Big Bang Fic: Rat and Sword Go To War, Chapter 2
Title: Rat and Sword Go To War
Author: rthstewart
Rating: T, for a soldier's salty language
Pairings/characters: Peter Pevensie, Susan Pevensie
Disclaimer: This work of historical fiction is offered respectfully and with deep admiration for the men and women herein depicted as well as C.S. Lewis and the other content owners of the Chronicles of Narnia and its related properties. Any original content in this derivative fiction is in the public domain and may be used freely and without notice to me or attribution.
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: All of The Chronicles of Narnia.
Summary: The High King and the Gentle Queen go to war, again.
Chapter 2
Rat and Sword Go To War
Part of The Stone Gryphon story cycle
By Rthstewart
Chapter 2 - Training Days
D-Day minus 1 year
ooOOoo
Medieval armour, sword and shield did not weigh less than a full pack, 9-mm Sten submachine gun, ammunition, the magazines for the squad’s Bren machine gun and the mortars for the anti-tank gun. Private Peter Pevensie of the Ox & Bucks 2d Battalion, D Company, knew this for fact because he’d been marching with his pack, ammunition, and gun for the last three days. Granted, Peter had never had the pleasure of heaving armour, sword, and shield across southern Exmoor and into the Somerset levels. Still, muscle memory did not fail him and he was certain what he carried now weighed more than what he had carried then.
He had also learned that whether in Narnia or Southwest England, makeshift army camps were much the same, except that in Narnia, a High King did not have to polish his own boots and clean his own weapons.
Peter took advantage of a break in the pre-dawn drizzle to pull his last pair of dry socks from his pack. He put them on quickly and then slid his boots on before everything turned to the feel and odor of wet sheep - something the High King of Narnia also knew very well, along with wet Talking Dog, wet Talking Horse, and worst of all, wet Giant.
His Company had camped on the downs - a cold, wet night it had been - and would be moving out any moment. The officers were striding about, making sure everything had been struck and calling orders to the last lazy private. Moving his toes in the leather boots, Peter could feel the blisters on top of blisters.
It was his own fault. Peter had passed up other opportunities - including a very polite and pointed invitation to the Officer Training Corps - to be here, in the mud. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. He’d heeded the advice of Major al-Masri who knew the CO of D Company personally. On the strength of that recommendation, Peter had sought this assignment and called in meager chits to get it, despite his father’s howling protests that his eldest son would never go into the infantry and as an OR no less. He couldn’t really explain to his father, I’m an Oxford-bound Private in a Company of Cockney Londoners, policemen, window-washers, and taxi drivers because a Lion told me to.
He’d led Narnia and fought for her. He couldn’t return there ever again. But over the last year he’d realised that Narnia and England were not as different as he’d supposed and that England needed him to use here what had been learned there.
That was the theory, at least. Peter didn’t feel Aslan’s paw often but he had thought he had discerned it here.
He wondered if he’d missed some essential part of the Lion’s instruction because this surely was not what Aslan had intended. Once a King and now the lowest of the low and among the youngest in the non-officer ranks of said window-washers and taxi drivers. Ruled a nation, fought battles, led an army and now the only perspective was that of the soldier’s shirt in front of him and the orders shouted down from on high.
Peter moved the things about in his pack so the whole would ride more comfortably on his back for the next twenty miles. Another irony. He’d thought he’d signed up for the Glider Corps. The Ox & Bucks 2d Battalion had been re-tooled to the Glider Corps of the 6th Airborne paratroopers. Gryphon-back, Peter had loved flying. Boats were out of the question; Peter hated boats. Joining up with the paras of the 6th Airborne should have meant time in the air in soaring gliders. He hadn’t done any of that yet, either.
The only thing of his past life of remotely useful purpose was the ability to run full tilt with armour, sword, and shield. Under the direction of D Company’s CO, the Mad Bastard Major John Howard, Peter was similarly weighted down and running. Or jogging. Or marching. Or double-time marching.
Major al-Masri had said Major Howard was a good man, the very best, destined for great things, and building a terrific, elite unit that would be doing something important, in time. Major al-Masri had omitted the mad bastard part. And Peter was having a hard time seeing that they were going anywhere except from one hillock and moor to another.
Lion’s Mane, he hoped there was some point to all this because the last three days had been a very special brand of Tash’s hell. Lately, it felt that the only thing keeping him here was the humiliation of admitting to his father that he had been mistaken and to yes, please, have those important men in New York and Washington pull those short strings and get him reassigned somewhere more interesting. It had been his for the asking and he had rejected it, leaving Edmund to take Peter’s place in Washington. If he’d gone into officer training, he would have had his own batman - squire - to clean his boots.
Instead, it was all marching, mud, and scraping off the muck of southern England himself.
It hadn’t all been ghastly. General Browning had sent them to Devon for a fantastic month of cliff climbing at Ilfracombe. The prospect of now returning to Bulford base for more drilling, marching, jogging, and running through the wilds of Wiltshire was just too dreary. The first time they had done laps around Stonehenge, a mere ten-mile jog from the Bulford army base barracks, it had been thrilling. By now, Peter knew every hummock and molehill within 30 miles of Bulford because he had marched or run or jogged over every one of them. After a month in Devon scaling cliffs, they didn’t want to return, now made much worse because General Browning had ordered the lot of them to march the 130 miles back to the base.
And if the whole regiment was marching across Devonshire and Somerset, damn it but the Mad Bastard was going to make a competition out of it and D Company was going to march faster than the others and beat the other Companies back to the base they weren’t in any hurry to get back to. Now, marching all the way to the action in Italy? Yes. Marching five days back to Bulford, in the heat of the summer in serge uniform? No. Definitely, no.
It had been blistering hot the first two days. Now a cold, wet rain fell. Peter tightened the laces on his boots.
“Company, fall in!” the Mad Bastard shouted.
Peter, and the 118 other men of D Company, all moved. He stood and as he hefted his pack, he felt his boots sink a few inches into the soft mud of Somerset. He pulled his feet out with a soft squelch and already felt the cold rain trickle down his neck and into the intimate space on his back beneath shirt and pack.
“You heard the Major,” Lieutenant Brotheridge called. Peter slogged to his place, second from the bottom in Brotheridge’s platoon.
“We’re ahead of the other companies by at least four hours!” Major Howard roared, striding up and down the line in the spitting rain. He was swinging his army walking stick. Peter had three shillings down against two of the other men in his platoon, Parr and Bailey, about whether the Mad Bastard would wear the inch of brass off the bottom of that walking stick by the time they made it back to Bulford. The other two of their gang, Gray and Gardner, were in on it and were going to measure the brass left on the stick when they got back to base. Bailey had tried to throw the wager for Parr by getting Major Howard onto a bicycle like a civilized officer.
Peter knew that wasn’t going to happen - he’d win the wager even if Parr wouldn’t pay up. Major Howard was a fanatic. If his men marched, he would march and all his junior officers, his subalterns, would march, too. Peter recognized that feeling and he respected it. As much as he hated the infantry, he did respect Major Howard’s command, and Lieutenant Brotheridge, his own platoon leader.
They formed the ragged line, but the company wasn’t moving out. There was some murmur and fuss. Standing on toes, trying to not tip over from the weight of the pack, from the back row, Peter could just see over the men and their bulging, soggy equipment.
Parr and Bailey were in the front of the Company, on their knees, in the dark mud, hands clasped in front of them. They looked like big, filthy, choir boys in a Tommy’s soggy serge.
“Parr! Bailey! What are you doing down there!” Mad Bastard Howard barked. “Get up! We’re moving!”
“Please, sir!” Parr inched on his knees toward Major Howard who towered over them. “We’ve marched 80 miles in three days! We’ve marched our legs right off! We don’t got any legs to march on!”
“Too bad, boys!” Howard yelled as the men all laughed. “If you don’t have legs, you’ll just have to take the last fifty miles on your hands.” The Major swung his stick and turned about, managing to make it look smart even in the mud. “Company fall out!”
And they did. Parr and Bailey were laughing, still on their knees. Peter squelched over to them and gave Bailey a hand up. Parr got a hand from Gardner.
Wally Parr, Jack Bailey, Charlie Gardner, and Billy Gray, Brotheridge’s batman, had taken the “schoolboy Pevensie” under their wing. All that meant was that, as the youngest and most junior in Brotheridge’s platoon, Peter got to buy their drinks and light their smokes. Years in public schools and Peter knew how to live under the fagging system; the common ROs enjoyed seeing an Oxford-bound classics scholar sweeping their barracks.
“Mad Bastard,” Gray muttered with a look at the retreating back of their CO. “Mad, ambitious bastard. He’ll get us all killed.”
“We march faster, we get back faster, we get in ahead of the other Companies, and we take all the hot water and the food,” Peter said, thumping Gray on the pack. Not that the food was worth hurrying back for, either. They lined up with the others and began marching.
“You forgot the girls, Pevensie,” Bailey said, flicking mud at Parr and matching the synchronicity of the marching company.
“Pevensie never forgets the girls!” Parr hooted.
“Them, too,” Peter retorted. “That was so obvious, I didn’t see to mention them.”
“Might as well forget ‘em,” Gray said, gloomy. “The birds all fly off with the Yanks.”
“It’s damn unpatriotic is what it is,” Bailey griped, repeating the complaint that had become all too common since the Americans moved to Tidworth, with their nice uniforms and all their cash and chocolate. The girls of Salisbury weren’t interested in a lonely, broke Tommy when the Yanks were about.
“More marching, less chattering!” Brotheridge ordered, jogging along beside them.
Together, they all fell in with the rest of D Company and marched, the quick step of the light infantry, and they’d dance another 50 miles back to base.
ooOOoo
June 1943, Wanborough Manor
Guildford, Surrey
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student was transferred here from staff assistant position at Beaulieu. Purpose is to assess suitability for further training. Handled transition easily and enthusiastically. Very keen to be here and grateful for the chance to prove herself. Very knowledgeable. Helping other students learn the ropes and rails.
Student is working hard to be fit; doesn’t complain about the early morning runs; she is game and eager but not overly competitive.
Contrary to her youthful appearance, this student is very serious and earnest, and very mature beyond her years.
Student can ride a bicycle and has learned the motorbike. I hope her driving skills improve. No one wants to drive with her now after a problem with some dustbins and an oak tree.
Student has adequate but not natural mechanical skills. Given clear instructions, she will follow them precisely and can patch a tyre on a bicycle, lubricate cylinders on a motorbike, or repair a wireless. Not a tinkerer or inventor by nature.
Students needs work on language and has never lived in France. This could be fatal and she knows it. To her credit, she’s working very hard at it, queries everyone about life there. She is always taking notes, reading, observing, and practising.
Caught student at mess copying how the French students eat and what they eat. Commended her for her observational skills.
Student learns codes and ciphers easily; picked up Morse Code uncommonly quickly. She admitted to studying it in advance and practising it on tabletops. Recommend her for w/t training.
Student never complains of the physical rigours at all. Strong arm, sharp eye, good endurance, decent speed at running and jumping, can pull herself up. Better than all the women and most of the men at swimming.
Student is almost an actress in ability to play a role. Admitted Walker-Smythe taught her importance of living her cover. Significant improvement in language even over last four weeks. Recommend she proceed to guerrilla training in Arisaig.
ooOOoo
D-Day minus 11 months to D-Day minus 6 months
ooOOoo
“Hey! Pevensie!”
A hand shook him roughly.
“Piss off, Parr. I’m sleeping.”
“Come on, Pevensie! You were up for it before! Can’t let your platoon down!”
“It’s not the platoon. It’s you and Gray.”
“We’re the heart of the platoon!” Parr whispered. “We need you.”
Peter grabbed his blanket and rolled on his side. Major Howard called them all scallywags and troublemakers and Corporal Parr was the chief instigator.
“No. If we go through with this, we’ll get RTU’d.”
He was not going to get kicked out of the most elite glider company in the 6th Airborne because Parr had (another) mad idea. He knew it was the most elite because they kept telling themselves that, and because Mad Bastard Howard worked them ten times harder than any of the other glider companies. Keep saying it long enough and you start to believe it.
Parr peeled the blanket off and patted his cheek. “Not with your good looks and long legs, pretty boy Pevensie. ‘Sides, you said you knew how to break in.”
Me and my big drunken mouth.
Peter groaned and tried to pull the wool blanket over his head.
“You saying that was all just talk and you fancy Nancy public school girls aren’t up for picking a NAAFI lock?”
Parr roughed him again on the shoulder.
“And if you don’t come, the whole platoon will know you’re just a double crossing piker who’s too good to get his hands dirty.”
That wasn’t fair and the bastard Parr knew it. He gave as good as he got.
“You aren’t leaving until I get up, are you?”
“No. Come on, mate. Do us a favour, yeah?”
With a sigh, Peter rolled over and sat up. He pulled on his trousers and bent over to slide his feet into his boots. His ID discs swung and clinked from his neck and he shoved them into his undershirt. It’s the middle of the night and a damned London Cockney Corporal’s got me breaking into the Bulford base NAAFI canteen.
What had he become?
Was there anything worth stealing from the NAAFI? He didn’t want more tinned food. If they took cigarettes, whiskey or proper food, all they’d be doing was robbing one poor Tommy for the benefit of another Tommy and that wasn’t fair. They were all in this misery together.
God, he was so bored with the marching and drilling and shooting crackers and blanks, sneaking with Parr into the NAAFI seemed like a good idea. There was something very wrong with his thinking. Being so fagged was affecting his judgment.
Parr and Gray were already outside the spider block when he eased out of the barrack, his escape covered by thunderous snores. The Mad Bastard was running them too hard for this sort of prank in the middle of the night. Squinting, he could make out that it was barely 0400 on his watch. “If I get RTU’d for this, Parr, they’ll never find your body.”
“You’d murder a married man, Pevensie?”
“I’d be doing your wife a favour.”
Parr leading, they snuck around the other blocks and barracks. Peter felt alert and ready, and was spoiling for a fight. It was bracing outside, cool and damp. There’d be rain in a few hours.
“Never thought I’d be grateful for the Mad Bastard’s night exercises,” Gray muttered.
He had to admit that sneaking around in the dark was a lot easier since Major Howard started training them at night. The saying was that Jerry didn’t like to fight at night. The problem was that Tommy didn’t like to fight at night either and the Mad Bastard had aimed to change that thinking.
“Do you think he knows yet what we’ll be doing?” Peter asked. “Where we’re going? When?”
“No,” Parr replied. “I heard Captain Priday asking the same thing and if the Major’s SIC don’t know, Major Mad Bastard don’t know either.”
D Company was kept in a spider block separate from the other barracks. It added to their sense of being elite and held for something special, which was undoubtedly a dangerous, highly specialized mission requiring marching faster than anyone else, running longer, and carrying more ammunition to pretend to blow things up.
The distance meant it was a long, dark walk to the NAAFI canteen. The nerviest part was sticking to the shadows of the HQ, because if there was a guard about, that was where he’d be. There wasn’t, but the three of them were really quiet too. Parr led them by the Nissen huts, Officers’ Mess, and the workshops and laundry. The backdoor of the NAAFI opened out toward the parade grounds, so there wasn’t anyone there.
Peter crouched down at the door handle. “Gray, give me a quick light, would you?” From his pocket, Peter drew out the torsion wrench and pick. Guided by the torch light, he carefully inserted the wrench into the lock and got to work.
“You can shut it off now,” he told Gray. It wasn’t a complicated lock. This wasn’t the arsenal; it was just the NAAFI with its comic books, tinned meat, tea, and razors.
“Where did you learn locks, Pevensie?” Parr asked. “Were you sneaking into the girls’ rooms at the boarding school across the pitch from that fancy school you were in?”
“My sister.”
“You were breaking into your sister’s room? You twisted bastard.”
“My sister taught me locks,” Peter said, inserting another pick and feeling for the pins. Susan and Edmund had obtained a set of picks for Jill Pole at Christmas and Susan had taught him the basics of it. Where was Susan now? The last letter had been weeks ago, with everything all blacked out by censors. Doing a spy’s work, somewhere, he supposed. Even that sounded better than what he’d been doing. Maybe he should write her. Maybe he should find out if her outfit needed an extra private who excelled at marching and shooting guns with blanks.
There was an audible click as the pins fell into place.
“Damn it, Pevensie, I take back all the things I said about you just being a girl.”
“Say that to my youngest sister and she’d stab you, Parr.” Peter pushed the door open, stood, and carefully wrapped up the wrench and picks.
“Is she the one that taught you how to pick locks?” Gray asked, shining his torch inside the NAAFI.
“No, that’s the older one. And she’d not settle for stabbing Parr. She’d shoot him, too.”
“Savages, the lot of you,” Parr said, pushing his way into the NAAFI. They fanned out into the dark canteen. It wasn’t large, just a few rows of metal and wooden shelves, floor to ceiling.
“What are we going to steal?” Gray asked. “The food’s so bad, who’d want it?”
“If we steal it, maybe we’ll get better slop? Something from the officers’ mess?” Parr disappeared down the long aisle, carefully shining his own torch on the stacked goods.
“From the way Danny Brotheridge complains, it’s not any better for them,” Gray said.
“We’ll be in the brig, so it won’t matter,” Peter replied.
“Maybe the food’s better there,” Gray said.
“And maybe hell will freeze and Manchester United will take the cup.”
Peter searched along a short aisle near the door into the main canteen. The treasure of Cair Paravel it was not. It was all tea and tins. On a shelf, Peter found a lone pack of Player’s and stuffed it in his trouser pocket. He’d divvy them among the boys of the brotherhood, assuming Parr didn’t get them all RTU’d.
“Found something!” Parr came out from behind a rack with packages in his arms. Gray shined the torch at Parr.
“What the hell you got there, Parr?”
“Soap. Soap powder. Bonjour soap. There’s some Oxydol still on the shelf. Get it.”
Peter could take an order from a Corporal. “Yes, sir, right away, sir.”
He squeezed passed Parr to the shelf where the NAAFI girls had stored the soap. Peter felt a spasm of guilt that he was stealing and probably wasting soap that was rationed off base. Mum would be so disappointed. But Mum also had not been up before dawn for a five-mile run in less than 40 minutes, then a day of training exercises all over the Bulford base grounds - shooting, running, shooting, blowing things up, more running, and marching. Then, they rounded out the day with mandatory sports. He’d left rugger and cricket behind in school and would kick a football around with the other ORs or go for yet more running with Brotheridge and some of the other subalterns.
“We’re breaking into the NAAFI and risking RTU for soap?!”
“Do you see anything you’d want to steal?” Parr asked.
“No.”
“So get moving, both of you.”
Peter tossed Gray packages of soap powder. “Load up, Billy.”
He took boxes of detergent himself. “Now what, boss?”
Parr led them out of the NAAFI. Peter had to juggle his boxes so he could shut the door behind them.
Parr stopped in the courtyard where they did the colours and had the flagpole. He tore open the soap flakes and started scattering them all over the cobblestone and pavers.
“Mad bastard,” Gray muttered, ripping open his own package of soap flakes. Peter squinted up into the dark sky. It was going to rain soon, and hard. With a shrug he tore open the box of Oxydol detergent.
ooOOoo
From: Private Peter Pevensie
Bulford Base
Salisbury
Wiltshire
To: Edmund Pevensie
c/o Colonel Walker-Smythe
British Embassy
Washington, District of Columbia
United States of America
Dear Ed:
The good news is that I wasn’t RTU’d. The bad news is that I’m in gaol for three weeks. We broke into the NAAFI, took all the soap, spread it on the walks and went back to bed. You know how I sleep. The rain began to fall and I forgot all about it until reveille. By the time I got out there, it looked like it had snowed. I’ve never seen so much foam and the men were sliding around it and whooping it up. So, today I write you from gaol and…
The knock on the door interrupted the last lines to Edmund. The courtesy wasn’t really necessary. He was in the base brig and his gaoler did not need to be polite.
“Come in!”
Peter shoved the letter into the Aeneid - for Professor Kirke’s sake, not his own - and scrambled up from his bunk as Lieutenant Brotheridge opened the door. “Sir!”
Danny Brotheridge was so tall he had duck to come through the doorway into the cell.
“Sit down, Pevensie, and ease up. There’s not room in here for us both to stand and I want to talk to you.”
Still, he waited until the leader of his platoon sat on the stool before sitting on the edge of the bunk.
Brotheridge scooted the stool over and there was the harsh sound of wood scraping on cement. He frowned and stared at him and finally asked, “Pevensie, why are you here?”
“Sir?”
The Lieutenant leaned forward, folding his height in, elbows on knees. “You were uni-bound, right? Decent public school. Read Latin and Greek? Rugger, cricket, and fencing. You were a prefect, head boy, high marks. Your father’s, what, a diplomat, I heard?”
“Something like that, sir.” Peter would omit the part about Father working for high-ranking spies with a charge direct from the Prime Minister.
“Given your age, somebody looked the other way to see you in uniform, Pevensie. So, I ask again, why after all that effort did you end up here, in D Company, with a lot of boys like me? Why didn’t you go to OTCU with the rest of your class?”
Brotheridge was a plain speaking man and not the sort to use double meaning, though class meant several things. There were those young men in Peter’s class, who were lying low, hoping they wouldn’t get called up, or who were off for officer training. There were those of Peter’s own middle class - the sort that worked hard, went on to Uni to study esoterica and competed for coveted offices, appointments in ministries, and civil service jobs. Peter couldn’t say, I’m here because a Lion told me to.
But some of it he could say because men like Brotheridge had wanted the same thing. “I wanted to wear the shoulder flash, sir, of Bellerophon astride Pegasus, and wear the maroon beret, of the paras.”
“Because we’re all so natty?”
Because the Professor and Polly had flown Fledge? Because he had worn the Lion’s scarlet? Because he had soared and glided with the great Gryphons of the Narnian Aerial Corps?
“I wanted to be in the Glider Corps, sir, and didn’t want to wait. And I thought I would be better in a company taking orders from top-notch officers than taking my chances elsewhere.”
Brotheridge’s mouth twitched, a little humourous and a little mocking. “Laying it on with a trowel won’t get you out of gaol, Pevensie.”
“No, sir.” Peter struggled to find the words in a way that would not have him carted off straight to the infirmary as mental.
He remembered what both Richard Russell and Major al-Masri had observed. The Professor had cautioned him of it right before he left for basic training and Susan, Lucy, and Edmund had all shared the same concern. “I don’t take orders well, sir. From fools, that is. Finding a place where I wasn’t likely to receive stupid orders I wouldn’t carry out was a priority.”
“Wouldn’t carry out?” Brotheridge repeated, with an edge. “So you think you’d know better than command?”
The Lieutenant understood what Peter was saying. Insubordination was ugly and serious and Peter knew he was at risk for it. He nodded. “Yes, sir. And by all accounts, I didn’t think I’d be getting foolish orders here, from Major Howard and his subalterns.”
“You’re right there, Pevensie, and I should have realised you’d have some clever explanation.” Brotheridge leaned on his stool, put his back up against the wall, and stretched his legs. “You aren’t supposed to be here and everyone knows it, but getting busted off to gaol and taking your licks with the rest of them isn’t a bad thing. Makes you one of them, playing their games, talking their sport. Once we see action, you’ll get promoted soon enough.”
Peter shook his head. “It’s not the rank, but thank you for saying so.” That was easy for him to say. He couldn’t be shoved down further than he already was. Parr had been busted down to Private from Corporal for this escapade.
Emboldened, Peter asked the question he so wanted an answer to. “There is a point to all this, isn’t there? We will see action, won’t we, sir?”
“That eager to kill some Jerrys, Pevensie?”
“I’m not eager to kill anyone, sir. It’s just what has to be done and I want to see it done.”
“Use those Oxbridge brains then. Paras dropped from a plane get scattered all over a drop zone. The Glider Corps was created to be able to put a whole fighting unit down in one place, fast, behind Nazi lines, probably among the first in a coup de main operation.”
He paused. “With all your education, I’m guessing I don’t need to tell you what that means.”
“No, sir, though French is my sister’s language, not mine.”
“She’s seeing action as well?”
“I don’t really know, sir. I think so. She was at the Embassy in Washington in ’42 and has left school. She’s somewhere. Could be in France before we are, for all I know.”
“It runs in your family then?”
Peter smiled at that. “It does, sir.”
“Well, not to worry. It’s coming and the Army wouldn’t be spending all this money on us and letting Major Howard do what he is if they didn’t have big plans for D Company. The Major is taking common infantry unit and turning us into first class commandos and you can bet whatever we do will be important.”
“You really think so, sir?” He hated sounding so doubting but all Peter ever saw was the target, shirt, or hill right in front of him; the common RO had no view of the overall strategic objective.
“I do. You want to be part of that and I want you there, Pevensie, and so does the Major. Don’t give us a reason to send you down.”
“I won’t, sir. Thank you.”
“Also, you’ll be allowed out for training. In fact, that’s an order from Major Howard. We want you running with us every day and staying fit.”
“Sir?”
“There’s an all-Brigade running competition in two weeks. We’re fielding our best twenty runners, which includes you, and we’re going to beat the other companies all to hell, and put on a good show for Brigadier Kindersley.”
A foot race. Aslan’s Mane, he was being let out of the brig for more cross-country running.
“Your insubordinate streak is showing, Pevensie,” Brotheridge said when Peter didn’t immediately respond. “You should have said, ‘thank you, sir, for letting me out to train. It’s an honour to run for D Company.’”
“Sir, doesn’t all this competition seem a little…” Peter struggled to find a tactful way of saying it that wouldn’t land him in more trouble.
“Off the mark? Pointless?”
“I’d add destructive, too.” With Brotheridge’s stern look, Peter quickly added, “but I’m sure the Major’s got a good reason for it. Sir.”
“Two of ‘em, actually, and I think he’s got the right of it. First, we’ve got all these young firebrands like yourself, spoiling for a fight, and he’s taking all that spirit and piss and pointing it at the other companies until we can aim it at the Nazis.”
Peter nodded. He’d never needed motivation like that in Narnia, but he could see it.
“Second, it means we’re training harder than the other glider companies and we’re better. When the time comes, when the Generals are deciding who does what, and when and where, they’re going to look at D Company and say we’re the best.”
Not something, again, that he had ever noticed in the Narnian Army but it was certainly possible that some of their units and levies had done precisely that to get his attention, and that of the General.
“I can see that, sir. It seems like a sound plan.”
Brotheridge laughed. “I’ll be sure to tell the Major you approve, Private.”
Peter felt a curl of anger at the condescension and beat it back down. He knew he had to put his sense of entitlement aside and earn his place, the same as the rest of them. He respected the men he was serving for. Brotheridge was right, too, about becoming part of the platoon. Getting into serious trouble had earned him a place in Parr’s brotherhood along with Gray, Bailey, and Gardner.
Brotheridge stood. “That’s all for now, Pevensie. Between you and me, the Major doesn’t care much about NAAFI soap. It was a smart bit of work, and a good laugh, and he wants men who seize the initiative and take risks. If you come in the top five runners, I think he’ll probably shave off a week of your time in here.”
“I’ll try, sir. I won’t let the Company down.”
“The Brigadier will be there, so it’s another chance to show them that when it comes time to dole out the plumb assignments, they think of D Company first. That’s why we’re doing this.”
Brotheridge clapped him on the shoulder. “I’d get some sleep while you can. After this, the Major’s decided you all have too much energy, so we’re going back to night exercises.”
“The men will be ragging me for that.”
The Lieutenant grinned. “They will, at that. Blame Parr. The Major does. After the race we’re headed to a blitzed part of Southampton for street fighting training. Live ammunition, even.”
That would be an exciting change of pace. “Sounds splendid, sir.” Even as he spoke the words, Peter knew he didn’t sound like the other men. He couldn’t change that, but he could show he felt no distance, that they were all equals.
“We’ll see if Lieutenant Wood can tell when the safety’s on his damned Sten and not shoot me in the foot.”
Peter laughed. He’d heard the story. It had happened before he’d joined D Company.
“Unless you prefer staying here? Having a cell to yourself?”
“I’d rather be with the platoon, sir. It’s where I belong.”
Brotheridge shook his head. “It’s not, Pevensie. Not really. But we’re damned glad to have you all the same.”
00oo00
Arisaig House, Arisaig, Inverness-shire, Guerrilla Training
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student’s fieldcraft is among the best observed, despite being a woman. She gamely went through rugged terrain and is an inspiration to the rest of her team. Knows compass orienteering, camping, cooking, firebuilding, finds and marks trails, basic foraging, even latrine digging. Would be very good in training camps and rough country.
Student has done well with parts of weapons class. Student is better with fisticuffs and melee than guns. She’s handled knives before and is skilled with them. Not real comfortable with guns but does her best to overcome it. It might be the killing, so we’ll see how she does with the deer. She’s not afraid of guns as some women are, she just doesn’t like them.
Special note: Today, the class worked on the target range with the Big and Lil’ Joes. We’re not using them in the field, but in theory they can deliver a projectile or for silent assassination and it’s always a good morale booster because the class likes playing Robin Hood. Student was barely courteous during lesson; I caught her whispering contrary instructions to the other students on how to handle the crossbows, load and sight the quarrels. She was visibly impatient with me.
I challenged her to do better than I did. Student stepped up to the mark, loaded the bow, and fired, dead to center.
Student shot the bows eight times each, Lil’ Joe first and then the Big Joe. Never missed a shot and she ran out of room on the target’s bull’s eye for the arrows. It’s too bad the War isn’t being fought with bows and arrows because student would give us an armistice by midsummer.
ooOOoo
The SOE kept a herd of tame deer in a pen near one of the cottages outside of Morar. The students all visited the deer, fed them, came to know them, and were encouraged to name them. Then, one by one, each student hiked with Major al-Masri some five miles from Arisaig House to the pens. Some students returned cut and bloodied; others returned shaken or grim. Women went to the lavatory and secretly wept.
When it was her turn, they left in the morning. Susan always felt on uneven ground with Major al-Masri. His duality was precisely as Agnes had predicted - the Hierophant who served two masters, one light and one dark, and confidently walked the path he wished to follow. As Asim bin Kalil he was a close friend to her brothers and sister. He had not been to Narnia but had dreamt of it and they had given him the picture of the Dawn Treader.
Mrs. Caspian and Major al-Masri, however, were formal and never discussed dreams, journeys, visions, and Lions. She was a student and he was a teacher and one who was always evaluating her suitability and reporting on her progress. When he was in uniform and lecturing on blowing up railways and delivering a clean, killing blow, the mystic she knew he also was seemed very distant.
They climbed a rise and Susan took a moment to enjoy the crisp greens, browns and blues of Loch Morar. A relative of the Loch Ness monster purportedly lived in the lake. She wondered if Eustace would find his way here in his never ending search for dragons and sea monsters.
Major al-Masri continued briskly walking down the hill. She hurried to catch up with him, easily jumping over rocks, keeping her footing sure, enjoying how even after four miles, she felt no discomfort at all. She was fitter even than she had been in Narnia.
“How is Peter?” she asked. Her letters were so heavily censored it was almost pointless to write and Peter was a terrible correspondent.
“Bored,” the Major replied. “Which is regrettably the life of light infantry training.”
Susan’s own training had certainly not been dull. “I wish he would have joined us here. Or done something else. It seems to be such a waste.”
“I disagree, Mrs. Caspian. Peter is training hard and well with a very good CO.”
“There are good COs here!” she retorted, automatically rising to the defence of the SOE.
“Yes,” he said and then offered an unsatisfying qualifier. “Some are good. Most are talented amateurs, learning as they go.”
“And you are among the good ones, of course?” Susan would be less irritated if he acted a trifle less assured.
“I am a professional,” Major al-Masri replied. He glanced at her, stepped lightly over a rivulet, and kept his footing on the loose rocks. “You are not yet a professional, Mrs. Caspian, but you are very, very good. Nevertheless, I shall have to reassess my opinion of your formidable acumen if you have not seen the problems in the SOE.”
She wanted to bristle at the blunt critiques of both her and the SOE, but in fairness could not. The skills of Narnia were useful, but did not perfectly translate to the life of a spy in occupied France. She had needed to learn so very much and still was. The Nazis were more formidable than any foe faced before.
And the multiple crises within the SOE had been terrible indeed. Even out here, alone with the birds and the wind, she whispered, “You are speaking of the Prosper disaster?” Dozens of agents and hundreds of informants in France had been rounded up that summer and never heard from again and an enormous and productive network had been completely blown.
“Not just that, Mrs. Caspian.” She edged closer so that they could talk more quietly even on the lonely Highlands path. Once upon a time she would have spoken so with Rats and Crows, with Edmund, and with her loyal Guard, the he-Wolf, Lambert.
“Something worse that Prosper?” she asked.
“More a concern of what gave rise to the Prosper disaster and that nothing will be done to prevent it again.” The wind blew a chill and they both picked up their pace. There was still the task with the deer herd to come.
“Recall that the SOE was formed by secret order. It is accountable to no one. They are brilliant but they are also naïve and they frequently operate, as much of the British intelligence community does, under the regrettable assumption that men of a certain breeding and education are, by virtue of that breeding and education, loyal and competent.”
It was a testament to her trust in him that she did not doubt Major al-Masri’s words. How could she when she had observed these same failings. The full implications were chilling. Did Major al-Masri suspect there were double agents in their ranks? Was someone betraying them deliberately? Or was what had led to the deaths of hundreds of people merely criminal errors in judgment and rank stupidity? They had both observed phenomenal carelessness at times.
“You are being unusually blunt, Major. Thank you.”
He glanced around. Their walk disturbed some wading birds who had been picking through the damp heath. It was otherwise silent and lonely. The farmers and fishermen never said a word about the strange people who had occupied the hunting lodges of Inverness-shire and galloped about shooting things and blowing things up.
“Do not make the same mistakes your instructors and fellows make. Never underestimate your foe, Mrs. Caspian. And do not over-estimate your allies. You will die if you do so.”
Her pique rose again as he picked at a particular tender spot of hers. “I do not need protection!”
“No you do not,” he agreed. “I am offering counsel, not protection. You are wise enough to know the difference.”
She kicked a gray rock and it skittered down the slope into the Loch. They were almost to the cottage. “Yes,” she agreed with a sigh. “I do know the difference and I apologize for jumping to that conclusion. Knowing how great the need is, my frustration and impatience get the better of me at times.”
Another person would put a comforting hand about her shoulders. Susan had learned that Major al-Masri never touched a woman.
“Mrs. Caspian, waiting on the French situation to stabilise is a sound decision. If you went now, it would be as a radio operator, whose average life expectancy is currently about 6 weeks. I would expect you to do better, but I am reluctant to see you thrown in as yet more fodder. You need more time to perfect your French cover and there will be plenty to do there in 1944.”
They began the descent into the dell with the deer paddock. “Colonel Walker-Smythe had told me two years ago that I should look to 1944. It seems even farther now than it did then.” Susan hoped she did not sound too petulant.
“There is something coming for you, Mrs. Caspian. I cannot quite see it, yet, but I am looking for it on your behalf. Whatever it is will be important and a challenge and involve more than avoiding Gestapo signal vans searching for illegal wireless broadcasts.”
As they approached the pen, the skittish deer shied. They did associate humans with food. From a tin bin at the gate, Major al-Masri scooped out handfuls of corn and tossed it into the pen. Hunger overcame fear and the deer came closer to the fence and began to nibble on the strewn kernels.
She wished she could have brought one of the bows. The Lil’ Joe would have been perfect for this. But that was not the point of this exercise.
Major al-Masri moved to the side and Susan stepped up and studied the herd. She heard Lambert’s voice; her Narnian Wolf-Guard had had a beautiful voice. They had often hunted together.
“Do you see it, my Queen?” Lambert would whisper as they crouched together in the concealing brush.
She would watch how he tracked the deer in a herd until he found one - the weak one, the old, the ill, the young, the vulnerable. It had taken years for her to learn to see as the Wolves did.
There. That one. The doe’s nose was running and her sides were sunk in. The eye of this doe was not clear and bright and her head drooped.
Susan’s only regret was that Lambert was not now at her side. Without him to pinion a struggling deer, she would have to be careful of thrashing hooves.
She slid her long, thin, strong knife out of the sheath belted to her waist. Susan climbed through the fence, scooped up a little of the spilled corn from the ground, and walked slowly across the paddock to the little deer. If she could do this on horseback from yards away with an arrow, she could do this when standing right next to her prey.
She slowly approached the deer, palm extended. The doe lifted her head and her nose quivered. Tentative, she stretched her neck, red rimmed nostrils flaring. Susan remained still and the deer took two steps forward. The doe’s soft lips delicately tickled against Susan’s skin as she slowly mouthed the corn in her hand.
The corn trickled to the ground and the doe lowered her head to eat. Susan hefted the knife and gripped it in both hands. The hide was tough and she could not afford to catch the blade on bone.
Daughter, I send you to Aslan. Greet him for me.
She plunged the knife into the doe, between shoulder and upper leg, avoiding the rib she could see under the deer’s rough hide. The doe jerked and flailed so hard Susan nearly lost her footing. The deer bolted, taking the knife thrust into her side with her. Susan let her go.
The rest of the herd startled and tore about the paddock. Susan edged to the rail to avoid the thrashing hooves.
For a moment she lost the doe in the crush of panicked deer. It would not matter. There was nowhere for her to run and she’d felt the sureness of the cut when she’d pierced the hide and sinew. Susan had hit the largest part of the lungs and cut the top of the heart.
The doe suddenly teetered and crumbled to the ground, dead.
Susan waited until the herd settled before crossing the paddock to the dead doe. She hated death. The doe had fallen on the knife, so Susan had to turn her over to pull it out, boot on the carcass, two hands on the blade.
She returned to where Major al-Masri waited and climbed out of the paddock. She wiped the knife on the brown tipped grass.
“Well?” she asked, knowing she had done very well. She returned the knife to her sheath.
Major al-Masri glanced at the dead doe, whose life’s blood now was spreading on the ground. A crew would come later and butcher the carcass and share the meat with the local townsfolk.
“Mrs. Caspian, I will state in my report that I believe you will be capable of killing a human being, should the circumstances warrant. I will leave out of my report that you have obviously killed before.”
“A deer or a human being?” In her opinion, the exercise was foolish. There was all the difference in the world between killing a dumb animal for food and killing a human to save your own life. Susan knew the difference and so did Major al-Masri.
“We know the answer to that query already, Mrs. Caspian, and the more ambiguous I am, the better.”
ooOOoo
Arisaig House, Arisaig, Inverness-shire, Guerrilla Training
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student handled the deer kill coolly and professionally. She had studied deer anatomy, selected a target, and made a swift, clean, and humane kill. I observed no nerves or sentiment.
I have known and observed student over the prior year. Student is very well suited to covert and sabotage work. Student is gifted in stealth and explosives with a very steady head and hand. She is nerveless and very creative. Student exhibited no difficulty at all working with gammon bombs, 808s, and plastic explosives. Pity her target. She’s very patient and waits for the right moment, trusts her intuition, and acts decisively. As with the deer kill, she is as a wolf among sheep - once she selects her prey, she seldom misses a mark.
00OO00
Met the student for the first time during field exercises. Though a woman, student has definitely got a sense of strategy. Her plans are usually conservative, not bold or brilliant, and never reckless. Student is very good at studying a challenge, developing a plan, delegating the tasks, seizing the opportunity, and seeing it done. I’d expect her to be the sort of woman who gets lost in the details but she doesn’t. Student always grasps the goal and then is very focused on the strategy to accomplish it. Doesn’t get distracted by the little things.
Discussed student’s insistence upon perfection. Asked her if this meant she would only try what she knew she could do well and if fear of failure was holding her back. That brought her up. Student is not, by nature, a risk taker. She’s decisive and steady, but she wants luxury of good planning and shows of overwhelming force. Between that and the dislike of guns, not sure she’s suited for insertion into the armed resistance groups. No matter. She’s terrific for network building, courier, surveillance, espionage, and sabotage.
Oo00oo
Student is very keen on Ringway for parachute training. Recommend she proceed.
ooOOoo
RAF Ringway
Cheshire
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student is maybe too eager to jump out of airplanes. Showed great pluck and verve. Good head for heights. Very encouraging of other students. Sprained her ankle on 1st jump when someone got in her way on landing. She shook it off like a man. Never put a wrong step again.
Student is eager for finishing school and w/t training. Recommend her for both.
ooOOoo
Peter took another deep gulp of the putrid air, glanced at his watch and then fixed his eyes on the hollow strut above the pale, whitish, green face of Corporal Bailey.
“Ten minutes to cast off,” their pilot called. How they managed to fly these things was miraculous.
Ten minutes. He could do ten…. And then everything gave another wild lurch.
Peter pressed his back to the hull, bracing himself as the little glider surged and bucked. He had thought that being in the glider corps, in an actual glider, would be most akin to flying with the Gryphons.
Never had Peter been so very, very wrong. Gliders had no more engines than did a paper airplane. That was fine; neither did a Gryphon. Gliders, unlike Gryphons, had no means of independent propulsion. They were tethered to a big bomber and towed aloft, like a balloon pulled by a motor car. Once the glider cast off from the bomber, it was everything he’d hoped it would be - freed of the tow cable, they were alone, in the sky, gliding silently on currents and thermals.
Until that glorious moment, though, glider-borne was worse than a boat, or anything else for that matter.
When tied to the bomber, the glider pitched, yawed, heaved and bucked and, eventually, so would your stomach. The little, Yank-made Wacos didn’t help either - they were small, unstable, and flimsy. Pull on something too hard and you worried the whole thing would come apart.
Still, having traveled in enough odd contraptions through his (first, Narnian) adulthood, Peter had assumed he was pretty well immune to motion sickness. He’d been wrong about that, too. If the whipsawing motion inside the Waco didn’t get him, the vomiting of the others could. Thirty minutes into a training flight and the deck of the Waco would be awash in the vomit of the ten members of the platoon trapped inside.
But the High King of Narnia not only had personally experienced all manner of unorthodox, sickness-inducing transport, he had become pretty well inured to strong smells that would turn any less-hardened stomach. He was an expert in the odours of mammals and birds, dwarfs, and Fauns. He knew what they all smelled like when wet, filthy, diseased, or bloody, and could distinguish a goat from a Satyr to avoid an embarrassing mistake in the dark. He knew the stench of bloated and rotting corpses on blistering hot battlefields, the stink of Giants, the reek of the slums from the great city of Tashbaan, and the eye-watering fumes of stewing offal meats from the Cair Paravel kitchen.
He was, quietly, proud that he’d retched on only four of the last eleven training flights. That was seven better than his CO. Major Mad Bastard Howard had gotten sick every time they went aloft in the Waco. Hearing the telltale sounds, Peter quickly looked fore, up the bench toward the cockpit, and saw Major Howard bent over. Peter fixed his eye at the porthole window and watched the clouds sailing by.
Some interminable length of time passed that was only another seven minutes, during which Brotheridge and Gray also got sick. Finally, there was a snap and shudder, and the drone of the engines of the Halifax that was towing them fell away. They’d cast off. The motions wouldn’t be the problem now. Just the fetid odours.
The navigator was calling out altitude as they slowly descended in lazy circles toward the runway.
“Bailey! Pevensie!” Lieutenant Brotheridge barked, sounding hoarse, Bailey squeezed aft, careful to avoid slipping on vomit, and took his position for releasing the parachute that would slow their landing speed. Peter stood, bracing himself against a strut. As he put a hand on the door handle, he felt Parr firmly grab on to the back of his belt with one hand; Parr would be holding on to a strut with the other hand.
The ground of the base’s runway was coming up fast and then the order came from Major Howard who was watching their elevation, “Open the door!”
Peter grabbed the lever, yanked hard, and the door to the glider’s cabin slid up, letting in a burst of cooler air that took out the stench. Peter got the hatch opening job a lot, for he was taller than most and had a good head for heights. The greens and browns of the base’s runway whipped by below them. Parr tightened his grip on Peter’s belt and hauled him back into the cabin, away from the open hatch. They were still airborne and the deck was slippery.
“Link arms! Boots up!” Major Howard ordered. They all sat quickly on the benches, linked arms and lifted their feet. Peter didn’t like thinking about what was on the sole of the boots. Here they were landing on a smooth runway, but in a combat situation the glider would land wherever it could and the bottom could easily be torn away. Boots up meant their feet wouldn’t go when the deck did.
They skidded on to the tarmac and there was another hard lurch. Bailey deployed the parachute from the rear of the glider. The Waco shuddered and bounced about, slowing on her skids.
They were still lurching down the runway when Major Howard started shouting, “Out! Out! Out!”
Parr took up the Major’s favourite refrain and they all joined in and chanted, “Rats in a trap, rats in a trap!” They scrambled out of the cabin as fast as they could. Gray was the first one out and the moment his boots touched ground, the air erupted with the sounds of crackers; a thunder-flash went off a few yards away. Observers were shooting blank rounds at them. Peter wished he could say it felt like a real risk, but it didn’t. Peter, right behind Brotheridge and Bailey, jumped onto the runway; his boots hit the ground with a crunch. Crouching under the wing, Peter ran from the glider and dove off the runway into the ditch that ran alongside it. Feet hitting gravel and the good smell of clean dirt and grass cleared his head and stomach.
A deck slippery with vomit was just one reason to prang out of the glider as fast as your legs could get you. The other was that they were trapped and defenseless so long as they were inside the glider. Major Howard called them rats in a trap, but Peter though proverbial fish in a barrel was even more apt. Except that a barrel was a lot sturdier than the plywood glider.
“Damn flashy schoolboy,” Parr muttered, landing next to him in the ditch. “You won the pool, didn’t you? You beat the spread?”
“Four to twelve,” Peter affirmed, referring to the number of times he and Major Howard had each lost breakfast in glider training,. “Twenty shillings and nine cigarettes.” They both anchored their guns loaded with blanks in the dirt and peered out over the edge of the ditch, sighting for enemy that wasn’t there. Soon, he told himself. Soon.
Oo00oo
Beaulieu Finishing School, Hampshire
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Susan Caspian
Student has shown remarkable progress in language. Her errors are few and she never makes the same mistake twice.
Student exhibits a notable stubborn streak. She is very security conscious, very focused on following protocols, so long as she agrees with them.
Student has excellent tradecraft skills. Very observant, good memory, very focused upon details. Student has a very logical mind for a woman, as good as a man at measurements and sums.
Student is utterly committed to the cause. She speaks with great emotion against Nazism and the murder of Jews. I had asked student if she had friends or family in the occupied countries and if that was the reason for her passion. Student gave me a cool look and said that with one million dead she didn’t need to have a personal relationship to care about their fate. Did I?
Student does not guard her tongue when provoked. An instructor made a crude joke about Jews and student gave him a royal tongue lashing. Other team members speak of never saying anything bad in her presence about coloured people. Can get a rise out of her with anti-British sentiment, too, especially Indian politics. Took her aside and discussed with her that she’s being deliberately provoked and this sort of thing will give her away. If she wants to go to France, she needs to learn to stay out of the damnable internecine politics. She doesn’t like being corrected, but accepted it.
Oddest thing. Caught student writing in cipher during lecture on tradecraft. Hauled her up and asked her to explain. It’s not shorthand but a private code she says she developed with her brothers and sister when she was a child. Couldn’t make heads or tails of it but she read from it easy as anything and repeated back the lecture. Sent her over to pianists to see if they could make use of any of it.
She is very friendly with the other students on her team, and very supportive. She remembers every birthday, always asks about health and family. She knows all the staff; chats easily with anyone regardless of station or class. Very popular, very kind. But no one knows when her birthday is. It’s subtle - everything about this student is subtle - but she never talks about herself. She holds herself a little aloof. She never confides.
Student can hold a grudge. She gives a masterful performance of forgiveness, but you can see her continuing resentment at the wrongdoer in a set of her jaw and the cool aside. It’s not nice, but if our agents were more cautious and less forgiving, maybe we wouldn’t have blown so many networks and seen so many dead and disappeared. I told her to change that anger, which at first she denied having, to suspicion. In the field, if someone does something she doesn’t like, there might be a reason for it that leads straight to the Gestapo.
Caught student teaching others how to pick locks to the liquor cabinet and kitchens. She’s got a lockpick set; says she bought it from a jeweler off Baker Street. I confiscated it to see what she would do. She broke into my office and stole it back two nights later. Our cracksman is besotted with her. Also says that her pick set is professional grade which means she got it from another professional. Don’t know what to make of it.
Student speaks with great fondness for her brothers and sister and writes to them frequently. She never speaks of her husband. I finally asked if there was trouble there and she was genuinely surprised and assured me there was not. It’s none of my business, of course, but we want to be sure she is not coming to us for the wrong reasons. She does not appear fatalistic at all so I can’t get a bead on her.
Student has many male admirers. She’s very good at giving clear expectation politely. If she’s taken a lover, it’s discreet. Can manage men and would probably be excellent as a keeper of a safehouse.
Turns out student is intimate with one of the w/t instructors, WC Tebbitt. Been going on for weeks apparently and they only got caught because of a bomb drill. They worked together previously in America in ’42 which explains a lot. Probably the reason student is not concerned overly with her husband.
Rumours finally caught up with student. Realise who she is. Everyone knows she was running agents two years ago in America, coshed a spy with a flower pot at the British Embassy, and burglared the Vice President’s valise. Student doesn’t discuss it, but everyone knows. Why is she not deployed already? Is there something wrong? She’s getting bored and frustrated. It’s a damnable waste.
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3 Part 1 Part 2
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6 Part 1 Part 2
Author: rthstewart
Rating: T, for a soldier's salty language
Pairings/characters: Peter Pevensie, Susan Pevensie
Disclaimer: This work of historical fiction is offered respectfully and with deep admiration for the men and women herein depicted as well as C.S. Lewis and the other content owners of the Chronicles of Narnia and its related properties. Any original content in this derivative fiction is in the public domain and may be used freely and without notice to me or attribution.
Possible Spoilers/Warnings: All of The Chronicles of Narnia.
Summary: The High King and the Gentle Queen go to war, again.
Chapter 2
Rat and Sword Go To War
Part of The Stone Gryphon story cycle
By Rthstewart
Chapter 2 - Training Days
D-Day minus 1 year
ooOOoo
Medieval armour, sword and shield did not weigh less than a full pack, 9-mm Sten submachine gun, ammunition, the magazines for the squad’s Bren machine gun and the mortars for the anti-tank gun. Private Peter Pevensie of the Ox & Bucks 2d Battalion, D Company, knew this for fact because he’d been marching with his pack, ammunition, and gun for the last three days. Granted, Peter had never had the pleasure of heaving armour, sword, and shield across southern Exmoor and into the Somerset levels. Still, muscle memory did not fail him and he was certain what he carried now weighed more than what he had carried then.
He had also learned that whether in Narnia or Southwest England, makeshift army camps were much the same, except that in Narnia, a High King did not have to polish his own boots and clean his own weapons.
Peter took advantage of a break in the pre-dawn drizzle to pull his last pair of dry socks from his pack. He put them on quickly and then slid his boots on before everything turned to the feel and odor of wet sheep - something the High King of Narnia also knew very well, along with wet Talking Dog, wet Talking Horse, and worst of all, wet Giant.
His Company had camped on the downs - a cold, wet night it had been - and would be moving out any moment. The officers were striding about, making sure everything had been struck and calling orders to the last lazy private. Moving his toes in the leather boots, Peter could feel the blisters on top of blisters.
It was his own fault. Peter had passed up other opportunities - including a very polite and pointed invitation to the Officer Training Corps - to be here, in the mud. It had seemed like a good idea at the time. He’d heeded the advice of Major al-Masri who knew the CO of D Company personally. On the strength of that recommendation, Peter had sought this assignment and called in meager chits to get it, despite his father’s howling protests that his eldest son would never go into the infantry and as an OR no less. He couldn’t really explain to his father, I’m an Oxford-bound Private in a Company of Cockney Londoners, policemen, window-washers, and taxi drivers because a Lion told me to.
He’d led Narnia and fought for her. He couldn’t return there ever again. But over the last year he’d realised that Narnia and England were not as different as he’d supposed and that England needed him to use here what had been learned there.
That was the theory, at least. Peter didn’t feel Aslan’s paw often but he had thought he had discerned it here.
He wondered if he’d missed some essential part of the Lion’s instruction because this surely was not what Aslan had intended. Once a King and now the lowest of the low and among the youngest in the non-officer ranks of said window-washers and taxi drivers. Ruled a nation, fought battles, led an army and now the only perspective was that of the soldier’s shirt in front of him and the orders shouted down from on high.
Peter moved the things about in his pack so the whole would ride more comfortably on his back for the next twenty miles. Another irony. He’d thought he’d signed up for the Glider Corps. The Ox & Bucks 2d Battalion had been re-tooled to the Glider Corps of the 6th Airborne paratroopers. Gryphon-back, Peter had loved flying. Boats were out of the question; Peter hated boats. Joining up with the paras of the 6th Airborne should have meant time in the air in soaring gliders. He hadn’t done any of that yet, either.
The only thing of his past life of remotely useful purpose was the ability to run full tilt with armour, sword, and shield. Under the direction of D Company’s CO, the Mad Bastard Major John Howard, Peter was similarly weighted down and running. Or jogging. Or marching. Or double-time marching.
Major al-Masri had said Major Howard was a good man, the very best, destined for great things, and building a terrific, elite unit that would be doing something important, in time. Major al-Masri had omitted the mad bastard part. And Peter was having a hard time seeing that they were going anywhere except from one hillock and moor to another.
Lion’s Mane, he hoped there was some point to all this because the last three days had been a very special brand of Tash’s hell. Lately, it felt that the only thing keeping him here was the humiliation of admitting to his father that he had been mistaken and to yes, please, have those important men in New York and Washington pull those short strings and get him reassigned somewhere more interesting. It had been his for the asking and he had rejected it, leaving Edmund to take Peter’s place in Washington. If he’d gone into officer training, he would have had his own batman - squire - to clean his boots.
Instead, it was all marching, mud, and scraping off the muck of southern England himself.
It hadn’t all been ghastly. General Browning had sent them to Devon for a fantastic month of cliff climbing at Ilfracombe. The prospect of now returning to Bulford base for more drilling, marching, jogging, and running through the wilds of Wiltshire was just too dreary. The first time they had done laps around Stonehenge, a mere ten-mile jog from the Bulford army base barracks, it had been thrilling. By now, Peter knew every hummock and molehill within 30 miles of Bulford because he had marched or run or jogged over every one of them. After a month in Devon scaling cliffs, they didn’t want to return, now made much worse because General Browning had ordered the lot of them to march the 130 miles back to the base.
And if the whole regiment was marching across Devonshire and Somerset, damn it but the Mad Bastard was going to make a competition out of it and D Company was going to march faster than the others and beat the other Companies back to the base they weren’t in any hurry to get back to. Now, marching all the way to the action in Italy? Yes. Marching five days back to Bulford, in the heat of the summer in serge uniform? No. Definitely, no.
It had been blistering hot the first two days. Now a cold, wet rain fell. Peter tightened the laces on his boots.
“Company, fall in!” the Mad Bastard shouted.
Peter, and the 118 other men of D Company, all moved. He stood and as he hefted his pack, he felt his boots sink a few inches into the soft mud of Somerset. He pulled his feet out with a soft squelch and already felt the cold rain trickle down his neck and into the intimate space on his back beneath shirt and pack.
“You heard the Major,” Lieutenant Brotheridge called. Peter slogged to his place, second from the bottom in Brotheridge’s platoon.
“We’re ahead of the other companies by at least four hours!” Major Howard roared, striding up and down the line in the spitting rain. He was swinging his army walking stick. Peter had three shillings down against two of the other men in his platoon, Parr and Bailey, about whether the Mad Bastard would wear the inch of brass off the bottom of that walking stick by the time they made it back to Bulford. The other two of their gang, Gray and Gardner, were in on it and were going to measure the brass left on the stick when they got back to base. Bailey had tried to throw the wager for Parr by getting Major Howard onto a bicycle like a civilized officer.
Peter knew that wasn’t going to happen - he’d win the wager even if Parr wouldn’t pay up. Major Howard was a fanatic. If his men marched, he would march and all his junior officers, his subalterns, would march, too. Peter recognized that feeling and he respected it. As much as he hated the infantry, he did respect Major Howard’s command, and Lieutenant Brotheridge, his own platoon leader.
They formed the ragged line, but the company wasn’t moving out. There was some murmur and fuss. Standing on toes, trying to not tip over from the weight of the pack, from the back row, Peter could just see over the men and their bulging, soggy equipment.
Parr and Bailey were in the front of the Company, on their knees, in the dark mud, hands clasped in front of them. They looked like big, filthy, choir boys in a Tommy’s soggy serge.
“Parr! Bailey! What are you doing down there!” Mad Bastard Howard barked. “Get up! We’re moving!”
“Please, sir!” Parr inched on his knees toward Major Howard who towered over them. “We’ve marched 80 miles in three days! We’ve marched our legs right off! We don’t got any legs to march on!”
“Too bad, boys!” Howard yelled as the men all laughed. “If you don’t have legs, you’ll just have to take the last fifty miles on your hands.” The Major swung his stick and turned about, managing to make it look smart even in the mud. “Company fall out!”
And they did. Parr and Bailey were laughing, still on their knees. Peter squelched over to them and gave Bailey a hand up. Parr got a hand from Gardner.
Wally Parr, Jack Bailey, Charlie Gardner, and Billy Gray, Brotheridge’s batman, had taken the “schoolboy Pevensie” under their wing. All that meant was that, as the youngest and most junior in Brotheridge’s platoon, Peter got to buy their drinks and light their smokes. Years in public schools and Peter knew how to live under the fagging system; the common ROs enjoyed seeing an Oxford-bound classics scholar sweeping their barracks.
“Mad Bastard,” Gray muttered with a look at the retreating back of their CO. “Mad, ambitious bastard. He’ll get us all killed.”
“We march faster, we get back faster, we get in ahead of the other Companies, and we take all the hot water and the food,” Peter said, thumping Gray on the pack. Not that the food was worth hurrying back for, either. They lined up with the others and began marching.
“You forgot the girls, Pevensie,” Bailey said, flicking mud at Parr and matching the synchronicity of the marching company.
“Pevensie never forgets the girls!” Parr hooted.
“Them, too,” Peter retorted. “That was so obvious, I didn’t see to mention them.”
“Might as well forget ‘em,” Gray said, gloomy. “The birds all fly off with the Yanks.”
“It’s damn unpatriotic is what it is,” Bailey griped, repeating the complaint that had become all too common since the Americans moved to Tidworth, with their nice uniforms and all their cash and chocolate. The girls of Salisbury weren’t interested in a lonely, broke Tommy when the Yanks were about.
“More marching, less chattering!” Brotheridge ordered, jogging along beside them.
Together, they all fell in with the rest of D Company and marched, the quick step of the light infantry, and they’d dance another 50 miles back to base.
ooOOoo
June 1943, Wanborough Manor
Guildford, Surrey
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student was transferred here from staff assistant position at Beaulieu. Purpose is to assess suitability for further training. Handled transition easily and enthusiastically. Very keen to be here and grateful for the chance to prove herself. Very knowledgeable. Helping other students learn the ropes and rails.
Student is working hard to be fit; doesn’t complain about the early morning runs; she is game and eager but not overly competitive.
Contrary to her youthful appearance, this student is very serious and earnest, and very mature beyond her years.
Student can ride a bicycle and has learned the motorbike. I hope her driving skills improve. No one wants to drive with her now after a problem with some dustbins and an oak tree.
Student has adequate but not natural mechanical skills. Given clear instructions, she will follow them precisely and can patch a tyre on a bicycle, lubricate cylinders on a motorbike, or repair a wireless. Not a tinkerer or inventor by nature.
Students needs work on language and has never lived in France. This could be fatal and she knows it. To her credit, she’s working very hard at it, queries everyone about life there. She is always taking notes, reading, observing, and practising.
Caught student at mess copying how the French students eat and what they eat. Commended her for her observational skills.
Student learns codes and ciphers easily; picked up Morse Code uncommonly quickly. She admitted to studying it in advance and practising it on tabletops. Recommend her for w/t training.
Student never complains of the physical rigours at all. Strong arm, sharp eye, good endurance, decent speed at running and jumping, can pull herself up. Better than all the women and most of the men at swimming.
Student is almost an actress in ability to play a role. Admitted Walker-Smythe taught her importance of living her cover. Significant improvement in language even over last four weeks. Recommend she proceed to guerrilla training in Arisaig.
ooOOoo
D-Day minus 11 months to D-Day minus 6 months
ooOOoo
“Hey! Pevensie!”
A hand shook him roughly.
“Piss off, Parr. I’m sleeping.”
“Come on, Pevensie! You were up for it before! Can’t let your platoon down!”
“It’s not the platoon. It’s you and Gray.”
“We’re the heart of the platoon!” Parr whispered. “We need you.”
Peter grabbed his blanket and rolled on his side. Major Howard called them all scallywags and troublemakers and Corporal Parr was the chief instigator.
“No. If we go through with this, we’ll get RTU’d.”
He was not going to get kicked out of the most elite glider company in the 6th Airborne because Parr had (another) mad idea. He knew it was the most elite because they kept telling themselves that, and because Mad Bastard Howard worked them ten times harder than any of the other glider companies. Keep saying it long enough and you start to believe it.
Parr peeled the blanket off and patted his cheek. “Not with your good looks and long legs, pretty boy Pevensie. ‘Sides, you said you knew how to break in.”
Me and my big drunken mouth.
Peter groaned and tried to pull the wool blanket over his head.
“You saying that was all just talk and you fancy Nancy public school girls aren’t up for picking a NAAFI lock?”
Parr roughed him again on the shoulder.
“And if you don’t come, the whole platoon will know you’re just a double crossing piker who’s too good to get his hands dirty.”
That wasn’t fair and the bastard Parr knew it. He gave as good as he got.
“You aren’t leaving until I get up, are you?”
“No. Come on, mate. Do us a favour, yeah?”
With a sigh, Peter rolled over and sat up. He pulled on his trousers and bent over to slide his feet into his boots. His ID discs swung and clinked from his neck and he shoved them into his undershirt. It’s the middle of the night and a damned London Cockney Corporal’s got me breaking into the Bulford base NAAFI canteen.
What had he become?
Was there anything worth stealing from the NAAFI? He didn’t want more tinned food. If they took cigarettes, whiskey or proper food, all they’d be doing was robbing one poor Tommy for the benefit of another Tommy and that wasn’t fair. They were all in this misery together.
God, he was so bored with the marching and drilling and shooting crackers and blanks, sneaking with Parr into the NAAFI seemed like a good idea. There was something very wrong with his thinking. Being so fagged was affecting his judgment.
Parr and Gray were already outside the spider block when he eased out of the barrack, his escape covered by thunderous snores. The Mad Bastard was running them too hard for this sort of prank in the middle of the night. Squinting, he could make out that it was barely 0400 on his watch. “If I get RTU’d for this, Parr, they’ll never find your body.”
“You’d murder a married man, Pevensie?”
“I’d be doing your wife a favour.”
Parr leading, they snuck around the other blocks and barracks. Peter felt alert and ready, and was spoiling for a fight. It was bracing outside, cool and damp. There’d be rain in a few hours.
“Never thought I’d be grateful for the Mad Bastard’s night exercises,” Gray muttered.
He had to admit that sneaking around in the dark was a lot easier since Major Howard started training them at night. The saying was that Jerry didn’t like to fight at night. The problem was that Tommy didn’t like to fight at night either and the Mad Bastard had aimed to change that thinking.
“Do you think he knows yet what we’ll be doing?” Peter asked. “Where we’re going? When?”
“No,” Parr replied. “I heard Captain Priday asking the same thing and if the Major’s SIC don’t know, Major Mad Bastard don’t know either.”
D Company was kept in a spider block separate from the other barracks. It added to their sense of being elite and held for something special, which was undoubtedly a dangerous, highly specialized mission requiring marching faster than anyone else, running longer, and carrying more ammunition to pretend to blow things up.
The distance meant it was a long, dark walk to the NAAFI canteen. The nerviest part was sticking to the shadows of the HQ, because if there was a guard about, that was where he’d be. There wasn’t, but the three of them were really quiet too. Parr led them by the Nissen huts, Officers’ Mess, and the workshops and laundry. The backdoor of the NAAFI opened out toward the parade grounds, so there wasn’t anyone there.
Peter crouched down at the door handle. “Gray, give me a quick light, would you?” From his pocket, Peter drew out the torsion wrench and pick. Guided by the torch light, he carefully inserted the wrench into the lock and got to work.
“You can shut it off now,” he told Gray. It wasn’t a complicated lock. This wasn’t the arsenal; it was just the NAAFI with its comic books, tinned meat, tea, and razors.
“Where did you learn locks, Pevensie?” Parr asked. “Were you sneaking into the girls’ rooms at the boarding school across the pitch from that fancy school you were in?”
“My sister.”
“You were breaking into your sister’s room? You twisted bastard.”
“My sister taught me locks,” Peter said, inserting another pick and feeling for the pins. Susan and Edmund had obtained a set of picks for Jill Pole at Christmas and Susan had taught him the basics of it. Where was Susan now? The last letter had been weeks ago, with everything all blacked out by censors. Doing a spy’s work, somewhere, he supposed. Even that sounded better than what he’d been doing. Maybe he should write her. Maybe he should find out if her outfit needed an extra private who excelled at marching and shooting guns with blanks.
There was an audible click as the pins fell into place.
“Damn it, Pevensie, I take back all the things I said about you just being a girl.”
“Say that to my youngest sister and she’d stab you, Parr.” Peter pushed the door open, stood, and carefully wrapped up the wrench and picks.
“Is she the one that taught you how to pick locks?” Gray asked, shining his torch inside the NAAFI.
“No, that’s the older one. And she’d not settle for stabbing Parr. She’d shoot him, too.”
“Savages, the lot of you,” Parr said, pushing his way into the NAAFI. They fanned out into the dark canteen. It wasn’t large, just a few rows of metal and wooden shelves, floor to ceiling.
“What are we going to steal?” Gray asked. “The food’s so bad, who’d want it?”
“If we steal it, maybe we’ll get better slop? Something from the officers’ mess?” Parr disappeared down the long aisle, carefully shining his own torch on the stacked goods.
“From the way Danny Brotheridge complains, it’s not any better for them,” Gray said.
“We’ll be in the brig, so it won’t matter,” Peter replied.
“Maybe the food’s better there,” Gray said.
“And maybe hell will freeze and Manchester United will take the cup.”
Peter searched along a short aisle near the door into the main canteen. The treasure of Cair Paravel it was not. It was all tea and tins. On a shelf, Peter found a lone pack of Player’s and stuffed it in his trouser pocket. He’d divvy them among the boys of the brotherhood, assuming Parr didn’t get them all RTU’d.
“Found something!” Parr came out from behind a rack with packages in his arms. Gray shined the torch at Parr.
“What the hell you got there, Parr?”
“Soap. Soap powder. Bonjour soap. There’s some Oxydol still on the shelf. Get it.”
Peter could take an order from a Corporal. “Yes, sir, right away, sir.”
He squeezed passed Parr to the shelf where the NAAFI girls had stored the soap. Peter felt a spasm of guilt that he was stealing and probably wasting soap that was rationed off base. Mum would be so disappointed. But Mum also had not been up before dawn for a five-mile run in less than 40 minutes, then a day of training exercises all over the Bulford base grounds - shooting, running, shooting, blowing things up, more running, and marching. Then, they rounded out the day with mandatory sports. He’d left rugger and cricket behind in school and would kick a football around with the other ORs or go for yet more running with Brotheridge and some of the other subalterns.
“We’re breaking into the NAAFI and risking RTU for soap?!”
“Do you see anything you’d want to steal?” Parr asked.
“No.”
“So get moving, both of you.”
Peter tossed Gray packages of soap powder. “Load up, Billy.”
He took boxes of detergent himself. “Now what, boss?”
Parr led them out of the NAAFI. Peter had to juggle his boxes so he could shut the door behind them.
Parr stopped in the courtyard where they did the colours and had the flagpole. He tore open the soap flakes and started scattering them all over the cobblestone and pavers.
“Mad bastard,” Gray muttered, ripping open his own package of soap flakes. Peter squinted up into the dark sky. It was going to rain soon, and hard. With a shrug he tore open the box of Oxydol detergent.
ooOOoo
From: Private Peter Pevensie
Bulford Base
Salisbury
Wiltshire
To: Edmund Pevensie
c/o Colonel Walker-Smythe
British Embassy
Washington, District of Columbia
United States of America
Dear Ed:
The good news is that I wasn’t RTU’d. The bad news is that I’m in gaol for three weeks. We broke into the NAAFI, took all the soap, spread it on the walks and went back to bed. You know how I sleep. The rain began to fall and I forgot all about it until reveille. By the time I got out there, it looked like it had snowed. I’ve never seen so much foam and the men were sliding around it and whooping it up. So, today I write you from gaol and…
The knock on the door interrupted the last lines to Edmund. The courtesy wasn’t really necessary. He was in the base brig and his gaoler did not need to be polite.
“Come in!”
Peter shoved the letter into the Aeneid - for Professor Kirke’s sake, not his own - and scrambled up from his bunk as Lieutenant Brotheridge opened the door. “Sir!”
Danny Brotheridge was so tall he had duck to come through the doorway into the cell.
“Sit down, Pevensie, and ease up. There’s not room in here for us both to stand and I want to talk to you.”
Still, he waited until the leader of his platoon sat on the stool before sitting on the edge of the bunk.
Brotheridge scooted the stool over and there was the harsh sound of wood scraping on cement. He frowned and stared at him and finally asked, “Pevensie, why are you here?”
“Sir?”
The Lieutenant leaned forward, folding his height in, elbows on knees. “You were uni-bound, right? Decent public school. Read Latin and Greek? Rugger, cricket, and fencing. You were a prefect, head boy, high marks. Your father’s, what, a diplomat, I heard?”
“Something like that, sir.” Peter would omit the part about Father working for high-ranking spies with a charge direct from the Prime Minister.
“Given your age, somebody looked the other way to see you in uniform, Pevensie. So, I ask again, why after all that effort did you end up here, in D Company, with a lot of boys like me? Why didn’t you go to OTCU with the rest of your class?”
Brotheridge was a plain speaking man and not the sort to use double meaning, though class meant several things. There were those young men in Peter’s class, who were lying low, hoping they wouldn’t get called up, or who were off for officer training. There were those of Peter’s own middle class - the sort that worked hard, went on to Uni to study esoterica and competed for coveted offices, appointments in ministries, and civil service jobs. Peter couldn’t say, I’m here because a Lion told me to.
But some of it he could say because men like Brotheridge had wanted the same thing. “I wanted to wear the shoulder flash, sir, of Bellerophon astride Pegasus, and wear the maroon beret, of the paras.”
“Because we’re all so natty?”
Because the Professor and Polly had flown Fledge? Because he had worn the Lion’s scarlet? Because he had soared and glided with the great Gryphons of the Narnian Aerial Corps?
“I wanted to be in the Glider Corps, sir, and didn’t want to wait. And I thought I would be better in a company taking orders from top-notch officers than taking my chances elsewhere.”
Brotheridge’s mouth twitched, a little humourous and a little mocking. “Laying it on with a trowel won’t get you out of gaol, Pevensie.”
“No, sir.” Peter struggled to find the words in a way that would not have him carted off straight to the infirmary as mental.
He remembered what both Richard Russell and Major al-Masri had observed. The Professor had cautioned him of it right before he left for basic training and Susan, Lucy, and Edmund had all shared the same concern. “I don’t take orders well, sir. From fools, that is. Finding a place where I wasn’t likely to receive stupid orders I wouldn’t carry out was a priority.”
“Wouldn’t carry out?” Brotheridge repeated, with an edge. “So you think you’d know better than command?”
The Lieutenant understood what Peter was saying. Insubordination was ugly and serious and Peter knew he was at risk for it. He nodded. “Yes, sir. And by all accounts, I didn’t think I’d be getting foolish orders here, from Major Howard and his subalterns.”
“You’re right there, Pevensie, and I should have realised you’d have some clever explanation.” Brotheridge leaned on his stool, put his back up against the wall, and stretched his legs. “You aren’t supposed to be here and everyone knows it, but getting busted off to gaol and taking your licks with the rest of them isn’t a bad thing. Makes you one of them, playing their games, talking their sport. Once we see action, you’ll get promoted soon enough.”
Peter shook his head. “It’s not the rank, but thank you for saying so.” That was easy for him to say. He couldn’t be shoved down further than he already was. Parr had been busted down to Private from Corporal for this escapade.
Emboldened, Peter asked the question he so wanted an answer to. “There is a point to all this, isn’t there? We will see action, won’t we, sir?”
“That eager to kill some Jerrys, Pevensie?”
“I’m not eager to kill anyone, sir. It’s just what has to be done and I want to see it done.”
“Use those Oxbridge brains then. Paras dropped from a plane get scattered all over a drop zone. The Glider Corps was created to be able to put a whole fighting unit down in one place, fast, behind Nazi lines, probably among the first in a coup de main operation.”
He paused. “With all your education, I’m guessing I don’t need to tell you what that means.”
“No, sir, though French is my sister’s language, not mine.”
“She’s seeing action as well?”
“I don’t really know, sir. I think so. She was at the Embassy in Washington in ’42 and has left school. She’s somewhere. Could be in France before we are, for all I know.”
“It runs in your family then?”
Peter smiled at that. “It does, sir.”
“Well, not to worry. It’s coming and the Army wouldn’t be spending all this money on us and letting Major Howard do what he is if they didn’t have big plans for D Company. The Major is taking common infantry unit and turning us into first class commandos and you can bet whatever we do will be important.”
“You really think so, sir?” He hated sounding so doubting but all Peter ever saw was the target, shirt, or hill right in front of him; the common RO had no view of the overall strategic objective.
“I do. You want to be part of that and I want you there, Pevensie, and so does the Major. Don’t give us a reason to send you down.”
“I won’t, sir. Thank you.”
“Also, you’ll be allowed out for training. In fact, that’s an order from Major Howard. We want you running with us every day and staying fit.”
“Sir?”
“There’s an all-Brigade running competition in two weeks. We’re fielding our best twenty runners, which includes you, and we’re going to beat the other companies all to hell, and put on a good show for Brigadier Kindersley.”
A foot race. Aslan’s Mane, he was being let out of the brig for more cross-country running.
“Your insubordinate streak is showing, Pevensie,” Brotheridge said when Peter didn’t immediately respond. “You should have said, ‘thank you, sir, for letting me out to train. It’s an honour to run for D Company.’”
“Sir, doesn’t all this competition seem a little…” Peter struggled to find a tactful way of saying it that wouldn’t land him in more trouble.
“Off the mark? Pointless?”
“I’d add destructive, too.” With Brotheridge’s stern look, Peter quickly added, “but I’m sure the Major’s got a good reason for it. Sir.”
“Two of ‘em, actually, and I think he’s got the right of it. First, we’ve got all these young firebrands like yourself, spoiling for a fight, and he’s taking all that spirit and piss and pointing it at the other companies until we can aim it at the Nazis.”
Peter nodded. He’d never needed motivation like that in Narnia, but he could see it.
“Second, it means we’re training harder than the other glider companies and we’re better. When the time comes, when the Generals are deciding who does what, and when and where, they’re going to look at D Company and say we’re the best.”
Not something, again, that he had ever noticed in the Narnian Army but it was certainly possible that some of their units and levies had done precisely that to get his attention, and that of the General.
“I can see that, sir. It seems like a sound plan.”
Brotheridge laughed. “I’ll be sure to tell the Major you approve, Private.”
Peter felt a curl of anger at the condescension and beat it back down. He knew he had to put his sense of entitlement aside and earn his place, the same as the rest of them. He respected the men he was serving for. Brotheridge was right, too, about becoming part of the platoon. Getting into serious trouble had earned him a place in Parr’s brotherhood along with Gray, Bailey, and Gardner.
Brotheridge stood. “That’s all for now, Pevensie. Between you and me, the Major doesn’t care much about NAAFI soap. It was a smart bit of work, and a good laugh, and he wants men who seize the initiative and take risks. If you come in the top five runners, I think he’ll probably shave off a week of your time in here.”
“I’ll try, sir. I won’t let the Company down.”
“The Brigadier will be there, so it’s another chance to show them that when it comes time to dole out the plumb assignments, they think of D Company first. That’s why we’re doing this.”
Brotheridge clapped him on the shoulder. “I’d get some sleep while you can. After this, the Major’s decided you all have too much energy, so we’re going back to night exercises.”
“The men will be ragging me for that.”
The Lieutenant grinned. “They will, at that. Blame Parr. The Major does. After the race we’re headed to a blitzed part of Southampton for street fighting training. Live ammunition, even.”
That would be an exciting change of pace. “Sounds splendid, sir.” Even as he spoke the words, Peter knew he didn’t sound like the other men. He couldn’t change that, but he could show he felt no distance, that they were all equals.
“We’ll see if Lieutenant Wood can tell when the safety’s on his damned Sten and not shoot me in the foot.”
Peter laughed. He’d heard the story. It had happened before he’d joined D Company.
“Unless you prefer staying here? Having a cell to yourself?”
“I’d rather be with the platoon, sir. It’s where I belong.”
Brotheridge shook his head. “It’s not, Pevensie. Not really. But we’re damned glad to have you all the same.”
00oo00
Arisaig House, Arisaig, Inverness-shire, Guerrilla Training
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student’s fieldcraft is among the best observed, despite being a woman. She gamely went through rugged terrain and is an inspiration to the rest of her team. Knows compass orienteering, camping, cooking, firebuilding, finds and marks trails, basic foraging, even latrine digging. Would be very good in training camps and rough country.
Student has done well with parts of weapons class. Student is better with fisticuffs and melee than guns. She’s handled knives before and is skilled with them. Not real comfortable with guns but does her best to overcome it. It might be the killing, so we’ll see how she does with the deer. She’s not afraid of guns as some women are, she just doesn’t like them.
Special note: Today, the class worked on the target range with the Big and Lil’ Joes. We’re not using them in the field, but in theory they can deliver a projectile or for silent assassination and it’s always a good morale booster because the class likes playing Robin Hood. Student was barely courteous during lesson; I caught her whispering contrary instructions to the other students on how to handle the crossbows, load and sight the quarrels. She was visibly impatient with me.
I challenged her to do better than I did. Student stepped up to the mark, loaded the bow, and fired, dead to center.
Student shot the bows eight times each, Lil’ Joe first and then the Big Joe. Never missed a shot and she ran out of room on the target’s bull’s eye for the arrows. It’s too bad the War isn’t being fought with bows and arrows because student would give us an armistice by midsummer.
ooOOoo
The SOE kept a herd of tame deer in a pen near one of the cottages outside of Morar. The students all visited the deer, fed them, came to know them, and were encouraged to name them. Then, one by one, each student hiked with Major al-Masri some five miles from Arisaig House to the pens. Some students returned cut and bloodied; others returned shaken or grim. Women went to the lavatory and secretly wept.
When it was her turn, they left in the morning. Susan always felt on uneven ground with Major al-Masri. His duality was precisely as Agnes had predicted - the Hierophant who served two masters, one light and one dark, and confidently walked the path he wished to follow. As Asim bin Kalil he was a close friend to her brothers and sister. He had not been to Narnia but had dreamt of it and they had given him the picture of the Dawn Treader.
Mrs. Caspian and Major al-Masri, however, were formal and never discussed dreams, journeys, visions, and Lions. She was a student and he was a teacher and one who was always evaluating her suitability and reporting on her progress. When he was in uniform and lecturing on blowing up railways and delivering a clean, killing blow, the mystic she knew he also was seemed very distant.
They climbed a rise and Susan took a moment to enjoy the crisp greens, browns and blues of Loch Morar. A relative of the Loch Ness monster purportedly lived in the lake. She wondered if Eustace would find his way here in his never ending search for dragons and sea monsters.
Major al-Masri continued briskly walking down the hill. She hurried to catch up with him, easily jumping over rocks, keeping her footing sure, enjoying how even after four miles, she felt no discomfort at all. She was fitter even than she had been in Narnia.
“How is Peter?” she asked. Her letters were so heavily censored it was almost pointless to write and Peter was a terrible correspondent.
“Bored,” the Major replied. “Which is regrettably the life of light infantry training.”
Susan’s own training had certainly not been dull. “I wish he would have joined us here. Or done something else. It seems to be such a waste.”
“I disagree, Mrs. Caspian. Peter is training hard and well with a very good CO.”
“There are good COs here!” she retorted, automatically rising to the defence of the SOE.
“Yes,” he said and then offered an unsatisfying qualifier. “Some are good. Most are talented amateurs, learning as they go.”
“And you are among the good ones, of course?” Susan would be less irritated if he acted a trifle less assured.
“I am a professional,” Major al-Masri replied. He glanced at her, stepped lightly over a rivulet, and kept his footing on the loose rocks. “You are not yet a professional, Mrs. Caspian, but you are very, very good. Nevertheless, I shall have to reassess my opinion of your formidable acumen if you have not seen the problems in the SOE.”
She wanted to bristle at the blunt critiques of both her and the SOE, but in fairness could not. The skills of Narnia were useful, but did not perfectly translate to the life of a spy in occupied France. She had needed to learn so very much and still was. The Nazis were more formidable than any foe faced before.
And the multiple crises within the SOE had been terrible indeed. Even out here, alone with the birds and the wind, she whispered, “You are speaking of the Prosper disaster?” Dozens of agents and hundreds of informants in France had been rounded up that summer and never heard from again and an enormous and productive network had been completely blown.
“Not just that, Mrs. Caspian.” She edged closer so that they could talk more quietly even on the lonely Highlands path. Once upon a time she would have spoken so with Rats and Crows, with Edmund, and with her loyal Guard, the he-Wolf, Lambert.
“Something worse that Prosper?” she asked.
“More a concern of what gave rise to the Prosper disaster and that nothing will be done to prevent it again.” The wind blew a chill and they both picked up their pace. There was still the task with the deer herd to come.
“Recall that the SOE was formed by secret order. It is accountable to no one. They are brilliant but they are also naïve and they frequently operate, as much of the British intelligence community does, under the regrettable assumption that men of a certain breeding and education are, by virtue of that breeding and education, loyal and competent.”
It was a testament to her trust in him that she did not doubt Major al-Masri’s words. How could she when she had observed these same failings. The full implications were chilling. Did Major al-Masri suspect there were double agents in their ranks? Was someone betraying them deliberately? Or was what had led to the deaths of hundreds of people merely criminal errors in judgment and rank stupidity? They had both observed phenomenal carelessness at times.
“You are being unusually blunt, Major. Thank you.”
He glanced around. Their walk disturbed some wading birds who had been picking through the damp heath. It was otherwise silent and lonely. The farmers and fishermen never said a word about the strange people who had occupied the hunting lodges of Inverness-shire and galloped about shooting things and blowing things up.
“Do not make the same mistakes your instructors and fellows make. Never underestimate your foe, Mrs. Caspian. And do not over-estimate your allies. You will die if you do so.”
Her pique rose again as he picked at a particular tender spot of hers. “I do not need protection!”
“No you do not,” he agreed. “I am offering counsel, not protection. You are wise enough to know the difference.”
She kicked a gray rock and it skittered down the slope into the Loch. They were almost to the cottage. “Yes,” she agreed with a sigh. “I do know the difference and I apologize for jumping to that conclusion. Knowing how great the need is, my frustration and impatience get the better of me at times.”
Another person would put a comforting hand about her shoulders. Susan had learned that Major al-Masri never touched a woman.
“Mrs. Caspian, waiting on the French situation to stabilise is a sound decision. If you went now, it would be as a radio operator, whose average life expectancy is currently about 6 weeks. I would expect you to do better, but I am reluctant to see you thrown in as yet more fodder. You need more time to perfect your French cover and there will be plenty to do there in 1944.”
They began the descent into the dell with the deer paddock. “Colonel Walker-Smythe had told me two years ago that I should look to 1944. It seems even farther now than it did then.” Susan hoped she did not sound too petulant.
“There is something coming for you, Mrs. Caspian. I cannot quite see it, yet, but I am looking for it on your behalf. Whatever it is will be important and a challenge and involve more than avoiding Gestapo signal vans searching for illegal wireless broadcasts.”
As they approached the pen, the skittish deer shied. They did associate humans with food. From a tin bin at the gate, Major al-Masri scooped out handfuls of corn and tossed it into the pen. Hunger overcame fear and the deer came closer to the fence and began to nibble on the strewn kernels.
She wished she could have brought one of the bows. The Lil’ Joe would have been perfect for this. But that was not the point of this exercise.
Major al-Masri moved to the side and Susan stepped up and studied the herd. She heard Lambert’s voice; her Narnian Wolf-Guard had had a beautiful voice. They had often hunted together.
“Do you see it, my Queen?” Lambert would whisper as they crouched together in the concealing brush.
She would watch how he tracked the deer in a herd until he found one - the weak one, the old, the ill, the young, the vulnerable. It had taken years for her to learn to see as the Wolves did.
There. That one. The doe’s nose was running and her sides were sunk in. The eye of this doe was not clear and bright and her head drooped.
Susan’s only regret was that Lambert was not now at her side. Without him to pinion a struggling deer, she would have to be careful of thrashing hooves.
She slid her long, thin, strong knife out of the sheath belted to her waist. Susan climbed through the fence, scooped up a little of the spilled corn from the ground, and walked slowly across the paddock to the little deer. If she could do this on horseback from yards away with an arrow, she could do this when standing right next to her prey.
She slowly approached the deer, palm extended. The doe lifted her head and her nose quivered. Tentative, she stretched her neck, red rimmed nostrils flaring. Susan remained still and the deer took two steps forward. The doe’s soft lips delicately tickled against Susan’s skin as she slowly mouthed the corn in her hand.
The corn trickled to the ground and the doe lowered her head to eat. Susan hefted the knife and gripped it in both hands. The hide was tough and she could not afford to catch the blade on bone.
Daughter, I send you to Aslan. Greet him for me.
She plunged the knife into the doe, between shoulder and upper leg, avoiding the rib she could see under the deer’s rough hide. The doe jerked and flailed so hard Susan nearly lost her footing. The deer bolted, taking the knife thrust into her side with her. Susan let her go.
The rest of the herd startled and tore about the paddock. Susan edged to the rail to avoid the thrashing hooves.
For a moment she lost the doe in the crush of panicked deer. It would not matter. There was nowhere for her to run and she’d felt the sureness of the cut when she’d pierced the hide and sinew. Susan had hit the largest part of the lungs and cut the top of the heart.
The doe suddenly teetered and crumbled to the ground, dead.
Susan waited until the herd settled before crossing the paddock to the dead doe. She hated death. The doe had fallen on the knife, so Susan had to turn her over to pull it out, boot on the carcass, two hands on the blade.
She returned to where Major al-Masri waited and climbed out of the paddock. She wiped the knife on the brown tipped grass.
“Well?” she asked, knowing she had done very well. She returned the knife to her sheath.
Major al-Masri glanced at the dead doe, whose life’s blood now was spreading on the ground. A crew would come later and butcher the carcass and share the meat with the local townsfolk.
“Mrs. Caspian, I will state in my report that I believe you will be capable of killing a human being, should the circumstances warrant. I will leave out of my report that you have obviously killed before.”
“A deer or a human being?” In her opinion, the exercise was foolish. There was all the difference in the world between killing a dumb animal for food and killing a human to save your own life. Susan knew the difference and so did Major al-Masri.
“We know the answer to that query already, Mrs. Caspian, and the more ambiguous I am, the better.”
ooOOoo
Arisaig House, Arisaig, Inverness-shire, Guerrilla Training
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student handled the deer kill coolly and professionally. She had studied deer anatomy, selected a target, and made a swift, clean, and humane kill. I observed no nerves or sentiment.
I have known and observed student over the prior year. Student is very well suited to covert and sabotage work. Student is gifted in stealth and explosives with a very steady head and hand. She is nerveless and very creative. Student exhibited no difficulty at all working with gammon bombs, 808s, and plastic explosives. Pity her target. She’s very patient and waits for the right moment, trusts her intuition, and acts decisively. As with the deer kill, she is as a wolf among sheep - once she selects her prey, she seldom misses a mark.
00OO00
Met the student for the first time during field exercises. Though a woman, student has definitely got a sense of strategy. Her plans are usually conservative, not bold or brilliant, and never reckless. Student is very good at studying a challenge, developing a plan, delegating the tasks, seizing the opportunity, and seeing it done. I’d expect her to be the sort of woman who gets lost in the details but she doesn’t. Student always grasps the goal and then is very focused on the strategy to accomplish it. Doesn’t get distracted by the little things.
Discussed student’s insistence upon perfection. Asked her if this meant she would only try what she knew she could do well and if fear of failure was holding her back. That brought her up. Student is not, by nature, a risk taker. She’s decisive and steady, but she wants luxury of good planning and shows of overwhelming force. Between that and the dislike of guns, not sure she’s suited for insertion into the armed resistance groups. No matter. She’s terrific for network building, courier, surveillance, espionage, and sabotage.
Oo00oo
Student is very keen on Ringway for parachute training. Recommend she proceed.
ooOOoo
RAF Ringway
Cheshire
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Mrs. Susan Caspian
Student is maybe too eager to jump out of airplanes. Showed great pluck and verve. Good head for heights. Very encouraging of other students. Sprained her ankle on 1st jump when someone got in her way on landing. She shook it off like a man. Never put a wrong step again.
Student is eager for finishing school and w/t training. Recommend her for both.
ooOOoo
Peter took another deep gulp of the putrid air, glanced at his watch and then fixed his eyes on the hollow strut above the pale, whitish, green face of Corporal Bailey.
“Ten minutes to cast off,” their pilot called. How they managed to fly these things was miraculous.
Ten minutes. He could do ten…. And then everything gave another wild lurch.
Peter pressed his back to the hull, bracing himself as the little glider surged and bucked. He had thought that being in the glider corps, in an actual glider, would be most akin to flying with the Gryphons.
Never had Peter been so very, very wrong. Gliders had no more engines than did a paper airplane. That was fine; neither did a Gryphon. Gliders, unlike Gryphons, had no means of independent propulsion. They were tethered to a big bomber and towed aloft, like a balloon pulled by a motor car. Once the glider cast off from the bomber, it was everything he’d hoped it would be - freed of the tow cable, they were alone, in the sky, gliding silently on currents and thermals.
Until that glorious moment, though, glider-borne was worse than a boat, or anything else for that matter.
When tied to the bomber, the glider pitched, yawed, heaved and bucked and, eventually, so would your stomach. The little, Yank-made Wacos didn’t help either - they were small, unstable, and flimsy. Pull on something too hard and you worried the whole thing would come apart.
Still, having traveled in enough odd contraptions through his (first, Narnian) adulthood, Peter had assumed he was pretty well immune to motion sickness. He’d been wrong about that, too. If the whipsawing motion inside the Waco didn’t get him, the vomiting of the others could. Thirty minutes into a training flight and the deck of the Waco would be awash in the vomit of the ten members of the platoon trapped inside.
But the High King of Narnia not only had personally experienced all manner of unorthodox, sickness-inducing transport, he had become pretty well inured to strong smells that would turn any less-hardened stomach. He was an expert in the odours of mammals and birds, dwarfs, and Fauns. He knew what they all smelled like when wet, filthy, diseased, or bloody, and could distinguish a goat from a Satyr to avoid an embarrassing mistake in the dark. He knew the stench of bloated and rotting corpses on blistering hot battlefields, the stink of Giants, the reek of the slums from the great city of Tashbaan, and the eye-watering fumes of stewing offal meats from the Cair Paravel kitchen.
He was, quietly, proud that he’d retched on only four of the last eleven training flights. That was seven better than his CO. Major Mad Bastard Howard had gotten sick every time they went aloft in the Waco. Hearing the telltale sounds, Peter quickly looked fore, up the bench toward the cockpit, and saw Major Howard bent over. Peter fixed his eye at the porthole window and watched the clouds sailing by.
Some interminable length of time passed that was only another seven minutes, during which Brotheridge and Gray also got sick. Finally, there was a snap and shudder, and the drone of the engines of the Halifax that was towing them fell away. They’d cast off. The motions wouldn’t be the problem now. Just the fetid odours.
The navigator was calling out altitude as they slowly descended in lazy circles toward the runway.
“Bailey! Pevensie!” Lieutenant Brotheridge barked, sounding hoarse, Bailey squeezed aft, careful to avoid slipping on vomit, and took his position for releasing the parachute that would slow their landing speed. Peter stood, bracing himself against a strut. As he put a hand on the door handle, he felt Parr firmly grab on to the back of his belt with one hand; Parr would be holding on to a strut with the other hand.
The ground of the base’s runway was coming up fast and then the order came from Major Howard who was watching their elevation, “Open the door!”
Peter grabbed the lever, yanked hard, and the door to the glider’s cabin slid up, letting in a burst of cooler air that took out the stench. Peter got the hatch opening job a lot, for he was taller than most and had a good head for heights. The greens and browns of the base’s runway whipped by below them. Parr tightened his grip on Peter’s belt and hauled him back into the cabin, away from the open hatch. They were still airborne and the deck was slippery.
“Link arms! Boots up!” Major Howard ordered. They all sat quickly on the benches, linked arms and lifted their feet. Peter didn’t like thinking about what was on the sole of the boots. Here they were landing on a smooth runway, but in a combat situation the glider would land wherever it could and the bottom could easily be torn away. Boots up meant their feet wouldn’t go when the deck did.
They skidded on to the tarmac and there was another hard lurch. Bailey deployed the parachute from the rear of the glider. The Waco shuddered and bounced about, slowing on her skids.
They were still lurching down the runway when Major Howard started shouting, “Out! Out! Out!”
Parr took up the Major’s favourite refrain and they all joined in and chanted, “Rats in a trap, rats in a trap!” They scrambled out of the cabin as fast as they could. Gray was the first one out and the moment his boots touched ground, the air erupted with the sounds of crackers; a thunder-flash went off a few yards away. Observers were shooting blank rounds at them. Peter wished he could say it felt like a real risk, but it didn’t. Peter, right behind Brotheridge and Bailey, jumped onto the runway; his boots hit the ground with a crunch. Crouching under the wing, Peter ran from the glider and dove off the runway into the ditch that ran alongside it. Feet hitting gravel and the good smell of clean dirt and grass cleared his head and stomach.
A deck slippery with vomit was just one reason to prang out of the glider as fast as your legs could get you. The other was that they were trapped and defenseless so long as they were inside the glider. Major Howard called them rats in a trap, but Peter though proverbial fish in a barrel was even more apt. Except that a barrel was a lot sturdier than the plywood glider.
“Damn flashy schoolboy,” Parr muttered, landing next to him in the ditch. “You won the pool, didn’t you? You beat the spread?”
“Four to twelve,” Peter affirmed, referring to the number of times he and Major Howard had each lost breakfast in glider training,. “Twenty shillings and nine cigarettes.” They both anchored their guns loaded with blanks in the dirt and peered out over the edge of the ditch, sighting for enemy that wasn’t there. Soon, he told himself. Soon.
Oo00oo
Beaulieu Finishing School, Hampshire
Subject: Notes by instructors and staff regarding student Susan Caspian
Student has shown remarkable progress in language. Her errors are few and she never makes the same mistake twice.
Student exhibits a notable stubborn streak. She is very security conscious, very focused on following protocols, so long as she agrees with them.
Student has excellent tradecraft skills. Very observant, good memory, very focused upon details. Student has a very logical mind for a woman, as good as a man at measurements and sums.
Student is utterly committed to the cause. She speaks with great emotion against Nazism and the murder of Jews. I had asked student if she had friends or family in the occupied countries and if that was the reason for her passion. Student gave me a cool look and said that with one million dead she didn’t need to have a personal relationship to care about their fate. Did I?
Student does not guard her tongue when provoked. An instructor made a crude joke about Jews and student gave him a royal tongue lashing. Other team members speak of never saying anything bad in her presence about coloured people. Can get a rise out of her with anti-British sentiment, too, especially Indian politics. Took her aside and discussed with her that she’s being deliberately provoked and this sort of thing will give her away. If she wants to go to France, she needs to learn to stay out of the damnable internecine politics. She doesn’t like being corrected, but accepted it.
Oddest thing. Caught student writing in cipher during lecture on tradecraft. Hauled her up and asked her to explain. It’s not shorthand but a private code she says she developed with her brothers and sister when she was a child. Couldn’t make heads or tails of it but she read from it easy as anything and repeated back the lecture. Sent her over to pianists to see if they could make use of any of it.
She is very friendly with the other students on her team, and very supportive. She remembers every birthday, always asks about health and family. She knows all the staff; chats easily with anyone regardless of station or class. Very popular, very kind. But no one knows when her birthday is. It’s subtle - everything about this student is subtle - but she never talks about herself. She holds herself a little aloof. She never confides.
Student can hold a grudge. She gives a masterful performance of forgiveness, but you can see her continuing resentment at the wrongdoer in a set of her jaw and the cool aside. It’s not nice, but if our agents were more cautious and less forgiving, maybe we wouldn’t have blown so many networks and seen so many dead and disappeared. I told her to change that anger, which at first she denied having, to suspicion. In the field, if someone does something she doesn’t like, there might be a reason for it that leads straight to the Gestapo.
Caught student teaching others how to pick locks to the liquor cabinet and kitchens. She’s got a lockpick set; says she bought it from a jeweler off Baker Street. I confiscated it to see what she would do. She broke into my office and stole it back two nights later. Our cracksman is besotted with her. Also says that her pick set is professional grade which means she got it from another professional. Don’t know what to make of it.
Student speaks with great fondness for her brothers and sister and writes to them frequently. She never speaks of her husband. I finally asked if there was trouble there and she was genuinely surprised and assured me there was not. It’s none of my business, of course, but we want to be sure she is not coming to us for the wrong reasons. She does not appear fatalistic at all so I can’t get a bead on her.
Student has many male admirers. She’s very good at giving clear expectation politely. If she’s taken a lover, it’s discreet. Can manage men and would probably be excellent as a keeper of a safehouse.
Turns out student is intimate with one of the w/t instructors, WC Tebbitt. Been going on for weeks apparently and they only got caught because of a bomb drill. They worked together previously in America in ’42 which explains a lot. Probably the reason student is not concerned overly with her husband.
Rumours finally caught up with student. Realise who she is. Everyone knows she was running agents two years ago in America, coshed a spy with a flower pot at the British Embassy, and burglared the Vice President’s valise. Student doesn’t discuss it, but everyone knows. Why is she not deployed already? Is there something wrong? She’s getting bored and frustrated. It’s a damnable waste.
Introduction
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3 Part 1 Part 2
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6 Part 1 Part 2