In Mr. Bolt's Machine Shop, a life-size automaton man salutes visitors as a massive pendulum slices through the air above the work floor. It is a visionary's shop of uncommon odds and ends and technological marvels, but to Lucy Arancini, it is home. Hidden beneath the grease-stained trousers and soot-blackened face of an apprentice, Mr. Bolt's most talented boy, is actually a girl-- a girl who dreams of nothing but becoming an engineer. But Lucy's dreams are abruptly shattered when her sister's mutilated body is pulled from the river, and her only goal becomes revenge. Detective Gabriel March fears that a serial killer might be stalking the grounds of Arcadia College of Mechanical Arts-- the killer who murdered Lucy's sister. With the danger high, and the evidence scarce, he hatches a desperate plan to send Lucy to Arcadia in the guise of Lucien Bolt. An ancient and terrible secret hides beneath the ivy-covered halls of Arcadia College, but if she is to uncover the truth, Lucy will have to guard her identity, and... her heart.