Rin is the fourth? in line for her grandfather’s throne. Some of those before her in line have recused themselves – not interested in leadership, focused on a calling in the priesthood, interested in romance with someone who didn’t want to be in a leadership position, or not interested in creating heirs for one reason or another. Many have died. Her grandfather is quite old, and has outlived handfuls of his heirs.
More than half of the royal heirs went into the army. Calenta has a heavily meritocratic society – their rulers were originally war-chiefs of nomadic tribes – and earning a high position in the Army is one way to prove your merit. However, it’s also a good way to die, especially with an active war boiling on the front.
When Rin left to study healing, she was fourteenth in line. When she left for the army she was ninth in line. Her cousin Elen was three behind her and now is one behind her.
Her mother recused herself long ago. Her mother is a scholar and prefers her books to people.
Probably –> recusing yourself is acceptable (being removed from the inheritance is not, is considered very shameful, and it /does/ happen), but it is a one-way street. You can’t decide to un-recuse yourself.
While I decided to get rid of the immensely complicated inheritance system I’d originally thought of, it still flips genders. I.e., since the Emperor is male, his heir WILL be female, his daughter or a granddaughter THROUGH a daughter, or, if one suitable cannot be found, from his mother’s or grandmother’s line.
This has made Rin’s uncle, who needs a name (though he might have one in an earlier draft), exceedingly cranky.
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While I decided to get rid of the immensely complicated inheritance system I’d originally thought of A little sad, but probably wise. IIRC the allowable heir set was defined tightly enough that it would be easy to have lots of descendants none of whom met the criteria. Her mother is a scholar and prefers her books to people. I recall her dad being scholarly, and vaguely thought her mother was more political, but I’m not actually pulling a specific scene to mind, so I may’ve leap to that just from it being on Mom’s side that Rin was an heir.
Yeah, the original system sort of depended on, say, your seventh daughter HAVING seven daughters. And so on, worse as it got further down the line. If you died after your third kid, everyone was SOL. I think you’re right re. mom, but perhaps… Mom is a scholar, and, while she enjoys the company of people, prefers ordering books to ordering nations.
If you had two dozen kids all of the wrong gender, the system was SOL without anyone dying. Or if you died before you had grandkids. So, yeah, fun but too hard to generate valid heirs. You can take a total rewrite on Rin’s Mom if you want to — she didn’t have that much page time in the first draft, and plenty of other things are changing.
Mm, but I like her as socially-astute-but-likes-books-better. 😀