Strandpiel 50
Keuring van Keuse – passing selection (part 1)
And so we come back to the story. Blimey.. half a century's worth of chapters… playing with the idea of closing this monster down and re-opening Strandpiel Book Two – Arrival in Howondaland… second quick edit to eliminate previously un-noticed typos and do very minor revisions...
Finally – the Witch Trials…
The Meadows, Lancre:
Hosting the Witch Trials usually rotated between Lancre and the Chalk. Places like Escrow, which now had its own thriving community of Witches, were also petitioning for the honour. The local tourist board was eager for the prestige(1), but mainly for the revenue.
Most usually, the annual convention of the Disc's witches was held in one of the two big centres of the Craft. This year it was Lancre's turn, and the large common meadow outside Lancre town, one of the few really large flat spaces available, was laid out as an arena and festival site, a performance area roped off in the middle and the usual inevitable carnival of tents, stalls, hopeful bunting, and marquees all around.
It was a fine summer day in Lancre, in defiance of the usual climate, and crowds were already gathering, even in the earliest morning.
Bekki and Ampie had arrived early. Ampie had been granted the favour of flying in as her passenger, with both Mum and Miss Band allowing him the privilege in recognition of his having performed outstandingly well with the travelling Assassins' School group. The rest of the Field Trip were on their way in by foot and would arrive later on in the morning. Bekki hoped there would be no more little misunderstandings of any kind. The Battle of Highmost Pigmanhey(2) had been two days before. She shuddered at how that might have gone. There'd been an impromptu poetjie supper and braai that evening, and the Assassin school party had moved on in the morning, to start covering ground into the heart of Lancre. Bekki had accompanied them, local witch and Guide, for the next day and stayed over with the party the following evening at their next rest-stop. It had been held to be wise that they had a chaperone. Just in case. Bekki had also joined in with the informal training sessions and had got to see her mother in action as a teacher. That had been interesting.
"Come on, Ampie." Bekki said, after she'd registered her intention to compete and had been given an approximate time-spot. "You never finished telling me about how you got to be here in the first place. I'm interested."
They found a place to sit, away from the crowd, and watched the broomsticks being held in the ready-to-land circuit above the field. There were a lot of them. Bekki was pleased they'd arrived early.
Ampie turned his eyes away from the spectacle. He abstractly noticed that witches who arrived on the Pegasus flying horses were automatically given precedence and allowed to land first. He found it interesting that they seemed higher in the pecking order.
"Sophie's coming over later in the morning. She'll be with Irena or Olga and they'll be bringing Rosie and Boetjie over. Our colts." Bekki said. "I think that was Hanna von Strafenburg. She's Überwaldean. Does the runs to places like Müning, Blondenburg and Bonk. Gets on OK with Olga and Irena, considering. Then again, we're all Witches. Now. Tell."
Ampie explained.
The application forms having been received, instructions had been sent back for the Candidate to be brought to a location near Bloemfontein with sufficient appropriate clothing for a six day stay. The Candidate should be escorted by at least one guardian, and the party was expected to find local accommodation and support themselves for a period of up to seven days. Expenses for this would not be paid. Ampie's father had grumbled at the cost and inconvenience, but Ampie's mother had said not to be so stingy and it might make for a nice stay. Bloemfontein is not called the City of Flowers for nothing.
They had arrived, staying at a plaas nearby, owned by relatives. And the next morning, punctually at seven-thirty, Ampie and his parents had been delivered to an intimidating mass of people gathered, for justnow, at a theatre in the city. Ampie came from a people who were usually widely spread over a large area and who only came together in numbers like this once in a blue moon. Being in a city, and Bloemfontein was the largest he had ever seen, was also overpowering. The rented theatre was the only venue capable of accommodating several hundred people all at once. And, on the stage, they saw the people who would be Directing and Selecting.
Pratoria, Rimwards Howondaland.
Suki van der Graaf had no objection to other people paying for dinner. Especially when the other person was General Crowbar Dreyer. He was incredibly newsworthy. And, she was forced to admit, an incredibly personable guy with lots of charisma. And unmarried, the little voice said in the back of her head. She tried to shut it out. There isn't a Mrs Dreyer. Never has been. the voice went on. Yes. Exactly. said the inner Suki.
The Crowbar thanked her for the iconographs, the unpublished ones, and said he wished he'd thought of that as a way of getting somebody into Princess Ruth's base. Posing as somebody from Sto Kerrig and taking advantage of the fact she offered open house to journalists. Professionally nosy people with iconographs. Maar, that must have taken ba… guts…
They discussed Suki's recent illegal-twice-over foray into the heart of the Zulu Empire for some time. Crowbar Dreyer made genuinely appreciative noises as she described her trip. He was especially interested in her impressions of Ruth, and admiring of the fact she had – briefly – shaken hands with Paramount King Mpandwe himself, probably the first White Howondalandian ever to have done that and survived to tell the tale afterwards.
"I think he suspected." Suki said. The journalistic party had been formally introduced to the King after the Presentation. They had seen the man behind the formal regality: fat, jolly, benevolently disposed and with the appearance of a man who had seen the joke and understood he was the punchline. Suki had noticed the bottle of Bearhuggers and a glass within convenient reach of his right hand. She had also noted Ruth's personal assistant, Chakki N'Golante, behind his right shoulder, introducing each journalist by name and paper. Chakki had announced Marilyn van der Medelander from Sto Kerrig with a completely poker face.
"But you got away with it." Crowbar remarked. "Ag, they say he's a man who admires courage and cunning. Is he as ill as the rumours say?"
Suki shrugged.
"If he is, he's hiding it well. Public face. But the whispers are that it's some sort of gut cancer and he'll be dead inside a year. Eighteen months, tops."
Suki felt vaguely uneasy in talking about her trip. The inconvenient voice of Conscience, that often got in the way of her profession of Journalist, was making critical noises that this was somehow abusing Ruth's hospitality and understanding. She reminded herself that Ruth had explicitly said to tell the Crowbar, when she met him, everything she'd seen and experienced. Ruth had reminded her she was likely to need some sort of get-out-of-jail-free card when she returned Home, and that having invited the world's Press to freely see her place, she couldn't complain if they went home afterwards and talked about their experiences. Besides, there isn't much you can tell Dreyer that he doesn't already know. I can work around that. Suki wondered if this was all part of the game, for Crowbar Dreyer to get a visitor's honest impressions as to, for instance, how well guarded and organised Ruth's city was, a sort of come and have a go, if you think you're hard enough, challenge.
"She's got artillery." Dreyer said. Suki saw a hint of worry cross the Crowbar's face. "From what you describe, the sort of simple, low-tech, things that still pack a punch, but simple enough for Zulus to use and keep in good order."
Suki had seen the artillery park. She wondered if Ruth had intended this. For her to go back and tell people. Suki had been politely dissuaded from taking iconographs and her minders had tutted and looked disapproving that she'd shaken them off for just long enough to see something that - apparently – she wasn't meant to see. She had, very deliberately, left this out of her published account, sensing this would be part of the get-out-of-jail-free card, or at least the small print on it.
They moved on to other things.
"So there's never been a Mrs Dreyer?" Suki said, politely. The Crowbar grinned.
"Came close, well, close-ish, a time or two. Never found the time, Sukes. And you?"
Suki noted the affectionate diminutive.
"The same." she said. "Hard to find somebody who can put up with coming second to what you do. And that you're hardly ever there, the job takes you all over."
Crowbar Dreyer nodded, understanding.
"There was somebody once who made me wonder." he said. "Junior officer, like me. Just out of the academy and both of us in the Slew. At the time we didn't have fighting women soldiers, well, not officially. We've learnt, since. But maar, that girl could fight. Woman was a Ghatian tiger."
Dreyer looked uncharacteristically reflective for a moment.
"She moved to Ankh-Morpork. Married a guy. Hear she has children now."
Suki smiled slightly. The journalistic part of her mind was cross-referencing people and other stories.
The Meadows, Lancre:
"That looks like a crockett crease in the middle of the field." Ampie remarked. He indicated the narrow rectangular strip in the middle that had been lovingly flattened and tended with a lot more care. Bekki nodded.
"Yes. The Lancre town side plays home games here. Against the other towns and village sides. King Verence is eager for some sort of wider league. Inviting teams from elsewhere. You know, some sort of test matches. A Lancre-wide eleven, the best players, testing itself against the best out of the Shires and Ankh-Morpork."
Ampie nodded. Bekki guessed he was evaluating the merits of the place as a Crockett ground. She added, out of devilment
"In the autumn, when people don't play crockett much. Some of the young men from Lancre do eleven-a-side and fifteen-a-side and play here. Oh, and the new version Uncle Danie gets sniffy about, the thirteen-a-side code that he thinks is neither one thing nor the other. (3) Jason Ogg grumbles that all these new-fangled sports are stopping young men from trying out for the morris-dancing side. That's big here too."
Ampie nodded.
"I wonder if I could talk to Simon and Mr Bradlifrudd. If we could bring a Guild team out here. Lancre is an interesting place to visit."
Bekki smiled the smile of a Lancre-resident Witch who knows a few things more than other people do. She reflected on the thought of the patrician Simon Anstruther, a boy who in some indefinite way got up her nose, facing Jason Ogg(4) lumbering down the field to deliver a very fast and accurate delivery with a small hard crockett ball.
"Yes." she said, thoughtfully. "That would be a very good idea. I'll introduce you to a few people later."
Then she grinned at Ampie and squeezed his arm.
"Come on. Tell. How you got selected ahead of a couple of hundred others to get here."
Bloemfontein, Rimwards Howondaland, nearly seven years earlier:
After initial registration and Induction, the parents and guardians had been assured their sons and daughters would be looked after with the appropriate degree of vigilant care. They had been politely dismissed, and the Candidates had been escorted to a nearby school that the Guild of Assassins had rented, out of term, for the day.
The group of a hundred and eighty Candidates, who were now looking at each other to size up the competition, were moved into a large hall that had been laid out as if it were an examination room, with rows of desks and chairs. What looked like examination papers were laid out face-down on the desks.
Ampie blinked. This wasn't what he had been expecting…
Ushered to take places, the Course Director, who had been introduced as Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen, addressed them. She reminded them that examination rules would apply here. And for the next two hours, until we break for lunch at twelve, you will complete the required questions to the best of your ability, unseen and unprepared. Except where directed, you may complete the entrance exam in Vondalaans or Morporkian, whichever is your first language. Vondalaans speakers among you, the majority of us, must note that several sections of the paper are to be completed only in Morporkian. Morporkian is the teaching language of the Guild School, after all, and we are testing you in your fluency in the language. If you cannot adequately speak Morporkian, you will struggle. Thank you, and you may turn the papers over and begin now.
The paper itself wasn't a problem to Ampie. It tested basic competencies in maths, language comprehension and scientific skills, and asked the candidate to write a short imaginative essay on a given topic. He had regarded Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen. Early to middle twenties, possibly a lot nearer to twenty than thirty, a woman immaculately dressed in black, young as an adult, but all adult women look impossibly old when you are barely eleven. She looked austere, but Ampie sensed sympathetic was in there somewhere. She had reminded the Candidates that she too had undergone this selection course, when she had been not even eleven. The Guild had therefore asked her to assess and direct this crop of potential students. She stood at the front of the hall with the other Directing Staff, scanning the room. Their eyes met for a second, and Ampie realised he was being assessed. It felt uncomfortable. He went back to the key topic that he realised he must try and answer in Morporkian. The question was simple. But simple questions often call for complicated answers.
Why do you want to become an Assassin? Closely followed by Why do you believe you are good enough for the Guild School?
And in the afternoon there were physical tests. A man called Mr Bradlifrudd administered these. Ampie understood he was Head of Physical Education at the Guild School. The PE master.
"My Tannie Mariella." Bekki said. This interested her.
"Indeed. I knew enough to know the Smith-Rhodes family are influential people. But the family relationship did not become apparent to me until I arrived at the School."
And by the second day, the hundred and eighty Candidates had become less than a hundred. While Mr Bradlifrudd had been putting them through it, in a cheerfully merciless way, the other Directors had been reading and assessing the morning's exam papers.
"I don't speak your language, much!" the PE Master had said. "But I've been told your country's Army calls this die boempie trek. The bumpy road. Well, we're on the bumpy road now!"
All the Candidates had been issued a tabard with a big number on it. Periodically, Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen would appear, confer briefly with the other Directors, and numbers would be called, or somebody who had faltered in the physical training would be tapped on the shoulder and told to fall out. They never returned.
Later on, Ampie realised the purpose of the first two days was to weed out the dreamers, the hopeful-but-unsuited, and the no-hopers. By Day Three, only eighty people remained. Ampie was pleasantly surprised he was still one of them. The course now became more direct, more personally focused. Other skills were tested. Mr Lensen, another Director who in his turn had once undergone this course, took them through elementary weapons skills, learning to dismantle, reassemble and fire a standard crossbow. Some Candidates washed out here too. Ampie wondered if he was related to, or perhaps the husband of, the pleasant Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen.
And by the morning of Day Five, there were thirty-two.
Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen addressed them personally. Ampie realised she was taking care to address them all by name, not just by tabard number.
"Listen to me." she said. "You have all done fantastically well to get this far. And you now present us with some agonisingly difficult choices to make. I'm satisfied that any one of you would be a good student at the Guild School. All of you would be good students. But we only have eight places to confer. Not thirty-two. Three out of every four of you will not make it. That's a hard fact. We now have to select, out of thirty-two excellent candidates, the eight who are completely outstanding. And that's going to be hard. Let me say this. If you end up as one of the twenty-four. You have not failed. You are not deficient as people. Whatever school you go to will receive a glowing testimonial from us as to your skills and abilities and talents. We will recommend you as potentially outstanding people. And not being selected here is not the end of the world. Not at all. I'm pleased to have met you."
She nodded to Mr Lensen and the other Directors.
"Now let us start."
Pratoria, Rimwards Howondaland.
"Listen. I'm here for a fortnight or so. Maybe longer. Necessary office work and conferences at the Octagon.(5) Got an assignment to inspect the combat-readiness and efficiency of the Ceremonial Guard, and a licence to put them through it if they're not."
Suki nodded. She suspected her father had been active and had used influence to separate the Crowbar from his command for a while, thus putting a big block on their inclination to go out there and look for trouble with the neighbours. Assigning him to inspect the decorative but suspect-as-soldiers Ceremonial Guard, the brigade charged with static duties in the capital city and looking good for tourists, should keep him occupied for a while. And soldiers who had grown fat and complacent in a posting they had hitherto thought far away from any trouble were in for a shock, too. Trouble was on the way, and it was called General Crowbar Dreyer.
Suki grinned.
"I'd love to be kept informed on that." she said.
"Don't see why not. I'll give you an off-the-record or two you can get in the papers. To show all our Army is combat-ready, and what we do to ensure it stays that way."
He looked at her speculatively.
"Maybe when we have dinner next?"
"Okay." Suki said.
Bloemfontein, Rimwards Howondaland, nearly seven years earlier:
On the morning of the last day, the thirty-two Prospectives were called, one by one, to a final interview with the Examining Board. Ampie had been steeling himself for sympathetic looks, a handshake from the Examiners, and the sad news that unfortunately, pressure of numbers, etcetera…
He waited for his number to be called. He noticed that, as the people in the room dwindled, those called to the office did not come back the same way. So those remaining could not infer or ask as to who had been Selected. They were being kept in the dark, deliberately. And they were being watched, too. Ampie gathered this was another Test. To assess how well people reacted under stress, in a waiting room where they were, deliberately, being under-involved and had time to let it dwell on them. Time to think.
He had produced paper and pens from a pocket and was playing simple games with two of his fellows. Just to pass the time.
And then, late in the morning, he was called.
The little voice in his head said you're still in the game. Horses routinely win races at four-to-one odds.
He politely knocked, and entered.
The five examiners were in line at a long table. Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen was in the centre, flanked on one side by the genial Mr Bradlifrudd and the pleasant blond guy Mr Lensen. On the opposite side was Mr Retief, who had been introduced as the Guild's Resident Chief Assassin in Rimwards Howondaland, and a dark-suited man who had not been introduced. Ampie suspected he had the look of Government about him. The resident BOSS man in Vaalvaaser, who Ampie had had pointed out to him, with instructions to be wary, had the same aura.
There was a single chair, set directly in front of Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen. Ampie was invited to sit. He noticed this paced him on a slightly lower level to the Examiners. There was a long intimidating silence while the five members of the Board scrutinised him.
Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen smiled. Ampie, with the dim awareness of these things which begins awakening in boys of around eleven, realised that sitting this closely to her, he could smell her perfume and that she was, in some respects, incredibly beautiful. It was intoxicating. He tried to consider her as something more, a lot more, than the impeccably arranged red hair and the paler redhead's skin with the dusting of freckles. (6)
"Andrijs Hansie duPris." she said. "Known to his femily es Amper, or Ampie. But here, just Cendidate Twenty-Three."
She was speaking Morporkian. Ampie recognised the language choice.
"Twenty-Three was my platoon number, during Army recruit training." she remarked. "An odd coincidence."
Then she fired the killer question. Out of the blue.
"Explain why you wish to become an Essessin."
Ampie gulped, and thought quickly.
"Well, mevrou, you know my nickname from my femily. Elmost. It is because I em elmost but not quite a farmer. End because I em elmost but not quite a fifteen-a-side player. I have no wish to be elmost, but not quite, a selected student et the Guild School."
Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen smiled again.
"Ja. I cen eccept thet. But things do not elweys go according to plen. I too pessed through this Selection, with the great intent to leave this country. I hed no wish to end up running a farm, end I certainly hed no great wish, insofar es I thought ebout these things, to merry a Vondalaander man."
Ampie noted the brief glance she gave to Mr Lensen. His face had a hint of amusement and wry humour about it.
"End the first proper job I hed efter graduating from the School. Was meneging a farm. Within two years efter thet I was beck home in this country.(7) And today, for most of the year, I menege a plaas."
She siged, resignedly. Again the sideways glance at Mr Lensen. He seemed a little bit amused.
"End I got merried. To a Vondalaander man."
She extended her left hand for his inspection. Ampie noted the rings.
"Far more ornate than it calls for." she said. "But my husband chose them. A woman should not be so ill-mennered es to refuse."
"He values you greatly, mevrou." Ampie said, politely. He remembered his father grumbling about the cost of the engagement and wedding rings for his mother. He also saw another look going between her and Mr Lensen. Ampie might only be eleven. But he guessed from what he'd seen that some things between a husband and a wife were private in-jokes.
"They cost him nearly four thousand dollars."
"Three thousand nine hundred and ninety five, to be ebsolutely end precisely exect." Mr Lensen said.
Ampie blinked. Was this part of the interview? He boggled at the value. Four thousand Ankh-Morporkian dollars. Around fifteen thousand rand. Eight or nine times what many people earned in a year. Spent on two rings...
"Assassination pays very well as a career." Mr Bradlifrudd said, guessing his thoughts.
He looked at the rings on her hand again. She was not withdrawing it.
"The rings fescinate you, Mr duPris?"
"Ja, mevrou. I heard ebout Lady T'Malia, who is a headmistress end who runs Scorpion House, who teaches the uses of such rings."
She looked thoughtfully at Mr Lensen, as if considering this. Then said
"Impressive, Mr duPris. You clearly did your research. It is remarkable how so many Candidates did not."
She stretched out the hand again.
"Take the rings off my fingers, end feel their weight."
Ampie hesitated. Another test?
"They may not be those sort of rings. Or they may be. You examine them, end tell me."
Her hand felt warm and soft, although he noticed the callouses on her upper palms and some fingers.
"You practice with swords, mevrou?" he asked.
She smiled.
"Observant, too."
Ampie noticed the rings slid off with some ease. He wasn't conversant with the intricacies of married life and that sort of gender politics, but he thought Should a woman's wedding ring come off so easily? He wondered if she was making some sort of sideways point to Mr Lensen. Do not assume this ring will stay on forever.
They were heavy. He weighed them in his palm. And he really didn't know what to look for. He'd heard about Lady T'Malia's rings. But where would the poison be kept? He made am experimental twist of the cluster of gems in the engagement ring. He was relieved a hidden compartment did not spill deadly poison on his hand.
"Your verdict?" she prompted him.
He considered.
"They are normal rings, mevrou."
"Why?"
"To be honest, I have no idea where to look for hidden compartments or surprises. But I think. You have been examining us. But you cannot kill or injure any of us. Words would be spoken. Err. Therefore you would not deliberately place one of us in harm's way by inviting us to handle poisoned rings."
All the examiners nodded in degrees of appreciation.
Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen smiled broadly.
"And you reason well under pressure. Good. Now you can place the rings back on my finger, perhaps?"
Ampie automatically went to do this. Then he hesitated. Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen raised an eyebrow, He noticed that her eyebrows were well-groomed.
"Errr.. it is perhaps your husband's place, and not mine, to return the rings to your finger, mevrou?" he said. He looked at Mr Lensen, who was grinning.
"You can act as my agent in this, boykie." he said. "Besides, I can't reach, and I'd have to get up and walk round. Too much bother, and you're sitting nearest!"
"Courteous and well-mannered, too." Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen remarked. "And he knows. Engagement ring first, then the wedding ring."
"And then comes the suffering." Mr Lensen murmured.
Then the interview ratched up another notch.
"Mr duPris." Piet Retief said, in a business like way. He was a dapper man of no great height who affected a fussy goatee beard. He was also dressed in stylish Assassin black. "We have noted from interviews and from your written submissions that your emphasis, on being asked why you wish to attend the Guild School, is on what you perceive to be the outstanding musical education the School offers."
"That is correct." Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen agreed. Mr Retief nodded.
"Indeed. The School does indeed offer extensive teaching and rehearsal facilities and is renowned across the Central Continent. And you want to be in a place that offers you both formal instruction and an introduction to higher musical academies for further training."
Ampie gulped again. An image of a pineapple in a fruit basket crossed his mind.
"Indeed, sir. I am told that minheer Doktor von Ubersetzer is a brilliant teacher of music and has a hand-chosen dedicated staff. And that music is viewed as an essential skill to the Assassin graduate."
"Good research again." Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen said, with approval.
Retief frowned.
"Even so. The first year pupil is expected to take the point of view from the very first day that they are an Assassin, or a possible Assassin, first and foremost. And that everything else is secondary to this. You could be perceived as taking the point of view that becoming an Assassin is secondary to being a musician."
There was a silence. Ampie gulped again.
"Sir." he said. "That too is true and I make no secret of it. But I also believe that only a very small number of Guild members who graduate every year go on to being active Assassins. I am, perhaps, making my position clear to you right at the start, that I would have no intention of practicing?"
Silence again. Then Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen stood up. She moved to the back of the room. Ampie watched her move, registering that she was indeed beautiful. Her heels clicked. She bent down, picked up a large black case, then walked round the front of the desk to Ampie. She presented him the instrument case.
"Took a lot of finding." she said. "But I like to be prepared for an interview, and to tailor it to the candidate."
She smiled.
"Your instrument, mr duPris." she said. "The saxophone, I believe? Play it. Treat this as an audition."
Ampie gulped again. He remembered to spit and moisten his mouth. Then he slung the strap over his neck and played. A simple tune, one he was practiced in, Boesmanlaand.
And afterwards…
The last of the five Examiners said, in clipped and pointed Vondalaans, that we have been doing the background checks on you and your family. Should you be selected, you will be part of an élite group permitted to live and study outside this country. We like to monitor such people.
"Yes. You do, don't you?" Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen said, also in Vondalaans, in her harsh Transvaal accent. The civilian in the dark suit ignored this.
"You will be required to check in at the Embassy. The Security Section there will have opened files on you, and Liutnant Verkramp, the security head in Ankh-Morpork, will explain to you what is expected of you as citizens in a foreign nation…"
"We can explain all that, later," Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen said, cutting him short. It was obvious she didn't like the man. Ampie winced. Even if he hadn't made it, he sensed he was still going to get a BOSS file all of his own.
"Are you finished with the saxophone?" she said, kindly. "I have to return that later."
Ampie realised.
"Forgive me, mevrou. It occurs to me it might be the courteous thing to do if I were to clean the mouthpiece and the spit valve, before this goes back to its owner."
"Thoughtful and considerate, too." she said.
She turned to the others at the table. There was a low whispered conference and a lot of nodding. He heard Mrs Smith-Rhodes-Lensen say "Well, we should send Doktor von Ubersetzer a talent. It would be a courteous and thoughful thing to do. When I graduated nearly five years ago, he was already beginning to twitch, poor man."
Then she took a clipboard. Ampie could see that there were a lot of names on it. Quite a lot had red crosses against them. She deliberated, took a green pen, and placed a green tick against one name.
"Welcome to the Assassins' Guild School, Mr duPris." she said. "I hope your seven years there will be happy and rewarding ones."
"And that was it, really." Ampie said. "The eight of us who made it, and our families, were taken to dinner by your aunt and uncle. She said that as she has no plans to become a teacher at the School at any time soon, we should drop the mevrou bit as it made her feel old, and just call her Mariella. Also that this man here who isn't as big a bliksem as he looks, he's called Horst. Mr Bradlifrudd said I didn't have to play fifteen a side, I could try out for other sports, and maybe find one I really liked. Use my first year to try out. He said he always gets incredibly physically fit people from Howondaland and he was eager to see it at first hand, so he'd grabbed a chance to come here and be part of our Selection. Also that your aunt was an incredibly good long-distance runner. He really wanted to see what it is about our country that makes for great athletes, that he really wanted people as potentially good as me, whatever sports we ended up playing. And I'm here."
"So you're here." Bekki said. She became thoughtful and relfective for a few moments.
"You know, I remember Tannie Mariella saying she wanted to get out of Howondaland and only ever go back there for holidays. That she only wanted to go back to farms again just to visit. And that she was determined never to marry a Vondalaander. And exactly what she thought about Horst Lensen. She was quite heated about that, I remember.""
Bekki smiled, slightly.
"I'm just betting after what she said to you then, she's going to end up teaching at the Guild School for a few years. Just a feeling I get."
She looked up. Several Pegasi were approaching in close formation. Two were towing passengers on magic carpets. Bekki grimaced. Great, she'd be performing in front of...
"What do you know. My family's here." she said.
Extracts from a letter to Doctor Johanna Smith-Rhodes, from her sister, Mariella Smith-Rhodes-Lensen. Six and a bit years before the present.
The Selection went without a hitch. I know you said Gods help me if I sent you any pielkops or hard bargains. But I really think the eight we picked are potentially outstanding, even Kristina de Vos.
Kristina is, in her own right, a potentially outstanding pupil or else she would not be there. But you must be aware she is the younger sister of one Anna de Vos, who was in my recruit platoon, who was the resident piemp, and who is now a captain in the BOSS. We decided to give her a place, on the grounds that it makes things easier if you know from the start who the BOSS piemp will be in the new intake. You have to have one: there was a BOSS rodent wished on us for the panel, representing our government. Giving him Kristina de Vos meant he could go away happy to make a good report, and to be fair, she merited her place. But watch her. Her family are BOSS to the core and she grew up steeped in all the bullshit. Knowing now she will go to BOSS makes her easier to manage. and you never know, seven years in Ankh-Morpork may even turn her, as it ultimately did for Horst, and she will return wiser and better-educated. I'm sure you and Heidi will attend to this, as this sort of thing gives you job satisfaction as educators.
…you will like Ampie duPris, who is an engaging young man… I fear I placed pressure on him in his final interview, sensing he is at the beginning of the difficult years for a young boy. I wanted to assess how he could think and reason when his head was befuddled by nearness to a woman he clearly found attractive. It was amusing, I hope in a way which is not cruelly intended, that he couldn't quite conceal this. In the event he mastered himself commendably well, and I now feel guilty. I hope I did not overdo it and that he is not now imprinted with a thing for red-haired women and girls. If there is a failing in him, he needs to develop a streak of bliksemheid, in the best possible way: he needs to be a little bit of a bastard to survive at the School. I hope this will not be a struggle for him. I'd assign him to Viper House? Grune Nivor will like him.
7000 words. Damn. Hits my approximate upper limit for a single chapter and then goes over. also decided to make young Meisie de Vos a Kristina: there's already a Katerina in the character list and there is what tvtropes calls the One Steve Limit. Although there are good narrative reasons for six Johannas... To be continued.
(1) Escrow! Gateway To Überwald! Or else Escrow! Gateway to the Chalk!. It all depended which way you were facing. Canny burghers had covered both options with great big roadside signs on either side of the main road. And were discovering, like Flintshire or Flyover Country, that they were seen mainly as a place you had to pass through (or over) to get to somewhere more interesting on the other side.
2 (2) which would come to be seen as a minor footnote in the long history of fraught relationships between Boer and Zulu
3(3) Thirteen-a-side foot-and-hand-the-ball was a newish and experimental thing. Factory owners like Mr Catterail had noticed that for some reason, their employees could get morose and depressed (3.1) and perhaps needed some sort of small relatively inexpensive gesture to keep their morale up, something to feel proud about. Catterail and other factory owners had agreed to sponsor what began as fifteen-a-side teams to fly their factory and industrial colours, generously paying for the team strips and boots and things. And as they were representing their employers, then they could be paid their usual hourly rates for training and playing on a Saturday afternoon and, well, even a small token bonus for winning. This straightaway ran into trouble from the Governing Union of Fifteen-A-Side Foot-And-Hand-the-Ball who insisted the sport should be strictly amateur and players should participate for the joy of the sport. Paid players were against the spirt of the game. (3.2) The factory owners promptly seceded from the Union and set up a Foot-And-Hand-The-Ball League of their own. And people like Mr Catterail, who pointed out they were not made of money, looked to streamline and rationalise the game, arguing that fifteen men in a team was a prime example of overmanning, especially when you were paying them to play. They cut the team size to thirteen. And a new League was born… League-code foot-and-hand-the-ball had caught on in Lancre, out of the fact that many of the smaller towns and hamlets would struggle to be able to get fifteen men together, but might stretch to thirteen.
(3.1) Somehow, factory owners like Mr Catterail never, ever, considered that issues of gloom, despondency and low morale among their workers could be remedied by measures like, for instance, increasing pay and improving working conditions. That sort of thing costs money, and do we look as if we're made of it?
(3.2) this was some years before people like Johanna Smith-Rhodes started seeding the best players with the heretical idea that the strictly amateur set-up, and insistence that players turned out for the pleasure of it, really suited the interests of the people who owned the grounds and stadiums, where the best teams routinely attracted between fifteen and thirty thousand paying spectators. Do the maths, Johanna and Heidi van Kruger had said to players like Danie Smith-Rhodes. The background to a Professional Sportsmens' Guild is explored as a side-note in my tale Gap Year Adventures.
(4) The son of the village blacksmith, who took after his father in terms of size and strength. He morris-danced to keep Dad happy, but preferred crockett. Simon Anstruther wasn't a bad guy, far from it. It was just that he automatically assumed the place of a woman in crockett was to be completely supportive to her man and to dutifully go to the pavilion to serve the tea and sandwiches and cake. And nothing more.
(5) the headquarters of the Bureau of Defence had been designed by an avant-garde architect who had been told to make it look big and imposing and threatening. An eight-sided building? Eight being the number of bad luck and misfortune? Vorbei, why not? The bad luck applies to anyone we fight, after all.
(6) This too was intentional. The girl candidates, ones who had agreed with each other that Mr Lensen was gorgeous and a hunk, found in their interviews that he was in the centre chair. There was also a family joke, form Johanna to her two older daughters, that went "We are redheads. We don't tan. In strong hot sunlight we just go the same colour that everybody else starts out as. Eventually."
(7) a calback to my tale Gap Year Adventures. Where all the things Mariella didn't want ended up happening to her anyway.