The Hearth Assembly

The Hearth Assembly governs Dovara’s internal law, citizenship, and formal admission. Its jurisdiction is deliberately narrow. It sets the rules between neighbors and decides who belongs to the refuge realm, but it does not govern household language, inherited memory, or interpretation of the Twofold. Dovara’s founders treated shared civic law as necessary and cultural uniformity as a power the Assembly should never possess.

Most admissions occur without an Assembly decision. A receiving community may accept a newcomer on its own word, taking responsibility for the person it brings among its homes. An Assembly warrant exists for arrivals no community has vouched for. That route receives greater scrutiny, but the Assembly grants such warrants more readily than outsiders expect from a protected Far Reach settlement.

The division with Edrane is equally strict. Edrane provides defense and represents Dovara externally under the protectorate arrangement. It appoints no Assembly member and holds no authority over Dovaran citizenship or local law. The Assembly, in turn, does not direct Edrani convoys or speak for the protector abroad. The arrangement continues because Edrane gains a stable outer flank while Dovara retains the internal self-government for which its communities settled there.

Emergency practice favors refugee traffic before ordinary arrivals. No vote established that priority, and none has been sought. The custom persists because the Assembly’s admission power exists to preserve a refuge, not to make refuge inaccessible when it is most needed.