The Collateral System

Item from Bride by Ali Hazelwood

The interspecies political arrangement that trades people — usually women — as living guarantees of peace, wrapping hostage exchange in the language of marriage and diplomacy.

Also known as: The Collateral, Collateral Marriage, The Alliance System

What They Know

• The system was designed by the Vampyre Council — giving them inherent structural advantages in its execution
• Previous Collateral arrangements have failed, sometimes violently — the current treaty exists because the last one collapsed
• The legal framework technically protects Collateral individuals from harm — in practice, enforcement is political
• Both species maintain the system because the alternative is open war, not because either side considers it just

Connections

• created_by — vampyre_council
• governs — misery
• governs — lowe

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