The ward's as open and spacious as the hearts of its rulers're closed and cramped. Every main street's cold, broad, and echoing, and a cutter can see huge swathes of the sky, more than anywhere else in the city. Most Cagers don't care for the view, 'cause the view's a bit too big. From the edge, some say a cutter can see right into that endless Void, and a smart cutter knows that that fall is infinite. Truth is, you just see black. And you never hit the bottom, you just die along the way. It's a convenient way to get rid of bodies "quietly" in this part of town. Most cutters spend as little time as possible on the ward's streets, under what passes in the Cage for open sky.
Off the main streets, the ward is a little more like the rest of town. The alleys are full of sharp corners, with lights shining from recessed windows. There're a good half-dozen public clock towers in the squares, all of which run forward and then backward, from peak to antipeak. Drives the modrons half-mad, it does, but attempts to make these clocks run forward always fail. It's called The Lady's Ward (a Cager can hear the capital T) after the Lady of Pain. Not that she lives here more than anywhere else, it's just that she keeps her tools here: the City Barracks, the Court, the Prison, and the Armory — all the things that define her power and enforce her will. Since power attracts power, bloods set their cases in The Lady's Ward.
'Course, power also attracts those who feed on clout, money, and influence. The knights of the Ward are the hidden government, the shadow lords of the city. They are organized and keep a relative peace among themselves, to better their profits. The knights of The Lady's Ward live in the High Houses, as the palaces of the ward are known (see details below). The majority of these cases are set in what's called the Noble District, bounded by Portal Close, Harmonium Street, and Lords' Row. Most of the High Houses are private and extremely well guarded; nighttime deliveries are common, and even rich garnishes yield little valuable information. Few know what goes on behind their doors, or what treasures are larded away in their cellars. What the knights of the Lady want kept dark, stays dark.
Perhaps as a way of balancing the grasping, shameless greed of the High Houses, the ward is also home to over half the city's temples. These ain't just for the provincial powers from the Prime or some upstart Lords of the Abyss; no, The Lady's Ward is home to temples for the bloods. among the powers, including Ptah, Opener of the Ways, Io the Dragon King, and Brahman the Creator. (Don't forget, though; no powers are allowed into Sigil, by order of the Lady. Temples? Fine. Proxies? Fine. Powers? Not a chance.) As might be expected of the finest ward of the crossroads of the planes, most powers of travelers and wandering have their proxies and temples here, such as Muamman Duathal the dwarf wanderer, Baravar Cloakshadow of the gnomes, Koriel of the ki-rin, Diancastra of the giants and titans, Zivlyn of Krynn, and Daragor the shape-shifter. Their temples are all elaborate, sprawling buildings, richly decorated and well staffed with wide-eyed acolytes and hardened priests. Naturally, every temple in The Lady's Ward is designed to display the might and glory of its high-up. It's as if the multiverse itself had been mined of its monuments, and all of them were placed here.
The great creators and the traveling gods aren't the only ones who set their proxies' cases in this ward; there're also proxies of many powerful pantheons' leaders, including those of Shang-ti, Corellon Larethian, Gruumsh, the Lords of the Nine (the high-ups among the baatezu, rulers of the layers of Baator), Odin, Moradin Dwarffather, Garl Glittergold, Primus, Maglubiyet, and Zeus. Sure, the houses of the powers are great, and their proxies and servants are powerful, but in the end they too are drawn into the mad whirl of the kriegstanz that obsesses factols, fiends, and crime lords alike. In The Lady's Ward, even the powers' representatives are seen as merely more powerful pieces on the chessboard. Rooks, maybe, or bishops, I'd say.
THE HIGH HOUSES
Not surprisingly, the buildings in this ward reflect the power and wealth of their owners. The greatest of the palaces are called the High Houses, and each of them has a name and history longer than that of any of the lords who ever dwelt within. A few of the High Houses are known to every Cager: the grim, dominating Prison, the dour and humorless Barracks, and the regal and imposing City Court. Most other palaces, held privately, lie in the Noble District.
For all its majesty, The Lady's Ward is still cold and lifeless. It's the quietest and most orderly place in the city, because only a leatherhead'd make trouble in an area that's home to both the Harmonium and the Mercykillers. The regular hurly-burly of street life is missing, as too many folks're afraid of the Hardheads and the Red Death (and with good reason). That suits the residents just fine, because the rich haven't ever been fond of the poor camping on their doorstep. The tapestry of life in the ward is actually much more vibrant than it seems, but it's carefully hidden behind iron-gated walls and discreet facades. Most of the bloods who come here merely seek diversions: gambling, intrigue, a distracting but passionate affair with an inappropriate someone — the rebellions of the rich. Beneath that, the true players struggle for every advantage in their treachery: blackmail, forgery, necromancy, even forbidden and arcane rituals for the benefit of dark powers. If a cutter finds his way inside, there're great costume balls where rivals circle each other, where grand plots are hatched over lavish dinners, and where secret affairs are hidden far from sight; but the price of knowing the dark of the high-ups is that one can always learn too much and be cast from the spire to fall forever...