"Come to the Chamber of Secrets when you're finished. You still have a great deal to learn."
After grandfather and granddaughter had dinner together, Old Fawley left her with that reminder before heading to the mysterious chamber relocated from their ancestral home in England.
Alice's gaze had regained its composure. She nodded and rose to handle her official business in the study.
In a study filled with purple and black decorations, Alice first brewed herself a cup of hot tea, then sat at the desk to read through her documents.
As for their commercial expansion into the United States, the Chief's meticulous planning had set it in motion more than a year before the International Confederation of Wizards.
So even though, as expected, the United States Congress had not signed a trade agreement with England,
their potion dumping continued unabated on the United States' magical black market, voraciously snapping up all kinds of scarce raw materials.
As long as they could withstand the Congress's Aurors and their armed crackdowns, the United States Congress would have to compromise within six months.
Black-market smuggling, after all, could cause enormous losses in trade tax revenue.
With no other choice, it would ultimately be forced to sign a formal trade agreement with England.
Normally, work like this could be left to any capable subordinate. There was no need for a trusted aide of Shawn's like Alice to oversee it in person.
But the situation in the United States Wizarding World was far more complicated than they had imagined.
Although the Congress was controlled by the descendants of the Twelve Aurors, the fact that Grindelwald's Army had helped arrest the infiltrating Double Serpent Society members last time showed that the governing institution here was as full of holes as a sieve.
And that was not