In some sense Jilia Bainilus has earned her promotion to Archduchess like an adventurer. She certainly had more of an adventure, these last two years, than most of the delegates being invited to this convention.

First some famous pseudonymous rebels from the time of the Civil War reappeared in her city to cause trouble, and it's not even that she disagreed with them about the influence of the Thrunes being bad for Kintargo, but they had no conception of the difficulty keeping the Thrunes from exerting more influence on the city. Rumor said that Jackdaw was back from the dead, raised from the last years of the Civil War, and she believed it, because he and his Silver Ravens were acting like the Thrunes were upstarts who could be warded off by shows of force and public support, not secure tyrants who could throw a regiment of Hellknights and if that didn't work a small legion of devils at the city. She managed to prevent escalation, but she had to make even more compromises and crackdowns and the best she could do for the ordinary people caught as traitors and dissidents was making security weak enough that they could kill themselves painlessly before they got messy executions.

And then Barzilai Thrune decided he wanted a private playground and she spent four months trapped in a gemstone while he ruled his city not just tyrannically, but completely arbitrarily and idiotically. She didn't hear the details until later, of course, but she seethed nonetheless.

He was executed with two teleports and three moments during what people called the Four-Day War, by the archmages who, it turned out, had also caused her recent Silver Raven problem. She'd be angry at them, but they did remove the Thrunes and the diabolists from Cheliax, Kintargo included, and those same Silver Ravens had found her soul gem and freed her from it, and endorsed her when she made a public address and asked to be re-elected Lady Mayor, which she was.

She's not much of an Iomedan, and not a Milanite as much as her city seems to think she is. She is tired, and struggling to get back on top of her job, and almost turns down the appointment to Archduchess of Ravounel until she'd reminded of the alternatives, sighs, and accepts even more work.

The Ravens celebrated their victory, but Jackdaw, at least, isn't content to be free of the Thrice-Damned Thrunes; he wants Ravounel independent, and never mind that nearly all their trade runs back through the Arch of Aroden. Now she has to deal with Vyre, and whether or not Norgorber runs the city of masks they're as much of a headache as you'd expect the Thief-God's followers to make a city. There are strix and giants and gods-forsaken druids and a border with Nidal, and besides Jackdaw the Bellflowers are all-but-public and agitating for the immediate abolition of slavery.

She can do the job. She's good at it. She wishes she didn't have to.

In some sense Jilia Bainilus has earned her promotion to Archduchess like an adventurer. She certainly had more of an adventure, these last two years, than most of the delegates being invited to this convention.

First some famous pseudonymous rebels from the time of the Civil War reappeared in her city to cause trouble, and it's not even that she disagreed with them about the influence of the Thrunes being bad for Kintargo, but they had no conception of the difficulty keeping the Thrunes from exerting more influence on the city. Rumor said that Jackdaw was back from the dead, raised from the last years of the Civil War, and she believed it, because he and his Silver Ravens were acting like the Thrunes were upstarts who could be warded off by shows of force and public support, not secure tyrants who could throw a regiment of Hellknights and if that didn't work a small legion of devils at the city. She managed to prevent escalation, but she had to make even more compromises and crackdowns and the best she could do for the ordinary people caught as traitors and dissidents was making security weak enough that they could kill themselves painlessly before they got messy executions.

And then Barzilai Thrune decided he wanted a private playground and she spent four months trapped in a gemstone while he ruled his city not just tyrannically, but completely arbitrarily and idiotically. She didn't hear the details until later, of course, but she seethed nonetheless.

He was executed with two teleports and three moments during what people called the Four-Day War, by the archmages who, it turned out, had also caused her recent Silver Raven problem. She'd be angry at them, but they did remove the Thrunes and the diabolists from Cheliax, Kintargo included, and those same Silver Ravens had found her soul gem and freed her from it, and endorsed her when she made a public address and asked to be re-elected Lady Mayor, which she was.

She's not much of an Iomedan, and not a Milanite as much as her city seems to think she is. She is tired, and struggling to get back on top of her job, and almost turns down the appointment to Archduchess of Ravounel until she'd reminded of the alternatives, sighs, and accepts even more work.

The Ravens celebrated their victory, but Jackdaw, at least, isn't content to be free of the Thrice-Damned Thrunes; he wants Ravounel independent, and never mind that nearly all their trade runs back through the Arch of Aroden. Now she has to deal with Vyre, and whether or not Norgorber runs the city of masks they're as much of a headache as you'd expect the Thief-God's followers to make a city. There are strix and giants and gods-forsaken druids and a border with Nidal, and besides Jackdaw the Bellflowers are all-but-public and agitating for the immediate abolition of slavery.

She can do the job. She's good at it. She wishes she didn't have to.