The crown of the First Speaker

A very short story.

Over 30 years ago, long before First Speaker Amantha had managed to rise to her present office, she and her mother were visited by a stranded Time Lady. The Time Lady soon got involved in an intense romantic relationship with Amantha's mother. Eventually, the Time Lady left. The small family was left with tales of the possible and imossible things in the universe, and a knowledge of the Gallifreyan alphabet. Since then Amantha has been obsessed by the thought of time travel.

Eventually she rose to the title of First Speaker, through a combination of manipulation and actual skill. Since her election, the Council has put a considerable amount of its money into research on time travel. So far no progress has been made on the actual problem, but the country has become leading in both navigation and clockwork mechanics - a fact that does nothing to attenuate the First Speaker's fervent search.

(This is the story of the persona of my latest steampunk costume, that I am making for SilwerSteam. There will be lots of more pictures of the full costume later, after I have finished it.)