Strandpiel 53
Ontdekking – Discovery (открытие)
Advancing the story to the point where a natural break will occur, Book One can close, and Book Two will deal with Bekki's life in Howondaland. So closing all the closeable loose ends – for now.
To cover: events in Howondaland
(Ruth N; the van der Graafs; Mariella and Horst)
Olga and Eddie and kids on extended holiday on the River Vulga
Summer music practice
Bekki in the Watch and training for the Pegasus Service
First long-haul solo flight
End of Book One! Hopefully within this chapter. And Gods know, I've said that before…
Most of the Russian phrases used here are mechanical translations via Google Translate. I have cross-referenced and used intuition and more research (Russian magical traditions) to double-check them where I can – a degree in linguistics has to count for something – but if any Russian readers can suggest better – love to hear from you!
Hoping to wrap up Book One of Strandpiel with at most one more chapter, having set up lots of threads to pick up in Book Two…. This is now the 0.4 version, with minor corrections, revisions, and amendments. Especially one suggested by reader CarrieVS, who deplored the fact I missed the bit in The Reply Of The Zaporozhnian Cossack Horde concerning hedgehogs. Duly corrected. I will beat myself with a knout for missing that, first time. Thank you, CarrieVS.
Also. Long-standing British soap opera "Coronation Street", something of an institution on British TV and arguably the longest continually-running TV soap in the world, introduced a south African connection tonight... the unseen mother of a beloved character apparently fled there after giving up for adoption the cjild who later became Tyrone the mechanic. She went to... Pietermauritzberg in Natal Province. Better known as Piemberg. Has the scriptwriter read Tom Sharpe - or maybe even me? This is the sort of thing that creates great chuffedness...
At Astrakhan Oblast, on the River Vulga – Matushka
The Vulga Horde was pretty much nomadic, like most Cossack hosts, although it had a few pretty much permanent settlements spread along its accepted range up and down both banks of the river. Some Cossacks were even boatmen, ferrying people and horses across the river and acting as a trading link to the towns and small cities along its length.
The Host generally went where its herds chose to graze. At this time of the year their course took them near to the walled town, almost a small city, of Astrakhan(1). Its high and turreted wooden walls and stout gates were there partly because of Cossacks. In former times the Kazakh peoples had had a reputation akin to the D'Regs in Klatch and the Apaches in central-turnwise Howondaland, and for pretty much the same reasons. The Vulga Horde could still do this kind of thing if they needed or wanted to, but these days they had seen the value of trading and commerce as opposed, say, to riding in, laying waste, and taking what they wanted. The problem with that approach was that you could only do it once, as it took ages for the people you'd just cheerfully been laying waste to and plundering to recover, to the point where a second visit was worth the effort.
Even so, the river-port city of Astrakhan had high solid walls, a well-trained militia with plenty of long pikes and crossbows, a system of wide defensive moats, and a thriving metal-working industry that made lots of caltrops, for instance. Old memories die hard.
Olga Romanoff rode with the Host, accompanying her friend and fellow Witch Xenia Galina. With his wings folded back, her Pegasus stallion was happy to ambulate at ground level in the normal manner, like any other horse, and seemed happy and excited in the presence of so many other equines. Lord Vetinari had given permission for her Pegasus to accompany her here. Nobody other than the bonded Witch could ride one, so trying to steal him would be futile. And she'd satisfied Vetinari's other stipulation; her stallion had a carefully regulated amount of a certain herbal preparation mixed into his feed. He would not be tempted to take an interest in any mares whilst here. Olga knew the need for this: Vetinari didn't want any other nation getting its own Pegasus. Her mount had, therefore, been gelded, at least temporarily.
She regarded the high walls. The fact they were made of wood – stone was in short supply here and hard to get – didn't make it any less formidable as an obstacle. She reflected that this far Hubwards, they were in border country. The Theocracy of Muntab claimed this land as part of its divinely ordained Imperium. Muntab proper was a couple of hundred miles Hubwards. A former Theocrat had sent the Ataman of the Kazakhs a peremptory letter to tell them they were now subjects of the Theocracy and he expected the little issues of accepting Muntabian sovereignty, and consequent payment of taxation, to begin promptly.
The Ataman and his council of lesser Hetmans had heard the delegation out with silent courtesy, respecting them as an Embassy, and had gone away to discuss the issue and prepare a response. Vodka had been called for. They had written and sealed a letter of response, advising the Muntabian emissary, with inscrutable solemnity, to deliver it promptly and unopened into the hand of their Theocrat.
It had essentially invited the Theocrat to go and eat govno, perform an unedifying intimate action with a pig, and to kiss the collective backside of the Kazakh nation. In several pages of inventive and graphic insult, with no profanity repeated twice. The Theocrat had also been invited to contemplate the humble hedgehog, specifically the reason why it can be found ambling along at ground level without a care in the world. Specifically, he had been invited to lower his backside onto one without benefit of protective clothing or indeed any garment on his lower body. (2)
The Muntabians had promptly invaded, and found themselves trying to punch fog. Fast-moving fog with a lot of sabres and lances in it. After the remains of their Army retreated home, they had not seriously tried again. A survivor of that Army had said that given the sheer number of sharp pointy things coming at them, very very quickly and definitively, it was indeed like sitting bare-arsed on a hedgehog. But they still claimed the Kazakh lands. Places like Astrakhan remained fortified just in case the Muntabians tried it on again.
Olga regarded the onion-shaped spires of the town and felt at home. Only the churches and temples had been able to afford to have stone shipped here to build. She wondered about the priorities of a people who used the stone to build temples and had to be content with wood to build defences, with a powerful potential enemy about a fortnight's march away. She shook her head and turned to Xenia, who had been explaining her position in the Horde.
A Witch, yes, by anyone's standards: a healer, a dealer, a midwife at one end of life and a sort of undertaker at the other, one who arbitrated disagreements, a woman who expected and got Respect. That was universal. It defined a Witch. Anywhere.
But Xenia was also a shamanskaya. Back at the Witch Trials, she had received the instant and unforced witch bow from both Tiffany Aching and Nanny Ogg, recognition of her status and a welcome to the community of Witches. Olga and Irena had interpreted the discussion that followed.
Nanny Ogg had seen the other thing straight away.
"Mainly Witch. And I'm just bettin' you're a bloody good one, too. But your other foot's in Priestessin'. You has the look of one who has to deal with the Gods, bunch of bloody useless buggers."
Olga had translated useless bloody buggers into the closest equivalent. Xenia had burst out laughing.
"Da, Babiuschka Ogg. Our Gods are indeed bydlo and svolochii. This I should know." (3)
The conversation had continued between Olga and Xenia. Xenia explained there were four Gods of the Shaman. She had encountered and interacted with three of them: Топацьи, Скелде, and Умчеррел, but not the most elusive of them all, the one called Багаж. (4)
"And how do you find your Gods?" Olga had asked, politely. Xenia shrugged.
"Sometimes useful." she said. "But normally bloody useless."
They rode on together. Olga reflected she'd have to fly back to Ankh-Morpork soon. But there was no immediate rush. She took a deep breath and steeled herself to the fact she'd be leaving her children here. They're both keen to stay, she reminded herself. They love it here. And the Cossacks love their children. They are safe. They adore Xenia. Again she wondered if it was too early for this sort of separation. But Vassily needed to learn about his mother's country. His country too. and this was a good place to start. He is to become Grand Duke and rule a Duchy. He must learn of the people he will be Grand Duke to. And Valla has magic, more strongly than her brother. A witch as foster-mother for a month or two will be good for her. Besides, I have two new Pegasus pilots to deliver advanced training to. That's important. It needs my full attention. Hanna's in charge right now. She's a Fritz. Which means she can be relied on to keep the place running like clockwork. And on time to the very second.
They rode on together, Olga learning more about Shamanism.
Spion Kop Barracks, Ankh-Morpork
Wee Mad Arthur had the rank of Watch Sergeant. Barely six inches tall, big for a Feegle, his role in the Watch was to be the leading rank among those Feegle and Gnomes who worked, in one capacity or other, as part of the loose Watch family. There weren't many: the majority of them worked for the Pegasus Service and each was affiliated to one Witch, acting as her Navigator and craw-stepper on long-haul flights. Once a female Feegle, surplus to requirements for now, had been released by her Kelda mother to go out and see the world before returning to the Nac Mac Feegle to marry and found a Clan. She had become a Watchwoman, part of the family of inter-species misfits who found a home there. Sam Vimes had appreciated her wit, and ability, and her knack for getting on with people of all shapes and sizes and species. What he hadn't appreciated was that she had been obliged to bring a retinue with her, an escort of brothers sworn to guard and protect her. This had caused an administrative difficulty, leading to Wee Mad Arthur and Buggy Swires, the other senior Little Person in the Watch, having to knock some sense into them at regular intervals.
Vimes had been genuinely sorry to lose Kirsty when her time was up, but at least when she emigrated to Howondaland to found a Clan there, the first Feegle to leave the Central Continent, the "auxiliary Watchmen" she'd brought with her had left too. One or two had remained, with the Air Police, to pilot the birds of prey and ravens the Watch used as additional patrol vehicles. This put them under the direct supervision of the Air Witches, and Incidents were now few and far between.
These days, Sergeant Wee Mad Arthur was ranking NCO among the fifteen Feegle who were the pool of Flight Navigators for the Pegasus Service. Who were now about to become seventeen.
He took his duties seriously, and was as near to a six-inch tall sergeant-major as you could find anywhere. With this task in mind, he'd navigated Olga Romanoff to the Far Steppes and the banks of the Vulga, excused himself, begged her leave, and craw-stepped himself back to the Yard to tend to this duty. He was due back in a couple of days to bring her, and her mount, back to the Air Station.
First, there was this…
He studied the two young Feegle who stood before him, in a human-sized classroom. He shook his head sorrowfully.
"Aye. Weel. I has a difficult task aheid o'me, I see." he remarked. He paused to let this sink in.
"I now has to take ye two wee bampots and sorry skulkers, and turn ye both intae Flight Navigators fit for the Service. Weel. Miracles may happen. But your Keldas nominated ye both, an' your Gonnagles think you are perhaps fit. And who am I tae gainsay a Kelda, or go agin the word of a Gonnagle?"
He scrutinised Wee Archie Aff The Midden closely. He scowled.
"The word with ye, laddie, is that ye are directionally challenged." he said. "That ye dinnae know your right frae your left, or your Widdershins frae your Turnwise."
He eyeballed Wee Archie.
"Weel. Here is where ye begin to learn. By the time you get aboard your mount wi' Miss Rebecka, the Hag who will trust ye tae get her there and tae lead her right. That is the sacred calling of the Navigator, and ye will earn that rank. I hear ye couldnae navigate your way oot a paper bag even if somebody was haudin' it open for ye."
He indicated the walls of the classroom. They were covered with detailed maps of the Disc, with routes and destinations outlined in red or green or blue.
"Taxi-cab drivers in this City has tae learn what is called The Knowledge of this city, before they is allowed to take a cab oot on the streets."
His nod took in Shelpit Stevie, who the Lancre clan Kelda had asked Sophie to take as her Navigator. This too had been decided at the Witch Trials. "Well, laddies, you two is now gauntae learn The Knowledge of the world. All the routes. And ye will both become perfect in them. And ye begins. Now."
It wasn't only Bekki and Sophie who were getting recruit training.
Pseudopolis Yard, Ankh-Morpork
Bekki, sitting in the hayloft at the Air Station after her evening session of grooming Boetjie, was reading the latest letters from Howondaland.
If your instructors are complete dofs, it is tempting to find permissible ways of baiting them. Seven years at the Guild School gave me a lot of practice in this, and getting it right boosts your morale and provides satisfaction. Be advised, though. The cookhouse and canteen floors at Fort Rapier Barracks have a lot of surface area to cover, if you are one girl with a mop and a bucket. You may find yourself reflecting on whether it was truly worth it.(5)
Aunt Mariella had also enclosed newspaper clippings from Home. Bekki had shown them to Sophie and provided translation of the captions.
"So we made the papers in your country." Sophie had said, thoughtfully, looking at the iconograph picture of herself, Apricity and Bekki proudly showing off their medals. Sophie's picture also clearly showed off the Bees she had won in service of the Paramount Crown Princess of the Zulu Empire. She had worn them on the day as, well, the Witch Trials are the right occasion for this sort of thing, aren't they?
"it's the sort of thing they like." Bekki said. "Any sort of international contest where a Rimwards Howondalandian places with a medal. Or preferably wins."
Bekki felt anxious about the implications of this. Aunt Mariella had also written I was perplexed as to how a gentleman called Oskar Verdraainer found out about you. When I realised all he had to do was to read the papers and realise a Smith-Rhodes is also a Witch – which you know is illegal in this liberally-minded Nation of ours – all became clear. The obnoxious Verdraainer will seek to interview you when you arrive here. We will need to make a plan. I have a few ideas.
"And the secret police have clipped that picture out of the morning paper and put it in your file. Ouch." Sophie said.
Bekki nodded. Then she paused. They weren't alone in the hayloft…
"Hei, Bekki." A voice said. She recognised the voice.
"Oh, hi, Ampie. Howzit?"
Then she added
"Errr… how did you get in here, if that's not a silly question? This place is well-guarded. And Commander Vimes would go spare to see an Assassin in here."
Ampie grinned his usual wide lovely grin. Bekki realised she was absurdly happy to see him.
"You just answered your own question, I think. Look, I brought you a few things."
Ampie's bag was full of chocolate. Bars and small boxes.
"I wasn't sure what sort you like." he said, apologetically.
Bekki grabbed him and kissed him. It was spontaneous. He's an Assassin student. He's just risked getting into the Watch headquarters and one of its best-guarded places. Just to bring me chocolate and he's gorgeous and he brought me chocolate and I think I love him…
"Err.. shall I go and find something to do somewhere else for a while?" Sophie said. "Leave the two of you to it?"
Bekki tried hard to be sensible. It was difficult. She gathered herself.
"Look. Ampie. I really don't think your being here is a good idea. Commander Vimes has got some pretty definite ideas about Assassins being here. Especially places where the public can't go to. You could be in big trouble."
"I know. But I've missed you these last couple of weeks."
She kissed him again, impulsively. She'd missed him too.
"You'd risk getting into big trouble? For me?"
Ampie nodded. Then another voice said
"I hope it was worth it, Probationary Air Policewoman Smith-Rhodes. I could arrest the young man right now. And take him to the Commander. Who would not be a happy Commander."
Bekki scrambled to her feet. Sergeant Hanna von Strafenberg was duty officer with the Air Police. She was Überwaldean and everything about her radiated the usual Überwaldean dedication to duty, order and efficiency. She was OK, in her way, but not one to go outside the rulebook, quoting Befehl ist Befehl as justification. Orders are orders.
"And neither of the Ivankas would be happy either." she said. "Fortunately one is on leave several thousand miles away and the other is off-duty tonight. Which, liebchen, leaves me in charge." (6)
"Well, you hed better put me in hendcuffs, then." Ampie sighed, regretfully. "It was worth it, though."
Incredibly, Sergeant von Strafenberg smiled. Bekki reflected that she was a witch too. A Pegasus flyer. And she seemed amused.
"Tell me how you got in here." she invited Ampie. He shrugged.
"I rode up in the service lift. The one thet takes stuff down to ground level. I saw the Dwarfs et the bottom unload the stable waste for Herry King's boys to collect. They loaded hay bales to go up. Then went off for a cigarette. Some distance eway, leaving the lift unguarded. From my observations I knew the lift is on en automated mechanism thet stops et the top. End thet people et the top might leave it a while, before they unload. I hid myself between the hay bales end reasoned they would not look too closely when they sent en unattended load up, with no great sense of urgency concerning unloading it. When ettention was elsewhere, I got out end went to the stables, knowing I would find Rebecka here."
Hanna von Strafenberg nodded and considered this. Then she smiled. Bekki reflected that she was not unattractive and should be less serious and Überwaldean about things and should smile more. Let that meticulously plaited blonde hair down.
"Well, you had a few minutes with the young lady. I am not completely unsympathetic to such things. You risked all this just to bring her chocolate?"
Ampie nodded.
Sergeant von Strafenberg looked thoughtful and made a decision.
"Have you a bar of Higgs and Meakin's Fruit and Nut in there? The one with the almonds and raisins?"
"Ja, fraulein Feldwebel." Ampie said. He rummaged in the bag and found a bar. He hesitated, put it back, and brought out a larger bar. He offered it to Hanna.
She hesitated. Then took it.
"I prefer to consider this a perk of the job, and certainly not as a bribe." she said. Then she smiled, human and relaxed.
"Leave the way you came, junge." she said. "I am of the opinion that you came here not as an Assassin scouting us out, in which case I would have to arrest you and bring you before the Commander. Who does not like Assassins in his Watch premises. You came here unofficially, to see the young lady. I understand such things. Even if the young ladies refer to me as die Golem, thinking I have no more emotion than a thing of clay."
She studied the chocolate bar. And smiled again.
"You pointed out a gap in our security. The Dwarfs were negligient. I will mention this to the Ivankas… to Captain Romanoff, when she returns from leave. Lieutenant Politek should also know."
She nodded to the exit.
"And if I have occasion to see Lord Downey. To mention to him, in passing, that one of his young men got in here unseen. You may get a glass of sherry out of it, perhaps. Now walk with me."
And they left, Bekki reflecting that the Golem wasn't as hardened as she thought, and actually had a heart…
Sophie nudged her.
"I saw some hazelnut milk chocolate in there." she said, hopefully. Bekki understood. She wasn't the only one to have been deprived of chocolate for over a month.
At Astrakhan Oblast, on the River Vulga–Matushka
Mother Vulga rolled sedately past. Olga Romanoff found the vista of rolling grassy plain leading to distant, barely-there, mountain peaks to be oddly hypnotic. And the nature of the Steppe was that there was a lot of horizon. Horizon was abundantly supplied. Horizon abounded. There was a suspicion of more distant peaks on another quarter, towards Muntab. In the opposite direction, smudges of darker green hinted that was where steppe began giving way to forest. And where she was looking, the Steppe seemed to go on. Forever. It was alluring. She could see why a certain sort of mind might want to get on a horse and ride. Forever.
Olga reminded herself she'd also seen it from a long way above. The endless steppe, in that direction, had an end, as it began getting hillier and more densely populated and farmed. There were higher hills becoming more mountains. After a while you came across real cities, built in stone, like Blondograd. Then the Bonk, the Kneck and the Lipczitsa, and beyond those rivers, places like Lipwig and Müning, where Fritz dominated. And beyond that, a place where humans of all ethnicities dwelled but the dominant power was not human, but called Lady Margolotta. She'd flown this route often enough by Pegasus.
She sat back on the step of the caravan, and accepted a drink from Xenia.
"Spassibo."
They sat together and watched the sunset over in the widdershins.(7)
They listened to the sounds of life in the Cossack encampment subsiding with the sun, and looked out over caravans, tents and horse-herds. These stretched out for quite a way.
"The children sleep." Xenia said. "A young woman who is reliable is watching over them." Olga nodded appreciation. They watched the sunset over the horizon together.
"It has an attractive beauty." Olga said. Xenia considered this.
"Da. But after while people reach for vodka bottle. View not so great in January, for instance."
They discussed the four Gods of the Shaman, Топацьи, Скелде, and Умчеррел, and the most elusive of them all, the one called Багаж.
Then Xenia smiled.
You should have a little Vision Quest while you are here, I think."
Olga nodded assent and sat, outwardly impassive, whilst Xenia made preparations and gathered the herbs and accessories she would need. The twilight deepened into true night over the Steppe.
Ankh-Morpork.
Irena Politek had taken over the next stage of training the two new Pegasus pilots. She and Sergeant von Strafenberg had supervised Bekki and Sophie in the tricky procedure of fitting the special tack to their mounts, the tack that included, for the first time, saddles. And the adapted stirrups. These needed to avoid the wing root that didn't apply to a normally appointed horse. Sophie wondered about who had designed them.
The girls had then been detailed just to walk their mounts around the landing circle at the Air Station, to get Boetjie and Rosie used to the feel of the new unfamiliar leatherwork. All normal flying was suspended for the duration. This took priority. Most of the Air Police contingent turned out to watch.
It was a trudge, but Bekki appreciated being away from the bore of routine Watch training. It was agreed their Pegasus Service status took precedence.
After a couple of hours of this, the two recruit officers were sent over the road to the Lemonade Factory for some instruction in weapons use. Bekki, who had been trained by her mother and people like Alice Band and Auntie Emmie, sighed at some of the obvious gaps in the knowledge of their instructors. Aunt Mariella had warned her this was likely to happen, and that drawing attention to it was not a bright thing to do.
Bekki put up with it. At least the instruction on how to get handcuffs onto a person who did not want to be handcuffed had been something new and interesting. She did not let on that her mother knew how to apply pressure just so to somebody's arm and elbow, so that the limb became nerveless and limp for just long enough. Mum had explained how this was done and where to grip, and Bekki could do this, at least in theory. Mum said she was not teaching this skill to Famke. Just in case. She guessed that applying skills taught by her mother to Assassins might be considered to be Watch brutality, or something.
At Astrakhan Oblast, on the River Vulga – Matushka
"This is the realm of Топацьи, the spirit of the smoke."
Olga accepted this. It looked familiar. She focused on trying to stop the top of her head untwisting and spiralling off into the unknown. One minute, she and Xenia had been sitting cross-legged looking into a small fire. Three fully armed Cossacks had appeared, bowed respectfully to their Shamaness, and had deployed to stand guard. Apparently this was expected. Xenia had rolled a long fat mahorka cigarette with intense care, added some herbs and resins, and after a while the two had shared it. Olga reflected that sometimes you had to inhale. There was no getting around it. And then, there had been a feeling of dislocation, something unravelling…
"I know this as Feegle Space" Olga said, her voice oddly distorted and echoing. She wondered why she was walking normally but there was no apparent ground under her feet. "We enter it on every Pegasus flight. The Feegle who navigates leaves our world, enters this one, then leaves it again in the correct place. That is as much as I know. They never divulge how they know."
"Da." Xenia said. "Many years ago, on a quest into this realm, I saw white horse with wings, and woman riding. Little blue man sitting in mane saw me. He made magical sign with fingers. Like this."
Olga thought Xenia, who was maintaining an inscrutable poker face, had since worked out what the finger gesture had meant. She'd met Feegle in Lancre and must have been able to work it out by now. She smiled. Xenia added:
"I thought that was the God of the Smoke appearing to me. Usually he is little green man dressed in green with green hat. Smiles all the time. Not usually little blue man who scowls and shows me fingers of right hand. One who tricks. Joker god."
"The people of the widdershins, in Lancre, call him Hoki." Olga said.
Xenia nodded, seriously.
"Da. I thought white horse with wings ridden by woman, with blue man in mane, was the God appearing to me. Then, when I meet such a woman, I realised it was vision of my future. Топацьи spoke truly, that time. Most times he makes it all up, I suspect. You wonder why you bother."
They moved among the impossible geometries and the polygons with the wrong number of sides for some time. Olga wondered if she'd meet any of her Pegasus pilots in here. That would take some explaining. Then, by degrees, the alternative reality faded away and they were sitting by the fire again.
"The second God is Скелде, the spirit of the mushroom." Xenia said. She smiled at Olga. "But perhaps for another night, da?"
Olga agreed. She felt her head was screwing itself back into place, slowly but surely. She sensed that if she thought about it a little bit, and came back to this place with Xenia to guide her, she might work out the secret of craw-stepping and be able to do it for herself. Eventually. She wondered if this was the God's message to her, and then reflected Xenia's warning thatТопацьи was a Trickster God and was to be approached with caution. They went to find their beds, eventually. Olga slept. The day after tomorrow she'd be back in Ankh-Morpork. To see Bekki and Sophie into the air on Pegasii. Some final training, and then they'd be Pegasus Service pilots. Horosho.
The Ridings, Ankh-Morpork.
Irena and Hanna had taken Bekki and Sophie as pillion passengers across the City. Two riderless Pegasi flew on behind, on long leading reins. The destination had been one of the many riding schools on the Quirm side of the City, where the girls and their mounts had been led into one of the large indoor riding rings.
Bekki had a feeling this was going to be a life-changing moment. Godsmother Irena was brief in her instructions. They were to mount up when they each felt their horse was confident with the idea of taking a rider. They were not to get airborne. That was why they were indoors. They were to ride their Pegasi conventionally, at ground level, in the training ring, so that mount and rider would get to know each other and become comfortable with each other. We'll be doing this for a couple of hours every day until Captain Romanoff returns from leave. She wants to be there when you go airborne for the first time. Then your advanced training begins. So, when you are ready. Mount up. And remember, no flying. And. Trainee Pilot Smith-Rhodes. I hope you remembered to save me some chocolate.
Bekki hoped she'd remember this moment when she was old. Her first time aboard Boetjie. Who was a good forgiving mount who seemed happy to have her there. Sophie seemed equally elated. They'd both been waiting for this for ages. The next step was to get airborne…
To be continued
(1) It was named for its thriving textiles and tailoring industry, and its long fur-trimmed coats were famous around the Disc.
(2) this really happened. When the Ottoman Empire under Mehmed IV claimed sovereignty over Russian Cossack lands in what later became the southern Ukraine, Ataman Ivan Sirko, leader of the Zaporozhian Host of the Dneiper Basin, sent back a very blunt and non-diplomatic answer packed with inventive profanity.
In the Discworld, there is a popular Cossack song of long antiquity, of the sort intoned after an evening of melancholic vodka-drinking, entitled Невозможно содомизировать ежика, не получив проколотую задницу. It's about hedgehogs. For people who can't read Cyrillic: Nevozmozhno sodomizirovat' yezhika, ne poluchiv prokolotuyu zadnitsu (Note: Google Translate version. I can read Cyrillic and voice the words and I know a few stock phrases, but my Russian isn't great. As always, feel free to correct or suggest improvements.)
(3) Firing blind here: I picked these two expressions from a list of Russian idioms as they seemed to get the general idea across, of a bunch of layabouts with a sense of entitlement sponging off everyone else. Again, could any Russian-speaking readers suggest better?
(4) Refer to Terry Pratchett's The Light Fantastic for an introduction to Discworld Shamanism. A female Shaman could reasonably be expected to have her head screwed on a little bit better. Even if in certain professional circumstances she might permit it to unwind a little bit. Just far enough. Rincewind does encounter an elderly Shamaness in one of his travels. Who does appear to be more with it than her male counterparts. She might conceivably have been a great-grandmother of my Xenia, as she belonged to a "horse tribe" who took Cohen in as a fellow-traveller.
(5) My tale Gap Year Adventures covers Mariella's recruit training in the Army. Cookhouse floors and a mop come into it in one chapter.
(6) the Pegasus Service and the Air Police were informal and very mildly military. Most of the time informality and first name terms applied. Olga off-handedly referred to her sergeant as Fritz and accepted that she was equally off-handedly referred to as an Ivanka. When there's mutual respect, you can get away with, for instance, calling a Dwarf a lawn-ornament. It was better than Nemetskiy, for instance. Nemetskiy in Russian can also apparently cover Dutch people (also gollandets) , and by extension, Afrikaaners (Afrikander).
(7) The direction of sunrise and sunset on a planetary system consisting of Turtle, elephants, Disc, sun, moon and other celestial particles is not fixed. For us it's east. Something terminally drastic would have to happen for our sun to declare it might like to try rising in the west sometime, just for a change. On a world where the Disc is continually rotating on the shoulders of its elephants, one of which has to periodically cock a leg to allow the Sun to pass by… it is wise to assume that the point of sunrise and sunset can gradually rotate through all 360° in the course of a year.
Notes Dump:
Russian: words for "shamaness" and "witch" = шаманка ведьма (shamanskaya ved'ma)
Or else шаманство, ведьма (shamanstvo, ved'ma)
Current reading: Peter Conradi's "Who Lost Russia", a history and analysis of Russia since the end of the USSR. Very enlightening: some of the conclusions are suspect, but sympathetic to the idea that when viewed from Moscow and not Washington or London, and with Russian history in mind, the world is very, very, different. The idea we don't see in Western media very much: that Vladimir Putin is not a monster, a psycho, or a new Stalin. A rational and realist politician seeking to keep his country strong and stable and doing what he thinks is right for Russia: looking at the unfolding story and the issues from the Russian point of view is something we don't do, and when you ask the right questions, a lot of things become clearer. The imperative for Putin is "What's good for Russia and how can I achieve that?" Still leaves a few questions unanswered and some of the logic is puzzling, but it's a good start for understanding modern Russia, its political leadership, its preoccupations, and some of its decisions. Recommended.
The business over the Ukraine suddenly becomes a lot less clear-cut, for one thing: not simply, as we are led to believe in the West, a matter of "Ukraine = victim; Russia = aggressor." It's far more nuanced than that. Putin may have a little bit more right on his side than Americans and Brits are led to think.