The Graduation Class – extra bonus chapter.

Based on and expanded from my short "The Only One" and put into context in this story. At the moment I'm putting this at the end of the story so everyone can see it to be able to read it. In context in the story, it will fit shortly after the last "flashback"scene in which Emmanuelle's capture by the Guild is explained and the offer she cannot refuse is put to her. I am systematically rewriting the rest so as to incorporate this new information and to allow for it - currently up to chapter 13 or 14 out of 28. Also tidying up and eliminating inconsistencies, anachronisms and irritating little grammar and spelling issues.

It's like this.

The moment of dread for any fanfic writer engaged in fleshing out the author's one-shot, underdeveloped or placeholder characters, is when new canonical information emerges about that character that all of a sudden renders their speculative fiction about that character fallacious or just plain wrong.

I've just hit that wall, and it's painful.

I went "ouch" and had an infra-black moment. Especially when I realised the information about that character had been out there in the public domain all along – I just never had access to it. The thing is, Terry Pratchett does an annual diary in the Discworld style that carries extra information about the Discworld that you don't get in the novels. Because it's by Pratchett and it's about the Discworld you have to accept it as Word of God – canonical. And the thing abut the annual Yearbook is that by its very nature, it's ephemeral. They don't get reprinted, the people who bought them seem to hang on to them, and you never see them up for sale on EBay or in second-hand bookshops. And not everything in them makes it into the Discworld Companions, I have now realised.

So I missed the additional information about one of my favourite characters, Madame Emmanuelle-Marie Lapoignard les Deux-Épées, which has been hiding in plain sight – until I got to locate additional extracts and quotes from the Yearbook in lost corners of the Internet.

This has now been set firmly in the context of the original story "The Graduation Class".

As the training year began, the other three women began to have mixed feelings about Emmanuelle. There was nothing any of them could put her finger on exactly; the Quirmian woman was generous with her time and skills, likeable and pleasant enough, and tolerable in the confined space of their shared quarters, where all four were aware a large amount of give-and-take must apply, if life was to be bearable at all.

But where Alice, Joan and Johanna were moving tentatively and hesitantly in a strange place and were still, after nearly two months, learning all the ins and outs of Filigree Street's rambling corridors and stairways, Emmanuelle moved with ease and certainty. It was as if she already knew her way around. More than that, she seemed conscious of needing to conceal the fact she already knew the place – Alice had heard her say to one of the other trainees "Guild Stationery Office? Up the main stairs, but where you would turn right to the Master's Office, you turn to the left and follow the corridor around, past the Contracts Registry…." Then she had been aware of several sets of eyes looking at her with a common How on Disc do you know that? expression. "Or so I believe from studying the floor-plans." she had added, hurriedly back-tracking.

And, sharing a bedroom with Johanna, the Howondalandian girl had mentioned they were due for a basic lesson in Inimical Alchemy with this Mr Mericet tomorrow. "Whet sort of teacher do you think he is?"

Emmanuelle had smiled and at the end of a tiring physical day, had said, unguardedly, not appreciating her room-mate had asked a rhetorical question with no expectation of a reply,

"Mr Mericet is most certainly dry, he has ze appearance of a zombie, he is younger than he seems, although not by very much, he is of a most sardonique disposition. That is, he is very sarcastic, ma chèrie. For should you put one finger or toe out of place, his chosen weapon for inhumation is dark and destructive sarcastic comment. He is, however, a most good teacher of his subject, possibly the best. Did you ever have a teacher like him?"

"How did she know?" Johanna had said, with perplexity, after the lesson and her first encounter with deadly sarcasm in the form of Mericet. And the way the Quirmian had said Did you ever have a teacher like him? had sounded strange, somehow. Elmost es if he hed taught her before, but thet cennot be right, cen it?

Alice and Joan had nodded at each other.

"We need to have a quiet little word with Madam." Joan had said, decisively. "Alice, m'dear, are you thinking what I'm thinking?"

"She went for that private drink with Lady T'Malia the other evening." Alice said, with a grim look. "Joan, they tell us we are going to be the first women to ever qualify as Assassins. But if that's the case, how did T'Malia ever make it? When did she make it? And how?"

"And if there's already one woman Assassin, there must be more out there." agreed Joan. "And did you see the way Mericet looked at her, as if he recognised her from somewhere? As if he knew her before? Is it just me, m'dears, or am I beginning to suspect our Quirmian madame isn't all she seems?"

"And Mericet nearly called her by a different name." Alice agreed. "That was strange. He called her "Mr de …" and then checked himself quickly. Did anyone else catch that?"

"Well, up until now, everyone in his classes has been a "mister". Joan mused. "So we can't read too much into that. He's just not used to women, that's all! But let's say they've insinuated a couple of fully-qualified graduate Assassins into our class. Just to watch us at all hours of the day."

"To check on our loyelty? To listen to whet we sey when we think we are in private? Spies?" said Johanna. Brought up in Rimwards Howondaland, she had learnt early about the paranoid and secretive Bureau of State Security, part secret police, part spy machine, part-Assassins, said to have ears everywhere. Her family had been investigated by BOSS for several reasons, and a favourite uncle had had to leave the country in a hurry, going into voluntary exile.(1).

"A spy, certainly." said Alice. "Where is she now?"

"Down in the erena, doing some extra sword-drill." said Johanna.

"Hmm." Joan said, thoughtfully. "She is rather good with swords. Johanna, keep that dangerous-looking whip of yours to hand? Alice, m'dear, have a pistol crossbow where you can reach it? If necessary, I'll dope her drink. Mr Mericet hinted there are such things as truth drugs, but all it needs is to get her part sedated and then use kindness when you talk to her. We really do need to have this out in the open where we all can see it!"

The three women armed themselves and quietly waited for the return of the fourth.

Emmanuelle wiped the sweat from her face and draped the towel around her shoulders.

Eh bien, this will do for today. Back to the rooms, I think, and a bath before dinner. I must be so careful. Lady T'Malia advised me not to let on to the others that I was a pupil here before. She believes my presence will stiffen resolve as I am only revisiting things I did with success before, and those skills I have I can informally teach. But Alice is so very clever. And it does not do to under-estimate Joan, who is a woman of cunning and resource. They have both, I am sure, noticed things about me that do not fit. And la petite, Johanna, her attention is consumed by having to understand a strange and very foreign place to her, very quickly. She too is by no means stupid.

Mr Wilkinson, the old and soon-to-retire Master-at-Arms, smiled and patted her shoulder. He said, in a quiet voice

"You were a pleasure to teach ten years ago. I see you have improved in the years since, young master de Jeanndarc!"

She looked about her. Nobody near enough to have heard. Bon.

"I can report to the Dark Council that in the coming years where young ladies will attend this school, we have a most worthy candidate to succeed me after my retirement. I am glad. Many of us felt you were ill-treated by the Guild when your secret was revealed."

Emmanuelle smiled at her old teacher, one of few men she respected and looked up to.

"It is a prize to strive for, most certainly." she said. To her surprise, she no longer felt ill-will or bitterness towards the Guild for what had happened. Lady T'Malia, after all, had advised her to look on the Mature Students' Course as a year of refresher training in what she had already been taught. And this time around she would become a licenced and legitimate Assassin.

Emmanuelle was pleased, too, that young women would soon be able to do openly what she had been forced to do in secrecy and subterfuge. And her experience would guide them. It was much for this reason that she had reconciled herself to a life of teaching at the Guild school. She could still be a Gambler in her free time, after all, as there was no bar to cross-Guild membership. And she had been sternly warned by T'Malia not to even think of professional misconduct with the older boys "although I know well enough myself that there will be beautiful boys of eighteen who will be a temptation. It just isn't done, my dear. Not if you wish to remain a teacher."(2) Apart from that, the Guild had assured her that it did not police or make moral judgments on the personal lives of its members. So discreet lovers would still be a feature of her life.

But do I tell the others I have been to this School before and the unique circumstances of my attending? T'Malia warned me that this may bring suspicion on my head. But if they already fear I am a spy in their midst…

Paying sincere respect to Mr Wilkinson, who in his sixties could still fight a shrewd practice duel drawing on years of experience of not having come second in a swordfight,(3) she made her way back to their quarters, on a high floor she knew was reserved for Very Senior Assassins. The women, by default, had been allocated far more spacious and better-furnished accommodation than most of the male trainees had been allocated. They were, after all, the first four official female Assassin trainees. And two of the four were still under house-arrest: only Alice could leave the premises with complete freedom on her unsupported parole. Johanna could come and go with an escort; but Emmanuelle and Joan had also been hunted by the Watch, and the Guild was bound to keep them under open arrest. Even when the Guild could see fit to relax this, both of them had been warned that the Watch might attempt to re-arrest them for the slightest little thing, like littering or walking without care and attention.

Emmanuelle noted as she passed through the courtyard that whole wings of the Guild were under "Do Not Enter: Building Work In Progress" signs as internal floors were re-arranged to split larger dorms down into two, or to repartition larger rooms into smaller, so as to fit the intake of new pupils that were being planned for. The summer, with most pupils packed up and gone elsewhere, was the only time for this, and it was anticipated the rebuilding work would progress, during school holidays, over the next year, to be only just finished before the first girls arrived.

Indeed, the Guild had bought out the old College of Heralds site on Mollymog Street for an overspill campus; its heraldic animals were, for the moment, housed at the Palace Menagerie alongside the displaced Heralds, and the understanding was that the Guild would eventually provide purpose-built facilities for the Heralds. It also had an option on vacant buildings on Short Street. She knew the Mollymog site was being developed to incorporate classrooms, lecture theatres, and additional student accommodation, intended for the use of senior pupils who had survived the spartan dorm years. Despite her native cynicism, she conceded that this was an exciting time to be a teacher, in a school where money was being lavishly invested to fund an expansion and whole new subject areas were being brought onto the curriculum.

She walked on to the stairway leading to their rooms, knowing her swordfighting dress – loose baggy harem pants and a tight sleeveless top – were drawing attention, not least from building workers. A smile in reply to the usual catcalls, accompanied by a clearly seen warning hand on her sword-hilt, dealt with that minor irritation.

And then she was back. to see three occupied chairs had been set in a loose semi-circle facing a fourth vacant one. A tray of coffee and four cups had been left out. She was welcomed with smiles and nods. Purposeful ones.

"Ah, Emmanuelle, m'dear!" Joan said, cheerfully. "I think it's time for a little chat, don't you?"

Ah. Here it comes.

"Pour yourself a coffee, would you? There's cream. And just make yourself comfortable. A few little things we need to discuss between the four of us.."

Emmanuelle took off her sword-belt and propped it against the wall, visibly out of reach. Then she sat on the free chair.

"I have made myself defenceless." she said, with a sincerity that fooled none of the others. "I sincerely have no desire to fight any of you. Johanna, ma petite, you are nearest to the coffee? Ah, merci."(4)

There was an expectant silence as Johanna handed around coffees.

Then Emmanuelle said

"I must apologise. I was at fault for not telling you sooner and I regret you suspect me of darker intentions. Please listen to me."

And Emmnuelle spoke of her early life in Quirm, of her father, the master sword-smith and of learning from him how to nurse raw metal along all the stages of becoming an arrowhead, a crossbow quarrel, a halberd blade, an axe-head, and finally, when her father judged her ready, her first formal sword. She spoke of her mother, who tooled leather and ornamented it with inlay and filigree, who as often as not made matching scabbards and belts.

"My father, who smelt of the forge, and my mother, who, alas, carried the smell of the tanners. We were not poor, by any means, but we were of the lowest."

And of her patron, the Compte de Lapoignard, who had taken her into his sword-fighting academy and taught her the basis of what she knew.

And so Emmanuelle-Marie found her first sword teacher, a man who respected her as a uncle should a favoured niece. He recognised there was more here than just a bright and gifted girl with a talent for swords. By agreement with her father - the Ecole Quirmienne having taught her all it could - he also supervised the prodigy's further education. He was liberal, this Count, and realised that the girl would likely ascend to the greatest heights had she been born a noble and not just as the fille d'un artisane. She was not just pretty, she was beautiful. She was possessed of a fierce intelligence and a graceful wit. She was born to swords, that much was clear. Feed her intelligence and tutor her in languages and the graceful arts, and she would go far, this Emmanuelle-Marie.

At first, she quibbled at the language teaching, finding Morporkian ugly to her voice and Überwaldean to be utterly harsh and graceless. But the Compte, who she respected, won her over, pointing out that Morporkian was the language of the world outside Quirm, and not to speak it was to be voiceless. As for Überwaldean, he shared her sentiments, but he pointed out that the destinies of Quirm and Überwald were somehow bound together. Occasionally, and certainly within living memory, it had become absolutely necessary to arrive at accommodations with Überwald and for Quirmian pride, regrettably, to be set aside. Emmanuelle had heard rumours that le Compte had, er, collaborated, in the aftermath of the last need to arrive at an accommodation, when Überwaldian armies had briefly been in occupation of Quirm. But she shrugged: the noble had been selflessly kind to her. She was in his debt. Et bien, she would learn Überwaldian and Morporkian. Besides, having out-paced at least one tutor, Le Compte had mysteriously said he had a bon idée for her future teaching. One that dictated that her Morporkian had to be very good indeed.

But, hélas, it also required a degree of deceit and subterfuge. He, the Compte, feared that the Quirm Academy, run as it was by a pair of singular spinsters, would now merely bore and confine her. And the academic opportunities for our gifted girl-children are so very pitifully limited. How good an actor could she be?

"But surely, mon patron, you mean an actress?" Emmanuelle-Marie had queried him.

The old Compte had smiled.

"Non, ma petite. I most assuredly mean an actor. Ecoutes-moi, s'il tu plâit. Deception is distasteful, but it sometimes becomes necessary so as to advance oneself in life when all doors are closed, and I fear you are fast coming to the limit of what I may teach you.. The best schools on this Disc are closed to girls. In the future it may not be so, as I hear the wise Lord Vetinari is giving thought to expanding education in his City. But that may be fifteen or twenty years hence and no use to one such as you now. I am giving thought to announcing that I am taking in a noble ward, son of a distant cousin whose parents, hélas, died in sudden tragic circumstances. I am undertaking to pay the costs of his upbringing and education and I will welcome him as a son, although a second son after my heir Maurice. This ward, I am sending to Ankh-Morpork to one of the best schools there is."

He looked appraisingly at Emmanuelle.

"Your figure is boyish and with a little deceit and art, you will not be too obviously feminine about the chest. Your hair must be shorn, and you must be taught to shave, or at least how to go through the motions of shaving. Other deficiencies… well, my valet suggested a rolled-up pair of socks will suggest a shape in the correct place. You have trained with men and boys in my academy, you are good at imitating their swagger and their walk, and your father René assures me, with frowns, that in the forge you swear and curse with the best of his prentices.

"I have discussed this with your parents, and they agree. You are going to the Assassins' School in Ankh-Morpork. Although not as a girl."

Emmanuelle took a deep astonished breath. Then she laughed.

"Pourquoi pas?" she said. "It will be most droll!"

Emmanuel-Martin, chevalier de Jeannedarc, passed the late-entry entrance exam to the Assassins' School with flying colours. His examiners said the young man had presented as a brilliant prospect and they were glad to be able to accept a clever, graceful, young gentleman of good family and background. Especially one so gifted in swordcraft of all kinds.

A place was not a problem: a late entrant at the age of fourteen will find there are plenty of vacant desks in Assassins' School classrooms. People starting at eleven drop out for various reasons. Maybe they decide the Assassins' School isn't for them and transfer elsewhere, maybe the School, with exceeding reluctance, expels, excludes or sends down unsuitable, unsatisfactory or otherwise intractable pupils; in some cases natural attrition has created a vacancy. One whose education has been on a par with the Guild School, one who is naturally good at swords and bladed weapons, one who in Metalwork lessons can even teach his tutor a thing or two about forging a blade, one who generously passes his skills on to less fortunate comrades, will always fit in, and little eccentricities can be made light of.

Showering with your kit on after Games, for instance, and changing under a towel; well, some boys, especially ones yet to be visited by puberty, are naturally shy. Emmanuel was relieved he was one of five in Scorpion House who were shy in the changing rooms. Emmanuel found himself in more danger when he realised he was looking too intently at the naked boys in the changing rooms, some of whom were well-built and well-proportioned for fourteen. Well, he'd never been in a room full of naked men before, and, zut alors, he was not one to pass up on the educational opportunity.

He found himself being whispered about, and wondered uncertainly if his secret was out. Conversations would begin in whispers and stop with uncertain glances as he walked past.

Disconsolately, he wondered if his disguise wasn't good enough. Ma foi, this is farce! How long will it be before I am discovered?

He. could have cheered when he realised the truth – a big brash dorm-mate referred to him, off-handedly, as that Quirmian poof. He's got to be, the way he was looking at my todger in the changing room!

Emmanuel laughed it off with sheer relief, but boys who were well-disposed towards him, the ones who said in whispers It really doesn't matter, and Don't think you're alone, in a place like this a lot of that sort of thing goes on, you'd be surprised, also said, warningly Don't be too obvious. If they find out, it's an expulsion offence. They have a crack-down every so often and boys caught at IT get expelled!

He soon learnt to avoid predatory older boys of That Type. One day a sixth-former who was notorious in dorm rumour tried to get fresh, putting a hand on Emmanuel's bottom. A whole common room looked on, seeing how the Quirmian boy would react. Emmanuel realised it was a test.

If he carries on making a pass at me, he will discover more than he expects. Or, perhaps, less. On the other hand if I do nothing, I am the weakling, the runt, prey for bullies. This must not be so.

Emmanuel shrieked a surprisingly girlish shriek, whirled, and very accurately kicked her offender in the fork, following it through with clubbed hands smashing down on the back of his neck, laying him out like a felled ox. He then turned, and addressed the room.

"I may be ze Quirmian poof." he announced, "But my body is still my own Learn from this fool's example. We Quirmians are fighters!"

To his surprise, the Scorpion House Common Room erupted and he received a standing ovation.

"HWHAT is happening HERE!" demanded Lady T'Malia, rushing in, drawn by the noise and cheering. She gave Emmanuel a suspicious look.

"Benson fell over and hurt himself, miss." said Noel Fforbes, Head of House. "We warned him about that rogue patch on the carpet before."

T'Malia looked around her. She picked a pupil at random.

"Is that true? You!"

"Yes, ma'am. It is."

Emmanuel realised that even people previously hostile were lying to a teacher for him. It was a good feeling. He'd been accepted.

"Very well, then. You and you, get him to his quarters. And tell him when he wakes up that I will punish any more "falling over the carpet", whatever form it took!"

She gave Emmanuel another long hard stare. He was reminded that Lady T'Malia taught diplomacy, realpolitik and political expediency. Therefore she was trained to spot a lie, a deception or an evasion from miles away. It was her trade, after all. But it appeared that T'Malia was going to let this lie pass, for deeper realpolitikal reasons of her own. She made the obligatory warning about "any more unseemly noise, and the whole house will be punished!" then turned and swept out.

Emmanuel had realised something fundamental about deception.

Because they believe they have detected I am a homosexual male, they will not now look further for the real truth. And as long as they see a funny Quirmian who is most of the time a friendly, courteous and helpful fellow, but a wildcat in a fight, they will be well-disposed. It will pay also to be more Quirmian than I am, the funny stage-Quirmian of the jokes and music hall.

And so her schooldays progressed. She returned to Quirm in the hols to see her family and the Compte and to report on her progress, glad to be Emmanuelle again.

Incredibly, the deception lasted over three years. By this time, she had ascended to the Sixth Form, where privilege meant she shared a room with three other boys. She was worried about this. But when selecting room-mates - another privilege - three boys who had been huddled together in quiet conference called Emmanuel over and asked if he would consent to be the fourth to share with them, she agreed. For she knew all three were temperamentally suited to share together, being of the more fey sort who appreciated the company of men more than they would girls. and having a naturally broad accepting mind, she did not quail that two of them chose to share a bed at night, leaving only she and Julian in the other half of the room behind a modesty-curtain. In fact sharing with three young men who were seriously experimenting with their sexuality was to make things easier, as everybody had a secret to conceal.

But when Julian got into Emmanuel's bed one night, she felt she had to gently disabuse him. The physical closeness was nice and warm and pleasant, and she was aware of what he wanted. It just couldn't be with her, that was the problem. Not without a certain intimacy that would be painful and somewhat messy.

"Peace, mon ami! " she said, as an exploring hand moved lower down and failed to find what it sought, stopping dead in questing surprise, mirrored in its owner's eyes. "Then she took a deep breath. "There is something about me that you should know..."

After his initial shock and surprise, Julian, and to a lesser extent the other two Odd Boys, Graham and Kenny, became her greatest friends and allies, keeping her secret and even helping her to refine the deception. It wasn't hard: everyone else dismissed the four as merely gay, and chose to look no further, taking the blue cat painted on their study-bedroom door as a huge coded joke at the expense of the masters. Julian even stayed with Le Compte in Quirm during holidays, relishing the chance to see Emmanuelle dressed appropriately as a girl and, in the privacy of her rooms, to experiment with wearing her clothes and make-up. Le Compte, a worldly-wise man of sophistication, was understanding, even nurturing.

But it had to come to an end. Within a few months of her Final Run, she took ill and had to be isolated in the School Sanitarium with a crippling influenza. The School Doctor was universally thought of as useless, but when he the female bedder who worked overtime shifts as a nursing orderly came to him and said

" I was bed-bathing the Quirmian boy in number four. He was putting up a hell of a fight to me undressing him… and you can see why…I think you'd better see this, doctor!"

Then even he could tell the difference between a naked boy and a naked girl. He wasn't that completely inept.

"Oh, shit." he muttered. "One of those".

And went to find Doctor Follett.

"I'm sorry." Dr Follett said, curtly. "This is an embarrassing situation, I hope you realise? The worst of it was, you fooled everybody. Everybody. You might even have graduated!"

Emmanuelle tried not to hang her head in shame, and instead tried to hold the Master's angry gaze.

"I don't see why we can't let her graduate." Lady T'Malia said, defending her. "She's shown great skill and style in keeping the act up for over three years. It was only bad luck that stopped her going the distance! Like I did, in my time!"

"Yes. You did." Said the Doctor. "But you were never found out and it was agreed to allow you to graduate so as not to embarrass the Guild!"

Emmanuelle looked at Lady T'Malia in surprise. Her tutor smiled back benevolently.

"My dear, did you never stop to wonder why I am the only apparent woman Assassin?" she asked. "Or how I got here? I performed a deception like yours too. And there are others." she added, mysteriously. "I am by no means the only one. Nor the first!"

Mr. Downey, who had taught Emmanuel and quite liked him as a pupil, shook his head.

"We really have no alternative." He sighed. "The School Rules dictate."

And by a verdict of two to one, Emmanuel-Martin de Jeannedarc was expelled from the Assassins' Guild School.

Emmanuelle les Deux-Épées felt shamed and embarrassed and hurt for him. But at least she'd had a Guild School Education.

"And that is the story, mes amies." she concluded. "I assure you on my honour and that of my patron who I loved as an uncle, I am not here to spy on you. Indeed, I am not a qualified Assassin either. T'Malia told me to look upon this as a refresher course to renew old skills, where I receive absolutely no privileges, where teachers who knew me previously as Emmanuel-Martin de Jeanndarc have all been asked not to advertise the fact. I still have to submit to study and training for the year, and I cannot call myself Assassin until I pass the Final Run which in the past was denied to me, although I was prepared for it. In the meantime I am to encourage you, make my skills available to you, teach what I know, and generally to be inobtrusive and helpful. Am I accepted? Are we four friends again?"

There was a silence. Johanna was first to extend a hand. Emmanuelle took it.

Joan nodded and said, grumpily, "I've heard rumours about the Borogravian Army. This sort of thing's not uncommon, I suppose. Gel joins up, stuffs a pair of socks down the front of her britches and binds everything else down. She learns to swear and swagger, deceives the men, who are, as always, inobservant. Damn it, I've wondered myself about a couple I taught from here, whose voices still hadn't broken in their final year!"

"So what did you do?" Alice asked, interested. Joan snorted.

"Me? Nothing! They'd been accepted as boys, so I treated them as boys! Not my place to do anything! I teach elocution. Can't go around asking a lad to drop his trousers on suspicion. Wrong end for voice production, for one thing, and besides it gets you a reputation! A bit traumatic for the young fellow, too!"

"Did you see Emmanuelle while she was a pupil here?" Johanna asked, after laughter had died down. Joan shook her head.

"Alas, no, m'dear. I was working out of my own school in town then. I didn't come here, the Guild School sent me pupils they thought could benefit. They were the only ones I got to see in those days. Evidently your Morporkian was good enough. But then, a Quirmian accent's always been thought of as an asset."

Alice frowned.

"Emmanuelle," she said, thoughtfully, "I'm assuming this was how Lady T'Malia made it into the Guild, in her time?"

"Most assuredly yes." came the reply. "She escaped detection all the way. It is hard to believe seeing her now, but after she graduated, the Dark Council had only two options. To inhume a mistake, or to accept it had been deceived, and discreetly accept her so as not to cause scandal. That has been informal policy ever since. If a girl manages to graduate without being detected, it is accepted as proof of resource, dedication and application to the Craft above and beyond the usual, and she is accepted into the Guild family. My bad fortune that I fell ill and was detected in hospital, non? There are few of us, but Lady T'Malia assures me they exist."

"Have you met any of the others?" Alice asked, excitedly.

"Women Assassins are expected to be extra-discreet and not to advertise the fact. Indeed, the Guild wished me not to make it public knowledge that I came so painfully close to deceiving them and graduating, and that I am here, in part, to correct the situation. Alice, chere amie, I know of two others for certain and suspect a third."

Emmanuelle refilled her coffee cup, at leisure. Alice Band leant forward in excitement.

She took time in answering the implied question.

"One was Remora Simmonds, who has since married a boy who was a fellow pupil, Nigel Selachii. Thus she ascended into the highest social order from fairly lowly beginnings. A second is one you may know from the Guild of Archaeologists, Lorenzo Cronk."(5)

"Laurie Cronk!" Alice exploded. "Laurie? She taught me most of what I know about Stealth Archaeology! We've been on digs together! She kept THAT quiet!"

"You were assuredly taught by the best, then." Emmanuelle said, with a shrug. "And I am not at liberty to divulge the identity of the other, who I merely suspect studied here under subterfuge. I will only say her nephew is influential and well-connected and she serves these days to direct his thinking. That is all. Now are we friends again?"

Joan considered this. She looked at Alice, who nodded. Then both extended hands to Emmanuelle.

"There's a bottle of something on ice in the scullery." Joan said. "Get it, would you, Johanna, and four glasses?"

"Yes, Joan." Johanna said, and got up.

"Then we can plan tomorrow. This thing called Introduction To Edificeering. You've been here before, so make yourself useful, and not just decorative. What's all that about?"

(1) See my story The Black Sheep, which introduces Johanna's uncle, a man whose particular method of expressing dissidence drew the attention of BOSS to the family. His reasons for leaving may have offended the apartheid state, but they were not especially exalted ones. Johanna remembered later that mention of Uncle Balthazar was not encouraged, and at his brother's name her father's knuckles would go white and he would scowl horribly.

(2) Emmanuelle had heard the clearly left unsaid "Not if you wish to carry on breathing and walking without being a Zombie" implicit in this.

(3) His pupils, in recognition off this, nicknamed him "Cohen" after the barbarian hero.

(4) It isn't just witches. In any gathering of strong-minded women, the youngest always gets the dogsbody jobs like brewing the tea/coffee. It's multiversal.

(5) Remora Selachii and Lorenzo Cronk are Assassins and a Stealth Archaeologist who feature in the Pratchett-scripted computer game Discworld Noir. Indeed, it is suspected that a Stealth Archaeologist with the suspicious initials L.C. was an early model for the character who later became Miss Alice Band in the canon.