Panel 4 is Bedard in a nutshell. He takes his direction from the others: what they decide is most useful for Gastonia to hear is more or less what he will print, with just enough truth in there that an overworked populace won’t question the rest. And he can do that with no qualms, because he doesn’t care. As long as he has interesting stories for the people to read, he’s a happy man… which would be all right, perhaps, if he were writing novels.

Syr’Nj has mostly put aside the pain that hobbled her in the last chapter, but in panel 5, it threatens to resurge. Caneghem may hate everything about being here for this, but consciously or not, he’s doing her a favor in panel 6 by interrupting her before she goes too far down that road.

“Well, technically, he’s not even in the ground. Last I heard, his body was being used as a dwarven tote bag.”