The Rulderhal

Written by Verse_Online

The Rulderhal was the first seat of government in Arc when the Vannic Empire established the city as an outpost at sea level. The Rulderhal was initially the governing council of the city, long before the The Azure Chamber emerged as a powerbase. It was not simply the means by which the Vannic and then Arcish emperors ruled the city, but it was also the link between the city and its Vannic past. The rulers of Daeuss Kaa and other Vannic strongholds above the low clouds of the Arching Mountains allowed the ministers and sages of the Rulderhal to take with them some of the arcane secrets of the Vannic empire, and the Rulderhal, as well as being a seat of government became a repository of the arcane after the Vannic Empire collapsed.

The Rulderhal and the Azure Chamber

Since the political rise of the The Azure Chamber, the relative power of the Rulderhal has declined, but it still has an important role in the functioning of Arc. The Rulderhal is comprised of the Protector's ministers whose job is to advise and to assist, but never to act. The settlement devised by the first Protectors was precisely this, that the Rulderhal be a useful source of information and expertise, but never a source of power in its own right. The Azure Chamber is more representative of the interests of Arcish merchants and the Rulderhal is a bastion of the Protector's interests. Real decision making always falls into the hands of the Protector, guided by the ministers invited to sit at his table. It has been several centuries since any protector chose advisors who would give them ideas they didn't wish to hear and as a result the ministers of the Rulderhal, known collectively as the Unbroken Circle, have become increasingly irrelevant. In popular song and ale house jokes they are portrayed as timid sycophants, and there is more than a grain of truth to this claim, as the most powerful figure in the city after the Protector is his top administrator and bureaucrat, the Lord Counsel, an office currently occupied by the cunning Drexe Othrana Azal. The delegates of the Azure Chamber have long muttered that it is time to abolish the Rulderhal, stating that the only meaningful political body in the city is the chamber itself. Merchants and bankers calculate that if the Rulderhal was shut down, the Protector's last source of guidance and counsel would vanish, placing the Azure Chamber and the commercial interests that it represents in a powerful position. The ultimate dream of the chamber is be able to dictate terms to the next protector who succeeds the ailing Droskun Arrand.

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Type

Government complex