"Your Holiness, this one made her offer in good faith, but must respect His Excellency's clarity of purpose." Melinda's demeanor might as well have been made of blue ice. Only her rage, channeled through the strictest adherence to protocol, grants her words any pretense of warmth at all. "Putting aside for a moment the deep mistrust that has characterized relations between our Fellowships, how could we even in the best of worlds be well assured of the currency and relevance of His Excellency's intelligence? This one concedes that it might be another matter if His Excellency Most Mighty were willing to oblige us with some substantive proof to corroborate his assurances."