The Senate's function was to draft legislations, and candidate lists for magistrate positions which, the Centuriate Assembly would vote on. Senate members were appointed by the Consuls. The Senate had no fixed rule for how many members it would have, though the norm was to keep the number close to 100. They served for life, unless they became so disliked that the rest of the Senate brought forth a decree for vote at the Centuriate Assembly to deprive them of their position, and said decree passed. The Senate acted as a forum where they, and people they invited in, would discuss the state and future course of the empire, and put forth decrees regarding these for the Centuriate Assembly to decide on the course of action through vote. The argument for the Senate's existence was that the regular citizen would not have the capacity or time needed to form an informed proposition about the empire's future trajectory.
Senators were often former high-ranking magistrates, and the cyclical nature of consuls selecting senators, and the Senate picking candidates for the Consul position, meant there were often a lot of collusion between senators and magistrates. While the Senate held no direct law-making power, the soft power they held in being able to decide what the Centuriate Assembly would vote on meant they could indefinitely block legislature they did not approve of. The only thing effectively preventing the Senate from stacking the odds when it came to magistrate candidates, or refusing to put forth certain legislations for voting at the Centuriate Assembly, would be the public's opinion and reaction to said actions. More than once in the empire's history was the entire Senate lynched by the citizenry due to being perceived as so corrupt that the general public deemed them enemies of the Empire. This effectively meant that if certain people became too popular, the Senate may be indirectly forced to include them on the list of magistrate candidates to avoid public outcry. The similar situation would apply for popularly wanted legislation.
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The Senate drafted legislation and prepared the Magistrate candidate lists for Assembly votes. Senators, appointed by the Consuls, served for life unless removed by an Assembly decree—a rare event usually precipitated by public outrage over perceived corruption. Although lacking direct legislative power, the Senate controlled the legislative agenda, effectively gatekeeping the issues brought before the Assembly.
+This power to influence, coupled with the cyclical nature of appointments between the Senate and Consuls, often led to collusion and corruption, moderated only by the threat of public backlash. Historical instances of entire Senates being overthrown by the citizenry underscore the volatile balance between senatorial power and public opinion.
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The Clergy unofficially formed the 4th pillar of the Empire's government. They held no official political power, but held a lot of soft power over the other bodies due to being perceived as the conveyers of the very will of the gods. The Empire's deeply religious nature meant that any official would find it hard going too far off what the clergy decreed to be the gods' will, out of fear of public outcry. The clergy tended to have its members closely accompany both magisters and members of the senate in order to levy this soft power as much as possible.
The Clergy was on paper led by the Oracle, though a more accurate term would be that they acted as the Oracle's attendants. The Oracle was a cleric kept in a constant trance through a mix of herbs and incenses, and who was believed to be able to commune directly with the gods while in this trance. The other members would attend to the Oracle, listen to whatever was said or done by the Oracle, attempt to decipher its meaning, and convey that to the governing bodies and the populace. The Oracle was seen as a sacred being in Concalian society, though the permanent trance tended to take such a toll on the person's body that they'd usually die after only a few years as Oracle. The senior members of the Clergy would typically pick a healthy young cleric, whose abilities indicated a lot of favor with the gods, as the new Oracle whenever the last one expired. This dynamic meant that, aside from the wrath of the gods themselves, there were little stopping the senior clerics from using the Oracle as a convenient puppet.