The Great Conference Hall of Varentis was a dying beast, its last breaths spent on petty arguments.
Marble benches, once gleaming, now bore the scratches of a thousand hurriedly-scrawled votes. The domed ceiling swallowed voices and spat them back as echoes, distorted and hollow. Officials of the Palatinate, councilors, stewards, guild chairmen with purses heavier than their morals, shouted over one another, their words as sharp as the knives they carried beneath their robes.
"The succession statute is clear," barked Councilor Andor Vell, fists planted on the ledge of the eastern bench. "If the Palatine is declared incapacitated, executive authority falls to the senior adjutant pending imperial review. That's protocol."
"And who declares him incapacitated, Vell?" snapped Chairwoman Relda Marn of the Civil Health Office. Her white-gloved hand trembled as she lifted a sheaf of parchment. "Because as of this morning, we've received no signed affidavit from the Palatine's physician. Until such a document exists, this is political theatre. You're playing dress-up with an empty chair."
Murmurs rippled across the benches.
"To hell with affidavits," muttered Deputy Chamberlain Rost. "The man hasn't been seen in public for three weeks. His last decree was delivered by a steward."
"A steward acting with his signet," retorted Councilor Duras Talion. "Until that ring is removed or buried, Varro still rules."
The central dais, where the Speaker's chair stood in polished obsidian, was drowned in noise. Magistrate Halden Yorr, acting Speaker of the Hall, raised his hands in a vain bid for order. "Gentlemen, gentlewomen, if we cannot conduct this session with restraint, we shall recess! The Empire does not suffer chaos in its chartered cities."
A voice from the upper balcony shouted over him. "The Empire has already suffered this one!"
Laughter broke, bitter, uneven.
The banners of the Palatinate swayed high above the floor, green trimmed with gold, the twin peaks of Blackmount flanked by crossed keys. They seemed to sag slightly in the rising heat of frustration.
Across the chamber, seated on the inward curve of the Merchant's Tier, Commissioner Yalis of the Dock Authority stood with deliberate care. "With respect," he said, voice smooth but cutting, "while the esteemed chamber continues debating legacies and legalities, trade routes are being redirected. Grain prices have risen six points in ten days. I have spoken with the Refinery Guilds, and they are withholding levy contributions until stability returns."
"Are you threatening us with economic collapse, Commissioner?" snapped Commissioner Arwen of the Transport Authority, eyes narrowed.
Yalis offered a polite smile. "No, Arwen. I'm informing you that it has already begun."
Gasps. Someone cursed softly behind the forestry bench. Tension climbed.
And still, no sign of unity. No alliance between Offices. No clear successor. Only chairs turning inward, voices sharpening, and the growing stench of fear beneath powdered civility.
Then, a sound.
Not of shouting. Bootsteps.
Measured. Clean. Echoing evenly against the old marble floor like a clock too punctual for comfort.
The twin doors at the southern end of the hall opened, not flung, not announced, simply opened.
Lady Celia Varro stood framed in the archway.
She wore the deep green of House Varro, lined in dusk-gold and clasped with a brooch in the shape of the Blackmount sigil. Her posture was perfect. Composed. Neither deferential nor defiant, merely inevitable.
Beside her stood Ser Kael Draven, draped in the burnished shimmer of full Barne Scale. A walking cathedral of sanctioned violence, his sword at rest, his silence more dangerous than any proclamation.
Conversation died in layers. First the nearest benches. Then the balcony. Then the floor itself.
She stepped forward, slow, deliberate.
Click. Click. Click.
Cloak trailing like a silk tide.
The silence stretched, brittle as old lacquer.
Lady Celia Varro took her place along the rear wall, uninvited, unchallenged. She did not approach the central benches. She did not ascend to the speaker's pulpit. She simply remained, half-shadowed beneath the high-lanterns, with Ser Kael Draven stationed beside her like an omen cast in silver.
"Does she think this is theatre?" muttered Deputy Chamberlain Rost under his breath.
"She's not here to speak," whispered Trade Comissioner Aldwyn, eyes narrowed. "She's here to listen."
Speaker Halden Yorr cleared his throat. "Lady Varro, this assembly is—"
Celia tilted her head slightly. A single, silent gesture.
Yorr hesitated. Then bowed his head. "Very well. Proceedings… continue."
The argument resumed, this time sharper for her silence.
Councilor Elma Harven of the Public Supply Office jumped to her feet, speaking quickly to seize the floor. "I bring my petition. We have seventeen grain contracts still unsigned because of the deadlock between the Guild Quarter and the Refineries. Caravans from Arkenwyke are sitting outside the southern gate without permit or escort. If we fail to approve temporary oversight for the trade routes, we risk losing a quarter-season's levy within the week."
"Perhaps you should have thought of that before refusing Ilthor's warehouse charter," said Commissioner Yalis, offering a bland smile. "Those contracts would be signed already if we had proper storage infrastructure at the west docks."
Harven scoffed. "Forgive me, Commissioner, if I hesitate to hand the keys of our food supply to a man who negotiates through proxy and bribes three recordkeepers for every signature."
That drew a fresh wave of muttering across the chamber, some uneasy, others clearly entertained.
The representative from the Waterworks Office stood and raised his voice before the room could move on. His sleeves were stained to the elbows with permanent ink, his tone already tired. "We've had two aquifer blockages in the Lower Tier this week. The maintenance crews are refusing to work the underchannels without hazard pay. Three weeks ago they pulled a corpse from the Tine sluice valves. Dismembered."
"Gangs," someone muttered.
"No," he snapped. "Clans. And the bodies don't wear colors anymore. Just pins. That should scare you more."
The Watch liaison, still silent near the archivists, shifted his stance, but said nothing.
Magister Orell rose slowly, and the chamber quieted. His voice carried weight, measured, sharp, and respected. One of the few Seventh Circle mages remaining on the council, when he spoke, even the cynics listened.
"The truth is this city is bleeding from a dozen small cuts. The Gutters are lawless. The refinery quarter is on strike. Half the garrison is either on leave or double-posted, and the rest are swapping shifts for coin. The Watch can't fill its patrol rosters. And the moment word spreads that Lord Palatine Varro's hand no longer moves the seal—"
"It will spread," said a woman from the infrastructure bench, her voice calm and cold. "It already has. The only question left is who shapes the story."
Eyes shifted toward Celia, she said nothing.
Aldwyn, the Trade Commissioner, leaned forward. "The Guilds want order. Not tradition. Not nostalgia. If someone cannot command the ministries, someone else will."
"That is not your choice," spat Deputy Chamberlain Rost.
"It may be no longer yours either," Aldwyn replied.
Across the hall, an aide returned to one of the district stewards and whispered something in his ear. The man paled slightly. Another muttered warning. Another courier, waiting outside. Reports circulating too quickly now.
The room felt like it was tilting, even though the floor held steady.
Near the rear of the hall, Celia remained perfectly still, her hands folded in front of her.
She watched them unravel.
Every shouted defense. Every nervous aside. Every desperate bid for authority through language.
They exposed themselves, piece by piece, and she hadn't yet spoken a word.
She made a single, deliberate step. Then another.
Celia Varro moved to the front of the hall with the calm of a blade sliding from its scabbard. Her heels clicked with rhythm as she approached the Speaker's dais, not asking permission, not waiting for invitation. By the time she reached the base of the pulpit, silence had already reclaimed the hall.
She turned and faced them all.
Clerks and councilors. Stewards and prefects. The wary, the waiting, the ones who dared not speak until someone else leapt first.
She spoke without raising her voice, and yet it carried like glass across stone.
"Honored members of the Palatinate Council of Varentis," Celia began, "I will not insult this chamber with pretense. You know why I am here."
A few officials stirred uneasily. The Speaker shifted in place, but said nothing.
"For weeks, this hall has convened around an absence. My father, Palatine Varro, no longer commands the seat, not in presence."
Councilor Andor Vell rose like a man who had been waiting to be proven right.
His wide frame cut a sharp silhouette against the dawnlight filtering through the gallery windows, and though his tone carried a practiced respect, his eyes gleamed with calculation.
"Then the course is plain," he said, addressing the chamber, but truly speaking to those still unaligned. "As I cited earlier, the succession statute is clear: If the Palatine is declared incapacitated, executive authority falls to the senior adjutant pending imperial review. That is protocol."
He lifted a hand as if claiming something already owed.
"By date of appointment and tenure served, that would be me."
Gasps, half disbelief, half awe at the audacity. A few officials looked between Andor and Celia, as if weighing which wolf had the duller teeth.
Celia turned to him slowly, her voice cool and unmistakably final.
"Indeed, Lord Vell. If the Palatine were formally declared incapacitated by imperial certifier, in accordance with Article Twelve of the Eastern Lang Succession Ordinance."
A pause.
"But I did not say he was incapacitated."
Andor's brow twitched. "You just declared him unable to rule—"
"I said he no longer commands the seat," she replied evenly. "Not that he has been rendered permanently unfit to do so."
Her gaze swept across the room. "I act in interim stewardship, not succession."
"There is no vacancy. There is no appointment. And thus, no trigger for adjutancy review."
Andor opened his mouth.
Celia didn't let him speak.
"Should you wish to challenge this interpretation, I welcome your petition. Submit it in triplicate to the Records Office. They're currently running six weeks behind on civic disputes, longer if you forget the correct wax seal."
A soft chuckle rolled through the floor like smoke.
Even the Speaker looked down to hide his smile.
Andor sat slowly, his jaw set.
Celia didn't look at him again.