The Laws of Nod

Nod has no legislature, no judiciary, and no constitution. What it has are customs old enough to have acquired the weight of law, enforced by the willingness of the powerful to punish those who violate them. The Council codifies and interprets. The Prefex enforce. But the laws themselves predate both institutions by millennia, and would survive their destruction.

The laws exist because Nod cannot function without them. A city of millions, comprising seven sapient species and an unknowable number of transient entities, held together by nothing more than mutual self-interest and the threat of disproportionate retaliation. The laws formalize the minimum agreement required to prevent that arrangement from collapsing into open war.

The Sovereign Laws

Sovereign Laws apply to all beings within Nod regardless of species, faction, or district. They cannot be overridden by local custom or guild authority. Violation is answered by anyone with the power and inclination to answer it.

The Law of Retribution

Any being wronged in its person, property, or standing has the right to repay the offense in kind. The offender must submit to the repayment or negotiate terms of restitution. If the wronged party cannot act personally, they may designate a champion to pursue the matter on their behalf.

Retribution is bounded. Once the debt is repaid, the matter is closed. Any action beyond proportional repayment constitutes a new offense against the city itself, and any being in Nod may respond to it at any time, at the same measure.

This law is a pressure valve. It permits violence without permitting escalation.

The Law of Haven

Any being may claim a territory as haven. Within that territory, the claimant's rules are law, provided they do not contradict the Sovereign Laws. The territory must be marked. The claimant is responsible for anything that happens within it -- any violation of Sovereign Law committed in a haven is the haven-holder's burden to answer for.

A being entering another's haven receives two chances to leave before the haven-holder is entitled to act: a warning and a threat. After the second, the intruder forfeits protection.

Any being intending to reside in another's territory for an extended period must announce their presence and negotiate terms. Failure to do so is grounds for expulsion by force.

The Law of Neutrality

Nod is neutral ground. Conflicts between Aeons, between Domains, or between external powers may not be prosecuted within the city. Those who bring external wars into Nod answer to Nemo, and Nemo does not negotiate terms or provide clemency.

The Mortal Protections

These laws govern the treatment of humans and other mortals who have not yet entered the supernatural world. They exist because mortal populations are useful, because their destruction would attract attention, and because some of the city's older residents remember what happens when mortals are provoked to awareness and action.

The Right of Ignorance

Mortals who are unaware of the supernatural have the right to remain so. As long as a mortal does not actively endanger a supernatural being's haven or accumulate significant evidence of the arcane world, they should be misdirected and their attention diverted. Even a mortal investigating the supernatural is given two chances to abandon their inquiry before they forfeit this protection: a warning and a threat.

A supernatural being who brings a mortal across the Veil assumes full responsibility for that mortal's safety and education. The mortal's actions are considered the sponsor's own, and the sponsor answers for any violations committed by their charge. If the sponsor harms their charge, the sponsor may be punished under the Law of Retribution by any interested party.

The Right of Safety

Mortals who have not harmed a supernatural being are not to be harmed by one without cause. Mortals who have not killed are not to be killed. Proportionality applies; a mortal who has caused harm may receive harm in kind, no more. A mortal who kills without justification forfeits the Right of Safety entirely and may be claimed by whoever can prove the offense.

Local Custom

Below the Sovereign Laws, each community, guild, district, and species maintains its own rules, enforced within its own territory. A being who claims haven may escape the local customs of surrounding territories while within their own. Some haven-holders grant asylum to those fleeing local judgment, a practice that functions as political currency.

Local customs are not enforced by the Prefex unless they intersect with Sovereign Law violations. Disputes between communities over local custom are settled by negotiation, threat, or violence, in roughly that order.

Precedents

Precedents are established interpretations of the Sovereign Laws that address recurring situations. They carry the weight of long practice but are not themselves law, and can be argued, though most beings find it safer not to.

Inheritance of Territory

When the holder of a haven dies, is destroyed, or abandons their claim, their territory passes to the recognized leadership of whatever faction, guild, or community the holder belonged to. Contested inheritance is settled by the Law of Retribution or, more commonly, by whoever occupies the space first and can hold it.

The Shadow Exception

The Shadow is considered free ground. No being may claim haven in the Shadow, and local customs do not extend into it. Those who establish positions in the Shadow do so at their own risk, though they may still invoke Sovereign Law. In practice this means the Shadow is where Nod's laws go to be bent.

Declaration of Enmity

If a being's negligence allows threats to breed in their territory (entities from the Shadow slipping through, abyssal creatures nesting in neglected corners) the affected parties may invoke the Law of Retribution and declare enmity. From that point, only the involved parties may engage. Anyone who takes a side forfeits the protection of the Sovereign Laws for the duration of the dispute. Resolution typically involves granting the threatened party access to the negligent party's territory and a declaration of non-interference. Declarations of enmity are treated with considerable gravity. As precedents rather than law, they are open to argument, but most beings respect them without question.

The Right of Honor

With the agreement of all parties and the local authority, two beings may waive the right of allies to pursue retribution on their behalf in the event of death or incapacity. This is invoked during formal duels. If an ally disrespects this waiver, they are considered to have violated the Law of Retribution against the entire city.

Enforcement

The laws are enforced unevenly and imperfectly, which is by design. The Prefex handle the obvious cases. The Council handles the political ones. Theoretically Nemo handles the ones no one else can, though usually those sorts of problems seem to 'work themselves out', usually in particularly grisly ways.

For most residents, the laws are not a system of justice. They are the rules of a game that everyone plays because the alternative, living in a city of millions with no rules at all, is worse than any individual injustice the system produces.