Guild-Family

Guild-families are the familial merchant houses who essentially run the Ossan Empire. They have control over the government, the economy, and the military. Members of the more influential guild-families earn seats on the Assembly, while the most elite guild-family matriachs and patriarchs run the Inner Assembly. The powerful guild-families adopt silic symbols as their official family sigils, and members get these sigils tattooed on their right hands to show their guild-family membership. Bastard children may earn the privilege of getting a smaller version tattooed on their hands, and some may even be legtimized. Guild-families also adopt the colors of the godglass associated with these symbols as their guild-family color. For example, the Grappo family use the witglass silic symbol and have purple as their guild-family color.
Culturally, the guild-families care most about wealth, power, and prestige, discarding all other virtues on behalf of those. This means they take contracts very seriously, including marriage contracts between their guild-families. Most guild-family members are expected to enter marriage alliances based on wealth, power, or prestige, some with the expectation of having children. Many of guild-families also own land-holdings or shares in businesses and resource extraction facilities all over the empire.
Some guild-families are much more powerful and wealthy than others, making them extremely elitist. They usually look down on people they do not see as their equals, especially those who have no connection to a guild-family, such as orphans. Many workers long for the prestigious honor of being a client of an elite guild-family. These guild-family patrons offer money, protection, and bragging rights in exchange for loyalty, stipulations, and responsibilities. Clients loyal to specific guild-families will wear client paint to show their allegiance.
The most powerful guild-families include the Vorcien, Magna, Dorlani, Kirkovik, and Stavri families, all of whom have their matriarchs or patriarchs as members of the Inner Assembly. The Grappo guild-family used to be rich and powerful, though their family's power has waned in the several years. The Zorlian guild-family had once been rich and powerful, only to have completely collapsed in the span of a few generations.
STORY
When Demir Grappo learns of his mother's death, Capric Vorcien offers to make the Grappo guild-family a client of the Vorcien. Capric says the Vorcien would pay off all of Adriana Grappo's debts and manage the Hyacinth Hotel on Demir's behalf so he need not leave the provinces. The deal offers the Grappo both protection and political influence, but Demir also knows that such an alliance also comes at the cost of his freedom, so he declines the generous offer. When he returns to Ossa, an independent broker named Duala Jaass mentions that the guild-families are engaging in a secret silic war, buying up all the cindersand, tripling their espionage efforts, and even resorting to sabotage. She also says it is a pleasure to work with Demir again since he pays on time and is never boring, unlike many of her other clients.
Kissandra Vorcien is the bastard daughter of Stutd Vorcien, who refuses to legitimize her since he supposedly publicly decries the practice. She does have a small Vorcien silic sigil tattoo and enjoys some benefits of being a Vorcien. However, she acts as a Vorcien enforcer, a highly expendable role. Despite her lack of legitimacy, her teenage relationship with Baby Montego, an orphan adopted into the Grappo guild-family, proved somewhat scandalous. Her eldest brother Sibrial Vorcien screamed at her for debasing herself when he caught the young lovers together and tried to drag her away, but Montego beat him to a pulp. This incident estranged Kizzie from Montego since she was so worried about the repercussions from her family. She and Sibrial kept the altercation a secret, and she obeyed her brother's demand to never see Montego again, which estranged them for fifteen years.
When Thessa Foleer meets Pari at the Magna-owned Ivory Forest Glassworks, she sees that Pari wears no client paint. Pari says she refuses to debase herself by becoming a client for the Magna guild-family. However, after Pari saves Thessa's life at the Lampshade Boardwalk, she agrees to become a client of the Grappo if it means she can work for Thessa. When she witnesses the Dorlani attack of the Hyacinth Hotel and when Justaci is pushed off the cliff, Pari realizes that the violence, betrayal, and espionage inside of the guild-families is just as dangerous as anything she experienced in the Slag.
While Thessa is building her phoenix channel, Breenen Alvari talks to her about legacy. He insists that the survival of the Grappo guild-family will be his own legacy. Though she does not understand fully, he alludes to his agreement with the Glass Knife. In exchange for Breenen turning over the phoenix channel to them, Devia Kerite promises to leave Demir unharmed during the war between Grent and Ossa. However, this deal is a betrayal of Demir, whom Breenen sees as a weak-minded patriarch who is ruled totally by his whims and emotions and who needs difficult decisions to be made for him in order for the Grappo to survive.
Demir later tells Thessa he never wanted to treat with another guild-family for a wife since it would be likely that they would have misters and mistresses and eventually grow to hate each other. He admits he potentially could find a companion to reasonably get along with, but he hates the expectations and the coldness of the contractual process. However, this turns out to be exactly what happens to Demir. When Demir finds out that Capric betrayed him at Holikan, he challenges him to a duel outside of the High Vorcien Club, declaring a blood-feud between them. They are both arrested for illegal dueling, and Father Vorcien coerces Demir to form an alliance between their guild-families and discard the blood-feud. Father Vorcien proposes a marriage alliance between the Vorcien and Grappo, offering Kizzie to him on the grounds that they are already friends and it would legitimize his bastard daughter. Demir begrudgingly agrees and is released. However, when he tells Montego about the engagement, Montego agrees to honor the deal on behalf of the success of the Grappo but insists he would have to leave the city if Demir and Kizzie wed. Demir then realizes that Father Vorcien is knowingly forcing Demir to lose his best friend and most powerful supporter with this deal.
When Sumala Volos visits the supposedly abandoned Zorlian Mansion, she reminisces on her experiences with the Zorlian family without fondness. She is actually glad to see their family legacy laid low, thinking they certainly deserved it, though the details of her past with them are not revealed.

Type

Guild, Merchant