A hush fell over the great ballroom as the private doors behind the dais swung open. Marshal Brand entered, flanked by four senior colonels of the cavalry brigade.
Brand was sixty-five years old, tall, erect, and imposing, with silver hair brushed back from a patrician forehead. He wore the full dress uniform of a Marshal of the Empire. A scarlet coat stiff with gold braid, diamond-crusted epaulets. A golden ritual sword whose handle knob was carved into the snarling head of a royal dragon.
Advocate Morrel stepped forward to the bar. He carried a huge folio volume bound in crimson morocco leather. He was stamped with the royal arms in heavy gold leaf.
“Your Honors,” Morrel announced, bowing deeply to the bench. “I present the approved, sovereign campaign journal of Marshal Brand—the main record upon which the Parliament awarded the Iron Line Victory Endowment eighteen years ago. This volume, lit up by the royal scroll-keepers and validated by six knight commanders, records the glorious cavalry charge that shattered the enemy center at three in the afternoon.”
Morrel turned toward the crowd of commoners, his lip curling with dramatic disdain. “This noble chronicle contains the complete, plain history of the campaign. It proves that the irregular peasant levies broke and fled into the bitter salt marshes before the first cannon was fired, leaving the defense of the kingdom entirely to the valor of the Marshal’s mounted gentlemen.”
