Chapter 40: Electioneering

The giant room stilled, and sound stopped. The Numbered around me tensed slightly, but I stayed relaxed, staring at the man pointing directly at me. Slowly, his hand fell, and Three's sister spoke up. "Don't be an idiot, Silas. You know how this works. We need nominations."

I thought to myself, I really needed to start remembering these people's names, and I really needed to call her something besides Three's sister. Still, I'd add it to the list to ask One later.

"I nominate myself," the Nar man interjected. Some chuckles came from the other Khaganate groups.

"Someone else has to nominate you," someone from the Ihererin delegation called, hiding a snicker. I almost missed the muttered "moron" that came after, but the Nar man did.

We all looked around, and it didn't appear that anyone was liked enough to be nominated. Three's sister spoke again.

"I nominate Coulomb," she said after a long pause.

Angry grumbling floated from the room, and I smiled. I did not want to win this vote, but it forced them to make another nomination otherwise I'd win by default. I assumed that's how that worked, at least.

People mingled around, talking to each other, and eventually, a few more nominations were made. No one exactly seemed happy about any of them, though. I supposed that no one would be elected this time. Backroom politics would need to happen. With a group of assassins, I had a feeling I knew what that would entail.

The servant returned. "Who votes for....?"

The Nar man voted for himself.

"Nar. One vote." Then came the Shunnel, who also received one vote. And then the Khaganate north and the Khaganate south, and then... "Coulomb."

Interesting. Unlike the rest of them, the servant said my name rather than the rest of the nation we represented. Three's sister voted.

"Coulomb, one vote," the servant announced.

He looked around for anyone else to vote. I voted for myself.

"Coulomb. Five votes."

I prevented any surprised reaction from reaching my face. I voted with four votes? That didn't make sense.

In order to get a majority, I would only need six. Based on how everyone else voted, I assumed that a plurality wouldn't be enough. One more vote. Any of the three who had abstained so far could vote for me, and I would win for sure. I hoped they didn't. I'd much rather have some sort of compromise candidate. But I didn't want to show weakness by not voting for myself. I would have abstained if I hadn't been nominated.

"Voting has concluded. No one has received the majority," the servant declared.

I let out the smallest of breaths in relief. There was a slight worry that this was going to be a plurality vote, but apparently not. One and Four fell in beside me as I turned to leave the hall.

Six paused and glided over to where the old Oialas group stood. She leaned in and had a quick exchange of words with Three's sister, who nodded. They had touched each other's hands before. Six hurried over to me and fell in behind us. As soon as we left the hall, Six leaned up and whispered into my ear, "They will meet us after dinner."

Five was waiting for us in our carriage. We only had a short ride through the city, still behind a lot of the checkpointed spots, preventing us from having to take too long before we reached our destination. I'd say it was an inn, but it was cut into a stone wall, and as far as I could tell, it only had one obvious entrance. The guards on it were serious and bowed to us as we entered. Perhaps it was more of a second home for our delegation.

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I wasn't sure how Five managed to get through all the checkpoints, but I never put anything past my Numbered. They seemed to be able to do whatever they wanted, and I wasn't going to second-guess their abilities.

Our rooms were vast, and a dining table was already set for us. Five and Four dashed in front of me and cleared the entire apartment before One, Six, and I had made it even up the stairs. Four ushered me into the dining room and pulled out the chair for me. I sat down, and the rest of the Numbered soon joined me. We passed food around and began to slowly eat before anyone said anything.

After I had taken the edge off my hunger and enjoyed non-travel rations for a while, I eventually spoke up. "Five, what did you learn?"

She swallowed a bite of the roll she was eating a little too early in her eagerness to answer and coughed. Six smacked her on the back, and Fived took a sip of wine before answering.

"Yes, there's been a lot of stuff going on," Five said. "The city ruler has gone missing. The Grandmaster seems to have passed away."

"Is that... are they related?" I asked.

"I don't think so," Five replied. "The Grandmaster was last seen in public a couple of weeks ago, but the city's ruler disappeared only a couple of days ago. There might be some sort of connection, but without the Grandmaster here, the Grandmaster's second has been operating in charge of the branch, but nothing overarching."

I nodded in understanding. "What else have you learned?"

"There's some trouble to the west, disputed trade routes between local nobles, it seems. But it has stopped the last couple of shipments of grain into the city. If that continues, someone will have to go clear them out, or there will be riots," Five added. It wasn't exactly relevant, but it was good to know.

"Good to know."

"Um, further north, there are monsters coming down from the glaciers. It's odd. Normally, they don't come this far south, but the army hasn't had any real trouble dealing with them yet," Five continued, sipping her wine again.

"Oh, and the guild is up in arms about something," She added.

One and Six questioned Five for a few more details, but Four just looked down at her food thoughtfully. Eventually, I had to ask, "Four, What is on your mind?"

She grimaced and looked up. "The vote."

One nodded as well. One and Six both nodded in agreement. Five looked confused.

"What happened?" she asked. I also wanted to know.

"It seemed to have gone away, I expected," Four said, confirming my thoughts. "That was rather expected. No one was elected, and people voted for themselves, but I'm not sure I see a good way out for us."

I nodded and motioned for her to continue. "See? We have five votes. Four from Master's territories and one from Oialas.

Five cut in, "I didn't realize that master actually had more than one vote."

"Yes," One nodded. "Master took over several guild branches and is acting as their leader, or at least their puppets of him.

"Technically, Oialas might be as well, but Three begged for clemency when he took her home," said Six. "She helped set up her sister as branch manager. She's capable and a worthy ally. More useful than many of the puppets we have running the other branches."

"That makes sense," Five said. "But... the other six are fractured. Surely, we can convince one of them to vote with us."

I cleared my throat. "That assumes that I actually want to be Grandmaster. I'd much rather have a compromise candidate. Someone who would leave us alone than be in charge of maintaining the entire organization."

My Numbered at all looked at me, and One nodded slowly. "I understand that, but I don't know how viable that is."

"That is the same conclusion I was working too." Four agreed with One. Then she thoughtfully added, "Maybe the Oialas can take it."

"No, she doesn't have the strength to hold the whole place for fear she would die. Honestly, no one does. You could. You could hold it," Six said. "But any other Grandmaster would likely be dead within a few months. Even if we were able to come together with the Ihererin or one of the Khaganate groups against playing against everything else and have them be a leader. They would either seek to interfere with us immediately or be deposed unless we offered stringent protection, in which case we might as well run it ourselves."

"That doesn't sound great. Are you sure there are no other options?" Five asked.

Four seemed to agree that there was not. One and Six looked grim.

"Hmm'hmm. I will think about it. But... we might have to dissolve the global Court if it comes down to it," I said.

Their eyes went steely, and One nodded. "True. If the Court doesn't serve a purpose, then..."

One trailed off. Six and Five smiled.

"I think I will have a lot of fun tearing it down," Six said, her wicked smile only being outshone by Five’s.