Prefect's Office, Court and Jail

[Daniel]

The Prefects Keep

Connecting to the castle on the west side, is the Prefect's keep. Inside the keep is a grand hall where the Prefect and his/her men eat and plan the cities protection. There are three doors in the hall. One leading to the medium sized kitchen. The second leading the Prefects own personal quarters. The third the cities guards quarters. A large fire place sets in the hall with a large oak sturdy table, with high back chairs. The room proudly decorated in the purple, black and gold colors of the city. The rearing horse standing wildly in the middle of each plaque, mural, painting.

Reception and Courtroom

While its outer facade is unadorned stone, on the inside the court of local justice in Abestat is an opulent, impressive building which pays some homage to the city's history as the traditional dwelling place of wealthy merchants who in their later years chose often to pursue law. The reception area has a multihued granite floor, a huge sculpture of an Imperial Warbird standing at the center of the room before the balif's counter. Three passageways lead out from the main room, granting access to the three chambers which constitute the main arteries of justice for the city.

While a courthouse would traditionally rise up steeply to the dias of the magistrate, in this case the building actually slopes downward slightly in that direction, part of an architectural effort to create more room for the many who may be interested in observing judicial proceedings here. Rising out of a veined marble floor, the sea of stained oak benches carved at the top and edges with understated vinework is parted by a royal indigo carpet inset at regular intervals with tiny pearls. The hallowed ebonwood platform including the cushioned seats of the judges rises imposingly, slightly larger than normal, with the seal of Prime Province inlaid in gold at its face. Four massive columns stand at the far end of the room, one on each side of two doorways - one with an ivory bust of Ioannes peering down beneficiently over it and the other with a hard black likeness of Jalat scowling toward those who might pass under it, the entrances leading to the office of the prefect and a stretch of the hallway leading to the subterranian gaol respectively.

Office of the Prefect

In contrast to the grandeur of the adjoining hearing room, the official place of business for the prefect is comparatively utilitarian. A superlative pine desk sits in a pool of the center of the room, its only accutriments a silver quill holder and ink pot. A massive bookshelf takes up most of the far wall, a veritable treasure trove both in the resources it must have required to fill and in the generations of knowledge about local, provincial and Imperial law proceedings that it contains. The literature therein ranges from scrolls to boxes with unbound pages to actual vellum-bound texts with carefully illuminated spines and wording, all of which must be memorized in order to successfully administer the law.

The stonework of the walls is covered by a series of banners in the colonial colors of Abestat, purple, black and gold flags draping above bronze torch holders which are kept blazing during the prefect's many late nights of service to the good of the city.

Gaol

As prisons go within the Empire, Abestat was particularly vicious about the construction of its very own place for the internment of the criminal element. Seen to by the efforts of Dwarven master builders and Gnomish tinkerers swayed into the service of the township by the enormous wealth of its government and a few choice benefactors, the narrow, pitch-black corridor leading into the dungeon-like complex is actually larger in total area than the zone cordained off to hold the unlucky malcontents who find themselves on the wrong side of the law. The sloping hall is a long, cold and potentially dangerous forced march which all new residents must undergo to reach the rows of reinforced cells at the bottom of the chasmlike construction. Occassionally, the dim flicker of a torch may light the way in the hall or to delineate the winding paths between the cells, but in general the whole schematic is enormously unpleasant, frightening, and detrimental to health and sanity beyond the wildest imaginings of topside thieves and vagrants.

As a rule, only the bailifs and most senior guardsmen know the layout of the whole jail, and only the prefect and other magistrates are aware of the intriciacies of all its hidden pitfalls. More than once - though not much more - has a particularly unfortunate soul managed to escape from their immediate confinement only to sprawl to their untimely death at the bottom of a four-pace wide pit or stumble into a variety of sharp, pointy objects about which they had no prior conception. To make things all the worse, there is a constant array of dripping, chittering and squeaking noises in addition to the sounds some have professed to hear after their visits begin to grow a little too wearying on mind and body ...

The idea of granting prisoners an exercise yard took a long time to catch on in Abestat, with its traditionally overzealous approach toward any who would threaten the sanctity of its wealth, but it was eventually permitted, if not exactly embraced. The yard is hemmed in by rough-hewn, towering stone walls and razorwire as well as having redundant guard towers, two pair, with archers stationed on every shift.