Chapter 24

The Council of Mars, minus the IIA Lord, walked in without announcement. Domitus Knew this would be bad, they never came in like this if it wasn't.

"Forgive us Sire, but we have information that you needed to know about," said the Naval Parat Agrum.

Domitus saw Ninian begin to leave out of the corner of his eye and mentioned for him to stay.

"Nav. please, this is Top Secret. I need you to leave," continued Parat Agrum Fulvia Dagný Roshanak of the Imperial Navy.

"He stays. He is to be cleared for the Council," said Domitus.

"Very well Sire, we need to go to the Room."

They all turned and walked out. Ninian kept close to Domitus not knowing where to go. The hidden elevator and the ride down intrigued him. In the room, he sat along the walls, keeping out of everyone's way, waiting for the news.

"We got a communication from one of our Hydras about an hour ago. We decoded the message and came straight here.

"The Carthage came into contact with a fishing boat off the coast of Africa. The occupant of the boat identified himself as a Roman citizen and gave the proper codes. He turned out to be a spy and had information that had to be sent.

"The Caliphate is going to attack in a month. The difference is they have gotten allies and they are going to attack our allies, to prevent them from helping us," said Dagný.

She let that sink in for a minute, and then continued, "That's not the worst of it. The IIA has a mole. It seems the daughter of Barron Jannike is the mole."

"I meet her six months ago. She gave me the creeps and I didn't know why," commented Ninian.

"It seems she converted to Islam some years ago from the daughter of a servant. A year ago, she was approached to get some information, her father works in the Military Intelligence Division and got the information. Since then she has passed on some more."

"Let's get Fionnán in here. I'll invite him for a different meeting and have the Guards bring him down here," said Domitus.

It took a few hours for Lord Fionnán to get to The Room. When he walked in his face and body remained calm, but his eyes told the others he was surprised. He bowed and took his seat, wondering what was going on.

"Lord Fionnán, please forgive us for lying to you, but there is a situation you must be told about. Parat Agrum Dagný, if you please," said Domitus.

Dagný retold all that she knew about the attack and about the mole in the IIA. Fionnán took it all in and then slumped.

"My Lord," he said addressing Domitus, "we only just recently thought a mole had infiltrated the IIA. Now that we have confirmation, we can deal with her. We didn't suspect a mole until a number of our operations had busted, and the operatives captured.