Episode 7 Summary

March 18th
-We open on a town council meeting. New members are Thomas Newton, a banker and Jeff Newton's heir, and Lewis Bryant, a member of Bill Newton's original party that left over a disagreement, who bought out White's estates.
-Anders proposes the creation of a citizen registry, but it is tabled for the time being.
-Ophelia returns from her trip to establish a greater intelligence network on a caravan, and meets Virgil who has been contracted to escort said caravan. Business is drying up for Virgil.
-Bryant talks to Sam Newton as a fellow person who didn't get along with William Newton.
-Thomas gets Lorraine's support for exploiting Newton's status as an economic center. Lorraine is finding that there are fewer buyers than usual for her horses from the three city-states.
-Dutch gets an encrypted message. It turns out to be from Cottonwood, telling them that they've had cases of radiation sickness and discovered tainted water as the culprit, but have been told by Greer not to tell Newton.
-Corwin sends the militia to check the water. The creek water is fine, but water drawn from wells is found to be contaminated.

March 19th
-Dr. Solomon tells the council that outlying farms are the most affected through irrigation; only about 40 individuals are at risk as habitual drinkers of well water. Most of the new farms given out to mercenaries are affected. He warns that if the exposure has been going on for more than three weeks, a large part of Newton's crop will have to be destroyed.
-The council is concerned that this is intentional. They debate whether or not to inform the populace of the nature of the threat, but decide to do so.
-Temporary measures are set up at great expense to provide water to farms from the creek, including using Lorraine's horses to haul it.
-The council sends out summons for a geologist and a civil engineer to come out to Newton, also at great expense.

March 26th
-The radioactivity is decreasing steadily, but still above safe levels.
-The geologist arrives and sets out to survey to find the source of the radioactivity.
-The civil engineer sets out plans for aqueducts and deeper wells, but it will be expensive.

March 29th
-The geologist has found the source on Randolf Peak, a day's ride from Newton, but was turned back from closer inspection by the Greer army, which has set up camp in the area.
-Corwin proposes the use of diplomacy and, if needed, a covert operation.
-Greer, meanwhile, asks for a diplomatic meeting. It is conducted by video over the internet with Floyd Barrows, the diplomat from Greer.
-Barrows is evasive and claims not to know much, just that their expert teams are working on the problem. He says Greer's council may be willing to reveal information if Newton allows investigators to investigate if Newton was involved with the contamination of the water.
-The council decides to send secret operatives to find out what has happened. The council agrees to fund a team Corwin creates under the guise of approving funding for a new reservoir.
-Corwin gets Dutch to assemble and lead a team to investigate. He also gets Ophelia to join the team.
-Dutch hires Virgil and his band for the rest of the team.
-Dutch says goodbye to his wife, who is upset that Dutch is putting himself in danger.

March 31st
-The team arrives and sets up camp.
-They approach the camp and find that a perimeter has been set up around a large tent which people in anti-radiation suits are going in and out of.
-The infiltration turns sour and a firefight errupts, but no one from Newton is identified and the team manages to make it look like a bandit attack. Meanwhile, Dutch uses the distraction to don a suit and enter the tent.
-Dutch finds that the site is an old Department of Energy dump site for radioactive waste. He collects evidence showing that an underground river had eroded through part of the site, but that someone had cut a barrel open and dumped it into the water. Greer did not cause the contamination, but someone did, and Greer was hiding the facts. The evidence also indicates that the dumping took place around March 10th, so the crop will not have to be destroyed.

April 2nd
-The team makes it back to Newton and delivers the evidence.

April 3rd
-The council discusses the documents. They decide to release the information anonymously to all three city-states. Corwin has Ophelia do so through her network.

April 7th
-With the information leaked, Cody and Laurel have condemned Greer for hiding the information. Newton joins them in condemnation. Greer apologizes, but pledges to bring justice to the perpetrators of the contamination. A collaborative effort between the three city-states to clean up the site and relocate the waste begins.
-Virgil, now much richer after the covert operation and having enjoyed it more than he's enjoyed his work for months, considers turning to the mercenary business.
-Ophelia continues to spread propaganda against Greer.

Next session will pick up on April 12th.