Glossary

The order of succession issued by the Church when the throne falls vacant: the new king must complete the coronation within seven days. Across four hundred years, most Emergency Sacred Councils began with this very order.

The supreme council the Church convenes in extraordinary times. In four hundred years it has met 17 times: 14 for succession, 3 for doctrinal mutation. Of those 14 successions, in 9 the Church directly named the new king.

A recurring Era-of-Gods ancient glyph. It appears on the bone shard of the old king, on the back of an old bronze clasp, on the empty stone base in the royal-tomb corridor, on the underside of a silver seal — the same glyph, and those who recognize it say: I've heard it, yet I do not know it.