Where The Lady’s Ward represents the principal seats of power and influence in Sigil that operate under the ostensible authority and permission of Her Serenity, every seat of power requires a bureaucracy. Present in the Clerk’s Ward are those clerks, ministers, and petty officials that carry out, plan and order the points of business that are determined from The Lady’s Ward.
The Clerk’s Ward has, in the past, been referred to as the Ward of Masks. Some archaic references to it still exist, but the term has been defunct for thousands of years. The origin of the name is lost in time, unlike the reasons behind the former name for the Lower Ward as the Prime Ward, itself explained in the details of that ward.
The streets are swept everyday. Statues scrubbed with soap and you will not find a seed of razorvine.
Areas
Civic Festhall
The Armory District is the border between the Lower Ward and The Lady’s Ward, blending the industrial feel of the Situated in the Clerk’s Ward at the corner of Crystal Dew Lane and Festive Way, the elegantly spired and gloriously decorated building has stood for over six hundred years and was built and planned over the course of a further century.
The headquarters of the Society of sensation is housed within its walls.
Once past the elaborate doors of the main entrance, each over ninety feet tall, the grand hall is filled with the scents of a hundred perfumes drifting on the air flowing from any number of people or classrooms throughout the first floor of the building. Off to either side the space is filled with classrooms and lecture halls that concentrate on any of a hundred topics that are never the same two days in a row. Lecture topics may range from mundane topics of academia such as the types of githyanki Astral Carracks over the past century, to a free for all food fight within a closed room with baatezu cuisine just because they threw tanar’ri food the other day.
Outside the Festhall and set on adjacent hillsides stand two auditoriums, the Northumber Amphitheatre which is in open air and the Elloweth Theatre which is shielded by a translucent covering of capiz shell to allow in light. Both are used for live performances of musical and theatric presentations, typically in daylight hours. Other concerts, plays, and the like are held within Ren Hall inside the Festhall itself to packed crowds regardless of the price of admission. These larger scale events are held twice a night with staggered styles of performances between evenings.
Hall of Information
Adjacent to the Hall of Records. The hall of information may be Sigil’s most valuable rescources. It provides general information about government operations, cultural affairs, and private sector services.
-Locate missing relative.
-Mediate dispute with merchant.
-Arrange meeting with wealthy landowner.
-Rectify tax status/dispute.
The Barracks District is the home and headquarters of the Harmonium faction, and for this reason, the district seems to stand as lifeless and dull. Nobody dares make problems for the Hardheads in their home turf, and so troublemakers and jesters tend to keep a wide berth.
The businesses in the neighborhood all cater specifically to Harmonium needs and obey a strict code of conduct. Business hours are from four to peak to six past peak, taverns are open only up until one to antipeak, and everyone hurries through the streets minding their own business and not making a lot of noise.
Hall of Speaker
the Hall of Speakers is a thing of beauty, a great oblong curved dome, topped by a carved, tall, graceful spire. Other smaller, but equally elegant spires rise from the lower sides of the dome, many of them of different colored stone or magically ornamented. Standing near to the dome rises a great iron statue called the Power of One, depicting a woman smiling and holding aloft a sphere of a Prime world cradled in one hand.
The forum in which the factions met to spout their arguments over philosophy, city business, and to preach their take on the world to everyone who would listen. More often, those who were there to listen were bound by their own factions to do so in order to wait their own turn to speak.
Trioptic NicOpena
The most breathtaking monument in all of Sigil. It resembles a gigantic rearing nic’opena, her long mane billowing in the wind. Over 200ft. tall with three oval eyes, one ruby, one amber and one emerald. Each ruby is a portal to another plane.
-emerald = Elysium
-Ruby = Prime material
-Amber = Mount celestia
To activate the portal a cutter must hold a small gem identical to the corresponding eye and step through the base of the portal. They must know the command word and the base is guarded day and night by the doomsguard to prevent unauthorized access.
Little Arcadia
Once a common squat for those members of the Harmonium involved in the constant patrols that monitored the Clerk’s Ward, this neighborhood has taken a downturn since most of the faction pulled up their roots and gave the Cage the slip after the Faction War. The pristine streets are still clean, clear, and well lit, but more for the increase in activity of the aasimon who have in fluxed into the district than to the now waning patrols of any city officials of the law.
Here, more than most areas of Sigil, celestials are commonplace and randomly observing a deva or similar being traversing the streets is not shocking, though the higher-ranking celestials tend to congregate among themselves. Indeed more than a few establishments in the area cater only to full-blooded creatures of the upper planes, gently turning away even bariaur as not “good” enough.
Workers District
Most of the lower ranking clerks, craftsman, and common laborers of the ward, those without rank, wealth, or both, tend to settle in the aptly named Workers District. This large district, roughly downward of the blue and green painted Hull Road opposite the Festhall District, is filled largely with small, single family kips and larger but clean and well-kept tenements. The place is orderly enough compared to the Hive, which is too easily within walking distance for most workers, but it lacks the luxuries common to the homes in the Administrators District.
Sandstone District
For all the order and cleanliness imposed by law upon the Clerk’s Ward, a blood wouldn’t commonly suspect that in the midst of it all, tucked away in all the order would be a community composed almost entirely of tieflings; and a respectable community at that. The Sandstone District is located between Crystal Dew lane, Founder’s Fence, and the edges of the Slags as they abut near the Clerk’s Ward. The name of the district is derived from the red sandstone paving stones used to line the streets of the district. The tieflings, many of them sick of their reputations, have holed up here among themselves and largely ignore the rest of the ward. Otherwise, the district largely resembles the Workers District in atmosphere and living conditions, if largely differing in the faces on the street.
Bars
The Tear of Barghest
Tavern favored by money lenders and landlords with candlelit tables, curtained booths, and expensive drinks.
The Iron Heart
With its metal chairs and almond brandy the Fated frequent this establishment.
The Greengage
Located just across the street from the Sensate headquarters is a tiny little cider shop known as the Greengage. This is the establishment of the halfling Marda Farambler. Over the years it’s earned a fine reputation, although it’s not popular with big folks. Marda, it seems, refused to bow to common sense and built the place to a proper scale. The commons are both immense and cozy to short folk, but the seating is cramped for anyone over four feet in height making it a popular place for the gnomes and halflings found in Sigil.
Black Wind Tavern
Decorated with violet tapestries and enderpine paneling. The bar requires all that enter abide by a strict policy of silence. Those that disregard this policy will find themselves muted for 1d4 days.