She had no idea when they had finally fallen asleep, but when she woke up Ada was tangled around her, breathing deeply and smiling in her slumber. Patience could feel the corresponding smile on her own face and lay there watching the girl until her eyes opened and their gazes met.
Patience’s breath was taken away as she saw the happiness, and perhaps a small measure of vulnerability in the brighter light of day. Patience tightened her arms around the smaller girl, who buried her face in Patience’s shoulder and then gave it a kiss. She started to kiss Patience’s mouth but just then Patience’s stomach growled.
Ada giggled until her own gave a corresponding rumble. She sat up, the bedclothes falling from her unashamed form and Patience’s breathing hitched in response. Ada poked at her and then stood up, stepping into her dress but ignoring her shift on the floor. She reached down and tossed Patience’s dress at her.
“Get up. We’re going to find breakfast.” She saw the gleam in Patience’s eye and added “the food kind. In the kitchen,” before Patience could get any ideas.
Trying not to pout, Patience pulled her own dress on, though she did step into her drawers first. Even with just the two of them, and certainly no secrets between them after the night, it felt a little immoral to have no underclothes on at all.
Chapter Thirteen
Ada ducked outside to collect eggs from the hens while Patience set water to boil for tea and took out a bag of oats and a box of cinnamon for oatmeal. She had no idea how to make oatmeal, but the cook always added cinnamon and sugar. She looked for sugar but couldn’t find any so she asked about it when Ada came back in.
“I am looking for sugar,” she said. “I checked the pantry but did not see any.”
Ada shrugged. “There’s only a tiny bit left. Perhaps enough for a few cups of tea, but no more than that. I’ll sweeten the oatmeal with raisins.”
Patience thought about it. “I could go to the village and get some more,” she offered. “No one there knows me.”
Ada winced. “I don’t think that’s such a good idea. Mr. Welsh will bring some eventually. We can do without for now. Besides, I don’t have a lot of money left,” she admitted. “We’d better save it for something we really need.”
Tactfully, Patience agreed. “How often does Mr. Welsh come to check on you?” she asked.
“It’s sporadic. When he can get away without anyone noticing. And he can’t bring too much at a time or it would be obvious he was making deliveries. He’s as careful as I could wish.”
Ada still seemed uncomfortable so Patience changed the subject.
“Could you show me how the things work, upstairs?” she asked. Curiosity thrummed through her when she thought about all the objects in the workroom. “I do not mean how to run them, I learned enough about that yesterday, but how were they made? I have yet to see the inside of a clock, even. Father has one and Mason took it apart once, but I did not get a good look. I was forbidden to touch it, even to wind it. It is the one task Father does for himself.”
Ada brightened. “Of course. We can go as soon as we eat. Father's made so many wonderful things. And I know how he did most of them. Except there are a few that are a big mystery.”
“Perhaps we could try to make something ourselves, I have never made anything before, if you do not count embroidered samplers.” Patience made a face. “I so hate to embroider. Unendingly tedious and requires no thought. A clockwork trinket is ever so much more interesting.”
Ada spooned oatmeal into two bowls, added a sprinkle of cinnamon and a handful of raisins to each and set them on the table. Patience stirred her bowl as Ada put a few hard boiled eggs in a saucer between them and poured tea. She noticed that Ada didn’t use any sugar from the nearly empty packet she brought out, so she didn’t either. The tea was strong with no milk and no sugar, but she resolved to smile and say she liked it best that way, should Ada inquire, though she usually added enough sugar to make her mother frown.
At home it would never have occurred to her that they could run out of anything, there always seemed to be too much. Too much food, too many new dresses, definitely too many dull visitors. She had never understood scarcity until her adventure on the road and she hoped never to do so again. There must be a way to get more supplies from the village without worrying Ada. She’d have to think about it.
The first thing Ada did when they reached the workshop was to name the tools that lay around the room. Other than tweezers, Patience didn’t recognize much, but she was amazed at the variety. They ranged from the tiniest screwdriver, no longer than her smallest finger, to great sets of spanners, with everything in between.
“I see how it makes sense,” she said, when they’d gone through everything, “to have so many tools so you can make things in a range of sizes. But would it not be easier to use the same size of screws or cogs, even in bigger things? Will they not work the same way no matter the size?”
Ada smiled. “The difference is in the power. The bigger the spring, and the tighter you can turn it, the more powerful the device will be. If I used the same size works in the beast as, say, in the cat, then his legs would only move as much as the cat’s, and his roar would be as quiet as the cat’s meow. It wouldn’t be powerful enough to scare away a fly. And if I used a beast-sized work in the cat, it would stick out the back and leap instead of walking and burn out
very quickly. My father always stressed using the correct tool for the correct job and that applies to every part.”
Patience considered this. “What if we put an even bigger clock inside the beast? Could we make him do more things? Could he bite, like the dog statue, and leap on people?”
Ada bit her lip. “I don’t understand how Father made the dog bite, I don’t think I could do that. But yes, I think we could improve the beast. It might be more useful if it had fewer limitations. We could make it scarier. I wonder if adding a second clockwork to control big movements, while the current one could do the smaller actions and the sound…” She started pulling things out of drawers and laying them out on the counter where most of the tools were, forgetting about Patience entirely.
She looked up again when Patience laughed. “I did not mean for you to start right now. I just mean sometime. You were going to show me how things worked. Then maybe I could help you with the beast.”
Ada blushed. “Sometimes I get carried away,” she mumbled, looking away from Patience.
Patience went to her. “And it is very charming.” She touched Ada under the chin and raised her head so she was looking at Patience. “We will work together,” she stated, and leaned in to kiss Ada softly.
The girl’s arms went around Patience and she hugged her, kissing her enthusiastically.
Patience’s heart rate increased and she pulled slightly away. “Later,” she promised the other girl. “Show me how the cat works.”
Ada gave her a small smile and fetched the cat, turning it upside down to show where the fur pulled away to reveal a tiny door. Inside was a jumble of what Patience recognized as gears and cogs and wires. It looked like a mess to her, but Ada pointed to each part and explained its function. She used the smallest screwdriver to take it apart so Patience could see exactly what made the legs move and what parts were for the cat’s voice and what made it vibrate slightly when petted. It was amazing that something so small should have so many different pieces and that all were necessary to the function. Patience revised her estimate of Ada’s skill. This cat was no toy, it was a work of art and if Ada had made the beast similarly, she wasn’t just a clever girl, she was some kind of mechanical genius.
“What if one part stops moving?” Patience asked.
“It would mostly depend on which part. If the mechanism that made the cat meow didn’t work, it wouldn’t affect the rest of it, but if the main spring stopped the cat would do nothing.” Ada put all the pieces back without hesitation; dozens of pieces in only a few moments, and Patience was amazed all over again.
Ada started the cat moving and it meowed, walked across the table and then curled into a ball and purred when Patience stroked it. It was the same motions she’d seen the first time she was in the workroom, but now that she knew how complex it was, the work that went into each tiny movement, she was astounded. “I wonder if you could control the movement somehow,” she mused. “Not just in a straight line, but if you could tell it to go left or right and when to stop and go.”
Narrowing her eyes, Ada considered the cat. “It’s possible. There isn’t a lot of room in there for other functions. But if we made a bigger one. A dog perhaps, that would have more room inside.”
“Or we could try on the beast. That is much bigger and must have lots of empty places,” Patience suggested. “And then if we needed to scare anyone else off, we could make the beast go up and roar in his face. That would be terribly effective. Not that I think anyone else will ever come,” she added hastily, not wishing to frighten Ada. “But just in case.”
Instead of frightened, Ada looked excited. “I never thought of that. I’m just used to Father’s creations running through their paces by themselves. But if we could make it move where we wanted, it would be so much better.” She hugged Patience again. “You’re a genius.”
Patience blushed. She didn’t feel like a genius, she had no idea what exactly was running through Ada’s mind and she wouldn’t be able to offer any real help tinkering with the invention, but just maybe her ideas would let her be Ada’s assistant. She'd always been told to stop expressing her ideas, but that hadn't stopped her from having them.
Ada was the first person in years who wanted Patience to use her mind, and was actually excited by it. She felt warm and wanted, both feelings new to her. She resolved to try as hard as she could to understand the things in that room, so she would be useful to Ada and could stay with her indefinitely.
“What are you thinking about now?” Ada asked, noticing Patience’s faraway look.
“I was daydreaming,” Patience admitted. She wouldn’t tell Ada about these particular desires. It was too soon.
Ada smiled. “Help me bring the beast upstairs so we can start redesigning it.”
“You should give it a name. It is similar to a pet, is it not? And it would be easier to call it something other than ‘the beast’ or ‘the creature.'”
“I never thought of that either,” Ada responded. “I haven’t talked to anyone about it, so there was no need to name it. But perhaps you’re right. What should we call it?”
Patience giggled. “Call it something like Daisy. It could be a girl beast.”
Ada wrinkled her nose. “I think it’s a boy beast. I didn’t give it teats.”
Patience had never heard anatomical parts being referred to so frankly and she blushed again.
It took Ada a moment to notice Patience’s shocked look and then she poked Patience in the side, in a place she had discovered was quite ticklish. “You’re such a city girl!” she exclaimed.
“Mother says if there is no euphemistic way to refer to something, then not to mention it at all. There are a great many things Mother never mentions,” Patience explained.
“Father says to call things what they are. Otherwise people get confused,” Ada countered.
“Your father sounds a lot more sensible than my parents,” Patience decided. “I will try to be as clear. But it may take some time.”
“Let’s call it Frank. Maybe that’ll remind you about clarity."
Patience grinned. “Let us retrieve Frank and begin the surgery.”
Halfway up the stairs, Patience decided Frank was heavier than he looked. “You ought to give him the ability to walk up and down stairs. Then we shall not need to do this again.”
Ada nodded. “That should be possible, if I can control the legs to follow a pattern. I did give him bendable joints. I want to design it so he goes in a direction until he’s told to stop or change. Otherwise I would have to control each step separately, and it would be more trouble than it’s worth.”
Once Patience had helped get Frank into the workshop, and had a look inside, she decided she’d better leave Ada to work. “I’m not going to be much help here. I think I will go down to the garden and see if there is anything ready to pick.” She didn’t know much more about gardens than about creating monsters, but she figured it had to be easier to understand.
Without looking up, Ada answered, “Some of the squash should be ripe, but that’s probably all. It’s the end of the season and too cold for much to grow.”
Patience went over the contents of the pantry in her mind. There didn’t seem to be enough food there to last Ada nearly through the winter, much less both of them.
Ada glanced up and must have seen Patience’s worried expression. “All the food is stored away for the winter. There’s always far more food than I can eat. I can and pickle and make jams. That’s why I’m out of sugar, most of it went into jam. It's all in a cellar under the kitchen. I can show you later.”
Patience let out a sigh of relief. “I can find it. You just keep… tinkering. I will put lunch together and call you when it is ready.”
“Thank you.” Ada said, sticking her head back into the opening in the beast. Patience watched for a moment, smiling at Ada’s enthusiasm and then removed herself downstairs to do as she’d said.
#
“Ada.” Patience called up the stairs f
or the third time. As with the two previous, there was no answer. She knew she was loud enough to be heard, even from the landing on the ground floor but the lack of response encouraged her to pile the sandwiches and tea onto a tray and carry it up the two flights of stairs.
She worried a bit that Ada might not be feeling well, as she hadn't responded to her calls, but was amused instead at the sight of her friend sitting cross legged on the floor, her skirt spread around her quite covered by hundreds of metal pieces. There were piles of cogs in different sizes and dozens of springs and far more bits than Patience could name, despite her lesson that morning. Ada was bent over something, holding it in one hand, using the other to screw a tiny screw in place. Patience noticed a few more sticking out from between Ada’s pursed lips, something she’d seen dozens of dressmakers do with pins, but this was far more entertaining.
“I know my cooking is not spectacular, but surely it will taste better than metal screws,” she quipped.
Ada’s head jerked up and the screws fell out of her mouth into her lap. “Damnation,” she said.
“Ada!” Patience exclaimed.
Cursing was something only drunks and vagabonds and sailors did, or so her books said.
Ada laughed at her surprise. “Don’t worry. It’s just what my father used to say when something wasn’t going where he wanted it. I guess I picked up the habit.” She seemed to think it was funny and Patience smoothed out her features. “Why didn’t you call?” she said, looking at the tray of food in Patience’s hands.
“I did. Three times. You ignored me.” She placed the tray on one of the only spots on the counter that wasn't hidden under tools and bits of metal.
“Oops,” Ada shrugged, seeing the chaos she'd spread through the workroom. “I think I got carried away.” She put the device in her hand down and carefully sorted the objects scattered over her dress into piles of like materials. Patience extended a hand and helped pull her up. “Why didn’t you use the dumbwaiter for the tray?” she asked.
Patience blushed. “I never considered it. It would have been more sensible than the stairs. Though moving the shelves away seems troublesome. We should shift those if we plan to use the contraption again,” she suggested, knowing there would be a next time. “Apparently you inherited more than cursing from your father. Such as a tendency to forget meals?”
