Find the man.

[Duquesne]

"What do you know about a man named Walhem Domenic?"

A wheel drops into a rut, tugging the vehicle to the side as it rolls down the road toward town. Shod hooves clatter, harnesses jingle as these related steeds trot their pace, blowing steam into the night air. On the bench, the driver is bundled and gloved, half-illumined in the glow of carriage lamps. And inside the carriage's warm interior, Syl Duquesne sits across from a man in travel weary garb. The stranger cannot be characterized as poor based on this, however, simply beset with a need for haste. "He was tried for treason and imprisoned years ago," the stranger replies from memory. "I know he was a man of moderate repute, average, hard-working by all accounts. A wife and family, a business of his own."

"The case against him was irrefutable," Duquesne says in a mild tone, gazing at the weary stranger beneath his tilted hat brim. The heir is calm in the moment, a thing of blackness and leather and tailored lines. This stranger cannot help but feel the weight of his very stare.

"Irrefutable," the stranger replies, "but the ruling went opposed for years. Many claimed there was mischief involved. A strand of lies and deceit all working together to condemn him."

"This man, he lost everything as a result, true?"

"Yes, sir. If he is still alive, his skin and bones are his only possession in this world."

Syl's eyes transfer toward the veiled windows beside him as the lights of the Dagger enter that field of vision and he studies the establishment in thoughtful silence, calculating the measure and tone of his next words before speaking them: "Do you know what it feels like to lose everything, Mr. Conor?"

"... no, sir," Conor replies uneasily, glancing out the windows to see just what the affluent man across from him was seeing. He takes little note of the tavern, though registers that his conference with the young lord is ending. His attention returns to Duquesne. "I can't say I do."

"Imagine the feeling of solid earth beneath you giving way to an abysmal blackness, a void which no amount of time or solace could possibly fill again. Imagine," he adds slowly, evincing that low tone characteristic of someone who -understands- precisely what they say, "every familiar and cherished thing robbed of you, thieved by men you never met." Syl turns his head and looks at Conor, although the other man cannot exactly say that he can see those green eyes beneath that brim--they are indeed lost in its shadow. All he may stare upon is the speaking mouth, painting a hypnotic picture of devastation. Conor shudders invisibly.

"And you cannot die, can you. Oh, but you -want- to as you suffer the numbing boredom, cold and miserable stench, day after day of life in a space barely large enough to house you, hardly fit for dogs. You sit idle in your own raw filth and wait for the sickness in the cells around you to claim you... but it never does." Conor lowers his eyes, listening to that slightly rasped voice, that hypnotic voice which speaks -too- well. He is gripped by those words, those mental images.

"You have lost track of time, unable to determine how long you have been where you are, atrophying in every possible way. Your beard grows long and peppered like an old man's. Lice thrive upon you, tickling your flesh. You exist. With the knowledge that you never broke a law in your life."

The carriage has turned, drawn nigh the Dagger and its stables in which a beast is housed, being fed and watered by the stable boy at hand. Conor's horse. He looks solemnly out the windows at the stable, then looks across to meet Duquesne's eyes which are now visible, so very green, so very commanding. "Do you know what that does to a man?"

"No, sir," Conor whispers, his mouth a little dry. Duquesne nods slowly, reaching across himself to grip his cane and draw it to his other side, just as he leans forward a mere few inches to say: "It makes a man hard inside, Conor; it makes him a killer. Find Walhem Domenic's prison. If he is alive, bring him to me."

[Duquesne]

A knock arrives on this broad mahogany door, knuckles to its smooth and aged near-black stain. There is silence in the wake of this questioning noise, for enough seconds that the hand lifts again and prepares for a second round of raps. But in that moment, a voice from inside commands: "It is open."

The brass handles of these double-doors are gripped and turned, pressed inward and admitting an assistant of immeasurable worth. Colfax turns toward the doors, pressing them closed with hardly a noise, and turns toward the body of the room again. In seconds, his brown eyes claim an assessment of the chamber, otherwise referred to as the 'library of lords'--the epithet itself representing too many books to count, from floor to ceiling on all four walls. A fire is burning inside a hearth of dark marble, its carved mantle glossed for the polishings of servants' rags over decades. There are chairs near there, each large enough for two, and a rug is spread there upon the floor, its fur so thick one could lose their feet inside. But neither is occupied, nor is the sofa beneath windows and their drawn drapes, nor even the broad and near-black table in the middle of the room, crowded with parchments, tomes, ledgers and scrolls. Illumining it all, candles gutter in clusters of sticks and drip tears of wax.

Colfax moves into the center of the room, a crumpled page crinkling under his boot-toe, enough of a noise to cause him to look down and notice there are many other such crumpled papers on the floor. "You called for me, sir?"

"I most certainly did," comes this rasped voice, charged with conviction... from above eye-level. Colfax turns somewhat, looking upward and finding Syl on the sliding ladder, leaning against a high rung with his hip and thigh, and balancing a gnarly old tome opened on his left forearm. The pages in his fingers seem brittle, ready to disintegrate with the most minor abuse. Colfax turns toward the heir more fully, folding his hands behind his back and awaiting the man's wishes. It is nearly a full minute before Syl chooses to utter his thoughts.

"Do you recall the surgeon you suggested I visit once?"

"Of course, sir," Colfax replies, observing the heir at his elevated location and taking particular note of the displeased elements sitting visibly at the edges of his mouth. "Doctor Pearce."

"Hm, Pearce. That is the one."

"Are you reconsidering the procedure, sir?" Colfax asks neutrally, but with secret hope supplied his phrasing. He stares upward at his employer with inadvertently questioning eyes. And he is rewarded with a derisive scowl.

"Not in the slightest. I have no desire to be cut open again, only to have them explain what went -wrong- or why they can do nothing for me, then endure recovery. No." Why mend the walls when it is the foundation that crumbles? He closes the book with a somewhat resonant thud and Colfax swears he sees those pages sneeze a little dust. "I need information from him."

"Sir?"

"If you recall, he and his wife attended the summits in Palzury last April." Syl slides his hand into the book's vacant space on the shelf, pressing others into their places before coaxing the book into its own. "You know, my -sensitive- hearing--"

"Keenly, sir."

"--enabled me to listen to the man's conversation. I was of course not trying to do this--"

"Of course not."

"--but things happen over which we have no control.

"He spoke of a procedure he had performed upon a man to correct a spinal problem," the heir explains, while carefully descending this sliding ladder one rung by one cautious rung. Let no disabled knee bar him from his books. "And he described this fellow as having various deformities already, one being a hand with truncated digits and the other a smaller foot with a dramatic twist in the ankle."

For Colfax, the pieces come together and he now finally comprehends the heir's train of thought. "The footprints. The irregular prints they found in the blood."

"Yes," Syl expresses most slowly, with a tone to compliment the realization: now you see my meaning, don't you. "Doctor Pearce had never seen such a thing, he said, in all his experience, and I have a suspicion that our prints match the man with the dramatic twist."

"How did you remember?" Colfax asks, shaking his head, turning to keep the heir in his sights as the man limps with his cane, making a return to his work-littered table. "How--"

"--did I make the connection?" The heir offers his assistant a low look of secrecy and grim little smile. "You shouldn't ask, my friend. You would surely rue the knowledge." Syl arrives at his table and slows there, observing its organized chaos with musing eyes now and his features seem in the moment to tighten down, to draw upon some careful focus lurking always inside him. This is a look with which Colfax is very familiar and he waits now for his orders. "Pay him a visit and see what information you may glean. He will of course resist, being as professional as he seemed to be. But I have confidence in your ability to convince him it is in his best interests to cooperate. You may leave as soon as you are ready. And wear your uniform; it intimidates people."

[Duquesne]

Morning and silence among these large rooms, rooms with high crown-ceilings, rooms with broad windows and thick drapes drawn aside. Fires burn in hearths to combat morning cold and their orange light is compromised by the push of sunlight through chill panes. And through the glass of these many windows, eyes open for daylight hours, there is such a view.

A sprawling expanse of lawn betrays old snow slowly melting, heaped in banks beneath the blue shades of tremendous trees, leafless monsters with far-reaching limbs and evergreens which keep their color. Grass offers hope, turning green beneath the brown as the weather betrays ideas of warm and wet days. And then the land falls away, descending into some narrow valley with steep grassy slopes and a network of small glass lakes on which winter birds land and from which they take flight again rhythms. Flocks of sheep dot these hillsides, white shapes ever-moving to the guidance of stomachs and assiduous sheep dogs always on guard. Clusters of horses loiter at a lakeshore, dark and dignified figures against the bright reflection of water. And though he is watching these things, his mind is not upon them. Though steam curls from his mouth to evince the temperature of morning, he does not notice this creeping cold.

An old fellow in trim coat-tails and a neck-tie never out of place enters his master's rooms, searching, casting his old eyes here and there beneath long and wirey white eyebrows. He holds a plate with two letters set upon it, ones in need of imminent delivery. Just when he is ready to give up on every finding the 'boy', that boy is spotted outside and Archibalde shakes his head in private frustration. "My lord," he says, stepping out onto this semi-circular terrace, "you will find an early grave if you do not take advice to heart."

Syl turns his head somewhat, sinking a cheek into a tousle of gray collar-fur and gazing sidelong at the elderly servant--a man who outlived Syl's grandfather and stayed on to serve the grandson though he had rights to retire. Ideas of questions with one-worded answers begin to separate, allowing other thoughts to emerge as the young man inhales carefully and exhales just as slow, turning away from the rail and moving to approach Archibalde. "Death is inevitable, is it not?"

"Aye. But there's no sense in rushing to meet it. I am sure you will get many thanks for listening to your physician, sir, rather than defying him every chance you may."

"If I heeded him on every point," the heir reminds, stepping inside after holding the door for the old man, "nothing would be done and the world would be in ruins."

Archibalde chuckles a frail chuckle and shuffles to the young lord's drafting table, depositing the two letters onto it and then tucking the plate under his arm afterward. "You will not mind my saying it, Lord Duquesne--this is why the gods created Delegation."

The heir quietly laughs as he turns, gripping his cane tightly as he presses the door closed by its latch, sealing the brisk morning from the room. "And let me not forget it. What have you there?" he asks, nodding toward the two letters on the edge of the table beside the old man's hip.

"Those, sir, have just arrived from Stockton." And there develops a silence afterward, one in which Archibalde is not in the least bit uncomfortable. He had served this boy's grandfather before him and knew the family's patterns of thought.

Syl lowers his chin grimly, pursuing the appearance of those letters with sapient eyes, as if their parchment were transparent and their words clearly read from here. He says nothing in reply for a lengthy moment, then straightens in degrees, regripping his cane, committing himself to movement. "I am expecting a guest within the next few weeks, Archibalde. See to the preparation of a room in this wing. And... send me the chief gardner at some point today. There is something I wish to ask him about the north garden."

Archibalde's white eyebrows rise discreetly and he offers the young man a slow nod, a knowing and rather sympathetic expression crossing his wrinkled and kind face--the north garden was rarely discussed. "It will be done, sir." And knowing he is free to go, he turns and carries himself at his elderly rate toward the doors, out them eventually into the hall.

Syl listens for the click of those brass door-handles before he reaches down to touch the letters, drawing the topmost one aside to inspect what lies beneath. And he takes a cautious breath, closing his eyes and lowering his head--was it the sight of that handwriting that made his heart to pound? He moves his hand back, gripping the edge of the table as the back of his knee touches the edge of a chair and he sinks into it tiredly, letting his cane support his gripping hand. The morning had begun so well, but he could not help think it was about to take a grave turn.

[Duquesne]

"Martin is returning to Palzury," he says, dipping his quill into an ink pot and loosening the excess at the rim before finishing a few lines of scrawl on this sheet of parchment. "Time is running short on this little affair, so waste no time. I am instructing Farazh to reply with immediacy, so you should expect to be gone no less than three to four days."

"And the supply posts?"

"Fully equipped. Fresh horses, food, supplies..." and the heir completes his lines, then redips his quill specifically for the signing of the letter. Afterward, he applies sand to absorb the wet, taps it into a dish, then commences folding the letter. "Medical supplies, should you find yourself in need of treatment.

"Be cautious, lieutenant. It is imperative that I get an answer soon, lest all that we've striven for be undone with a single well-placed blow. Our parliament grows restless for answers and I dare not test their patience much longer."

"They are eager for action, it is true, being men with visible power."

"Yes," Syl replies slowly, tilting a candle to drip dark wax onto the letter's seam, with a personal stamp pressed into it a moment later, "and that is a misfortune as much as it is a benefit. Haste has always been the downfall of men and the members of our government are not exempt from such a mortal shortcoming."

"You will succeed in this, sir. I am confident of that, as I have never served a more capable soul."

The comment lures Syl's attention and he takes a moment to regard the officer standing so formally beside his table. The man is not in uniform, but the spirit of his soldiery is all about him, worn even in the absence of insignia. "That is high praise, sir; you have my gratitude. And I hope you are right in your judgement." He lifts the sealed letter and offers it to the other man's gloved hand. "If not, then I will have failed in preventing a war of epic measure... and the gods help me then--I'll know the inside of a prison cell before the end of my days."

[Duquesne]

Meet him at the gate in one half hour, it was said, an instruction given by Archibalde's tottering voice. The chief gardener was early to such an appointment, for it was rare that the lord of the estate should ask to speak with him on any account--the man was not often to be seen roaming his extensive grounds, let alone in such cold days as these. So he rubs his gloved hands to stimulate warmth in those digits and huffs steam against a cold morning wind, which swirls 'round him in whistling snatches. Down over a cold barrier of an ivy-covered wall, down from among the vague spring-buds of trees' fingertips, down over everything this cold wind roves.

Somewhere behind him, a discreet chiming is music on the wind, drown out by it when gusts are broad and teased with it when they are small. This is a chime the chief gardener had heard before, had been hearing since he began work here four years previous. But never in all that time had the north garden been open to anyone's use, never had it been open even for maintenance. The man can only imagine what lies beyond those high stone walls and he feels a little urgency, a little private exhiliration because Duquesne was coming to meet him, hopefully carrying keys to that carved iron-bound gate. The mystery of the chimes would perhaps be solved.

The chief gardener piles a hand onto his slouching cap and rights it, squinting under its slight brim and hoping for a little liquor in his tea once he returns to the garden house, a place from which all tools of grounds maintenance are kept, distributed and maintained. Inside, there was a hearth, a few comfortable but beaten chairs and a necessary stash of whiskey. He turns his collar a little higher, eyeing the cobble-path under his boots... and then he glimpses darkness in his periphery. Darkness to which his eyes quickly move.

"Good morning, Mr. Chamberlain," the heir says, establishing gravity simply by his person's very blackness which, in comparison to their surrounds, is a dramatic color. Still, there is, as one swordswoman has recently noted, an element of color added to his wardrobe where formerly there had been only blackness. When first he resided in this place, black was diluted with other shades... but for some time now, he has had cause only to wear the color of mourning.

"Good morning, sir, a pleasant day despite th' wind, eh?"

"Despite the winter in general, Mr. Chamberlain. Give me sweltering days over freezing ones and I shall be content." The heir pauses, gazing at the carved iron-bound gate with solemn eyes. Dark eyes not quite their usual green. And to the gardener's joy, the master of the estate withdraws a ring of keys from inside a coat's inner pocket. "I have a project for you."

One key is isolated, one strange key belonging to a foreign lock, attached to an imported door. And this key is removed from the ring, offered to the curious chief gardener--an exchange is made between fine gloves and battered ones. Chamberlain looks up, only to find the heir's eyes steadfastly afixed to his own. It is an uncomfortable gaze, as the gardener suddenly feels transparent.

"There is much work to be done inside this garden. You are to keep this key on you at all times, never delegating its use to others. You alone will open the gate when work commences and you alone will lock it after work is done. You will select your workers carefully, choosing only the most patient and meticulous among them, and you will not under any circumstances... approach the sepulchre you will find therein. Do you understand?"

Chamberlain occupies some dumb silence for a moment, staring at the lord of the estate first and then at the key which seems heavy all of a sudden. He nods slowly and looks up to meet Duquesne's eyes once again, to show that he does understand every point. Besides, he was sensing this was no circumstance with which to be careless--the man had reason to want this garden sealed shut for so long, also having reason to want it in good condition again after the neglect of years. The heir was no one to trifle with, Chamberlain understood--to displease him was a memorable event. "Yes, sir. I understand, sir."

"Good." Syl inhales slowly and looks up at the gate, critically surveying its structure and the wild vines overwhelming the high stone fence, hearing that quiet chime stimulated by the wind. His mouth firms lightly, though its measure is saddened. "Thank you, Chamberlain. You may begin when you are ready." And he turns slowly, leaning weight heavily into this cane and limping away in silence, a little more ginger in his movement than usual. A little more pale than he had been.

[Duquesne]

"Courtney, I apologize for keeping you waiting. Any word from Conor?" the heir asks upon entering the room, a private sitting room in which Courtney has waited for him to conclude other business before attending this impromptu meeting.

"None whatever," the visitor replies, leaning forward at the edge of his seat to pick up a cup and saucer, "but his task is no easy one. It may be another week before we hear of his progress. The Csarsai have a tendency to isolate their prisons to a dramatic degree. But your man is an adept hunter. Domenic will be found." Courtney looks up above his tea, examining the heir for a moment as he limps toward the hearth and his favored chair there beside it. "You sound anxious. What news did your messenger bring?"

Duquesne sinks into his armchair, grateful for the relief it brings his strained body in the moment. Of course, the pain in his knee would abate only for a few minutes. He makes a low sound in his throat, a murmur of weariness and musing as he props his cane against the edge of his chair's cushion. "Mr. Tambrien has been moving money out of Lanesse for nearly seven months now."

Courtney raises his brows a small degree, an action of some measure of surprise. "That is news. Out of the country and to where?"

"Our geographic neighbors, my friend. Transactions have been traced to two Nnurian cities: Tynka and Bursede. Tambrien has evidently used a different proxy for each transfer, effectively keeping his antics beneath notice and making them nearly impossible to detect."

"How were you able to detect them, then, if he covered his tracks so well?" Courtney takes a drink from his cup, squinting a hair against the heat of the tea.

"I've the right people in the right places, I suppose," Syl replies evasively, offering his friend a discreet smile, causing Courtney to shake his head and lean back into the cushion of his chair.

"Fine, fine," the visitor says, waving a hand dismissively in the heir's direction. "I should learn never to ask, correct? You and your shady methods and secretive smiles. Anyway, go on. There's got to be more."

"There is," the heir says, leaning forward in his seat to reach for a box on the low table between himself and his friend. The lid, inset with abalone, is lifted and a pipe with a pearly stem removed. He goes about musingly preparing it for a smoke, while Courtney looks on with remote interest. He had watched Sylvius Duquesne do this a hundred times and every time he had to remark the thoughtfulness with which the man packed his leaf. Syl continues meanwhile: "The money has gone into the treasury of the Nnurian War Ministry and has been distributed to fund regiments. Intelligence suggests they are equipping themselves for an offensive, Courtney. They are gearing for war."

There is a moment of silence in which Courtney stares grimly at his friend, who is lighting his pipe now, tugging the flame into that packed leaf and emitting a rouse of ghostly smoke into the atmosphere above him. "Tambrien cannot be the only one directing money into Nnuria. There have got to be other suppliers."

"Oh, I have no doubt," Syl agrees, shaking the flame from the end of his lighting stick and looking across at Courtney as he lowers his pipe, resting his arm for a moment on the arm of his chair. "I have people working on that as we speak. Tambrien was careful, but he may be rare in that respect. His social and political counterparts are not known for their crucial wit as far as secrecy goes. Much will be uncovered in the coming week, I'm sure."

"Truly," Courtney murmurs and pulls in a deep, steadying breath, leaning his brow for a moment into his fingers. "Then it is true, that we may not trust anyone in parliament. Gods, we are to be destroyed from within our own ranks. When had such corruption entered the House, that we should find ourselves faced with a self-funded foreign invasion?"

Syl contemplates the question, knowing the answer readily but choosing to allow seconds to pass while his pearl pipe-stem haunts the edge of his mouth. Green eyes lower into middle-space between himself and the hearth's edge, where orange light flickers on a traditional carpet which had belonged to his grandfather's mother. "Corruption entered the House when our grandfathers died, Courtney. When their nobler convictions, conscientious hearts, and selfless minds seemingly shared the grave with them. It entered the House when Prurian Gable took the Seat as speaker and when he unthinkingly appointed Edmund Reule as chief council."

"-Reule-. A viper cleverly disguised as man."

"Yes," the heir whispers in something akin to a hiss, eyes narrowing as his attention diverts and refocuses on Courtney through a vague haze of pipe smoke. "Mark me, Courtney; I will see him brought low in this. I will see him dead."

[Duquesne]

"I confess, he is in finer condition than I expected, considering where he was being confined." This is the heir's personal physician, a man of five and thirty years and a long history of expertise. He is Grosvenor and he speaks in a murmur, standing with the heir at the edge of a bedroom. "Somehow, he has gotten away with -some- nutrition over the years, but there is a poorly healed break in the left humerus above the elbow over which I am concerned."

"Will it pose a problem for him?" the heir asks lowly, gazing in silence at the deeply sleeping figure on the canopied bed. A nursemaid in the doctor's service tends to the changing of bandages, for Walhem Domenic had arrived with infected lacerations on his arms--the most recent bit of torture.

"It could. Right now, it is the least of your worries. His organs have been strained and it shall take some time to revive them. Otherwise, I give him good chances long-term." Grosvenor turns a musing eye upon his employer. His patient. The pale aspect of the man's features do not escape his critical attention. "When was the last time you slept, my Lord?"

"A few hours yesterday. It was not to be had in full."

"Did you try the tincture?"

A silence. The heir turns somewhat, drawing his attention from the supine figure of Domenic and placing it upon the doctor. "No, in all truth, I did not. There were issues which..." he trails away.

Grosvenor clears his throat and looks down, musing on the matter of his patient's health for a few seconds before looking up and commenting: "You will not heal if you continue thus, sir. I am unsure you aware of the dangers of pressing too hard for too long."

"Heal, you say," Syl replies with a cool edge thrust into his tone, green eyes hard upon the physician. "You may choose a better word, sir, one with more truth. Lies do not become your profession." He purses his mouth carefully, exercising restraint in the moment as he could sense he was close to speaking things he should not. Grosvenor was a friend and concerned with his welfare. It was unjust to chastise. "I apologize. It has been a long day."

"Indeed," Grosvenor says with discretion, observing the heir with a distant set of eyes, ponderous ones. "Still, I urge you to medicate yourself soon and sleep. You will do no one any favors if you cannot execute your duties. Excuse me, sir." And he bows his head in deference to the man, then turns and steps away to return to the bedside of his more immediate patient.

Syl breathes and sighs a moment later, turning himself now to vacate the room. The corridor is empty when he takes it, closes the door behind him and walks out into its lamp-lit width. The evening had come on, reducing the light herein dramatically, as now no sun could pierce the glass star-vaults in the ceiling above him. For a moment, he listens to the silence of this place and despises it. With a bitterness in his mouth, indeed in his mind, he returns to the library of lords. But he is intercepted en route by Conor, who wears such a look that Syl cannot turn him away. "It concerns Lord Courtney, sir. It's important."

"What is it?" he asks once in the confines of the study, door firmly shut against the corridor outside. Conor takes a steadying breath and looks across at the man from whom he takes orders, takes a slow step forward as he searches for words by which to inform the lord of such developments. "Sir... he has defected. Sought immunity from the Nnurian government. He left Provincta this morning and crossed the border with his family. Agent Sceale confirmed the reports himself. He is on his way here to debrief you."

A long pause ensues. A long and dire moment in which senses of reality sway, lurching like a maddened sea. The heir stares blankly ahead, unmoving until a hand slowly lowers to the edge of the table for the sake of steadiness. "What is--" his voice affects a minor break, a roughened quality accenting its already rasped sound. He must start again. "When is Sceale's estimated arrival?"

"Two, perhaps three days. He rides by way of Cauld and will take a ship from the Bay of Storms."

The heir nods slowly in acknowledgement, a mechanical and hollow gesture. "Thank you, Agent Conor. You may go."

"Sir." And Conor draws into a seasoned salute, then returns to the doors, stepping out and leaving Syl with himself and this cruel news. This betrayal of the worst measure. Lids lower slowly, blocking out the fire-lit room as a stealthy crushing enters him. Hindering his breaths, weakening his resolve. He is suddenly alone with a vast burden and it terrifies him.

[Duquesne]

"Domenic is awake."

The doctor's voice stirs into the room like a vapor, so calm and so quietly made is it, a voice designed in the moment not to disturb that one whose ears should benefit from his confession. His eyes move to survey the room, one of the heir's network of private chambers, this one being a day room attached to his bedchamber. The mighty windows are closed for the night, their drapes drawn tight, and a fire in its place crackles to defend bones against low mansion temperatures. The smoke from the heir's pipe betrays his location, a sofa whose back protects the sight of him from the doctor's knowing eyes. One hand and a pipe emerge in a beckoning gesture. "Come, sit for a moment. I have a question."

Grosvenor lowers his chin a single, calculated degree and moves forward, crossing the wood and carpeted floor to 'round the couch, putting Syl finally into his view. And the man settles on the edge of an armchair's cushion, gazing across the space toward his patient's expression. A wine goblet is empty beside an empty wine -bottle-, both resting on the floor beside the sofa. This speaks volumes to the physician, who was able to read Syl's suffering even from a distance.

"This question was put to me, now I put it to you," the heir says, hoodedly eyeing his physician before tilting the ivory stem of his pipe inside the corner of his mouth, pulling slow and musing puffs. Smoke will drift from around his lips to accompany the Question, wrapped in a series of smaller ones: "Would you guard your mind or your body, sir? Which is the more vital of the two?"

Grosvenor makes a sound in his throat, leaning back into the comfortable embrace of the chair. "You're on one of your philosophical tangents again."

"No, I am drunk, sir. There is a difference between these two manias."

The doctor's features split into a laugh and tilts his head into his fingers, rubbing his brow to sooth levels of weariness accumulated there. "Neither is more vital than the other, Sylvius."

The heir frowns slowly and holds his pipe away, squinting at the other man with some elements of disturbance. "Qualify that."

"The two cannot be considered separately. They are not apart, but are -part- of one another. They provide balance. Is it more important to Reason or to Act? Is one able to be done independently of the other, in all truth? for isn't an act the result of thought, however basic a thought that may be?" The doctor muses for some moments, considering the dim expression of his patient, knowing the man was in pain and not simply in his knee. He had suffered a tremendous blow--a close friend had betrayed him bitterly. "Acting without thought is possible, but we call it something--"

"We call it Insanity, sir! in all its numerous forms. We call it Impulse."

"Right you are."

"Sharp as a tack, doctor," and yet as amused as the heir's features had become, they sink slowly into a nest of solemnity, of realization for the hundredth time. A re-acquaintance with reality. The ivory pipe stem returns gradually to his mouth, while the doctor watches a crease disturb the younger man's brow.

"You are pale. How do you feel?"

"I am tired and miserable as I have never been. Perhaps tomorrow you may cut off my leg above the knee and my head above the neck."

"That talk of dismemberments again. I recommend you sleep, my lord," the doctor says, leaning forward and rising up from his chair to cross toward a hutch. Its doors are opened and from its contents a tincture is made, one the man put together himself to treat the heir's struggling condition. "Drink this." He hands the glass down to Syl, who leans up on an elbow and takes the cup, downing its contents with a minor grimace.

"I will speak with Domenic in the morning. I saw recognition in his eyes before and I mean to question that. I think he knows me."

"He knows you, sir," Grosvenor replies easily in confirmation, turning now to cross the room toward the double-doors leading out. "Think no more on it, nor on anything else. Sleep. Tomorrow is a new day."

[Duquesne]

The atmosphere of the room is close, dim and confining despite the height of the ceiling, the breadth of the walls. It is a room defined by an element of desert culture, a foreign appeal addressed in the details. There is a scent here of burning spice, but also the scents of injury, of sickness, and of treatments.

Walhem Domenic occupies this bed, overarched by a traditional canopy of veils. Lamp-glow adorns his resting features, ones neither old nor young but settled somewhere between. Facial scruff has been shaved away, long matted locks short-cropped. This is an average face made distinct by the suffering of years. And it is a face carefully observed by the man's benefactor, a possessor of epic patience.

But by and by, this once-prisoner will change his breathing to signal a gradual return to wakefulness. He will sigh slow and turn his head, will sense eventually that he is not alone in the room and open his eyes to the strange comforts of this place. The room's now-familiar details are not all that his blue eyes encompass, however, for there is a figure to be observed. The first impulse is a spike of wondering in the mind, a lifted pulse rate in the wake of semi-recognition. Domenic blinks slowly to clear his vision, here proving his alert condition when he asks: "Where am I?"

"Myrken Wood. At a place called Aithne," speaks this rasped voice, quieted for the sake of the ailing Domenic, "and you are far from where you once were."

The weakened man swallows somewhat against a vaguely dry throat, still tasting an essence of the last medicines he was made to swallow. He blinks again, straining to discern the features of the one with whom he speaks. And the heir will draw nearer, taking slow steps to bring himself more into the light of the lamp on the bedside table. Beneath his hand, the opal cane-grip will burn with that light and the once-prisoner's eyes will be drawn to that sphere, then drawn once more to the man's face.

"Do you know me, sir," Syl will inquire, lowering his chin even as he lowers himself onto a chair's edge, regarding the patient will careful attention. And the patient will seem to relax, though will not be distracted from studying the other man's visage.

"Yes," Domenic whispers, nodding faintly, "You were at Thryferu. Yours was the cell across from mine. I... remember you sang in the darkness, in the language of the Qalor. I remember hearing you pacing." His eyes lower to the cane balanced under the heir's left hand, studying it closely because it was not familiar. At Thryferu, the man was not allowed anything to support him, only the wall against which to brace. Domenic's eyes return to Duquesne's. "I saw you at my trial."

"I was there."

"... you sat beside Lord Marshall Farazh."

"What else do you remember of the prison," the heir coaches quietly, with this tone and honest manner of speaking for which anyone might be lured to confess their closest secrets.

Domenic is tempted; Domenic gives in. "Men came, in the dark. Th-they were clothed like phantoms." And his voice is hushed now, his blue eyes focused anxiously on the man. "There was an explosion. When the dust cleared... your cell was empty. The corridor was empty. It was just in the same way I was..." and realization slowly takes hold... "broken free." He stares at the heir with a quickening gaze, a breath hitching in his throat in awareness. "You are a Watcher... what do you want with me?"

[Duquesne]

"I did not kill my family," the once-prisoner murmurs, staring distantly through sun-filled windows, "I could not do such a thing."

"No one believed that you did, not even those who testified. It was intimidation which had them lie, Domenic. It was the money."

Walhem's blue eyes turn in the heir's direction, that he might study the other man and wonder of these things. In spite of himself, he found truth in the patterns of the heir's voice and in the constancy of his demeanor. In the end, Walhem believed he was speaking right and so he nods, lowering his eyes toward his lap, then once more out the windows near which they sit.

"You were an example, a demonstration that your prosecutors had the authority to act in their own interests. Your trial and consequent conviction were designed from the very beginning to be messages of warning to the rest of your class: what happened to you could happen to anyone."

"But why me?"

And here is a question which deserves a carefully sculpted answer, for here they may delve into darker matters. Syl breathes in slowly and sinks back into the cushions of his seat, pulling the edges of his coats 'round him and musing as his chin sinks somewhat into tufted black collar-fleece. "They isolated you for one reason and one reason only: you were the husband of a woman who knew too much. Had seen something she should not have seen."

Domenic's brows knit together and he looks up, offering the heir a rather confused and anxious expression. "What... what do you mean by that?"

"Two days before she was killed," the heir replies carefully, watching the ex-prisoner, "your wife stumbled upon a crime. She saw a man executed in an alley not far from your home. Not only had she recognized the victim, she also recognized the killers... and she was not alone, your son was also with her."

"How do you know this?" the ex-prisoner asks, anguished.

The question goes unanswered. "They were followed home, identified and watched. Simultaneously, you lost money in a contract that went foul and to soften the fact, you plied yourself with liquor and, out of your wits, started a brawl in the street outside your tavern. You stumbled home to sleep."

Domenic's head is low, eyes away. But he listens because he hears justice in the other man's tone, hears an element of defense. Syl continues: "You awoke that morning to find them dead and no memory to convince yourself it wasn't by your hand."

"And They seized the opportunity," Domenic whispers with a tremble in his throat, and looks up again to judge his benefactor's features. He will find Sylvius watching him, contemplative and solemn. "I hoped to die in my cell, Duquesne."

"I know."

"You felt the same?"

"Yes, I did feel it," utters the heir, lifting vivid eyes to sunlight as he stares out the windows at hand, "and yet there was one sole matter keeping me living for the moment, for the hour, for the next day and the day after, and that was vengeance."

"Vengeance..."

"Vengeance. To repay the pain inflicted, to avenge the deaths of loved ones and to do so with wisdom and calculation."

There is a long and cautious silence, in which one man waits while the other absorbs what was said. Domenic is statuesque, his blue eyes firm and fixed upon the man responsible for his release from years of dark and cold desperation. And discreetly, he leans forward to whisper: "I want to hear more."

[Duquesne]

A piece of paper is slid across the glossed dark surface of this broad table. "This is the location Pearce gave as to his whereabouts," Colfax says, leaning back afterward and resting his elbows on his chair's arms. "I have sent people to verify it, but it is conceivable the Foot gave false information."

"Probable is more likely," the heir murmurs, perusing the information on the paper for a moment before looking across at the man sitting adjacent to his position. "The farther we follow him, the more complex his methods of disguise seem to be. I am beginning to wonder if the man is simply mythical. A figment."

Colfax's raises his brows, frowning a little in contemplation, as if this could actually be possible. And then he pushes a sigh, leaning his head toward a hand in order to scratch the back of his head. "Stranger things have happened, sir. Perhaps we might have more success if we incorporate that potential into our search."

Syl leans back in his seat, slouching down somewhat and affecting a somewhat terrible posture in the moment--not an uncommon practice, in actuality. The man preferred to be comfortable. And he is offering his assistant a half-grin, stabbing a brief finger in his direction. "That is not, by any means, a bad idea. We will do a test, you see. Add ghosts' antics to your list of criteria and perhaps we shall find ourselves steps closer to... resolution." With this last word, his humor begins to fade and the two men sit together in ruminative silence, while the lettered spines of numerous books gaze down on them from high shelves, up at them from low shelves. Like a thousand souls all watching, all waiting, all wondering what comes next.

"Has Lieutenant Marsch returned yet?" Colfax asks, softening the sudden loudness of the room's silence. The heir shakes his head somewhat, a slight knit forming between brows. "No, and no word. He may have encountered poor weather...."

"And Domenic? Have you spoken to him of your scheme?"

"Mn, I have prepped him for it but have yet to present him with the facts," Syl replies, seeming virtually to sink in among the fur-lined depths of blackish garments, feeling cold. "I believe he needs a little more time to recover physical strength, that his mind might fuction more clearly."

"Think you he will accept the offer?" The assistant pushes back his chair, leaning forward and levering himself out, collecting his goblet on the way past the table. A tilt of this vessel wordlessly inquires after the heir's own wish for more drink, but the man makes a brief gesture in the negative and Colfax resumes his path to a side-table on which refreshment had been much earlier arranged.

"One must always allow for the unknown," Syl says slowly, a turn of contemplation in this rasped voice, this word-vessel painted elusively with accent. "But if my intuition is any judge, he will accept. Out of a sense of indebtedness, out of a need for occupation. It appeals to Domenic to become a member of the defense of the Greater Good." A faint smile rouses at these mouth-corners and dark eyes, green eyes turn toward Colfax. "That is the very need that brought you and I and every other man and woman in this organization to where we now stand. Commited to the end."

"Here is to that need," the assistant offers, raising his cup a bit and drinking thereafter as he detours a few feet to occupy hearth-space, warming himself a little even as the wine warms his insides. "And also to the Genuine, those who run forward no matter the cost."

Syl smiles faintly, a solemn effort of this mouth and matched by the slightly darkened cast of the eyes. He nods, breathes in after a moment and grips his chair's arms, leaning forward from his slouched posture and pushing himself to stand. The cane is gripped where it stood leaning against the table's edge and the man presses his shoulder-weight into its support, limping forward to join Colfax at the fire. "May fate be kind to him if kindness is what Courtney truly deserves," he says lowly, but adding with discreet solemnity: "and may fate also see him gone from our midst forever."

[Duquesne]

Dusk has made long lines of shadows over Aithne, painted its grounds with strange half-light and fading colors. There is a gloom among old trees, with a density in the air 'round and among their trunks and their slightly budding branches. Here among these, birds sit in repose, hunkered into feathers to defy the cold wind coming down over the Sikasoons. Old grass still heavy and bent from winter snows tosses on the slopes, whirls through the bare limbs of trees and shrubs. Groups of horses in these wide pastures turn their tails to the wind and graze in the increasing evening, while beyond them these small network of lakes ripple endlessly, pushed by the currents in the air. Clinging to the last film of light in the sky.

The master of the place is restless, drawn out into the bitter wind, compelled along a cobbled path. The wind is with him, crafting a torment into the heavy cloth of his coats. Layers churn, separating and responding to the thrust of these gusts, then sinking to haunt boot-heels and shroud him again. It is an endless cycle of motion, while the man himself limps forward, reliant on that cane.

And that wind seems to coach him, encouraging him on, employing its gusts to aid him. Whispers things in his ears, soft things to bait his heart. According to its persisting voice, he walks on... on until his hand pats his pockets for a key, until an imported garden door looms before him in the gloom. He need not find a key for it, however, for the door creaks open a crack when he nears and breath stops in his mouth. A sinister chill caresses his spine and the wind bids him go.

He touches the door, pushing it inward and open and limps slowly forward over the threshold, crossing into a garden that has not entertained him for many years. And the heir, he turns aviseful eyes 'round this place, while the light and errant tones of a chime slither in and out of his hearing, eerily and gently punctuating the atmosphere of this place. He expects to see Chamberlain's efforts of transformation here, searches for those details among the chaos of overgrowth and neglect. But overgrown and neglected this place remains, shockingly pale where trees have died, shockingly dark where shadows hybernate, with no sign of any work done to improve it. His heart is pounding in distress, in grief over the condition of a place once vibrant and bright with life. It is hard to breathe this air beset with the odor of rot, hard to breathe so that he is laboring to do so.

And still those chimes slither, whisper, warn him. A phantom of a voice stirs 'round his ears, a palpable touch caressing his cheek by the cold drift of spectral fingertips. Sylvius... it breathes, with an essence of familiarity amid the alien sound of its otherworldly source. The sounds of the chimes lure green eyes upward, lure them to turn now that he might look down along the garden's central avenue, down among ghostly dead trees toward that structure, that sepulchre looming pale and elegant and sad in the waning day's last illumination. Come.

The path is a danger to him, with its stones jutting at treacherous angles upset by the gnarled antics of old roots and time and harder past winters. His cane skitters, his knee aches in warning. The dead trees quake above him, the creaks of their dead limbs like complaints. Nearer, nearer now to the gradual steps of this sepulchre, its twin doors shut tight against what lies inside. Remember.

There are vines growing where they should not and he reaches out, tearing them away from the edges of the doors, jerking them down as he feels some anger and guilt for the condition of this beloved and frightening place. And he reaches for one steel latch, reaches to grip its ring, and as flesh connects with it and the cold of that metal shocks him, as the door indeed swings wide to admit him... a rush of something meets him on the threshold and it is a terrifying assault of Presence and wind, churning amid his coats. Remember!

And the man finds himself thrust into the dim realities of a room, sitting upright and laboring to breathe as the surreal effects of a dream confuse him. There is a glow from the hearth across from his bed, but it shall provide little warmth to one rousing from such a nightmare as this. So real, so vivid. He sweeps back sheets and coverlets, gripping his throbbing knee and guiding it with the efforts of the rest of his body, that he might leave the bed. An anxious hand finds its way to his cane and he stands, limping across cold flooring to a washbasin.

Its water is bitter and welcome as he uses both hands to cup it, lift it up into his face, rinsing a residue of anxious sweat from this skin. Breaths continue to come shallow and tightened, just as they had in the dream. He grips the edge of the table to support him, feeling weak, feeling water dripping from off still-young features and pieces of blackish hair. The mirror's view will lend the bare and slimly tattooed ridges of his spine as he leans over this water, will lend the impression of quiet strength despite the body's ailment. A film of blood usurps his mouth, drips down into the water in the basin, thicker than that clear substance, and he waits for the rest of that red to rise. Waits for the pain to come after it. His eyes lift gradually toward the mirror, vivid green even in this dim and electric for the heart's suffering. The man remembers.

[Duquesne]

"I think I should warn you," Grosvenor begins, speaking in a murmur to evince his concentration on sound, "Lord Marshall Farazh wrote to me, questioning me about you."

Green eyes lift from under lids three-quarters closed and the heir weighs this information through a long and silent moment, considering the potential point of Farazh's inquiry. For the time being, he says nothing and the doctor continues his auscultation of the heir's breathing, using funnel-like devices connected by flexibe tubing. One end is held against flesh, the other to a knowing ear. The doctor's eyes move to observe his patient's profile, studying the regimented expression contained there, catching sight of a brief flex of that lean jaw. "I had to respond."

"Indeed. The Lord Marshall deserves immediacy." A lengthy silence now, because the doctor was not done with this ritual examination, listening in on these lungs. Grosvenor inhales slowly and sighs, straightening and folding the listening tube among his hands before returning it to its place in his bag. Syl clears his throat quietly, just before shrugging back into garments, a tunic the physical color of wine and a jacket of a brushed black. "Well?" he demands in a quiet way, lifting a brow in questioning the doctor with a sidelong look.

"Still crackling, my friend," the physician replies, head bent over a tablet on which he makes specific notes. It had been his long task to record the man's health, researching both its peculiarities and commonalities, hoping to make a diagnosis. Hoping to cure him. "Fluid in your lungs, but much more than was there mere weeks ago. This is what I wrote to the Lord Marshall, that you push too hard, that you do not follow my directions, that you have, sir, a death wish. I counseled him to relieve you unless he too had a desire to see you in your grave."

Here is a cool gaze given now, as the heir puts his look upon the doctor and skewers him with it, seering him with its fast-moving displeasure. A moment of silence, in which Syl is regulating a wash of angry thoughts and sifting through them for an appropriate answer. His jaw flexes again, a hand closing tight over his cane's opal grip. "I think you must regret, sir doctore, lending the man such critical information. It will be a serious detriment to this work if I am removed from duty."

"It will be a much more serious imposition for you to be dead, Lord Deputy, and many more would agree. As crucial an asset as you are at this point in time, you are far more valuable over years, not months or mere weeks."

The heir, swimming with both the heat of anger and the cold dread of physical pain, rises from his seat and keeps his silence for a measure, staring hard at the older man across from him, a man standing his ground despite the weight of Duquesne's present demeanor, despite the genuine anxiety his look puts into the doctor's gut. He had been too reserved for too long and could no longer acquiese. Syl lowers his chin and takes a small breath just before crafting a response: "We play a dangerous game with dangerous men, doctor. If these plans do not progress as intended, Nnuria will rape and burn everything our people have striven to guard since our freedoms were won. And if those armies march in, there will be irrevocable violence, there will be usurpation of the throne, and there will be death or imprisonment for the likes of me, those who dared to openly oppose the shifts in parliament.

"You have recommended my removal from office, so be it," the heir says, voice lowering from its moments of adamant passion into a more chilling version of this rasped self. "But remember this: if we cannot protect the throne and the royal line is slaughtered, if Nnurian captains and traitorous lords of parliament assume authority, who will they turn their eyes to first for punishment? Those who have been loyal, those who have defied them from the start. You can be assured, sir, that I shall be chief among those; I alone have carried the burden of this investigation since the day royal authority set it upon me. My life is a gamble already."

[Duquesne]

"You do not understand what you have set in motion."

The doctor is motionless, staring forward at his employer with rapt focus and some small measure of dread, no less a defiant streak in his heart on the matter. Could he consent to keeping a man only well enough? Could he consent to sacrifice Syl Duquesne to this cause, no matter how loyal, how patriotic it was? He begins to open his mouth, that he might respond when a knock surfaces on the door and there is a tense ensuing silence in which Syl is tormenting the physician with his gaze and the physician is enduring it. Until: "Come in."

The door opens and Colfax enters a room of insurmountable tension. He looks uncertainly between the two, his eyes finally focusing on Duquesne's posture. He had not seen him thus for some time, but each time it gave him a chill. Syl's hard look turns on Colfax. "What is it?" he commands, a slightly angry edge in his tone. The matter made him angry; pain made his ability to control it lessen further.

"Sir, Agent Sceale has just arrived. He has new information you should hear immediately."

"I will join him shortly," comes the reply, while all the heir desired to do was rest this injured knee, this detriment to his generally calm demeanor. "Find Conor as well. I want him there."

"Yes, sir." And Colfax backs out of the room, closing the door behind him.

Syl Duquesne, charged with a sense of doom and a wash of rapidly distracting pain, will refocus on the doctor and will take a careful breath. "The matter is not yet resolved; we will discuss it later." With that, he turns and limps toward the door, gripping his cane to endure his private agony. There was another matter now to see to and he could surely take steps to safeguard the work he'd done. With the help of his agents, he could surely do this... but even as he enters the corridor and hears the distinct echo of his cane accompanying his steps, he wonders if this is already beyond his control.

[Duquesne]

The library of lords is drowsy with lamp-light and the radiating glow of the hearth, for the sun had not yet risen when the servants tended the room and encouraged its warmth for the coming day, thus the windows and their immense drapes are still closed. In a chamber usually quiet as with the rustle of paper, the scratching of pens, the smooth noise of the ladder rolling on its track, there is now the sound of boot-soles and leather, heavy cloth and the hidden jingle of a little armor. Conor enters last of them all, pulling the twin doors closed firmly behind him and ensuring their lock is tight before moving more deeply into the dim room.

Colfax is balancing on the edge of the table, arms folded and eyes tired from a long night previous and a sleep too early interrupted by necessity. A mug of strong tea is beside him. He looks up somewhat as Conor steps past and reaches for the hand of another man, the newly arrived Sceale. "Kraegan, it's been a long time."

"Far too long," the man says, gripping Conor's hand and nodding once with agreement, though a slight grin creeps onto the edge of his features. "We've got some catching up to do once this is through."

"I certainly hope that excludes your poetry, Sceale," Colfax murmurs wearily, eyeing the two with suspicion. "It is very bad. Your songs, too."

"No reunion is complete without them!"

Colfax groans in dread of what is ahead of them and lowers his head, reaching down to gloomily pick up his mug just as the drapes are assaulted, one edge swept back from window-glass and admitting new morning light. He glances toward them, squinting to find the heir is the author of this development. The other drape is pressed aside, too, and the library's dim composure is now no more but bright with day. Syl begins limping back across the large space toward the others, a slight hardness at the edges of his countenance betraying what pain lies beneath flesh. Having learned to recognize it, the other fellows all know to deal the man a little leniency this day.

"Be sure to make yourself very drunk beforehand, Colfax," he says, aiming for a chair at the table, "and Sceale's verse will not seem so hard on the ears." He offers Kraegan a small grin and lowers into his seat, just as Colfax lowers into his and Conor is following suit. "Now, what is this pressing news, sir?"

Sceale, a man of thirty and a year, and an impressive record of service, pushes a goblet of spiced wine onto the table before this empty chair behind which he stands, and from his other hand he tosses a leather portfolio onto the table's surface. It slides on that black finish, so that the heir's hand comes down upon it to stop its progress in his direction. "That, my lord, is a list names. The most critical, however, is one man. Edmund Reule, our biggest threat."

Syl's eyes rise from off the portfolio and he judges Kraegan's expression carefully for a moment before looking down, opening the leather casing and sliding a thick stack of information from inside.

"We all knew he was a corrupt bastard before, but we didn't know how much. He's been hard to watch."

"Born in Durmi. The man is of Nnurian lineage?"

"Yes," Kraegan confirms, taking his seat, "his great grandfathers were lords and generals in the Occupation. Parts of the family stayed on in Lanesse even after Nnuria withdrew. Reule's family has lived in the Stone District since then, hence the lack of accent. But the man's loyalties are with the land of his forebearers."

"Which means he holds their beliefs as his own, that Provincta is historically and rightfully Nnurian and we are all of us interlopers." Syl folds back a page, exposing the list of names Kraegan had referenced. "And these are?"

"People sympathetic to that belief, both of Lanessian and Nnurian descent. They all of them have either given money, support, or action to what they call the 'Restoration'. Many familiar names on that list, aren't there."

"Disturbingly, yes," Syl looks up, glancing between Conor and Colfax before handing them the sheet. His green eyes return to Kraegan and he regards the agent in silence, then adds: "This is more extensive than we thought."

"It's been an abyss," Kraegan replies, nodding as he leans forward with the creak of boiled leather, leaning a forearm on the table's edge and looking from Syl to Colfax, to Conor while continuing. "The more we probe it, the more secrets come to light, the more snakes slither out. This plot spans years and vast sums of money. People have been killed; people have been paid into silence or service. I don't know how we could have missed the indications, but they're all there. Lanesse is seriously compromised and I'm not sure we have the resources to stop what's coming."

"Have you discussed any of this with Farazh?" Syl asks, leaning into the corner of his chair and resting his elbow there.

"No, I haven't had an opportunity. My priority was to bring you information on Courtney's defection. You'll find disturbing things there, sir. The man was a military liason for fifteen years and he was also spying for Nnuria for half that time... which means that he had almost complete access to Lanessian tactical information."

"He'll have a well-working knowledge of our military functions, strategies, official war plans, records. He'll know the exact numbers of our armies and the district reserves," Conor adds, glancing across the table at Syl. "Not to mention his service to parliament."

"I think it is safe to assume a crisis, sir," Colfax says, looking up from the list of names and indicating them with a gesture of his hand. "These names indicate an extensive network of movement." He looks down at the list. "Brell and Cerian are employed in the Royal Treasury; Talfry and Havelwick have their commissions in the Investigats. They are intelligence officers, for gods' sake. And many more names of businessmen, army captains. Look, Varro is even listed. He's a royal advisor."

Syl sinks a little more into the cushion of his chair, lowering his brow toward obliging fingers which rub wearily there. And there is silence in the wake of all this information, all this realization that the kingdom's security has been utterly and devastatingly breached. "This investigation is new and we've but scratched the surface. How, my friends, could this have been going on without our knowing."

Three other sets of eyes move among each other, looking and judging expressions, for all are thinking the same. It is Conor who vocalizes the suspicion: "We have a mole. Perhaps not just one."