he starts work on a couple of personal projects to alleviate the tedium. Firstly he starts constructing an embryonic intelligence gathering network. As he only has his stipend he can't afford to pay anyone. Instead he: make friends or at least acquaintances, decides who he can trust and who he can't and determines who he can use as the basis of a cell. Secondly he sets out to gather as much of the palace gossip as possible.
