Investiture

Stuff here about investiture.

Rites

The heir's investiture consumes three days, and involves three rites and one unofficial party.

• Offering to the Kingdom, which takes place in Ontine's throneroom before any who wish to attend: "I am acceptable to the people."
• Unofficial gift-giving party (that is, the heir's close friends give her gifts, during the day before the vigil).
• Vigil, overnight in the Cathedral: "I am acceptable to the gods."
• Investiture, in the throneroom again, at midday following the night of the vigil: "I am acceptable to my queen."
• This is followed by a celebratory ball, and then a feast.

History

Say something here about how this started.

Also mention that there's now part of the ceremony for dealing with spouses who become the heir's consort.

Prior Investitures

Maraesa

Maraesa had brought a chest of gold and silver coins and gemstones as symbol that she would enrich the realm, and had worn an equally opulent gown, also in Galare blue and silver.

Liolesa

According to historians, Liolesa had arrived arrayed in Galare blue and silver… but her gown had involved a train, and the diamonds on it had been pricked out in a star map that had encompassed not just their world, but all the sectors near them, and even had embroidered constellations. Two scrolls of maps, and both of them stunning: one of the Alliance that had included the Eldritch world, and one of Escutcheon in exquisite detail, available because of the satellites Liolesa had been instrumental in procuring during her preparation for the coronet. Her promise, according to the historian, had been ‘relevance, context, and the future.’ This account, however, conflates the acts of Liolesa during the upheaval caused by Fasianyl and Sellelvi with her investiture presentation in an attempt to make her seem like a Pelted partisan from the beginning. At the time of Liolesa's actual investiture, the Eldritch were not aware of the Alliance; her actual concerns at the time were not the Eldritch's extinction, but their stratification into an unsustainable society.

Bethsaida

Beth wore a ‘sumptuous gown’ of ‘royal Galare blue and silver, crusted with diamonds and pearls, with combs of platinum’ in her hair, and that was the summary of the very long paragraph the historian had devoted to her ‘raiment’, and brought with her a book of romantic tales commissioned as her Investiture gift. An enormous book, with pages of vellum. It is illuminated and illustrated. It contains gold, silver and copper leafing, as well as precious gems ground into the inks, as well as glued to the pages. the words are written in several colors of ink, reflecting the Eldren linguistic coloring. Each story features a different noble House, and every House is represented. Showing that Beth valued every person of rank, no matter their allegiance. All the women in the book have Beth's eyes and widow's peak, because the principal illustrator was in love with her. Afterward, someone went through and painted over the irises in different colors.

Sediryl

Sediryl wore a long-sleeved blouse, delicately pleated in dozens of narrow verticals, and buttoned with pearls at her throat and wrists; her leggings were a fabric that shifted hue depending on the angle, from deepest blue to abyssal black. The boots were perhaps better suited to riding than mucking in a garden plot. Over this, she wore a dark blue vest and riding coat like the ones she’d favored in the Alliance when she’d been acting as Liolesa’s ambassador, formal, tailored pieces. One string of pearls, wound into her hair; two pearl earrings; and the secret rampant.

• "My first gift to you is food enough to fill your bellies without so much reliance on foreign trade."
• "And with your aid, I give you my gift: the chance to become once again what we were meant to be. Helpmeets to our people. True lieges, with work worth waking up to. [...] A say in how that future affects the people who have granted you their trust with their allegiance."