Pandemonium reigned in the royal place as the throne room had detonated. Had the princess known what the crossbones on the device stood for, she would have never placed the item within the room.
The upside was that no one was using it, and no one was nearby. There had been walls, and a chair, and steps and nice columns and places to have formal ceremonies. Now there was just a blank space where the throne room had been, with ruined shrapnel and other sundry collected near the walls that looked more like swish cheese than partitions.
Crying bitterly in her mothers arms, the empress wanted to reprimand her daughter but the damage and destruction spoke for itself. While parliament was still trying to figure out who was still alive, the emperor had barricaded himself in his office.
