Cardenia took a breath and rose, using the scepter briefly to stabilize herself, the first and possibly last time the scepter would offer any practical use. Upon the completion of the ceremony, all the accouterment of the coronation would be (thankfully) stripped off her and sent back into their storage vault, to await the next coronation of the next emperox, whomever they might be. But for now they lay heavy on her.

That’s not at all symbolic, she thought.

She turned, to face the assembly of nobles, notables, and representatives. The executive committee, save Korbijn, in the front row of pews. Behind them, representatives from the House of Wu, and among them, looking wildly out of place, her uncle Brendan Patrick and her cousins Moira and Justin, representing her mother. Hannah Patrick would not hear of her daughter’s ascendance for weeks, and would hear it simultaneously to the news of her enlargement to become Baroness of Tacuarembó, a courtesy title from one of the emperox’s own holdings. This title would probably simultaneously annoy and tickle her mother.

Several rows back sat Naffa Dolg, with her family of republicans. Cardenia was touched that despite their opposition to imperial rule in a general sense, they still came out to support her, and their daughter. Between Naffa’s row and the close pews with the Wus sat the matriarchs and patriarchs of various guild families, nobles all.

And, in the third row, Amit and Nadashe Nohamapetan, both of them staring fixedly at Cardenia as if she were a long-term project, or a side of meat.

Or both, Cardenia thought.

Behind her, Archbishop Korbijn cleared her throat quietly, as if to say, Get on with it.

“I, Cardenia Wu-Patrick, having accepted these instruments of church and state, as is my right, become Grayland II, emperox, queen, head of church, successor to Earth, and mother to all. May the tenets of Interdependency, laid forth by the Prophet, bring continued peace and prosperity to all.”

“Long live the emperox,” came the reply, from the first pew to the rafters, followed by immense cheering, which Cardenia, through the sweat and cramps, still managed to enjoy.

Music swelled; the “March of the Prophetess” by Higeliac, written in the third century FI, swelled, performed by a chamber orchestra cleverly hidden in one of the transept alcoves in order to allow more pews to be placed in the cathedral. The boxed-up orchestra had its efforts played through speakers; the coronation audience stood, still cheering, as Grayland II took her first steps, down from the chancel, down the nave, and quickly down a side corridor, where assistants were waiting to escort her to a small office to divest her of crown, scepter, and other nonsense, and the imperial bodyguards to post themselves by the door.

“I thought that went well, Your Majesty,” Naffa said to her.

Cardenia looked up, confused, as she was being stripped down. “I just saw you in the audience.”