The Sevenfold Stair

The Sevenfold Stair climbs through Dovarhold's lower works, market galleries, crown chambers, and outer gate terraces. Oath trains climb it in ceremony; militias defend it under alarm; merchants curse it when ledgers, ore, and pride grow heavy. Each gate on the Stair has old scratches from drills, oath trains, riots, and siege watches. Whoever controls the Stair controls how quickly Dovarim becomes fortress, marketplace, court, or tomb. Its beauty is architectural memory. Its dread is logistical: a blocked landing can delay bread, reinforcements, surgeons, or the news that a lower hall is burning. Its cost is carried by stretcher teams, blocked merchants, hungry children waiting below a closed gate, and captains who must choose whether speed or order will kill fewer people.