The Spikatur Cycle

Chapter nine-2

If you have an emperor who is not allowed to do anything, has no job to do, then he will, like anyone else, become bored. And he’ll start looking around for something to get up to, to while away the time. Well, by Djan! And hadn’t I looked around, when bored, for something to do in Djanduin, and wound up king as a result? Keep an emperor busy and he will discipline himself, that was the theory.

In order to reward the many folk who had worked so hard for Vallia, the Presidio had instituted a whole fresh ranking of minor nobility, whose standing was a little below the already existing minor nobility. The main difference between this new hierarchy and the older minor nobility lay in the absence of lands or estates attached to the titles. The titles themselves had resounding names, which you