Cogs and Corsets: The Anise Buttersby Series Book 1

By Caitlin McColl

A collection of five short Steampunk stories, all connected but each story a different genre - Paranormal, Mystery, Western, Fantasy and Horror.

Miss Anise Buttersby is a 19th C newsreporter and a girl in a world of women wearing Victorian dresses, who DETESTS dresses and instead wears {gasp} pants, and vests! She goes on a cross country adventure with all the regular steampunk stuff thrown in: airships, rayguns, hot air balloons, floating lost continents, strange steam powered contraptions, metal men/automatons/robots, mechanical animals, (and even zombies!) - all in an era still with gaslamps and horse and carriages!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Caitlin McColl
• Release date: Jun 19, 2013
• ISBN: 9781301820207

Caitlin McColl

Since childhood, Caitlin has written mainy fantasy - with dragons, wizards and other fantastical monsters. But now she writes Steampunk, stories that makes our world just a little bit more interesting, with the ability to mask the humdrum days we all have - those cold, grey, rainy, depressing days. The days you accidentally sleep in, lock yourself out of the house, battle morning rush hour and realize your still wearing your slippers. Caitlin lives in beautiful Vancouver, Canada with her husband and her dog.Amazon: www.amazon.com/author/caitlinmccollInstagram: instagram.com/caitlinmccollauthorSeptember 2020-Published The Clockwork Universe and The Stained Glass Heart, follow ups to Under A Starlit Sky. Also re-did covers for books.-Published All That Remains - a free short story collection from 2017-Republished The Diary of Dr Jekyll that was published by a Seattle based publisher that is no more2015-Released a free ebook compilation of stories from her short story blog, Under A Starlit Sky, collectively called The Dark And Shadowy Places.Hope you enjoy!

Book preview

Cogs & Corsets

The Anise Buttersby series Book 1

By Caitlin McColl

Smashwords Edition

Copyright © 2013 Caitlin McColl

All rights reserved.

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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Table of Contents

Of Myths and Monsters – Paranormal

The Mystery of Spring-Heeled Jack – Mystery

Welcome to the Wired Wired West – Western

A Flight of Fantasy – Fantasy

Of Dreams and Desires – Horror

About the Author

Of Myths and Monsters

(Paranormal)

Anise Verity Buttersby detested her middle name almost as much as her last. Verity, truth, whatever that really meant. And Buttersby, it just reminded her too much of butter, and she hated the oily, fattening stuff with a passion.

If anything, she preferred to go by Abe, made up of her initials A and B. Not the most feminine name, she knew, but then again, she wasn’t the most feminine girl. Failing that, Ani was the next least offensive. She wasn’t one of the rake-like girls that looked like a wasp in their corsetry. Even with all her undergarments cinched as tight as they could go without her turning blue in the face, Abe was still plump, but with a bit of curves.

She pointedly ignored the women she passed on the street that looked like you could fit both hands all the way around their waists, even though she knew that most of that was due to the stiff struts and tight ties of the corsets that made their breasts nice enough to attract male attention. Abe always felt like a mound of soft mashed potato squeezed into a sausage casing that was ready to burst.

She looked at herself in the narrow full-length mirror that was stuck in a corner of the small one bedroom flat that she shared with her somewhat disgruntled dog, and grimaced. Even though she wasn’t wearing a dress – she hated them with a passion as made her look like a giant, fluffy, brightly coloured meringue – she wasn’t overly happy with her current outfit. She still looked, and felt, like a sausage. Not helped by the russet coloured trousers that came down just past her knees and the rust coloured bustier on top, over which she wore an extremely short soft brown jacket that fell just to the middle of her back, and just below her breasts – more like a shawl with sleeves, to cover her arms.

Her mass of curly hair, that most of the time looked like she had been dragged backwards through a hedge, was piled as neatly as she could get it on top of her head, with about fifty or so pins to hold it all in place. She gave a small half-smile at the decent job she had done with it, even though the colour of it, a dull mousey reddish brown, was also drab along with the rest of her clothes – her ‘field uniform’ she liked to refer to it. It was so much easier to move around in it than some flouncy dress with all its layers of lace and crinolines and petticoats. She glanced down at her feet and her smiled widened into a grin and she stuck her foot out, admiring her favourite boots – with the small buttons that ran up the side, closed neatly with small hoops of stretchy material. At least their colour was far from drab, and dull, and brown, they were bright red. The bright red of brand new bricks. Or of the new gentleman’s club that just opened down on Westminster Avenue. It wasn’t entirely painted in bright red of course, but it was trimmed in it. To attract the men to it like moths to a flame, thought Anise with disgust.

She resisted the urge to pirouette in front of the mirror and instead grabbed a small ebony handled sheath knife that lay on her dresser table and slid it into the brace that was just under the hem of her trousers and so that it slid into the top of her nearly knee-high boots. Because you just never knew what you might encounter when you were outside following up on the tidbits of information that the newspaper received.

Anise was a newspaper reporter. ‘An investigative journalist’ she said aloud to her reflection. She slapped a small hat, adorned with small, bright feathers in the band and secured it at a jaunty angle with one of her many hair pins. She gave one last look at herself in the mirror and, satisfied, left the small room to enter into the larger, yet still tiny living area and kitchen.

Seconds later she ran back into the room, almost tripping over her despondent King Charles spaniel Bailey, and grabbed the small leather bound notebook off her bedside table and slipped it as discreetly as she could into the top of her other boot. Her most important possession, for a career journalist, anyway.

As she left the apartment, she glanced outside the large bay window that overlooked the main street. She was on the top floor of a three-floor building and there was one other flat across the hall from her. From her window, she could see the light of day quickly draining and being swallowed up by increasingly big and dark cumulous clouds. She removed the miniature pocket watch from the small watch-pocket on the left side of her trousers and glanced at the time. It was only four thirty in the afternoon, but it seemed like nighttime came quicker the past few weeks. She ran a thumb across the engraving of her initials on the top and slipped it back and grabbed a small handful of toffees from a silver plate before slipping out the door.

As she stood on the side of the cobblestoned street, with its large patches that were worn down to almost dirt and dust, she thought that perhaps, her middle name wasn’t so bad after all. Verity. Truth. And isn’t that what she did as a reporter? she mused. Trying to get to the truth in all the rumours, lies, and half-truths that swirled around town in hushed voices and talked about raucously by the men in the local tavern, or in the quiet sanctity of women’s groups and sewing circles.

A horse and carriage trundled noisily up the street a hairbreadth away from the sidewalk on which Anise stood, so that she had to jump back slightly after she had held her hand up to wave the hansom cab over. The driver, sat high up on his perch of an uncomfortable looking bench at the front and outside of the carriage, was cloaked in shadow, just outside the reach of the bluish-tinted gas lamps that ran sparingly along the street side.

Abe was starting to wish she had actually brought a shawl as a chill air blew down the thoroughfare, and hugged herself for warmth. ‘The marshes,’ she directed the driver, standing on the platform on the side of the carriage so she could reach his hand to give him his fare. She sighed gratefully once she was inside the carriage with the door closed and she began to warm a bit. She leaned back against the soft velvet of the seat and wished it were more comfortable than it was, as the large wooden wheels of the cart bounced almost painfully over the uneven and worn away cobbles.

In the feeble light that shone intermittently through the small windows of her transport, she tried to make out the scrawl of her own writing in her notebook.

Reports of will-o-the-wisps, she read. And then beside it with a question mark was written ‘fireflies? Children?’ Underneath was written in hurried script, ‘talk of a shadowy creature that makes strange noises’.

She snapped her notebook shut and slid it back into her boot. Leaning back, she closed her eyes trying to steel her nerves for tramping around the wilderness alone at night. ‘That’s what good reporters must do,’ she admonished herself. She looked out the carriage window when it began to bounce and lurch along even more erratically than before. She noticed she was travelling along a dirt road, wheel tracks gouged deeply into dusty soil, and its way marred by rocks and stones that the cart hit at every opportunity.

Suddenly the carriage was brought to an abrupt halt and Abe could hear the horses grunting in protest. She swung open the door and looked up towards the driver.

‘This is as far as I’ll go, ma’am,’ the man said, looking down at her through the glow of the lantern that hung on a narrow post on either side of the bench.

Abe stepped down and stood directly under where the driver sat so he could see her, and she him. ‘What do you mean?’ She could see the fear in the man’s eyes, even with the little light offered by the lamps in the darkness that was now nearly complete. She looked around her and could see they were standing on a narrow country track and there was nothing but tall grasses and cattails all around. The terrain was flat, only marred by the odd cluster of trees here and there. In the distance, she could see the faint glow of street lamps and the dark silhouettes of the buildings. Above the stars shone brightly in the dark canopy of the sky.

The man shook his head vehemently. ‘I’m not going any further into the marshes, Miss. I’ve heard talk of strange things. Ghosts and fairies and dark, angry creatures!’

Abe tried not to laugh. ‘Fairies?’

The man nodded seriously, and Abe could make out a grim expression even under the large, dark beard that covered most of his face. ‘Yes. Haven’t you heard? There’s been talk all over town of strange lights being seen out here at night. Little balls of light. Fairies, I heard. And I’ve heard they can be vicious little things with wings. I’ve been told that they bite!’ he said with a sour, short laugh. ‘They are not your nice little women, wearing almost nothing and flying around granting wishes, or whatever it is fairies do.’

She took her notebook out again began writing with a small nub of a pencil. ‘What about this creature you mentioned?’ she asked with what she hoped was an air of seriousness and importance.

The man’s eyebrows knit together in a frown. ‘No, I won’t talk about that here,’ he said shaking his head, his dark eyes shifting from side to side. ‘This is as far as I’ll go!’ he said forcefully.

Abe dipped her head. ‘Very well. The marshes start not very far up the road, do they not?’ 

The man nodded silently.

‘Okay then. I shouldn’t take too long, I wouldn’t think,’ she said as she started to walk along the cart worn path.

‘Oh no! I’m not sticking around to wait for you, Miss!’ said the man with fear in his voice.

‘But how am I supposed to get back to town?’ Abe asked in disbelief.

The man shook his head again. ‘Well, you should have thought about that before heading out on this fools’ errand!’ he said as he snapped the reins loudly and the horses lurched forward.

She watched with wide eyes as the cart turned a little ways down another small farm road, and then came back along the path where she stood. As the horses galloped by, the man doffed his cap to her. ‘Good luck to you, Miss!’ was all he said. And then Abe was left standing alone on the side of a road in the middle of nowhere.

‘Well,’ she said as she began to walk quickly further away from the direction of town. ‘At least I’m wearing sensible clothes. And shoes.’ She was thankful that the moon was large and bright, and lit the road and fields around her with a brilliant light, turning the grasses and marsh plants into ghostly lakes of silver and the trees into strange galvanized things. The sky was clear of clouds, and, Abe thought vaguely, any of the nighttime delivery airships that travelled across the United American Empire and made deliveries to their small city a few times a month.

She had walked only about fifty feet or so when she stopped and looked up sharply. She held her breath so she could hear over the loud hammering of her heart. Off to the right of the path, she could see the tall field grasses had become shorter, and then almost non-existent as the ground turned into a dark mass – the swampy, muddy, marshes. She knew that during the day they were brown, brackish water, but at night, in the light of the moon, it looked like polished obsidian. The moon itself shone in it as clear as is if were mirror glass.

Abe gasped loudly as she looked across the darkness below. Above it a strange mist hovered that glowed with an unearthly fire in greens and blues. It looked almost solid. Suddenly it rose upwards and Abe stifled a scream, clapping a hand over her mouth. It shifted and swirled into a vague man-like shape.

And then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw small lights, little balls twinkling above the tops of some cattail reeds that had begun to turn to seed. She stuffed her notebook down the front of her top, for ease.

‘Hello?’ Her voice was soft and timid. She felt ridiculous. She gingerly stepped off the path, watching where she placed her feet in the soft ground that began to suck at the soles of her boots, and the heels sunk deeply into the muck. She moved as quickly and silently as she could towards one of the small, perfectly formed balls of light, and leaned forward, peering at one, trying to find the small human figure with shimmering wings inside. As she did, she shook her head. ‘You’re just being ridiculous, Abe!’ she chided herself. ‘There no such things as fairies!’ But, she thought, this is most definitely not children playing out here, playing pranks with lit candles. There was no one about, save her and the sporadic sound of crickets and the odd frog.

She reached out to grab the nebulous greenish light but it floated away from her as her fingers got near. ‘I really should have brought my gun, and not just my knife.’

She took another step forward as another ball of light bobbed past her over the muddy waters and her boot sank noisily into the sludge, swallowing it up over the top of the shoe. She pulled her foot free with great difficulty with a loud slurping noise and grabbed onto some tall, dry reeds to stop her from falling.

Then she heard it, a loud grumbling and snapping of teeth behind her. She turned on her