It’s one thing to learn how to curtsey properly, and another thing to learn how to throw a dagger while curtsying properly. Welcome to the Institute of Excellence. Sophronia, at fourteen years old, was an outright scourge of her mother’s existence: after all, it’s much more interesting to disassemble clockwork mechanisms and climb trees than adhere to etiquette during tea drinking. And, God, protect anyone who ever saw her ugly curtsy. Mrs. Rag-devil no longer expected that her daughter would become a real lady, so she decided to send her to Mademoiselle Geraldine’s Institute for the Perfection of Noble Maidens. It is unlikely that Sophronia and her mother knew that at that school, resourceful young maidens were honed to a different kind of perfection. Of course, at Mademoiselle Geraldine’s institution, pupils were taught the art of dance, elegant dressing and etiquette. But the young ladies were also improved in other skills: the art of death, deception, espionage and the use of modern weapons. And so it turned out that Sophronia and her friends had an amazing first year of school.