New year new chapter! You guys continue to blow me away will all the support you've given this story. I wanted to run an experiment past you guys. When I write I do so with music, it helps me set the tone. If you'd like, go back and re-read the chapters listening to one of the songs below.

Never be the same (Camila Cabello), Beautiful Pain (Eminem), Prince Igor: Polovtsian Dances (Alexander Borodin), Serenade - Schubert (Yehuda Hanani).

I'll see you in the next one ✌️

- Hawkfrost

The look on her face is what confused him the most. He had seen it when he was collecting his things. She had deliberately shut him out but had the nerve to look hurt when he didn't grovel for her affections like some weak dog. Who the hell was she to presume that he was some weak-willed thing to be tossed about at random? The anger that sparked in his chest flared white hot and intense for several seconds before burning itself out. With effort, he brought his breathing back under control. He rubbed his palms against his face in an effort to regain control of himself. His feelings for her were clouding his judgment. He inhaled deeply for several moments. As soon as he was satisfied that he was again in control, he climbed into his carriage. A sharp nod to his driver and they were off.

He glanced out the viewport at the city of New York. It was a thriving atmosphere, filled with merchants and shops, and lawyers, news, and so much more. It was somewhat beautiful he mused to himself. If it weren't for those damn rebels it would have been an ideal colonial city. But that's why you're here, aren't you? So that you can stamp these traitors out once and for all. He chuckled to himself, and if pigs could fly…

As the carriage bounced gently on the cobbled streets, he gazed at everything and everyone while never really focusing on any one thing. The biggest downside to being in intelligence and counter-intelligence was that you were never certain of anything. And anything could be found if you looked hard enough for it. The trap many had fallen into was inventing conspiracy where there was none. Twisting irrelevant facts and tidbits into a picture that suited their bias. His instructors had warned him that intel gathering was like putting a puzzle together when you didn't have all the pieces and were never quite sure what the picture actually was. It was frustrating, time-consuming work that required near constant vigilance for something that almost certainly wouldn't occur and inane amounts of patience.

The main problems was intelligence, or more accurately, what to do with all they got. The British Army raked in such a massive amount of intel from soldiers, merchants, spies, wannabe spies, and the like that it was a monumental task to collate and sort it all. The biggest problem was sifting through all the crap to find the small diamond in the proverbial trough. Operations had been made and blown because someone at the Manor had noticed something out of the ordinary. The raid that had so crippled Washington's war effort had been based on intel that they had had in their possession for 5 weeks before the connection had been made. No one had noticed it because in the sake of operational security no one knew everything. It was unbelievable how bloated the process could be but there simply was no way to streamline it.

Your basic analyst didn't need to know everything, it would simply clutter the issue. All they needed to know was what they had been assigned to know. Supervisory officers were around to cross check the work of subordinates and identify patterns and things of interest, not that it always worked. And now? What is your biggest threat now? He knew the answer to that, it was the other side of his job. Spies around the world are all alike. Paranoid and twitchy bastards. Henry had first been forced to contemplate the possibility of Reb spies a few months back. A British merchant ship traveling under the guise of neutral interest had been boarded and sunk by enemy soldiers. Somehow they had discovered the Royal Navy had been using ships like these to transport weapons, munitions, and food behind enemy lines to support the effort of loyalist forces. They stole the supplies, killed the crew, and sunk the ship, it was an all around rather embarrassing defeat for the navy.

But the enemy had been sloppy. It was the most acute of ironies in the intelligence game that the truly useful intel could hardly ever be used. Information that was truly operational was often only known to a small group of people, and as such dangerous to use, for fear of compromising the source. This was incredibly infuriating because it meant British intelligence had to sanitize the intel before it could be used, and they had no guarantee the information was still effective once the process was complete. Several high-value targets had been identified but been allowed to live because capturing or killing them would compromise carefully placed operatives. He sighed audibly and rubbed his temples. This was not helping his already sour mood.

The carriage pulled up to the Swan manor. It served as both the headquarters for British intelligence in America and as his personal residence. When the guards saw his approach they crisply saluted, salutes that he returned with mechanistic precision. He walked into his house and removed his jacket. His servant, he refused to keep slaves it was a deplorable practice that insulted the very idea of humanity, Mary, and continued into the house. He walked up the stairs to the second floor and opened the door. There were 10 rows of tables with 4 analysts per table organized in rows throughout the room. Supervisory officers were floating back and forth making sure everything was operating smoothly.

"Lieutenant, report." The lieutenant came to attention before proceeding.

"Nothing as of yet sir. We took note of the code phrase in yesterday's New York Times, but we have yet to identify the courier."

The lieutenant handed over the edition and Henry looked at the advertisement in the top right-hand corner. It was for two cases of Courvoisier Cognac. Whenever the enemy had new intel it would post that advertisement in the newspaper. They had caught onto this quite by accident, something that irritated Henry but couldn't be helped. A captain had gone into the shop looking to purchases one of the cases only to find that they were already 'sold out'. Apparently, someone had come in not one hour earlier and bought both cases. When this happened twice in a row the captain took to retelling the story over cigars while within earshot Henry. This immediately caught the intelligence officers ear.

Ever since they had been watching the tavern more closely waiting for another advertisement to be placed. They had caught a break one month prior. Again the ad was placed and again when they inquired about the cases they were sold out. One hour prior. Only this time they knew that no one had come before them, a five-man surveillance team had put that story to bed. And now here they were again, another advertisement.

"Place a team on standby to watch the tavern. Also, call in a team from the Campus. We'll need a full surveillance package if we're going to catch them this time. I want eyes on the tavern owner and his newspaper friend at all times, understood?"

"Yes, sir!" Henry nodded at him and began to turn away when the lieutenant spoke again. "And what about the barmaid sir?"

He paused and turned back around, "what about her lieutenant?"

The young man looked at him with a somewhat curious expression of his face.

"Shouldn't we place her under surveillance as well. As a maid wouldn't she have unfettered accesses to the patrons. This would give her a unique ability to overhear a conversation. Which could be pieced together to form actionable intelligence."

Henry knew he was right, had it been anyone else he would've commend the young man for his initiative, but it wasn't anyone else. She wasn't just anyone else.

"Not a bad idea lieutenant, proceed." The words seemed reluctant to come out of his mouth.

"Yes, sir."

As he watched him walkway, Henry couldn't help but feel like something significant had just been set into motion, but as for what he knew not.