The argument began, as all important arguments in the Sovereign Dominion began, with a procedural question.
"The agenda item concerns the appointment of a new Cardinal for the Northern Reach," said Chancellor Rethyn, the High Council's administrative officer — a Human woman whose job consisted entirely of managing the Council's procedures and whose expression, after thirty years in the role, had fossilized into the particular blankness of someone who had witnessed every form of political combat and found all of them tedious. "The appointment requires joint recommendation from the Crucible and the Crown, with final confirmation by divine assent."
