Sparrow Tracks—Teach your Nurselings that a way to limit forgery of coded messages is by using Sparrow Tracks. These can be dots over particular characters, scribbles on the margins, even a particular symbol scrawled in certain places. These Sparrow Tracks move in a seemingly random pattern from message to message so somebody who has seen the coded messages but isn’t aware of where the Tracks go next won’t be able to successfully duplicate them. You and your Nurseling will work on a system of unique Sparrow Tracks that you will readily recognize during their training.
Training—All Nurselings
Before you let your Nurselings out in the field, even under your supervision, they will be expected to demonstrate their abilities in:
Writing Reports—Nobody likes writing reports, but your Nurselings need to learn that a major part of their duties will involve writing and submitting them. Impress on them that their reports keep the realm from harm and can save their life and the lives of those who work with them.
The types of reports you’ll teach them to write or deal with include Background Reports, Profiles, Assessment and Appreciations, Urgent Immediate Reports, or the highly confidential Colored-String Reports. Colors for strings are White for immortals; Gray for Gifted animals like the Long Lake Wolf Pack; Red for countries Tortall is at war with, like Scanra; Yellow for countries unfriendly to Tortall but we’re not at war with, like Tusaine; Blue for countries friendly with Tortall but we’re not at present allied with, like Tyra or the Copper Isles; Green for countries we have an alliance with, like Carthak; and Uncolored Twine for matters inside Tortall.
Researching Information Using Books and Reports—For many, research is as bad as writing reports, though it’s necessary. Teach your Nurselings how to skim-read so they can go through reports or books quickly and remember what they’ve read, how to read a report to separate what they need from the chaff bureaucrats always throw in, and how to dress and act so they fit in when they go to a school or temple library, or the Hall of Records.
Once you’re satisfied they’re ready, give them a stack of reports or books, telling them to glean as much of one type of information from them as they can in a day. A Nurseling who proves to have a talent and liking for research can be given extra training and put to work in Corus, or under the command of a Falcon outside it, as a Research Sparrow.
Eavesdropping and Lip-Reading are two of the most basic skills Nurselings need to master. Teach them to be very good at doing both, and remembering exactly what was said to put in a report later. Demonstrate effective ways to eavesdrop (listen to conversations without seeming to), both using spy hole (viewing or listening) spells and how to listen unobserved when one isn’t handy, along with how to lip-read (tell what somebody is saying by watching the movement of their lips, rather than by hearing them). Don’t forget techniques to improve their memories (like how to build a Memory House inside their minds so they can remember things later), as well as exercises to sharpen the ability to report back what they’ve overheard or lip-read precisely.
Before you move to the next step, your Nurselings must be able to eavesdrop on a half-hour conversation—then write a report, including as much of the conversation as they can remember word for word. They must also be able to sit out of hearing of somebody speaking quietly, and by watching the movement of their lips alone, repeat back to you what is being said for at least five minutes.
Avoiding Eavesdroppers—While you’re teaching them how to eavesdrop, you’ll also teach your Nurselings how to avoid being eavesdropped on. You’re to teach them what to look for that suggests somebody is trying to listen to their conversations, ways to prevent lip-reading, how to detect the use of a spy hole spell without magic, and how to avoid it hearing or seeing them. Your Nurselings will also learn how to use anti-eavesdropping spells, though they shouldn’t expect them to be issued except in special cases.
Information-Gathering in Public—Teach your Nurselings how to ask questions without seeming to, how to lead a conversation where they need it to go, and how to find out from several different people if they tell a similar tale to spot if somebody’s lying.
After initial training, make arrangements with the Shadow Service’s Examiners to take your Nurselings out in public for a test. Tell your charges to uncover some bits of information the Examiners will already have arranged to have planted by rumormongers. There will also be Sparrows in the crowd under orders to deceive your Nurselings so you and the Examiners can judge their success in ferreting out who’s lying and who’s not.
Dealing with Magpies—Next to writing reports, dealing with Magpies (informers) is every Sparrow’s least favorite task. Magpies are jumpy, unreliable, prone to lie or exaggerate for a bigger payday, and will try to yank on heartstrings when they’re not trying to bully! Sad to say, they’re also our best source of gathering information where we can’t place a Hostler safely—so you’ll have to train your Nurselings to work with them. If it helps, tell them to be grateful that they can leave recruiting Magpies to the Hostlers.
Every Magpie has a different reason for singing to us, and every Sparrow has a different way of dealing with them. I won’t tell you how to teach, but if you’ll take a bit of advice? I’d say to treat their Magpies like a ma or da treats a troubled child—gentle when you can be, firm when you must be, as generous as you can be given you’ve not got much to give, but always remember that despite all you do they could easily go bad.
To test your Nurselings, the Examiners will set up a meet in a public place with some Senior Sparrows playing Magpies. You will not, of course, tell your Nurselings these Magpies are fakes, or that you know the information they’re to divulge—just that they are to find out what these Magpies have to offer, and to pay them some pittance for it. You and the Examiners will watch how your charges treat their fake Magpies, and what information they got out of them in their report to you. Be sure they describe the meet in detail, to see if they’re telling how it went straight or if they’re spinning tales themselves.
Tracking Inside a City—Following, or tracking, a person inside a city is another skill your Nurselings need to get very good at. During training, teach them how to do both open tracking (somebody who knows they’re being followed) as well as the more difficult closed tracking (somebody who shouldn’t know they’re being followed).
Be sure your charges know there are times when one is preferable over the other: For instance, while they might think they would always want to closed-track a Subject (the person or people being tracked), sometimes it helps to see how the Subject jumps knowing they’re being stalked. Tell them to watch how their Subject behaves—who they run to for help, or how they deal with knowing they’re being followed.
To test their tracking skills, have them closed-track a Subject for a whole day or night and at the end write a report of their Subject’s movements. If they can effectively closed-track within a city, then they shouldn’t have any problems with open tracking, either.
Investigation—Part of information gathering involves investigation—that is, searching places a Subject is or was at, or examining something they left behind and figuring from that where they came from and why they were there. This part of your Nurselings’ training won’t just be you and them—they’ll also be taught by Senior members of the Provost’s Guard to look for the same things they do to solve crimes.
Stress to your Nurselings: (1) Never Volunteer Any Details, and (2) Pay Utmost Attention to What the Guardsmen and Guardswomen Are Teaching. We of the Shadow Service aren’t likely to be as good at investigating as Senior Provost Guards are, but be sure your charges learn as much as they can because it will make them better at their jobs.
Test your Nurselings by having them investigate a room where a Subject lived or worked. Their job is to determine what the Subject did while there, whether the Subject was a foreign spy or not, and if so, to deduce, as best as they can, what this spy was up to. Was it simple intelligence gathering? Recruiting people to work as his spies?
Possible sabotage—that is, wrecking the gear or spells that aid and protect the Kingdom? Maybe even assassination—killing off somebody important to the Kingdom in some way?
Resisting Interrogation—At some point, every member of the Service can expect to be subjected to some form of interrogation, being questioned by an official from the local Guard or a foreign spymaster. This can be one of the most unpleasant parts of the job, especially if the interrogation is done in a country that is hostile to Tortall. That’s why you must teach your Nurselings the means of resisting both hard and soft interrogations.
Hard interrogations are difficult if you’re not prepared for them, and can include intimidation; not being allowed to answer nature’s call or to sleep; pain; and magic spells to cause fear, force the Subject to tell the truth, or detect when the Subject is lying. The only good thing about hard interrogations is that they’re usually conducted by people who have more faith in the infallibility of their methods than is warranted, and hear what they want to hear so they only expect confirmation.
Soft interrogations, by contrast, usually involve the interrogator being helpful and friendly, to get you to trust him or her. They’ll offer tea, ask about family, make you feel like you’ve got naught to worry about….That’s how they ferret out what you’re really doing, in the same friendly and concerned way. By the time they’re done, you will have told them everything you know and won’t even realize how deep in the muck you are!
I’m sure you remember from your training how it didn’t sound like that would work at all without the use of some kind of magic, and how well it worked on you even if your Interrogator doesn’t have a trace of the Gift or the Sight. It’s hard for people in trouble to resist a kindly face and a friendly voice; it may take longer and is harder for most Interrogators to do, but when they have the time and patience, it’s very effective.
A classic interrogation ploy is to combine hard and soft interrogation by having one Interrogator be sympathetic, while the other intimidates the Subject. The Provost Guard calls this “Good Dog/Bad Dog” for some reason—and has since time out of mind.
That is why the most important thing you can teach your Nurselings is how to lie convincingly when they’re the Subject, and how to determine when the time is right to “surrender” and tell their interrogator the lie they have ready.
At the start of training, you helped your Nurselings build Memory Houses, which are parts of the mind where people can store items to remind them of what they need to remember. A variation on this which can be very effective during interrogation is a Liar’s Palace, a mental construct of fake “memories” of who you’re pretending to be. If your charges build their Liar’s Palace well enough they can even convince people with the Sight they’re telling the truth, because they will believe it then!
It’s true that few people can live inside their Liar’s Palace that completely, but it’s not impossible. We know of a highly resourceful spy who recently succeeded in fooling the late Spymaster of the Copper Isles in this way. Despite being dosed with a truth spell and surrounded by fear spells, she convinced the once-unstoppable Topobaw that she was just a simple-minded and bigoted freewoman, worth cultivating as an Informant on the raka! We believe that her actions played a major role in Topobaw’s downfall and execution.
Explain to your Nurselings that even if they don’t completely believe their Liar’s Palace, they’ll learn to believe it well enough to at least fool run-of-the-mill interrogators without the Sight. Fortunately, the Sight isn’t nearly as common as people believe it is, and few interrogators possess it, since those who do usually find much more lucrative and satisfying outlets for their gods-given power.
During training, you’ll stage periodic “mock interrogations” for your Nurselings, which should happen without warning, and range from very basic questioning to pretty hard interrogation. (No torture, thank the Gods, as you want them to succeed.) Rather than a set test, keep track of how your charges handle these mock interrogations. Part of your job as a Nursemaid is to decide if they’re ready to go be interrogated by strangers or not.
Note About Hard Interrogation: We don’t train people in how to do hard interrogations that involve pain or fear spells, let alone torture. It’s been whispered about by other Spy Services that this is what you get when you give women too much power in a country, mostly by those who’ve never actually faced His Majesty’s Champion Sir Alanna or Her Majesty in a fight! They think this makes Tortall somehow “weaker” than they are. They’re welcome to continue believing that, same as they’re welcome to keep believing that the best answer is one beaten out of somebody. While it’s possible that somebody in the Shadow Service has used those types of hard interrogation, it is against Our Royal Majesties’ Law, and anyone found doing it will be hauled up on charges before the Chancellor and Deputy Chancellor.
It’s not just because we’re too “nice” to get our hands dirty, but because it’s too often the best way known under the Gods’ Realm to develop bad intelligence that will get people killed. Someone in pain will tell their interrogators what they want to hear, not what they need to hear, so acting on that information is always dangerous. We’ve also found that Spy Services that rely on these tactics are no better than footpads, so it’s easy to bribe or blackmail any number of them. The Copper Isles Spy Service was more feared for its brutality than respected for its skill, and got brought down because of thinking like this.
Note About Engaging in Criminal Acts: Unless your Nurselings are chosen to train as Hostlers, they should be strongly discouraged from engaging in criminal acts in the furtherance of their duties as Sparrows. A large part of Hostler training involves when to engage in criminal acts like pickpocketing, lock picking, burglary, sabotage, assault, and spiriting (kidnapping), and how best to do so if needful.
We know that other Spy Services consider our minimizing the additional damage our Hostlers do as a sign of “weakness.” Their equivalents to our Hostlers seem to make a point of pride out of how much havoc they can wreak along the way! That’s well and good if mayhem is all you wish. However, keep in mind that the King of Tusaine, after an unlawful operation launched by the spymaster in charge in Corus resulted in the deaths of a dozen civilians and the torching of three blocks in the Mire, had him recalled, drawn, and quartered. Perhaps His Majesty of Tusaine was inspired to this act by the receipt of a boxful of the ears of the agents involved in the operation, courtesy of the Whisper Man.
Most Important Lesson of All
Teach your Nurselings that “adventure” is another person’s life in deep dung far away. If a charge still hankers after new faces, places, and risks after a month of the dullest Nurseling work you have, talk to me. I will decide if Hurrock has a new Hostler recruit, or Commander Buri has a new Queen’s Rider…once he’s had a chat with one of our mages. Memory Spells or Forget-Me Tonics to make a body unremember his new friends are wondrous things! There’s no need to tell the world the little we’ve taught him.
Note About the Use of Magic in Spywork
by Master Numair Salmalín, Royal University in Corus
The emphasis in this Guide is on non-magical means of teaching new members of the Royal Tortallan Shadow Service their jobs, even though it does touch on magic in spywork and the use of spelled devices. The reason for that is because I spent years on the run from then Carthaki Emperor Mage Ozorne, and I learned the hard way that using magic when people are looking for you is a bad idea. Active magic is easy for anyone with the Gift or Sight, or using magic-detection devices like we give Hostlers, to see. Passive magic, as used in spy hole spells or forget-me suits, can still be sensed by anyone possessing powerful enough Sight, or with magic-detection devices.
Also, don’t think you can just magic your way out of trouble if detected. I am judged to be a powerful mage, but I can be defeated by a hedgewitch if my attention’s diverted, I’ve used up my Gift, or I’m exhausted. Also, all my power doesn’t stop an enemy without the Gift from clouting me
on the head, drugging my drink, or knifing me if I’m not careful.
If you believe one of your “Nurselings” possesses the Gift or Sight, or even the extremely rare “wild magic” as my wife, the Wildmage, has, inform the Chief of Nursemaids or me personally so we can test them, then train them to be Mage-Spies accordingly.
Compiled by Scribe Harvest Spider in Rachia
November 14, 439
To Myles Olau
By way of Honus Windfeld, innkeeper
The Wandering Bard, Berat in Maren
A gathering of information with regard to Princess Thayet jian Wilima of Sarain and her guard, the K’mir Buriram Tourakom, at your request, information taken from a number of K’mir, Saren, mixed-bloods, and outlanders
Princess Thayet jian Wilima, former heiress of Sarain
-Adigun jin Wilima, father, King of Sarain, deceased 439
-Kalasin of the K’miri Hau Ma, mother, deceased by suicide, May 3rd, 438
-Thayet, born August 8th, 421 H.E., only issue of marriage of Adigun jin Wilima and Kalasin
Princess Thayet, as heir to the throne, was given a proper Eastern lady’s instruction by tutors chosen by her father, including etiquette, dancing, management of a Great House, accounting, history, languages (Common, K’miri dialects, trade talk in the Roof of the World, Carthaki), horseback riding in the Imperial style, hunting with falcons and bows. News from K’mir tradesmen and wandering peddlers reveals that the queen also arranged for the princess, required by the royal wedding treaty to spend three summer months with the queen’s people, to learn riding in the K’miri style, combat with sword and dagger, care for horses, forest and plains hunting without royal retainers, tracking, and wilderness cookery.
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