by A K Fedeau
Syndicate members identify themselves with crescent moon motifs on their clothes, and often live incognito, on the road, or in underground hideouts. They rarely break into upper-class crime like political bribery - Syndicate members have their own politics and live by their own rules. While some members secretly deal in opium, Syndicate culture usually shuns the drug trade. Syndicate elders see it as more trouble than it is worth, and they know that it will eventually come back to haunt their own communities.
The most skilled Syndicate agents rise to the gender-neutral rank of “prince,” which affords them immense fear and respect among other criminals. To become a prince, a member must show proficiency in several fields of Syndicate trade, and a council must deem that they are committed to the organization for life.
Though the Syndicate is ruthless and involved in violent crime, the mark it leaves on communities is not always negative. Many Syndicate members are orphans and benefit from their found family, and many smuggle or steal to improve the living conditions in slums. Some even specialize in assassinating corrupt officials - their way of leveling the playing field in a world that has been unfair to them.
LAW, CRIME, AND PUNISHMENT
All provinces have their own variation on a police force, who follow a paramilitary system in the capital and a looser structure in rural areas. Trials are heard by judges and argued by advocates, who must undergo several years of study and an apprenticeship.
Just as the pontifex is the head of the Church in each province, the provinces’ highest legal office is called the judex. Judices do not hear cases, but they provide legal advice and help rulers write laws, so rulers handpick them knowing that they will be one of their closest allies. Depending on how long they live and how beloved they are, a judex could serve under two or even three monarchs.
Capital punishment is present, but rare, and frequently condemned by the Church. Removing body parts is seen as inhumane, so hanging is the usual choice. Beheading is reserved for traitors and the most egregious murderers, who are believed to have forfeited their connection to the Celestial Pair. The absolute worst offenders are then cremated and struck from public record, so that no physical proof of their existence remains.
For most cases, the law prefers exile or terms of imprisonment. The Vincula in Histria and the Krushka in Severin are the continents’ most notorious prisons - the Vincula for its large, winding structure that confuses those who try to escape, and the Krushka for its isolation in one of the coldest parts of Severin.
SCIENCE
Over the last few decades leading up to Dangerous Crowns, the continents have been in an era of scientific discovery. Scientists have made progress in a wide variety of fields, from naturalism to herbalism, chemistry, and astronomy.
The greatest advancements have been in medicine, where the rise of dissection has revolutionized surgery. However, finding a steady supply of cadavers is difficult, because the Book of Mira says the body is sacred and must be kept whole. This limits scientists to working with executed criminals, or taking chances with dead paupers that no one comes forward to identify. In addition, while physicians have not yet solidified germ theory, they have discovered the role hygiene plays in preventing the spread of disease. This has decreased deaths from infections and other secondary illnesses, as both physicians and folk healers wash their hands and use clean instruments.
In CC 1609, a Severin doctor named Lyudmila Savicheva published an essay called Dialogue on Wellness of the Spirit. In it, she proposed the soul could fall ill in the way the body could, leading to melancholy, anxiety, or destructive tendencies. More importantly, she stressed that the condition could be cured, and advocated a mixture of talk and behavior therapy. From this, the field of “cognitive alchemy” was born, and many young scientists have rushed to learn the new discipline. It does have its critics, though: Some scholars doubt its scientific merit, seeing it as hard to quantify and more of a religious concern.
BIRTH AND DEATH
Babies in the world of Dangerous Crowns are born at home, and named as soon as possible to imbue them with personhood. If a couple wants children - which is not demanded of them - they often wait until their thirties, so that their affairs are settled and they are certain of their choice.
Death in childbirth is rare, as are young, unplanned pregnancies, because moonflower tinctures are so readily available. Though there is no particular stigma on children born out of wedlock, people generally do not see a reason to have them without getting married first. On the other hand, people who conceive through infidelity are sharply rebuked, as are men who impregnate women and then disappear.
Healthy people can expect to live to their seventies or eighties. When they die, funerary customs vary from province to province. Histria and Jormunthal have elaborate catacombs, while the rest prefer burial in mausoleums or the earth. In Juba, an old person's funeral is a celebratory event, because the deceased is considered lucky to have lived a full life. On the other hand, Severin mourning periods can be very long - some families remain in mourning for years, and some widowed spouses never come out.
The Church does not have a concrete concept of an afterlife, because nothing is specified in the holy scriptures. Though some theologians say that the soul joins Titus and Mira in the stars, generally, people believe that when you are gone, you are gone. Therefore, the legacy you leave in life is of utmost importance. The greatest accomplishment is to be remembered for years to come.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
Thank you to my mother, Elizabeth, for everything: Your tenacity, your indulgence, reading to me when I was growing up, and the unconditional support of my terrifying, nonlinear choice of career. Thank you also for the extensive structural editing. If Dangerous Crowns makes any sense, it will be because of your help.
Thank you to the countless friends and acquaintances on social media who previewed excerpts and gave me a space to flesh out ideas. I realize how ironic it is to claim I’m grateful to people and then not go to the trouble of identifying any of them by name. I’m lucky enough to have so many of them that I can’t thank them all in a reasonable amount of space. But if you’ve ever read, listened, asked questions, or voiced your support, rest assured, I mean you. Yes, you.
Last, but not least, thank you to Henry Rollins for the inspiration and kind words of encouragement.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
A.K. Fedeau writes for both books and video games, appearing on several titles by Voltage Entertainment USA. She is a graduate of the University of California, Irvine’s Humanities Honors Program, where she wrote a thirty thousand-word novella for her senior thesis.
As a child with a tyrannical attention span, A.K. turned to art, fashion, and reading to entertain herself. At six, she invented her own country, and her teachers started getting suspicious. At eight, she started writing, and it was all downhill from there. She lives in California with a collection of more party dresses than she can wear, and can be found on Twitter or at her website, akfedeau.com.