Vaclan House is home to the Town Council and thus is pretty much the epicentre of the emerging conflicts in the city. It stands close to the seafront in the east of the city, part of a government complex built around Tukas Square (what other name could they have chosen?) Near to Vaclan house is The Preski, the occasional home of Zabrial's regional assemblies, as well as the headquarters of the local Guards regiments and assorted government offices and libraries. Increasingly clustered around the complex are also the homes of government officials, as the embattled political elite close ranks for survival. The whole site once held the substantial palace of the Kings of Zabrial, which was an increasingly sprawling surrounded by beautiful artificial gardens. After the Confederacy was founded, for a time the palace housed the federal government. However, the transference of power robbed it of all function. Crumbling and eventually abandoned completely, it was finally pulled in 1088 although part of its gardens were spared and still stand. The demolition wasn't popular with Zabric purists (a large demonstration delayed it) and neither was what replaced it.
The Preski was built in a conventionally Zabric style but many objected to Vaclan House. Its double entrance portico lined by columns and figures engraved on its roof, the mosaic courtyard beyond flanked by colonnades, the interior with its rooms, most strikingly the Debating Chamber, decorated by murals; all were seen as far too Dorlafan. In truth the architect, Cael Albi, was a native Zabric herself and was merely reflecting a wider trend in the city for Dorlafan styles, but it got the building off to a bad start. It has never really recovered; even when the separatist movement has been at its most dormant and even when it has housed openly partisan Councillors, Vaclan House has always been held up as a symbol of Dorlafan oppression. Its defenders point out that Albi also created a thing of rare beauty. Built in the pale brown local stone, its symmetry when viewed from the courtyard is perfect; an entrance portico (with yet more insidious columns) exactly dead centre and flanked by windows of gradually decreasing height as they ascend the building's five stories. It is capped by a gently rising pyramidal roof, from each corner of which rises an idiosyncratic spiralled chimney. The allegedly Dorlafan murals, and the statues and carvings which are inserted everywhere, show nothing but distinctively Zabric scenes; Narlan rising from the waves, Tars and Kaet Tukas battling the Erish, selective Kings of Zabrial (the less calamitous ones) and, in the debating chamber, an epic seascape complete with galleons, whales and kraken. On display in locked cases in the entrance hall are the legendary Tossoti Doctrines, a pact made between king and commons in the 700's which are said to be one of the earliest prototypes of a modern constitution. The hall and the public gallery of the debating chamber are supposedly open to all. Security is tight, however, and most important Council debates occur behind closed doors.
Unsurprisingly, Vaclan House has been the target of many pro-independence rallies. It will be first choice for the 1335 rioters, who attack and set fire to it, gutting the interior but not quite managing to destroy the building entirely.