West Borough, the Intis Embassy.
The confidential secretary, who seemed to be imitating Roselle with his carefully groomed little mustache, knocked on the door of Envoy Owen's office.
"Sir, Duke Negan has been assassinated! The attackers were a Desire Apostle and... and Baron Larry!" the secretary reported quickly, disregarding the envoy's displeasure.
"What?!" The envoy shot to his feet. It was not Negan's assassination that surprised him; after all, his organization had long since decided to make it happen.
What troubled him was that Larry had appeared at the scene and played a leading role...
After a moment's thought, Owen asked urgently, "Was Larry captured? Or killed on the spot?"
"No... They say he escaped right in front of the Mandated Punishers..." The secretary did not dare hide anything and briefly described what he had learned.
"He managed to escape under those circumstances? Did some powerful being intervene?" Envoy Owen pondered for a moment, then asked, "What about the Desire Apostle?"
"We're not sure yet... But the information I've received suggests some faction silenced him."
So little time had passed since the incident that the secretary had shown considerable ability just by gathering this much intelligence.
Envoy Owen paced the room a few times. "I may have fallen into George III's trap..." he muttered, then ordered:
"Arrange for someone to eliminate Bianca immediately. We can't let Loen obtain evidence that we helped Larry."
"Yes, Mr. Envoy." The secretary answered, then hesitantly reminded him, "But if Loen set this trap, they may already have some evidence... After all, other intelligence agents helped Larry too, not just Bianca...
"And it may already be too late to deal with Bianca..."
"That doesn't matter... If they catch the other agents, we can simply deny any connection to them..." Owen gave a cold laugh and