Literature / The Hands of the Emperor

The Hands of the Emperor is the first book in Victoria Goddard’s Lays of the Hearth-Fire series, and part of her Nine Worlds universe.

The series tells the story of Cliopher Mdang (Kip to his sprawling family), secretary to the emperor, head of the civil service and unofficial head of the government, who has spent half his life in the civil service, rebuilding the empire after a magic catastrophe and slowly working on creating a better world. He has toed the line in a court that is not of his beloved culture and with rules of etiquette that are sometimes impossibly strict—and who now finally feels ready to reach out to his emperor himself, the Lord-Magus of the world, the Sun on Earth, Artorin Damara, who is worshipped as a god.

The first novel, The Hands of the Emperor, follows Cliopher as he organizes a holiday for his emperor, learns more about him and his other friends from the palace, grapples with living his culture in the court and sees his life in the capital and in his home province clash.

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The book contains examples of:

• Abdicate the Throne: On his holiday in Navikiani, the emperor realizes the possibility of stepping down as the Lord-Mage of Zunidh (he is only emperor by tradition at this point, since the empire is no more) and resolves to find a successor and commit to her a well-ordered world that does not rely on the old empire's structures.
• Anti-Nepotism: Cliopher would never favor his family or home province. He sometimes over-does it: he is especially stern when dealing with his nephew Gaudy who is also in the civil service and initially ignores a problem that his family tells him about in his home-province — after all, if he learnt it through his family and not through any official channels and other provinces don’t have that possibility.
• Author Avatar: In story, Aurora the eponymous princess of the ballad. A rebellious princess, imprisoned in a tower, who escapes due to her friends and has hidden ideas to reform the government? – clearly, she represents the author Fitzroy Angursell/the later emperor Artorin Damara who was forced to live in a tower in absolute solitude as the Marwn until the legendary Red Company freed him.
• Badass Bureaucrat: Cliopher Mdang: he is the bureaucrat of bureaucrats, absolutely incorruptible, clever, compassionate and diligent. He made the civil service more inclusive, dismantled a millennia-old government-system to build a better one in the wake of a world-spanning catastrophe, brokered peace and practically eradicated poverty.
• Bag of Holding: Fitzroy Angursell famously had one, and there have been many attempts of mages to recreate it, some of them resulting in explosions. The emperor has also enchanted Cliopher's writing case to be bigger on the inside than on the outside.
• Bald of Authority: The emperor, due to shaving his head and a tonic that Conju provides to inhibit hair growth.
• Ballroom Blitz: "That party", when the folk heroes of the Red Company crashed the engagement party of Grand Duchess Melissa and her cousin and heir-to-the-throne Shallyr.
• The Bard: Fitzroy Angursell: wandering singer, poet and musician, lover of the moon, and adventurer as part of the legendary Red Company.
• Barrier Maiden: The emperor and the Marwn used to stabilize the magic of the worlds. The emperor did so by being the center of magic in the capital and performing various rituals, whereas the Marwn - a more minor member of the royal family - was confined to a tower in a magically significant location in absolute solitude.
• Benevolent Boss: The entire top of the imperial service, with the emperor, Cliopher, and his second-in-command, Kiri, who "runs the departement on laughter and jokes" being examples. The emperor takes pains in remembering the names of everyone who's working close to him, no matter their status. He also makes sure that Cliopher gets enough free time, sometimes granting him a day or week off when he feels Cliopher is overworking himself.
• Benevolent Mage Ruler: The emperor Artorin Damara, who creates powerful works of magic for the betterment of the world.
• Big Fancy Castle: The imperial palast in Solaara (formerly Astandalas). It was built on a large vulcanic plug, can comfortably house over 3000 inhabitants and is so grand that specific rooms in it are regarded as wonders of the Nine Worlds (the throne room and the imperial bath specifically).
• Born Under the Sail: The Wide Sea Islanders in Vangaye-Ve, who used to be famous explorers, chartering unknown seas and discovering new islands. By now, they have mostly settled on the islands, but retain a strong connection towards the sea and their ancient history.
• The Clan: The Mdangs of Gorjo city, with well over a hundred family members, which lead to the saying of "a cousin for every opportunity".
• Color-Coded Patrician: The emperor only wears black, white, gold (the colors of the Astandalan Flag) and imperial yellow (he is the only one allowed to wear that specific hue). Also, the Princes and Princesses each have colors signifying their province that they wear at court.
• Cryptic Conversation: Over his long time at court, Cliopher has become a master at those, to the the point that his relatives are absolutely mystified what he is talking about while he regards the same conversations as rather straight-forward and clear.
• Dark and Troubled Past: Artorin /Fitzroy before becoming emperor, purely because of his position as the second heir, the Marwn: He spent his childhood away from his parents in a remote palace, was not allowed to know his own name, his year-long tutor, the only person he was close to, got killed as not to leak information about him. Shortly after his sixteenth birthday, he was taken away to a remote island on another world to live there in absolute solitude for what should have been the rest of his life.
• Don't Call Me "Sir": The emperor tries to have his closest friends break themselves of the habit of always calling him by his formal title since he wants to be acknowledged as a person and not just an office of state (on the other hand, for his friends, the usage of the titles is a sign of deep respect and following century-old traditions).
• Elemental Motifs: For the main characters:
  • Cliopher is strongly associated both with fire and water:
    • Fire (especially hearth-fire) as the Tanà, e.g. fire-keeper: he is passionate, protective and warm.
    • Water (as a Wide Sea Islander): he is graceful, diplomatic and outwardly calm in his manner, achieves his goals by gradually overwhelming the opposition like a river eroding the earth and also has hidden depths through his culture and history.
  • Artorin /Fitzroy has even more elemental motifs:
    • He is a descendent of the Sun, a wild mage with a focus on fire, passionate (even if he doesn't show it), radiant (one of his titles being His Radiancy) and creative.
    • His other focus as a wild mage is wind magic and his personalty fits: while outwardly calm, he is adventurous, progressive (he dismantled the whole ancient traditions of the Empire together with Cliopher) and free-spirited.
    • Lastly, he is associated with Earth: as the Lord-Wizard of Zunidh, he is intrinsically linked to the world itself and the anchor point of magic, and also is patient and stable as his job and the rituals demand him to be. For Cliopher, the earth-association is more personal: he sees the emperor as providing the bedrock on which he can build his reforms.
• Everyone Can See It: At least everyone close to Cliopher – one of his friends in Solaara or one of his family or friends who reads his many, many letters know how he feels about his boss long before his would dare say anything of that sort.
• Fanfare: The imperial salute that has to be played when the emperor enters a building/room in official capacity.
• Fantasy Counterpart Culture: the culture and especially names of the Vangaye-Ve is heavily reminiscent of the culture of the Pacific islands, especially Hawai'i.
• Fire of Comfort: As the Tanà, it is Cliopher's responsibilty to tend to the fire and he is strongly associated with it, especially hearth fire. After the fall, it was he who re-lit the fire in the palace kitchens. He also tends to the hearth fire of the world metaphorically by making sure everybody has the means to be safe and flourish.
  Cliopher, vowing to Vou'a what he will bring back from the house of the Sun: "I will bring the hearth-fire of a new life for the world."
• Gilded Cage: The palace for Artorin Damara Fitzroy Angursell – there is every luxury in the nine world brought as tithes, but a very rigid set of rules and taboos that allow him no private moments while also banning any physical contact with other humans.
• Girl in the Tower: The Marwn, who gets imprisoned in a tower on a magically significant location from the age sixteen onward until their death (should they not unexpectantly inherit the throne, as Artorin Damara did).
• God-Emperor: The emperor (who is indeed descended from a literal god, the sun) is worshipped as a physical god, with shrines, invocations in prayers and ritual taboos.
• God in Human Form: On the festival of the eclipse, the Moon herself comes down to earth, and Vou'a, the trickster god from the Lays, lives on the islands as a hermit and is married to Cliopher's great-uncle.
• Gold and White Are Divine: The emperor's clothes are primarily in gold and white (as well as yellow and black) and he is seen as a god on earth.
• The Good Chancellor: Kip, after he is made Lord Chancellor to have a title corresponding to his vast political power: he continues working close together with the emperor to lift up the world, with the first major thing he implements being a universal income.
• Guile Hero: Cliopher is an expert negotiator who uses his wits, experience, in-detail-knowledge of the world and state apparatus and doggedness to bring on chance.
• Hat of Authority: The uniforms of the Upper Secretariat mandate a specific hat (which kind of looks ridiculous) for each rank for official functions. After Cliopher gets made Viceroy, he gets a new hat befitting his new station.
• Hidden Backup Prince: The emperor used to be one, though he was not hidden for the usual reasons, but instead to serve as an anchor to the worlds' magic as the Marwn. He was in fact never supposed to inherit (only doing so because the real, mad heir mysteriously decided to jump of a balcony) and was the only Marwn to ascend to the throne out of all the 100 emperors and empresses in the history of Astandalas.
• Home of the Gods: The Sky Ocean or Divine Realm, where the Sun resides.
• I Want My Beloved to Be Happy: At the festival of the moon's eclipse where it is customary to make a wish, Cliopher does not wish for anything for himself, but instead for his emperor to find happiness.
• King Incognito: The emperor on holiday in Navikiani – he takes great delight in not being seen as a god-on-earth (the local villagers even initially assume he is a political prisoner because of his many guards).
• Lost at Sea: Cliopher while on his long, long journey back home after the Fall whenever a storm blew him of his (already shaky) course.
• Love at First Sight: Platonically. As soon as Cliopher saw the new emperor's official state portrait, he decided to enter the civil service in Astandalas to serve him.
• Massively Numbered Siblings: Cliopher's mother had fifteen siblings, and all but one had children themselves - in Cliopher's generation, there are now 59 cousins.
• Mystical Plague: Whatever befell the island of Woodlark some time after the Fall: Whoever was affected died and turned into a monster. In the end, the island was quarantined and, to ensure the plague couldn't spread, the emperor burnt it down to the bedrock.
• Never Accepted in His Hometown: In Vangaye-Ve, Cliopher always is seen as the strange one who left and has no achievements (such as a family) to his name. People only know that he became a bureaucrat in Solaara and not that he is the second-most powerful person on the world who has changed all of their life in various ways. This in part due to the region's general lack of interest in the wider going-ons of the world, but mostly due to Cliopher's hesistance to tell his family anything if they don't ask, lest it be seen as boasting, and the few things he tells being rather oblique for people without any idea of the capital's power-structure.
• No Poverty: The government has practically eradicated poverty worldwide, first with universal education, then with housing and job programs for the least fortunate, and later with an universal income (the stipend) for any who need or want it.
• Power Glows: Whenever the emperor does magic, his eyes glow golden, and sometimes he is also accompanied by a golden glow. The eyes of other wizards, such as the Mother of the Mountain, may glow in different colors, e.g. silver. Also, in the days of the empire, all the magic of the lands connected to the emperor and made him or her quite literally blinding to look at.
• Reasonable Authority Figure: Cliopher is not only supremely diligent and absolutely incorruptible, but is also willing to listen to everyone's problems equally, at one point changing a prestigious project for a lowly official's concerns for salmon breeding grounds getting negatively affected.
• Religion is Magic: While magic is not shown to be divine in nature, the magical and the religious hierarchy are deeply intertwined – the emperor (a powerful mage) is worshiped as a god and all the imperial mages are priest-wizards.
• Royal Inbreeding: The emperor's family was prone to that, with cousins marrying cousins and even siblings marrying each other to keep the bloodline pure, which lead to some horrifying inbreeding:
  • The emperor's parents had a child each year for as long as they could (Artorin was born in the third year of their marriage, his sister Melissa ten years later) and except for these two, not one survived their first hundred days.
  • Their cousin Shallyr - son of the former emperor and heir to the throne whose parents were also closely related - was physically okay, but cruel and stark raving mad. He was apparently so crazy that he either jumped off a balcony on his own account or somebody magically forced him to do so to have literally anybody else inherit the throne.
• Royal "We": The emperor freely switches between the royal "we" and the more personal "I", allowing people who know him to discern whether he speaks more as himself or more as his royal persona.
• Snail Mail: The postal system after the fall used to be really bad and ineffective, with one of the over a hundred letters Cliopher sent to his family actually reaching them - then, Cliopher reformed the postal service as soon as the got the power to do so. By now, his letters reach his family punctually and securely.
• Stranger in a Familiar Land: How Cliopher felt when he came home the Vangaye-Ve after the Fall. The whole world had changed, continents had fallen into the sea, the empire had been broken apart and he had spent years, if not decades, traveling home on his own. When he arrives, only some years have passed there and everything is as it has always been. But after all the catastrophes he witnessed and having spent at least months entirely alone at sea, he feels like a stranger to his family and soon again leaves.
• Supernatural Gold Eyes: One of the emperor’s many titles is the Lion-Eyed for the golden eyes that run in the family. True to form, both of the characters we see with golden eyes are Artorin Damara and his distant ancestor Aurelius Magnus, both of them are extremely powerful mages whose works have shaped the worlds.
• Take Away Their Name: After getting declared the Marwn, everyone forgot Artorin's name, even his own parents. This was part of the magical rituals binding the Marwn, which included sacrificing their name (and entire life) to the empire.
• Tough Leader Façade: Artorin is the perfect emperor to all the world, unapproachable, someone who never shows emotions – or indeed has any except for mild benevolence – strictly follows the exhaustive protocols and rituals and practices schooled magic. On the inside he yearns for human contact, loves to use wild magic and would love to show emotions, such as joke.
  His Radiancy the last emperor to his closest friends: "Do you really believe I have all the emotional range of a statue? - You do, don' t you? You truly believe I am as serene as the ritual words suggest. (...) The trouble with pretending to have no emotions beyond a vague benevolence is that after a while, you start to believe yourself. But that I do not display my emotions does not mean I don't have them. Oh, no, it does not indeed. Benevolent I think I can generally claim to be, but calm, disinterested, and serene I am not."
• Try to Fit That on a Business Card: The emperor as well as Cliopher:
  • The last Emperor of Astandalas, his Radiancy Lord Artorin Damara, the Sun on Earth, the Lord of Rising Stars, the Lion-eyed, Lord of Five Thousand Lands and Ten Thousand Titles, Lord-Wizard of Zunidh, Fitzroy Angursell, the rebel poet of the Red Company, etc., etc.
  • Lord Cliopher Mdang, Secretary in Chief of the Offices of the Lords of State, Viceroy of Zunidh, Tanà of the Wide Sea.
• Unspecified Apocalypse: The Fall of Astandalas, between 25 and a thousand years back: Readers never learn exactly what happened and what caused it, and even in-universe, the knowledge is iffy: whatever happened broke the empire that had endured for a hundred generations, brought disaster, famine, death, even falling lands and the disruption of weather, magic and time itself.
• Vestigial Empire: The empire of Astandalas once spanned nearly five entire worlds – in the present day after the catastrophic event of the Fall it has been reduced to dominion over only Zunidh, the world where the palace and emperor ended up.
• Voluntary Vassal: The province of Vangaye-ve did not get subjugated by the empire, as many other regions and eventually worlds did, but instead voluntarily allied itself with the empire in the days of Aurelius Magnus.
• Year Inside, Hour Outside/ Year Outside, Hour Inside: The Fall of Astandalas really wrecked the time-line: In some places, generations passed while in others, the period until the emperor stabilized the time again happened well within a single lifetime.
• You Didn't Ask: This is why Cliopher never really told his family about his position or his boss - they didn't ask (at least not insistent enough), and he considered telling them without being asked as boasting.