The main hall of the stilt-village was less a royal court and more a festering, open wound. Damp air, thick with the cloying sweetness of algae and the sour tang of decay, clung to the colossal, bleached ribs of the dead Ruin Wyrm that formed the vaulted ceiling. Droplets of condensation dripped from the bones, landing with soft, wet plinks on the rotting floorboards. Veridia sat upon a makeshift throne of hardened mud and interlocking vertebrae, the coarse, homespun fabric of her new "royal" robes itching against her skin. She was a queen enthroned in a sewer, and the indignity was a physical weight.
"This first council of the Effluent Sinks Royal Court is now in session," she announced, her voice pitched with a regal authority that felt like a phantom limb. It echoed strangely in the damp air, utterly wasted on the assembled grotesques.
The response was not a respectful silence, but a cacophony of competing filth. Hisses from scaled throats, the bubbling gulp of something amphibious, and the wet, percussive slap of webbed feet on wood filled the chamber.
A Lizardfolk shaman, his scales the color of oxidized copper and his eyes like chips of unpolished amber, slithered forward. He unrolled a map drawn on what looked disturbingly like tanned and stretched human skin. "Great Queen of Muck," he hissed, his forked tongue flicking in and out, tasting the air. "The Sunning Rock. It is our most sacred place, where the mud is warmest. The Bog-Hydras defile it with their nests and their… leavings." He shuddered with reptilian disgust. "The Accord of the Scale, sworn under the last green moon, grants us exclusive basking rights."
Before Veridia could even begin to process the concept of "basking rights," a Swamp Witch with skin like wrinkled, peeling moss hobbled forward, leaning heavily on a staff of gnarled driftwood. She pointed a bony, dirt-caked finger at the Hydra delegate. "Their nesting filth sours the mire! It disrupts the humors of the bog! My hexes are coming out all lumpy, and my poultices curdle! I demand they be moved to the western sludge fields, where their stench will blend with the rest of the poison."
The Bog-Hydra, a creature with five serpentine heads weaving independently from a single, bloated torso, hissed from five mouths at once, a discordant symphony of reptilian fury. "We object!" the first head snarled, its voice a dry rasp. "Each head is an individual citizen with individual needs!" the second declared, its tone more petulant. "Therefore, we demand five votes on the council!" the third added, sounding cannier than the others. "And five separate tributes of shiny things!" the fourth and fifth chimed in together, their eyes glinting with simple, avaricious greed.
Veridia's eye twitched. This was not governance. It was pest control. It was a squabbling nursery of overgrown, monstrous children. "Your peasant squabbles over warm mud and shiny rocks are beneath the notice of the crown," she said, the dismissive wave of her hand a muscle memory from a life of effortless authority.
The reaction was immediate and hostile. A wave of angry hissing swept through the hall. The witch's pot began to bubble ominously, releasing a plume of purple, foul-smelling smoke. The Hydra's five heads all began growling at once, a layered, menacing sound that vibrated through the floorboards. In that moment, Veridia felt a tremor of fury—not at them, but at the humiliating, soul-crushing realization that her authority here was a complete and utter fiction. These creatures were not her subjects; they were her cellmates.
"And welcome back to *Queen of the Swamp*!" Seraphine's shimmering illusion appeared beside the throne, her gown a cascade of impossible starlight, her voice a saccharine poison in Veridia's ear. "Our beleaguered monarch is facing her first political crisis. Will she broker a peace, or will she be devoured by her own constituents? The ratings are through the roof!" She leaned closer to Veridia, her whisper for her ears only. "Offer the Hydra a multi-headed crown, darling. The Patrons would adore the symbolism. It's tacky, but it sells."
Veridia was about to scream, to lash out at the phantom, when a new figure pushed through the grumbling crowd with surprising force. Grolnok Gristle-chewer, his goblin frame now adorned with a ridiculously oversized necklace of polished river stones and a stolen bit of rusted chainmail, cleared his throat with a wet, gravelly sound.
"Your Majesty," he began, his new, self-appointed title of "Minister of Muck" rolling off his tongue with greasy relish. "These belly-achers can wait. We have a bigger problem. There's an army at the border."
***
The edge of the swamp was a curtain of gray mist and a constant, maddening buzz of biting insects. Veridia stood on a patch of semi-solid ground that squelched under her boots, her royal retinue consisting of Grolnok and a dozen twitchy goblins armed with rusty shivs. It was a pathetic, comical sight.
Through the mist, they emerged. Not as a chaotic horde, but as a disciplined, formidable phalanx. Centaur warriors, their equine bodies powerful and sleek, their humanoid torsos clad in polished leather and steel. Their long spears were held at a perfect, uniform angle, and they moved with a quiet, synchronized purpose that made Veridia's rabble look like the squabbling children they were. The only sound was the rhythmic, sucking pull of their hooves in the mud.
At their head rode a Centaur of immense size and age. His hair and beard were the color of winter frost, braided with small, carved stones, and his face was a roadmap of ancient scars. He radiated a calm, unshakeable authority that silenced the goblins' nervous chattering with a single, sweeping glance. This was Chieftain Voron Sagewind. He did not bellow. He did not threaten. He simply was, a feature of the landscape as solid and immovable as a mountain.
He halted his warriors a dozen paces away, the line stopping as one. His gaze, heavy and patient, fell upon Veridia. It was not the leering look of a monster or the fearful look of a mortal. It was the appraising look of a landlord inspecting a squatter.
"You are the one they call a queen," Voron said, his voice a low rumble, like stones shifting deep underground.
"I am Queen Veridia Vex, ruler of this domain by right of conquest and royal decree," Veridia countered, forcing a confidence she did not feel, the words tasting like ash in her mouth.
Voron ignored her titles as if they were buzzing insects. "I am not here to fight you for this poisoned land," he stated calmly. "I am here to occupy what has always belonged to my people. The Sagewind Clan holds a claim to these swamps, sworn on the Oath-Stone that stands in its heart. A treaty from before your precious Sweeps."
He signaled to a lieutenant, who produced a scroll case of petrified, dark wood, sealed with ancient wax. Voron took it, his massive, calloused hands unrolling an ancient, yellowed document with surprising care. It was a treaty, its script faded but legible, written in the high tongue of a long-dead human king. Beside the royal seal was another sigil, stark and undeniable—the coiled serpent of an ancient demonic house. A House she knew. A House her own family had dealt with. The claim was real. It was powerful. And it was ironclad by the laws of both realms.
Voron Sagewind looked past her then, his gaze sweeping over the witches and lizardfolk who had followed them to the border, their faces a mixture of fear and curiosity. His voice, though quiet, carried the weight of an epoch, a declaration that shattered the very foundation of her pathetic, newborn rule.
"These lands, and all who dwell upon them, fall under the protection of the Sagewin Accord. Your new Queen's reign is predicated on a lie. She is a trespasser."