In a message dated 9/1/2004 2:14:20 PM Eastern Daylight Time, Philip Hart <philiph at slac.stanford.edu> writes: > Nice thought re Vlad, but post-_Phoenix_ doesn't his Countship > (Countdom? Countity? Countitude?) come directly from the > Empress, hence he reports to her? I just re-read that bit, and it explicitly states that Szurke County is inside the Duchy of Eastmanswatch. There is no explicit comment re whom Vlad is answerable to. --KG