Three days later, Andrea sat across from Arion's desk beneath the cold light of the imperial office while half of Alamina's intelligence apparatus quietly dismantled his life in the rooms below.
The investigation folder, black and oddly slim for the dangerous data inside, rested near Arion's hand.
That alone irritated Otto.
The Emperor had reviewed the preliminary findings personally the previous evening with the exact expression he usually reserved for assassination attempts and ministers who believed a technically accurate answer was not, still, a lie. Otto trusted Nero's instincts in military matters more than most generals trusted their own reports, largely because Nero rarely accused anyone of anything directly unless the situation had already crossed into dangerous territory.
Nero mocked people. He provoked them. He set small decorative fires beside them if boredom became severe enough.
But the accusations were different, and Nero had not called Andrea incompetent.
