Happy Hogswatch an alle braven Mädchen!
V0.07. Hopefully the last run for the inevitable typos and glitches. Seventh revision. Belated new ideas and snippets. This time, one tiny, tiny, little typo but one that annoyed me every time my eyes passed over it. Just one. But needed correcting.
Despite there being at least three part-written chapters out there (Price of Flight and Strandpiel 2 and one other), it bothered me that I haven't managed a Hogswatch tale this year. Blame this on medical issues and general lack of oomph. (Igors will soon be attending)
Anyway, it's currently the 2nd January 2024, and therefore Ninth Night counted from Christmas Eve, so I'm still in time, and an Idea occured to me which hopefully I can finish in one chapter.
The timescale for chronology's sake will be maybe a year after the events described in "Negligient Discharge" and takes place on the following Hogswatch. Character ages, where relevant, have been adjusted to fit. It was in fact indirectly inspired by a line in ND, when I re-read the tale searching for inspiration.
Blimey, just had one reader, joshuakaug1992, who appears to have binge-read and favourited everything I've ever written. Thank you. I now feel slightly ashamed of my torpor and weakness and I feel obliged to actually finish this and to get it out there – woefully late, but cardiac issues do this to you and sap all creativity in the brainfog of just living. As a double whammy - the drugs do not help at all. you'd think there'd be some benefits and the right sort of altered state of consciousness, but no - not those sort of drugs.
And finally completed in March. Apologies. Blame it on the cardia and the brainfog.
As this is horribly late, I've added a couple of lines of speculation about the Discworld Easter with a thought or two about whether the Soul Cake Duck might also be arrested by the Watch on her rounds.
18 Spa Lane, Nap Hill, Ankh-Morpork. December.
Professor Sir Ponder Stibbons, Vice-Chancellor of Unseen University, steepled his fingers, then realised it probably didn't have quite the same effect as when Lord Vetinari did it, and un-steepled them again. He leant forward on his desk, and studied the Supernatural Manifestation that was sitting in front of him. He shook his head. It was hard to feel worried or intimidated by a seven-foot tall entity of demonic appearance, not when its long curved horns were drooping and it was trembling slightly, and manifesting a sort of hang-dog defeat as if it had been scared out of its inhuman wits.
Besides, its hands had been shackled by the Air Watch Witch who had concluded the arrest. She and a colleague were standing over to the right, making it clear with body language that they were not amused, and could add further restraint if this proved necessary.
"Let's start again, shall we?" Ponder asked, trying to sound severe(1). "You intruded on this house in the small hours of the morning. My house. You had a particular purpose in mind, which I'm still trying to get to the bottom of."
He looked across to one of the two Air Witches who were in attendance. She had explained the particular ethnic and cultural circumstances to him as best she could, and he had some sort of semi-perplexed inkling of what it was all about. But it was still hard going in unfamiliar terrain.
Ponder sighed and decided to begin from the essential facts. Always grasp the known and the essential. Ground yourself.
"You know the thing about the Wizard and the High Tower?" he asked, politely. "Well, as you've probably guessed by now, I'm a Wizard. And while this is a perfectly ordinary suburban house, I live here."
Ponder paused and added a prompt.
"Which makes this into?"
The Entity winced and shuddered again. Wizards were known to get intense when their personal space was intruded upon.
"You also came with the stated intention of menacing my daughter." Ponder said, remorselessly. "Which means her mother isn't very happy with you on both counts. And Johanna isn't greatly keen on having her sleep interrupted, nor of having a Watch patrol called here at one in the morning to attend to a Serious Incident."
Ponder allowed that to sink in. The tall imposing Air Watch Sergeant added a glare of her very own to the mix. The Entity shuddered again.
"I wouldn't annoy Johanna to that degree." Ponder remarked, pleasantly. "I really wouldn't. You've given her four good reasons to be annoyed, in fact. So aren't you lucky you're in here, talking to me?"
Ponder didn't smoke, but he was a Wizard who respected his colleagues. In here, in his study, he kept a desktop-case of cigarettes for visitors. An ashtray and a lighter also sat on the desk-top. And he knew when to let up and to be reasonable.
"Just reach over." he said, kindly, assessing the Entity as one that had had any threat knocked out of it. "You've got to be in that barrier octagram so the Watch can say every precaution's been taken, but I can relax it for just long enough for you to reach for a cigarette and the lighter."
The Watch Sergeant glowered.
"Vorsicht! Ich beobachte dich!" she said, in a loud and firm voice. The fact that she was currently out of uniform – seriously out of uniform - didn't make her any less frightening.
"Danke." the Entity said. It selected and lit a cigarette in trembling, shaky, hands. Ponder watched this and decided to be gentler.
"Now. I'd like you to explain, in your own words, what all this is about, exactly? Sergeant von Strafenburg and Officer Broadwick can witness and take notes for Watch purposes. Go ahead."
December 5th, Ankh-Morpork. Evening.
The tall figure, shrouded in a black hooded cloak, moved in a strangely careful and slightly awkward way down Elm Street. As this was the Shades, people very carefully refrained from comment on what they presumed was his gait. For one thing, the figure was well over six feet tall, emanated a sinister aura, and though nothing could be made out of what was inside the all-enveloping hood, it appeared to have an over-large head suggesting either something not human, or some sort of tragic accident.
It paused at the top of the steps leading downwards. Then it began to negotiate them, but very, very, carefully, and with an air of concentration. Stairs designed for humans put it at a bit of a disadvantage.
All conversation in Biers stopped as the newcomer entered. It had to duck under the doorframe, but raised itself to its full height as it approached the bar, with all eyes (and visually sensitive analogues of eyes) following it as it moved.
Igor, the bar-thing, paused in polishing a glass.
"No hoods." he said, with authority. "If we can't see what shape you are, you're barred."
The newcomer threw back his hood. Igor watched him, dispassionately.
"Oh. You're one of those." he said. "At this time of year, though, can't say I'm surprised. Schnapps?"
"Danke." the creature said. It accepted the schnapps and took a grateful sip. "Jagermeister. Good blend."
"We get the best." Igor said. "New in town?"
"Ja." the creature said. "I have got a few visits to make. However, Despatch just gave me a list of names and addresses, and this is a big city. I have never been here before. I asked around, and they said this was a welcoming place for me to seek assistance."
Igor scrutinised the list, and whistled. He nodded over to a group of indistinct shapes clustered in a darker and more shadowed region of the bar.
"Bogeymen get around, and they know this City." Igor remarked. "I'll set the drinks up, you pay for a round, and as their trade speciality overlaps yours, I imagine they'll be glad to help."
Igor added, with emphasis,
"Once you've paid for a round."
The newcomer suddenly realised he was surrounded. He hadn't seen them move. He tried to look unconcerned.
"Staying long, friend?" the largest Bogeyman asked, emphasising the word "friend". The newcomer caught the harmonic.
"Nein. This is seasonal work, at this time of year only. At the end of the week, I am back home in Überwald."
The newcomer tried to look impassive as he was surrounded by vague shapes he tried not to look too closely at. It didn't help that a couple of them had brought doors with them. Even if one was a plain pine construction straight out of the Ikea Ikeasson catalogue, it was still bloody disconcerting to be hemmed in by seemingly self-propelled doorways.
The Lättviktsdörr för invändig hushållsfunktion(2) opened slightly in its frame, and a hairy arm reached out.
"Mind if I take a look, friend?" a muffled voice said, reaching for the appointments list. The newly-arrived entity, surrounded by bogeymen, nodded assent, noting Igor was pouring drinks for them. He sighed, wondering if he could ask for a receipt and put it on expenses.
"Let's see... Jungherr Ludwig von Apfelpflücker, aged eleven, 47 Peach Pie Street. Been naughty, has he?"
"Exceedingly." the entity confirmed. "Therefore, a visit."
"Well, that's easy – Peach Pie's only a few streets away, friend. No bother. Thanks for the drink. And this one. Sehr Geehrte Fraulein Madeleine Rübenkopf, aged twelve, at 87 Filman Street..."
"'Ere, I can see how it works now." another bogeyman said from behind the door. "Someone's sat down with the street map, and they bin efficient. Did the planning. All your visits are in a sort of straight line, beginning here and moving out, and they bin planned so you don't need to go back on yourself."
"Well, he's Überwaldean, in'he?" another bogey said. "You expect that from Überwaldeans. No sense of humour whatsoever, but they're bloody efficient."
"Wish we got office support like that." an envious bogey added. "It'd make it bloody easier. Looks like you can call it a night after you do this last house-call on Spa Lane..."
There was a sudden silence among the bogeyman and what sounded like the beginning of a snigger, cut off by the very slight suspicion of a nudge.
"Eighteen Spa Lane." the spokes-bogey said, reflectively. "Funny, the name don't look Überwaldean..."
"The client is one two-thousand- and forty-eighth-part Überwaldean on her mother's side." the entity said, in his irritatingly nasal, slightly whiny, voice. It was a voice that was hard to like. "I asked Despatch. They checked. Therefore, she has Überwaldean ancestry, and she is eligible for my attentions."
Feeling that this was not nearly enough, he added
"There is a second young female there who is from Schmaltztsberg-Bonk. Therefore, unquestionably Überwaldean. However, my superiors are uncertain as to whether she meets the criteria to qualify for my services. I am assured they will notify me with a ruling."
The bogeys had all gone very poker.
"Well, at least it's your last call and the shift's over, then." the spokes-bogey said. "Call back. Tell us how you got on."
The Entity finished his drink and paid Igor, then left Biers with a wave of thanks to his new friends.
"I thank you." he said. "There are many Überwaldeans in this city. Therefore, our traditions at Hogswatch must be observed."
Behind him, the bogeymen waited for him to go, listening to the clatter as he very carefully negotiated the stairs to the street, and then burst into sniggering laughter. They speculated on exactly how long he would last on his last home visit.
"Learning curve, innit?" one said. "He'll learn. If he lives, that is."
"Else he falls off the curve."
They took long reflective sips of their drinks. It had not ended well for the last bogeyman who had attempted a house-call at Eighteen Spa Lane, perhaps fourteen years before. The bogey had lived, but was still deeply traumatised. (3) Nobody had ever made the attempt again at that address, even though two younger children had followed that first one.
18 Spa Lane, Nap Hill, Ankh-Morpork.
The upstairs bedroom was quiet and calm with a little moonlight intruding via imperfectly closed curtains. Even though there was a pull-out guest bed in the room for occasions like this, it remained empty. The main bed was a very large double; a key to understanding the mind-set of its owner, and of her mother, is that it is currently pushed back into the very corner of the room, up against a wall on two sides, from which the person sleeping there can watch both the door and the window, in case of anything threatening to interrupt her sleep.(4)
At the moment, this very large bed is occupied by four teenage girls, in the sort of companiable heap which happens when a sleepover runs out of steam and the need for rest and sleep takes over. Two of the girls are actually asleep. One is curled up in the angle of the two walls, a position she has been generously granted as a concession to her species. The girl to her immediate right is fast asleep, while two others are in a lazy on-the-verge-of-sleep conversation, in low voices. These two girls are in a relaxed, close, huddle with their arms around each other, the sort of close platonic intimacy which might normally be taken to be a sign of sisterly friendliness.
"This is not completely disgusting, Red Nuisance," one of the girls said. She made no effort to wrestle out of the mutual embrace. The other considered this.
"Could be worse, Big-Nose." the other one said. "If we're forced to share a bed just because Mum invited too many houseguests over, at least your feet don't stink and your breath smells fresh."
"Is pravda. Truth. And your feet are not objectionably cold." the other agreed. "And you keep toenails clipped. Is good sign. Even on you."
They snuggled closer. The girl on their right stirred.
"Better be careful." she said. "Or else people are going to start going round thinking you two actually like each other."
"Who, me?" the red-haired girl said. "And her? Big-Nose?"
"Would not do." the other agreed. "Simply sharing same bed with Vesnushchataya because of shortage of bed space. Nichevo."
The third girl very carefully avoided referring to the unoccupied guest-bed. She tried to close her mind to the deep sleep-breathing going on to her left, praying it wouldn't mature into full-blown snoring. She sighed. Thora could snore for Bonk. They'd been in the same dorm at the School for long enough to know that.
"Too many of Mum and Dad's house-guests." the red haired girl agreed. She sighed, part resignation and part exasperation.
"Why does my mum have to teach at the School?" she said, voicing an old sense of injustice. "When she invites people over, they're all teachers. You can't relax! I come here on Wednesdays and Saturdays to get away from the School. But Mum invites it here!"
"And how do you think I feel?" said the other girl. "Is not just you from Assassins' School. One of your teachers, she is also my teacher. Also, since they went on mission together, (5) your mother made new friend who is also here tonight. And she is staying over. So, understand feeling of discomfort. Was very uncomfortable."
"That's true." the third girl said. "Got to be hard for you to relax when she's.... well, you know, what she is."
"Human iceberg." the red-haired girl agreed. "Doesn't need to ask for ice in her drinks."
She paused.
"Beccs says she's not that bad, though. But Beccs sees everybody's good side first."
"Da. Should be lucky, Red Annoyance, you have big sister who sees good side in you. For me, still searching."
Elsewhere in the house, Professor Ponder Stibbons surfaced to half-wakefulness with a vague feeling something was slightly wrong. He focused on this as far as he could, then felt assured the emphasis was only on slightly. He'd taken very good care to instal and periodically renew the magical defences in his home: these began with guarding wards, which could be viewed as magical tripwires that would sound a metaphorical alarm if anything attempted to breach them.
Feeling reassured that Johanna was still very deeply asleep and untroubled, he explored the magical atmosphere around him. It was probably nothing; something passing by on its own business had probably brushed up against the wards and moved on. It happened. Besides, there were three Witches in the house right now, his oldest daughter and two house-guests. Witches were, magically, a Lore unto themselves, although all three respected the house rules. The most senior one present had even asked his permission before she'd demonstrated a useful bit of magic during the evening. Something witchy, he wondered?
He wondered if it was anything to do with the sleepover. The giddiness of a group of teenage girls allowed their own space to be thirteen and fourteen had subsided into silence, thankfully. And Ponder was an experienced enough father to know that a teenage girl sleepover was only to be intruded upon in great need and emergency. He preferred it that way.
Besides, Johanna had finely tuned senses of her own which were nothing to do with magic. If she was deeply and contentedly asleep, then that was a good sign of nothing to worry about. And the dogs were untroubled and both were in deep sleep. He relaxed, and rolled over.
A little later, the commotion began.
Outside, the Entity had arrived at Eighteen Spa Lane after a very satisfactory night. The various clients had been suitably reprimanded and admonished for unsatisfactory conduct during the previous year, and promises of remedial attention being paid to their attitudes and behaviour in the coming year had been received and noted.
This was his Purpose. This was what he had been created for. The Entity felt alive and full of strength and energy. He shouldered his sack and took an experimental swish with his chastising switch. It left a swoosh of octarine sparks in the air. Perfect.
He took a moment to consider his last house-call. This felt like a very prosperous and affluent district. Big detached houses, large gardens, the sort that would be inhabited by successful professional people. He wondered if parental affluence and good fortune had made the daughter into a greedy spoilt brat who required his chastisement, and he shrugged. He would read that in her when he saw her, face to face. He could read these things directly in the client.
Then he stepped forward and realised. In one respect, this would not be a straightforward visit. There were magical barriers here. Applied by a Wizard. He stepped back, so as not to trip any defensive alarms. So far that had only been the slightest brush, a tickle like a nettle-sting.
He composed himself and addressed the Magic directly, his mind speaking to the protective wards. He allowed a picture to form of his purpose in visiting, adding detail.
"You know why I am here," he said, in the nasal slightly whiny voice that was hard to love. "I have the right. By an age-old right older than Wizard-magic. At this time and in this season. You are a made thing. I am an elemental thing. I have the right."
He folded his arms and stared at the house.
-You have the right.
It was a concession he felt, rather than one spoken in words.
-You may enter for your age-old purpose to fulfill the role for which you were created.
The Entity felt the wards stepping aside and allowing him entry. He walked proudly forward and with purpose, a sinister shade in the night.
-The relevant bedroom is the third window along from the left on the second floor.
The Entity acknowledged this, and frowned for a second. The local guarding magic was being eager to help there, for some purpose of its own? He shrugged and stalked on. Behind him, there was the very slightest suspicion of something like a snigger in the magical ether.
The Entity shrugged, and dematerialised in a brief octarine mist.
In her bedroom, Rebecka Smith-Rhodes, Witch, awoke out of sleep with the unmistakable acid-lemon taste of tin in her mouth. Struggling into consciousness, she frowned and tried to read the atmosphere. Something was slightly wrong, some discordant note was creeping into an otherwise peaceful night. She sat up in bed and focused, trying to narrow it down. She knew her family home was defended by magic. Dad was a wizard, after all. This otherwise unremarkable suburban house, where he'd settled down with Mum to raise a family, was Dad's High Tower. It was his space. Wizards guarded and defended their space, she knew. It was built in. Wizards got intense about intrusion into their space. Even Dad. And she'd heard what he'd once done to defend it against intrusion. An attack on the house had unleashed the deep-down old-time Wizard in her father and Ponder Stibbons had been replaced, for as long as it was needed, by something primal from a long-ago Unseen University. He had then zapped large smouldering holes in quite a lot of things just to make the point. (6)
After that, he'd built in lots of defensive alarms and other things as a home insurance policy. Mum, a career Assassin, had advised and approved.
Bekki frowned. Mum was also, and these days mainly, an academic zoologist with a practical streak. Her idea of home security involved very large guard-dogs, among other things. Big amiable loving creatures, for most of the time. Considering Klipdrift and Rooibos, she tried to reach the dogs, animals she'd known since puppyhood and who she was attuned to. Her witch senses got an impression of deep untroubled canine sleep, whoever's room they were in right now. She thought they'd settled in their own bed in Mum and Dad's room, away from the noisy chaos of a teenage sleepover.
She sympathised. She'd had a long day with the Air Watch and had joined in with the evening out of politeness, appreciating that her parents and their house-guests now accepted her as an adult who could join in grown-up things as an equal. Having not been to the Guild School, she just saw her mother's friends as people who incidentally happened to be schoolteachers, if also Assassins. It helped that two of them had the status of informal aunts, and several guests were also, like her, part of the Air Watch family. Even if one of those was...
After a while, she'd got the informal request and the unspoken hint from her mother. Go and supervise the girls, would you, Rebecka? It would look better coming from you.
Accepting this was a Big Sister Obligation, Bekki had joined in with the younger girls at the sleepover, feeling nearly eighteen and impossibly old for this sort of thing. She had wondered if, four or five years in her past, Shauna's Gang had ever been like this, and concluded that they probably had been. It was probably how Mum and Dad had built the experience for dealing with this sort of situation, and why Dad was so keen to stay out of it and let Mum and his oldest daughter deal.
Eventually, she'd pleaded tiredness and relative-old-lady status, noted it all seemed to be winding down anyway, and had gratefully retreated to her own room. Ensuring her youngest sister Ruth, who had been kindly allowed to sit up with the big girls for a while and join in, got to bed when she was visibly tiring, had been a good reason to bow out herself. She had seen Ruthie into bed and gratefully grasped the excuse to withdraw in her own right.
She smiled and focused again, registering the wrongness was increasing but she couldn't get a fix on it. She wondered if she ought to discuss this with somebody, but realised it meant waking somebody up. And she'd just feel silly if this was a false alarm. There was Dad, as this had a magical feel about it. And there was a Witch with more seniority and experience than her, who had been offered a guest room. Bekki winced. It would have to be an emergency... but this was an older Witch with more experience. Somebody to consult. She swung herself out of bed and let her feet grope for slippers. A few seconds later, she let herself out into the corridor, hoping that out here on the second floor where all the bedrooms were, she could get a fix on whatever it was, whatever was wrong, hopefully without disturbing the peace of the household.
She wasn't surprised to discover she wasn't alone out there, in the dark unlit gloom. A tall imposing figure, which her imagination assured her was glowing in pink-white light all of its own, turned to regard her.
Ponder Stibbons awoke again. Something was definitely wrong in the atmosphere of the house. It troubled him that he couldn't pin it down and precisely identify it. He sat up in bed and frowned, trying to focus and to make some sense of it.
Next to him, Johanna stirred. She mumbled something, surfacing from sleep. Out in the room, Ponder also heard the dogs shifting in their bed. One of them made a noise that suggested if Mistress was waking up, they were prepared to go on duty as, well, it was their Baas-Lady who might need them.(7) He shook his head. While he got on with the dogs and had their loyalty, they were, when it came down to it, Johanna's. Both were getting older and slowing down now, but they were still, absolutely, hers. Just as the previous two dogs had been. He reflected they were both at least twelve years old now, and briefly speculated on the inevitable end. Well, we were here before with Kaffee and Creme. Johanna thinks there's a couple of years more, yet. I hope so.
"What's up?" she asked, surfacing.
"I'm not sure." Ponder said. "It's just a feeling. Something's not quite right."
"Magic?" she asked, getting to the point. Ponder nodded. Johanna gave him an understanding look. As he tried to explain more, she held up a hand for silence.
"Hear it?" she said.
He strained to listen. Muffled by distance and two intervening doors, it did sound as if a conversation was going on somewhere. Just the shapes of human voices in the air, on the edge of hearing. It sounded like it was coming from inside the house.
She scowled, and swung her legs out of bed. As she felt around for slippers, one of the dogs paced over to her and made a low rumbling noise. Johanna petted it. It was part of the nature of Boerboels, Howondalandian attack mastiffs, that she didn't have to reach very far.
"Let's go and take a look." she said, finding her dressing gown. She paused, considered, and added her sword-belt. As you never knew. (8)
"I am not certain." Hanna von Strafenburg explained to Rebecka Smith-Rhodes. "Something is not completely correct at present. I am not sure what it is, and also, walking around a house at night where you are a guest may be seen as an intrusion, and not polite."
"I get it." Bekki said, in the same low voice. "You don't want to go waking Mum and Dad up if it's a false alarm."
"But something is here." Hanna said. In this direction."
She indicated down the corridor to where Bekki's two sisters had their bedrooms.
"Something wrong, something out of place."
The background noise grew louder. Indistinct voices, that suggested teenage girls who were getting indignant about something. Bekki frowned again. This wasn't just the sleepover group waking up and finding new one-in-the-morning energy. There was something else there...
Behind them, a light flared as a door opened, and Bekki's parents emerged into the corridor. The padding of large paws and a suspicion of pant announced the dogs. Recognising young mistress, Klipdrift trotted over to greet Bekki.
"You felt it too, dad?" Bekki asked. Her father nodded, wordlessly.
The Entity had materialised in a bedroom. Taking stock, he registered the energies of four early-teenage females, only three of whom were human. Prompts in his mind told him that all four had done things in the past year that would be worthy of his attentions. However, he could disregard two of them as only one had the specific ancestry and ethnicity that warranted his time. His was a bespoke service, after all. He frowned, contemplating the fourth. A prompt in his head said We are aware of the ambiguity. We are checking the Terms and Conditions and we will advise you as to whether she qualifies. Bereiten Sie sich darauf vor, Anweisungen zu erhalten.
"Jawohl." the Entity acknowledged. As per his training and experience, he chose to silently loom against the dim light from the window, standing silent and motionless, knowing his silent grim presence would surely intimidate the client as she realised she wasn't alone. With any luck, the other adolescent females, who were not his concern, would also be cowed into silence, giving him a free hand. He folded his arms, and waited. An idle thought told him that while these females were undoubtedly at the upper age limit for his attentions, two of them were curled up in the bed in a not unbecoming and somewhat charming way, suggesting closeness and friendship and putting him in mind of two kittens in a basket.
The red-haired kitten suddenly became aware of him and her eyes opened.
"Who the Hells are you?" she demanded, disentangling herself and sitting up. The girl on her right, the one with the brown hair and the sharper facial expression even in sleep, also awoke. She scowled and became attentive.
The Entity had a sudden disconcerting image of a tiger cub and, for some reason, a bear cub, that had chosen to make a cross-species friendship. He pushed this aside, impatiently, noting that the girl with the skin so dark brown it was almost black was also awake and glaring at him.
The fourth, meanwhile, remained deeply asleep. The black girl spared her a nudge.
The entity trotted forward.
"You are Fraulein Famke Cornelia van der Graaf Smith-Rhodes-Stibbons?" he asked, in the irritating voice. (9)
"Who's asking?" the red-haired girl said, folding her arms and glaring at him.
"Today, madchen, is the Sixth of December, the Niklaustag." he explained.
The fourth had woken up. She looked around her, slightly blearily.
"Yes, but that only applies to humans." she objected. The Entity looked at her.
"This is yet to be seen, Fraulein Älteste Tochter des Oberbergaufsehers." he remarked. "Deliberations proceed, concerning your people. A definitive judgement is to be issued on your status."
He looked back to where Famke was still in folded-armed defiance.
"Doesn't mean much to me." she said. The black girl nudged her.
"Kay, weren't you paying attention?" she asked. "In your Auntie Heidi's class, when she covered Hogswatch traditions around the world?"
Connie Muthelezi studied the apparition.
"That's a Krampus." she said. "Überwaldean."
"Listen to your friend." the Krampus said, with a hint of mocking laughter. "Evidently, she paid her teacher more attention than you did. Which is slackness and lack of respect in the classroom, and also a punishable offence."
"Oh, Famke!" the black girl said, in what on the surface sounded like genuine head-shaking reproach. "You've clocked that one up so often, you're in real trouble now!"
"Exactly so, madchen." the Krampus said. A clip-board suddenly appeared in his hand. He consulted it, and shook his head gravely.
"Famke Cornelia van der Graaf Smith-Rhodes-Stibbons, aye-kay-ay "Kay". Aged thirteen. You are a pupil at the Assassins' Guild School. Where the record shows exactly one thousand, six hundred and forty-three counts of insubordination, disregard, lack of respect, and general dumb or active insolence towards members of teaching staff. This is shocking and regrettable."
Connie shook her head and tutted.
"Only one thousand, six hundred and forty-three?" she asked. "Kay, you're not trying!"
Famke scowled again.
"Yes, but this Krampus thing only applies to Überwaldeans." she objected. "I'm not Überwaldean, am I? Dad's from Ankh-Morpork and Mum's from Rimwards Howondaland. She's a Boer. Go back far enough and that side of the family is from Sto Kerrig!"
She glared at the apparition.
"So you're in the wrong place and whatever rules you've got to work to don't apply to me. Want to leave quietly now?"
"Take it up with whoever dispatched you?" Connie added.
The Krampus considered this. He shook his head and smiled, malevolently.
"Fraulein, you are incorrect in your assumption." the Krampus said, smugly. "I ask you to consider the ethnic mix that constitutes the white race in Howondaland. Not every emigrant from this continent was Sto Kerrigian. Many were from Phlanders, others from Quirm. Why, your older sister's boyfriend is a Boer with a Quirmian name, is he not? A young man of the du Pris family? Why, even your own family name, Smith-Rhodes, is not originally Sto Kerrigian and originates in the region of Scrote, a Morporkian-speaking rural locality nearby to this city? Intermarriage down the generations made your mother's family Boers. But not exclusively so."
"You're well informed." Famke said, grudgingly. The Krampus shrugged, radiating smugness.
"I am in touch with sources of information. I have the power to read this house and the people within it. And I can tell you, with confidence, that if you were to go back along your family line, past the Smith-Rhodeses, past the van der Graafs, and before them to family lines such as the van der Kaiboetjies and the Kuipermans, you will eventually return to the border country where the Stos meet Überwald, and mixed marriages happened. You are, by our reckoning, one two-thousand- and forty-eighth-part Überwaldean on your mother's side. And while the records are shockingly incomplete and regrettably hazy, it is entirely possible your father also has some Überwaldean ancestry. After all, in his work as a Zauberer, he stresses accuracy, meticulous observation, clarity of mind and sharpness of intellect. He also works and thrives in an environment that respects a defined hierarchy and obedience to those who are superior in rank. All Überwaldean virtues."
The Krampus smiled again.
"You therefore meet the qualifications for my attention. On this night, madchen, naughty children are punished for their misdeeds. You are a naughty child..."
The other girls in the room snickered.
"...and you are to be punished with the switch and the sack."
The clipboard faded out and the switch appeared in his hand. He gave this an experimental swing.
"Several corrective and restorative blows with the switch." he said. "And then into the sack with you."
The long thin whip lashed out. Four girls glared back, angry rather than frightened.
"So you then cart her off in the sack to your mountain lair in Überwald..." Thora said, digesting this.
The Krampus shook his head.
"Nein, Fraulein Älteste Tochter des Oberbergaufsehers." he said. "That would defeat the object of corrective chastisement. As you are older, it is permissible for me to tell you that the naughty child stays in the sack for what to her is an unguessable length of time, in the absence of light and sound with all her senses stilled except for a feeling of fear and anxiety. Then she is released back into this room, chastised and corrected, to resume her daily life as an improved person. Do you consider me to be some kind of a monster?"
"So you go around looking for an excuse to whip young girls?" Famke said. She felt the weight on the bed shift as, unheeded, Lexi Mumorovka slipped off it. She registered this and took care not to look round to her right.
"And young boys..." said the Krampus. "I do not discriminate."
"There's a word for people like you!" Famke said, indignant. "Besides, I've been in the Sensory Deprivation Tank.(10) Going into that sack is meant to scare me, or something?"
"The point is." the Krampus said, feeling as if he was losing control of the conversation, "You are returned to this world. You are not killed. You are not even seriously injured. All that remains is the memory of the sting of the switch. It leaves no mark. I repeat. If you wish for a monster with no soul, a psychopath who takes pleasure in punishment, go to the Rodinians, with their terrible Snegoroshka, the beautiful cruel girl with the Cossack sabre, who actually beheads naughty children."
He shook his head, sorrowfully.
"No wonder the Rodinians are what they are, barbarians with a surface veneer of civilization, who believe the crushing weight of sheer numbers makes up for lack of military strategy."
Over to the right, there was an ominous swooshing noise that sounded like metal drawn through silk.
"Это не с мирными намерениями." Lexi announced. "Krampus. You wish to see Cossack sabre in hand of terrible Rodinian girl with no culture and no civiization? Then look this way."
She took a step forward, her sabre flashing. She tossed her sword belt aside as something not immediately important. She could re-sheathe the sabre later.
"Errr..." said the Krampus.
"Famke is not my friend. But she is my comrade in the druzhina. As I am hers."
She nodded to Famke.
Is utomitelny. Vexing. I owe her."
Lexi spotted something and reached over with her left hand. She tossed what looked like a long stick over. One end glittered in the low light.
"Constance? Catch."
Connie reached across Famke and plucked her assegai out of the air, her approved cultural weapon. The Guild School had given her permission to carry this as, well, it's Cultural. She whooped, a Zulu girl and her weapon coming together.
Meanwhile, Thora Brittasdottir reached down the side of the bed next to the wall, and came up holding her name-axe, her own School-approved cultural weapon. She grinned through her beard.
"Well, alright!" she shouted.
Famke glowered, realising she was the only one without a weapon. She ducked down and rummaged underneath her bed, reasoning her back and her bum were being covered by friends – well, two friends plus Lexi - who'd see that whip coming and with any luck, would slice the bliksem's arm off.
"My big sister Beccs is a witch." she said, conversationally. "She works in Howondaland, but she gets to fly back here pretty often. Advantage of her owning a Pegasus. She told me when she was tiny, a bogeyman got in this house. It didn't last five minutes, but that's beside the point. (11) Anyway, Howondaland's got bogeymen too, but native ones, called tokoloshe. Beccs told me that people scare them off by putting bricks under the bed... got it!"
Famke resurfaced, with a housebrick in her hand. She tossed it up in the air, experimentally, and caught it again.
"I'm a bit hazy as to why bricks scare off bogeymen, but Beccs said it works, so I got one. Just in case."
Famke grinned a long slow grin. The sort that means trouble is on the way.
"So, Mr Krampus, how hard would you like me to hit you with this?"
The Krampus looked round and yelped. The determined terrible Cossack girl with the long sabre was working her way round him, blocking off his retreat to the window. Urgent prompts from ancestral Überwaldean memories were telling him that in the right circumstances, one Rodinian could be a crushing weight of number all on her own. And she wasn't on her own...he looked at spear, axe and brick, and determined that there was only one place to run to, to escape four determined and heavily armed young girls. He took it.
After a while, the door opened and light flooded in from the corridor.
"What the bloody hell is happening here?" a woman's voice demanded, in a strong harsh accent.
"It's retreated right into the back corner!" Connie Muthelezi complained, as she crouched close to the carpet, prodding underneath the bed with her assegai. "I can't reach it!"
She glanced back, and realised. The classic double-take happened.
"It's under the bed, ma'am!" she said to Johanna. The others exclaimed agreement.
Johanna Smith-Rhodes drew a deep breath. She was about to pointedly ask if the girls in the room were not too old to be concerned with monsters hiding under the bed?
She opened her mouth to speak, then realised Klipdrift and Rooibus had become two very intent low snarling growls. Both dogs trotted, with purpose, towards the bed and were seeking to get underneath it, snarling with affronted canine rage. Johanna took stock, and reflected these were three very good pupil Assassins and an extremely good student Witch, one who Olga Romanoff rated highly. Olga's sponsored pupil, in fact. And judging from the way the dogs were methodically trying to burrow into a space that was too small for them, keeping up an incessant low-pitched snarl, something was there...
"Oh, hell." Ponder Stibbons said, taking in sword, spear, axe and blunt instrument. He noted Lexi had made her way in between the window and the end of the bed, and was standing attentively with her long sabre in her right hand, poised on her feet and prepared to strike. Thora Brittasdottir was nearby, covering her and every so often, taking an experimental swing with her axe, letting it be seen arching and flashing through the gap underneath the bed, as if she was making a point, and an edge, to something that might be lying underneath the bed and watching.
"Thora? Careful with the carpet." he said, knowing it to be a dumb thing to say but feeling compelled to say it anyway. He sighed, resignedly. For as long as he'd known Johanna, he'd had to do with her students. He was used to being around young girls who knew about weapons. But even so, a room full of annoyed early-teenage girls in nightdresses, who were also armed up to deal with an intruder... Vampire? He wondered. But he discounted the thought. Underwired nightdresses were still a few years in the future of all these girls. He hoped. These immediate nightdresses tended to the pastel-coloured with bunnies and things on the front. In all cases there wasn't really very much to underwire. Hardly vampire-bait. Yet...
Without turning his head, he knew it was his daughter Rebecka who'd made the long resigned sigh. He also heard Johanna recalling the dogs to her side. Before they start clawing and biting great big holes in that wooden bedframe. Those things cost to replace.
The fourth person who had entered the room with them, an overnight guest awoken by the commotion, stood just inside the room as if she were intently reading it, looking and listening for the small subtle details, as a Watch Sergeant should. She beckoned Rebecka over and made a request, choosing to preface it with "Flying Officer Smith-Rhodes. Go into my allocated room, locate these items, and bring them to me. I require my Watch badge and my utility belt. Schnell!"
Bekki acknowledged her Sergeant, and left. From underneath the bed, there was a high-pitched nasal whine. It communicated fear and consternation.
Sergeant Hanna von Strafenburg smiled, a small tight grim smile.
"I believe I know what this is." she said. "Johanna, Sir Ponder, this is now a Watch concern."
She turned. Ponder reflected that some people didn't need a uniform to be scary. Any other senior Air Watch officer in a long pink dressing gown, the sort that has a fluffy kitten motif on the front pocket, and pink fluffy slippers on her feet, might be a woman with credibility issues when she started giving orders.
"Air Cadet Underofficer Mumorovka! You will sheathe that sabre, but keep it with you. And your weapon belt and scabbard are over here. You will retrieve them and wear them for the duration of the emergency. Schnell!"
"Yes, sergeant." Lexi responded.
But not Hanna, Ponder thought. Again, he wondered what exactly was under the bed, as she spoke in very firm and commanding Überwaldean.
"Aufmerksamkeit! Ich bin Polizeifeldwebel Hanna von Strafenburg von der Stadtwache von Ankh-Morpork. Du bist umzingelt. Sie haben keinen Fluchtweg. Sie sind verpflichtet, sich in Gewahrsam zu begeben."
Ponder Stibbons, following her words imperfectly, felt a sudden desire to raise his hands in abject, complete, unconditional, surrender. There was something about Hanna...
She broke off to thank Rebecka for promptly responding, and pinned City Watch Badge Number 504 on the pastel-pink dressing gown. (12) Bekki noticed she pinned it on the opposite side from where the fluffy kitten motif was. Well, regulations say it goes on that side of the body.
"This makes my actions completely legal." she said, in Morporkian, then continued, as she fastened her issue weapons belt on.
"Ich erinnere Sie daran, dass es hier bewaffnete Menschen und auch Kampfhunde gibt. Du wirst dich ergeben und sein behandelt werden!"
There was a shimmering in the air.
"Officer Smith-Rhodes. Cadet Underofficer Mumorovka. Stand by."
The Krampus rematerialised, in a flash of octarine. Ponder frowned. If it could do that, couldn't it also rematerialise a long way away, outside the house and away from further trouble and arrest? Then it dawned on him that the thing was terrified and not thinking straight. He got that. He, Ponder Stibbons, might have been scared witless at the sight of those four girls, tooled up and ready to deliver the sort of conclusive applied violence they'd all been schooled in. Three student Assassins. And one apprentice Witch, who'd already been educated in how to use that Cossack sabre, on account of her ethnicity and upbringing. And on top of that, she was an Air Watch cadet. And if that wasn't enough, Lexi had been honest and courteous enough to explain about the other things she could do, the purely Witch stuff...(13)
Johanna and two Boerboel dogs were a discourtesy detail, really. Although Ponder suspected his wife was scrutinising the creature with one eye on the Teatime Prize. (for the most stylish and original inhumation of a supernatural entity).
He regarded the Krampus. Seven feet tall, with those long curling ram's horns and the long angular cruel-looking face. The legs of a satyr, possibly, terminating in goat or deer hooves. No wonder its walking gait was awkward. Assessing the potential risk as a Wizard, he realised a greater part of this thing was based on bluff and appearance and an Überwaldean Fire Drill sort of thing – the automatic expected response that the victim, or client, or whatever, would submit to authority.
Just as the Krampus had meekly succumbed to a surfeit of its own primal terror, and was now holding its hands out for Hanna to snap handcuffs on its wrists. He realised this was Überwaldean Fire Drill, too. Hanna von Strafenburg was simply the more powerful Authority in the room.
"Steel cuffs." she said. "Which are ninety-six per cent made of iron."
Ponder realised. Even if the thing could think clearly enough to realise it could have escaped by dematerialising, it had lost the opportunity now Hanna had put iron on it.
"You are now in City Watch detention." she said. Adding, in a fierce bark, "Hier stillgestanden! Raus!"
"What happens now?" Johanna asked. Hanna considered this.
"This is now official." Hanna replied. "The charges, for the moment, begin with unlawful entry with intent to menace and possibly to abduct an underage girl or girls for purposes yet unknown."
"They're going to love you in the Tanty." Famke said, pleasantly. Hanna and her mother glared at her. Famke quickly closed her mouth.
"Put that bloody brick back where it belongs." Johanna said. "Whatever that thing is, it's not a tokoloshe. Too bloody big for that. And you two. Put those weapons down. It's all under control now."
Hanna was speaking into her Watch communicator.
"Control, this is Valkyrie. Reporting that I am currently at number eighteen Spa Lane, in Nap Hill. Reporting an ongoing Code Twenty-Three incident at Level Two, possibly Three. The suspect is now under detention and has been informed of his rights. I am therefore requesting a suitably equipped vehicle to transport the suspect to the Priory. Valkyrie out."
-Red Star Control to Valkyrie. Night Witches despatched to your location at Eighteen Spa to provide back-up and to escort the prisoner to Priory. You're getting Falcon and Hummingbird, incidentally. I'd express surprise, seeing as you're off duty on rostered days off, but it's Eighteen Spa Lane. Things tend to happen there even if you just drop in for a social drink. I'm just betting you've got RooiRattel and Firebird there for backup? Red Star out.
"Valkyrie to Red Star. Can confirm Firebird and the Honeybadger are present. I also have Schpaga..."
Famke spluttered with laughter and hastily went poker-faced as her mother, Special Constable J.F. Smith-Rhodes, known to the Air Watch as "Red Rattel" or "Honeybadger", glared at her. (14)
-Can you clarify the type and description of the suspect, Valkyrie? Patching Night Witch patrol in now, they'll be with you soonest. Red Star out.
"Valkyrie to Hummingbird and Falcon. The Code Twenty-Three entity that manifested at Eighteen Spa Lane is of Überwaldean origin. Therefore I was best placed to make the detention as this is a person of my culture. The suspect is identified as the Krampus, a spirit that manifests at Hogswatch to pass judgement on errant children. He is subdued and giving no trouble and I will report more fully later, but for now I reccomend overnight detention in the special cells at the Priory Watch-House. In the morning, we can convene and discuss which charges should be brought and what our next course of action should be. I will prepare the appropriate statements for Captain Romanoff, who will decide. For now, Firebird and I will begin taking witness statements. Hummingbird and Falcon, you will assist with this when you arrive. Valkyrie out."
Getting the Krampus down the stairs and into Ponder's office, where there were stronger magical defences, was probably the most difficult thing. The thing had legs that had never been designed with stairs in mind.
Bekki reflected that Dad was happy enough to let Witches deal with the situation, but he still wanted his own say. The big guarding octogram that appeared on his study floor, picked out in octarine light, made her father's case emphatically. The Krampus was shown a chair in the middle of the octagram, told it was a one-way device that would allow a person to step inside it but not out again, at least, not till I say so, and then invited to sit down inside it and to make itself comfortable while he and Sergeant von Strafenburg questioned it more fully.
"So you're the Krampus?" Dad said, opening the session.
The monster shook its head, miserably.
"Nein. Just a Krampus. There are several of us. We all have our rounds to visit. My full name, my individual name, is Knecht Ruprecht..."
Deciding it was a good sign that a supernatural entity was prepared to co-operate by revealing its full personal name, and that her father and Hanna knew this too, Bekki went to do her own job. Contemplating it, she decided she was bloody well going to put in for overtime pay for this. For at least four hours. She adjusted the set of City Watch Badge Number 523 on the front left breast of her dressing gown, just so her sister and her friends knew this was official, and set about taking witness statements.
Falcon, Flying Officer Petra Grant, joined her.
"The hurry-up wagon, the special one, should be here soon." Petra said. "Then we can load up the prisoner, and you can call it a night. I alert the duty Wizard-Constable, they book him in to a special cell, and that's another job done."
Bekki had heard about The Priory. She thought it was a sensible move for a police service in a city with a supernatural dimension. If you have to make special arrests, you need a special Watch-House. (15)
She yawned.
"Shpaga's writing her own report." she said. "Air Watch Cadet. Good practice. We'd better get working on the other three."
She smiled pleasantly at Petra, a fairly new hire to the Air Watch who had already got a reputation for being a little bit on the self-assured and over-confident side with an aura of snark. And she, Rebecka Smith-Rhodes, was the more senior Air Witch present.
"Have you met my little sister yet?" she asked. "You can do Famke."
"So what happens next?" Johanna asked, as the special hurry-up wagon pulled away. She reflected, gloomily, that by morning the neighbours would all be speculating on who got arrested at Number Eighteen during the night. She'd have to get in first with her own story. No help for it.
Ponder put an arm round her.
"There'll be a case conference in the morning, apparently." he said. "The Krampus goes into custody for the night, for his own safety, really, as this is the first time he's had to work the Ankh-Morpork beat."
Ponder paused for a second.
"Apparently the previous post-holder who did this city last Hogswatch is off on long-term sick leave." he remarked. "Our man last night was sent here at short notice. He usually does a rural beat in Near Überwald."
Johanna nodded.
"So tomorrow?" she prompted.
Ponder grinned.
"Hanna said she was preparing a case for the charges to be dropped, provided we don't object." he said. "She points out the Sixth of December is a culturally specific night for her people, the Krampus walks abroad by ancient imperative, and to her, it's unfair to arrest him and charge him with burglary. He was doing what he was designed for. It's as pointless as arresting the Soul Cake Duck for laying chocolate eggs, she says." (16)
"True." Johanna said, after a moment's thought. "Hanna's got a heart, deep down. And she's fair. If I ever committed a crime and needed to be arrested, reckon I'd ask for her to speak for me at the trial. And besides. He met Famke at her stroppiest. That's punishment enough for anybody."
Johanna looked thoughtful and contemplative.
"You know, Ponder, when I get those three back to the School in the morning, I'm going to suggest to Ethylene Glynnie that she makes them sit down and write a full report on all this. I know it wasn't an inhumation as such, but it could get them all a commendation as a submission for the Teatime Prize. A honourable mention. Good for their permanent records. Besides, it keeps them out of trouble, and it's a few brownie points for Raven House. Everybody benefits."
They went back into the house together. With luck, they might get a few hours' sleep before the alarm clocks went off.
(1) I have a mental picture of Ponder Stibbons in his middle-late forties, as University Vice-Chancellor and father of three daughters. A lot of the boyish innocence will have burnt off by now, but there will still be enough there. There will also be an element of Carl Sagan in his face and demeanour – but combined with the older Harry Potter, Sagan's sense of purpose and Potter's innocent charm.
(2) The Lättviktsdörr för invändig hushållsfunktion, a stylishly plain functional interior doorway not intended to be used for an outside door of the house but ideal for bedrooms, available in three colours of wood (2a), to be found on Page 457 of the current Ikea Ikeasson catalogue.
(2a) Pine, birch and mahogany.
(3) Now go to the opening chapter of Strandpiel, Book One. In which a bogeyman discovers he's in lots of trouble. Not so much from a four-year-old Rebecka Smith-Rhodes, but from everything else.
(4) "Pay attention to where you sleep at night and seek to make it easily defensible, as you will be at your most vulnerable. If there is a solid wall on two sides, then unless the attacker has a sledgehammer or is employing trolls, you only need to watch in two directions. And always have an escape route planned!"
(5) Now go to the third story arc of The Price of Flight for a mission, involving unique air vehicles, that would have taken an Air Watch Sergeant and a Special Constable of the Watch to Überwald a few months previously. That Sergeant and Special Constable bonded in adversity.
(6) Now go to the tale Hyperemesis Gravidarum for the full account of when Ponder Stibbons went primal. He had been taught by people like Dean Henry, after all.
(7) If they were not Howondalandian dogs from a Republic, they might have thought of Johanna as their Goddess. In the local canine mind, Baas-Lady occupied the same space. I also needed to check the reasonable life expectancy of molloser boerboel mastiffs: apparently it's nine to eleven years, so Klipdrift and Rooibos must, sadly, be elderly dogs now. They first appeared as puppies when Bekki was five and Famke around a year old, and at this stage in the timeline will be at the very upper end of life expectancy, around twelve. I'd like to give them a (feasible) year or two yet, but no longer than that; Ponder is aware they're on borrowed time and he'll be fretting as to how the family will take it when they go. One big, big, irony: the Kennel Club of South Africa does not accept black boerboels as pure-bred landrace dogs. Black is right out. (Wikipedia) I know this isn't the intention, but ag, man, 1994 happened...
(8) Another rule for the sleeping Assassin. Always have weapons where you can reach them. As you never know.
(9) I'm thinking of the speaking voice of German comedian Henning Wehn here, a voice which has exactly the right sort of qualities I want my Knecht Ruprecht to have.
(10) See the Strandpiel stories for Famke's experience with Total Sensory Deprivation, as a Vimes Run-level punishment and for her further education as an Assassin. She quite likes it in there and takes it as a professional challenge.
(11) For Bekki and the bogeyman, go to Strandpiel, Book One. An orphaned dialogue:
Connie, who knew all about the tokoloshe, winced.
"That's not quite how it works, Kay." she objected. "What you're meant to do is to take four bricks and put one under each post. The tokoloshe's only about fifteen inches tall, so if you raise the bed off the floor, it's harder for it to climb up."
Famke tossed the brick from hand to hand and scowled.
"But a really good thump over the head would work, too." Connie conceded.
(12) Panzer Battalion 504 fought in Normandy in 1944 and in one afternoon, tank ace Michael Wittman unleashed one of the most shattering defeats British armour has ever experienced, destroying the best part of ninety vehicles with the three Tiger Tanks under his command. 504 is therefore the only number Hanna could have on her Watch badge.
(13) "I will not seek to hide this or deceive you, Professor Stibbons." she had said. "If I am to be a guest in your home, is right you should know these things about me."
For details about The Other Things, go to my tale Alexandra: The Making of an Air Witch.
Lexi had also requested that Ponder didn't let on to Famke about the Vodegon and the Vikhor. "I wish to surprise her. When time is right."
(14) Johanna, as a Special Constable of the Cable Street Particulars, had been on attachment to the Air Watch earlier in the year. Captain Olga Romanoff had asked her to nominate a callsign for herself for comms purposes. Johanna had considered, and reasoned she had to be the Red Something, deciding to be RooiRattel. However, she hadn't taken into account that in a largely Morporkian-speaking service, a call sign not in Morporkian (and in a language spoken by only two of its members) had a habit of reverting to Morporkian. Thus Lexi, Shpaga, had become "Dipstick"; Vasilisa "Snegoroshka" Budonova, to non-Rodinians, had become "Snow Maiden"; and the Red Rattel in Vondalaans had inevitably become (after looking it up in a wildlife dictionary) The Honeybadger.
(15) Urban expansion into New Ankh on the other side of the city walls had meant a need for new Watch Houses. Smaller hamlets and isolated buildings in what was once countryside had been swallowed up as the city spread. The Priory, for instance, had once been a small monastic house and hermitage built by a minor noble as an architectural folly. Swallowed up by the City and now given Folly Street as a postal address, Captain Olga Romanoff had seen the potential and made suggestions. Sam Vimes had been swayed by the argument that it was a useful posting for some of the draft of Wizard Police Constables wished on them both by Vetinari, the ones Olga had found to be of borderline potential at best for the Air Watch, but who it would have been unfair to sack. Augmented by Air Witches on attachment and supervised by Olga and her command-rank officers, the Folly now dealt with those cases. The ones with a clearly magical or supernatural dimension. Olga had also noted that former monastic cells, formerly used as part of a religious house, were ideal for adaptation to holding cells for Entities. It just took a little bespoke research and ingenuity to make sure potential supernatural criminals stayed there.
(16) The charges might include multiple breach of food handling and food service legislation, also public order offences when people recognise exactly which orifice the chocolate eggs emerge from. also, the Guild of Chocolatiers would object to the eggs being provided for free and having a completely unhealthy excess of things like cocoa butter, as well as a regrettable absence of those healthy ingredients like mouse droppings, carpet fibre and tile grout.
And yes, this is homage to Ben Aaronovich and the Rivers Of London series. I'm not sure what form the River Goddesses will take in Ankh-Morpork, and in the case of mother Ankh or Old Father ankh, it might be wisest not to go there, but these details have a habit of working themselves out.
Notes Dump:
I discovered the inventor of the parachute in its modern form was a woman.
This must be noted for ongoing Air Watch tales.
Georgia "Tiny" Broadwick, pioneer American aviator, who made 1100 parachute jumps:
In 1914, she demonstrated parachutes to the U.S. Army, which at the time had a small, hazardous fleet of aircraft. The Army, reluctant at first to adopt the parachute, watched as Tiny Broadwick dropped from the sky. On her fourth demonstration jump, the static line became entangled in the tail assembly of the aircraft, so for her next jump she cut the static line short and did not attach it to the plane. Instead, she deployed her chute manually by pulling the shortened, unattached line while in free-fall in what may have been the first planned free-fall jump from an aeroplane. This demonstrated that pilots could safely escape aircraft by using what was later called a ripcord.
Also in 1914, Broadwick jumped into Lake Michigan, becoming the first woman to parachute into a body of water.
I have introduced her here as Flying Officer Georgia "Tiny" Broadwick, the second Air Watch officer to come from the Untied States of Aceria, but apart from her being only about five foot one tall ( therefore call-sign "Hummingbird") and having come to the attention of Olga Romanoff because she has good ideas about parachute design and improvement, there's not really much else, yet.
Also, this... Well, this is both entirely strange and entirely logical.
I have just discovered that the Russian Orthodox Church, back in 2017, recognised and retrospectively canonised St Patrick of the Irish as a Saint of the Orthodox Communion. I'm assuming the reasoning is that back in the day, this predated the schism between Catholicism and Orthodoxy and there would have been no doctrinal error involved: this guy Christianised a whole pagan country and is therefore worthy of honour despite the possibly regrettable direction Irish Christianity took from the 1000's onwards.
As I got this from the FB page of my favourite Russian folk-rock band Otava Yo, I also suspect that with March 17th imminent, it's a good reason to get the vodka out and drink to the Saint's health on the night (OY normally get together with folkies from Western Europe and do a gig - you ain't seen nothing till you see member of the Pogues on stage with a Russian band, jamming "Sumetskaya" with the Russians while Alexei Belkin reciprocates by singing "Dirty Old Town" in a strong Russian accent).
The idea of the Blessed Saint Paddy having a Russian identity amuses me. There's already the vexed issue that he might have been born Welsh, or - Irish readers, you know where the berserk button is - even English. A Russian St Patrick washing up in Ireland... well. It offers an alternative rationale for Christianity being adopted there.
"You adopt sensible religion. In return, I show you secret of distilling vodka with local produce. Is deal?"
"Bejaysus, Paddy. This poitin stuff. Almost makes you forget about all the bloody snakes, so it does."