Le Gentilhomme Aimant Sans Pitié - Lockwood x Lucy

Caravan of Fortune

"Le Gentilhomme Aimant Sans Pitié"

Lockwood x Lucy

Lockwood and Co. Series

Summary: What happened with La Belle Dame Sans Merci, but reverse.

Sequel: Private Renditions

————Lockwood————

It was hours later that I found myself walking out of the auditorium and through the corridors outside of it, the ones leading to Tufnell's Marvels and other entertainments inside the same building.

Le Gentilhomme hadn't reappeared since Lucy saw him in the water tank as a drowned pirate. The calmness of the colossal establishment managed to get us all a little jumpy, especially Holly and Lucy, since they were the only ones he had to target.

I had made sure George, Kipps and I checked on both girls as constantly as they would let us without getting on their nerves. They kept reassuring us they were fine, but something was gnawing in the back of my head, making me a little guilty about bringing the here.

Pausing periodically to look at the many posters on the walls, I kept walking around.

I suddenly found myself in the automatons room inside Tufnell's Marvels. Not really thinking of where I was going as long as I kept doing readings I had wandered off farther than any of the others. Maybe I should go back, but honestly, all the weird machinery had gotten my attention, and knowing myself, they would keep getting my attention until I took a look at them.

Surely the others wouldn't mind if I took a sneak peek at the apparatuses and rejoined them in a few minutes, would they?

I allowed myself a few minutes of curio wandering and looked at the old and new, gold and bronze, rusty and shiny engines. Some looked simple enough, but there were many others that were big and complex, with wiring here and there and levers sticking out of weird places and differently-colored buttons. Some looked like people, some looked like animals, some were basic geometric figures and some others didn't look like anything I had ever seen in real life.

Somewhere in the back of my mind a light switched on and a memory of me and my sister Jessica came to me. It was from back when I was still just a little boy. She had taken me to a fair in the city that may or may have not been this very same one of Mr Tufnell, but I couldn't really remember. All I remember was shrilly music, bright colors and having so much fun with Jessica. The memory enlightened a nostalgic happiness in me.

As I walked around the room a particular box at the closer end of the door caught my undivided attention. It was designed to look like some kind of caravan, painted in frilly red and yellow, with a sign on the top that read 'One pound. Your fortune told'.

...

I had one pound.

Against all of my better judgements, I fished inside my pockets and took out the money and placed it on the caravans slot.

At once the machine roared to life, lights turning up inside of it and the sounds of clanking coming from inside it. The caravan's curtains were withdrawn and witch sitting inside it was revealed, a glass-ball between her wart-filled hands. A whirling light filled the ball as her hands moved around it, a mechanical crow on her should cawing. The fortune teller laughed wickedly and the light in the ball died out after something was placed on the little hatch under the caravan. The lights died in the machine and the curtains were drawn in again.

I silently introduced my fingers in the hatch and took two bits of paper from it. I wasn't sure if it was a glitch or not, but whatever the answer, I was not complaining.