The three representatives at the base of the platform were not what Adrian had prepared himself for.
He had spent the carriage ride from the estate to the High Chamber running contingency thinking about the Iron Meridian — about the specific, cautious aggression of institutions whose first response to novel developments was to assess threat before anything else. The Iron Meridian's challenge had been the second arc's opening institutional move, and it had established a pattern he had been expecting to continue. More challenges. More carefully constructed baseless arguments designed to create uncertainty rather than win formal disputes.
What was waiting at the bottom of the platform steps was entirely different.
