The Seven-Day Coronation Decree

The Seven-Day Coronation Decree is the decree of succession the Church issues when the kingship stands vacant — the Throne must not stand empty long, and the new king must sit down on it and complete his accession within seven days.

The text of the decree is signed by the Pontiff's own hand and stamped with gold leaf from the tomb gold, copied out seven times and sent to the seven realms. The riders who carry it take the shortest of the post roads, changing horses on the road but never the rider; counting from the day the decree arrives, the new king must be sitting on that chair before sunset on the seventh day.

The seven copies end differently. Ironhold's is read aloud in public and then sealed away in the Household; the other six go to the capitals of the realms and are opened by the heads of the houses in person. The Mute March's copy travels furthest — the post road to the city of the Mute March takes 9 days, and the seven-day term is reckoned from the capital, so by the time the decree has reached the north the thing is usually settled. When the head of the house in the Mute March takes that sheet of gold leaf in his hands, the new king has more often than not been on the chair for some time already.

In 400 years the Extraordinary Synod has met 17 times, and of the 14 that had to do with a succession, 9 opened with this decree.

As to the number seven, the Pontificate's account is that it is fixed from the oracle. In practice it presses everything into a very narrow window: the examination of the body has to be finished, the rites texts copied out, the heads or envoys of the seven great houses brought to the capital, the choice of an heir agreed. Seven days is short — short enough to leave no room to find out how the last king actually died, which everyone sitting at that table understands perfectly well.

So every time the decree comes down, the reckoning-boards of the seven realms start clicking at once: who wants to drag it out, who wants to look into it, who wants to use those seven days to push his own man up onto the chair.