'Firstly!' shrieked a clerk, voice cracking as he consulted an enormous ledger, 'Lord Brock!'

Up in the gallery people mopped their faces, muttering and gasping as if they were facing death. Perhaps some of them were. The whole place reeked of doubt, and excitement, and terror. So strong it was contagious. So strong that even Ferro, who did not care a shit for the pinks and their damn vote, felt her mouth dry, her fingers itching, her heart thumping fast.

The Announcer turned to face the chamber. 'The first candidate will be Lord Brock! All those members of the Open Council who wish to vote for Lord Brock as the next High King of the Union, will you please raise your—'

'One moment, my Lords!'

Glokta jerked his head round, but his neck-bones stuck halfway and he had to peer from the corner of one dewy eye. He need hardly have bothered. I could have guessed without looking who spoke. Bayaz had risen from his chair and was now smiling indulgently towards the Open Council. With perfect timing. A volley of outraged calls rose up from its members in response.

'This is no time for interruptions!'

'Lord Brock! I vote for Brock!'

'A new dynasty!'

Bayaz' smile did not slip a hair's breadth. 'But what if the old dynasty could continue? What if we could make a new beginning,' and he glanced significantly across the faces of his colleagues on the Closed Council, 'while keeping all that is good in our present government? What if there was a way to heal wounds, rather than to cause them?'

'How?' came the mocking calls.

'What way?'

Bayaz' smile grew broader yet, 'Why, a royal bastard.'

There was a collective gasp. Lord Brock bounced from his seat. Quite as if he had a spring under his arse. 'This is an insult to this house! A scandal! A slur on the memory of King Guslav!' Indeed, he now seems not only a drooling vegetable, but a lecherous one. Other councillors rose to join him, faces red with outrage, white with fury, shaking fists and making angry calls. The whole sweep of benches seemed to honk and grunt and wriggle. Just like the pigpens at the slaughterhouse, clamouring for any swill on offer.

'Wait!' shrieked the Arch Lector, his white-gloved hands raised in entreaty. Sensing some faint glimmer of hope in the darkness, perhaps? 'Wait, my Lords! There is nothing to be lost by listening! We shall have the truth here, even if it is painful! The truth should be our only concern!' Glokta had to chomp his gums down on a splutter of laughter. Oh, of course, your Eminence! The truth has ever been your only care!