Read Online City in the Sky by Glynn Stewart - Free Book Online Page A

long moment, the two of them just stared at each other. Erik could see, now, the similarities between this woman's features and his own.
    “Karn's son?” she questioned. Erik nodded. “Harmon?”
    “Yes, My Lady?” Ikeras replied immediately.
    “Leave us.” The tone of command was completely different from her comfortable familiarity of a moment before.
    The Aeraid bowed. “Understood. This is sept business, not mine.”
    Silence reigned in the room as Ikeras let himself out, and then Erik found his gaze locked by Arien's again. “I can see a resemblance,” she said softly, almost to herself, “and I do not believe Ikeras would intentionally deceive me. Nonetheless, this is hard to believe.”
    “How do you think I feel?” Erik said softly. “My father died years ago – I never even knew the man, let alone that I had family on his side.”
    “Dead?” Arien said, lowering herself into a chair. “I feared as much when my efforts to find him, when your grandfather died eight years ago, failed.”
    “Eight years ago?” Erik said softly. “He was twelve years dead by then.”
    “Tell me,” Arien told him. “ Please , tell me... how my son died.”
    He shook his head, realizing it was the wrong question. “I'll tell you how he lived,” he told her.
     
     
     
    Erik knew nothing first-hand of his father's life in Vidran, but his grandfather had told him much of his parents and their love for each other. Everything he knew, he told his grandmother. He told her of the whirlwind courtship, the marriage, of the love they'd held that had never seemed to diminish.
    And he told her of the fire, and the choice his father must have made among the flames and smoke. He told of the man who, realizing that he could only save one person, chose to save his child rather than living without his wife.
    He told his grandmother all that he knew of his father in life, and watched her tears fall slowly, gently, the tears of a mother for the son she should never have outlived. By the time he finished, the sun was down and the maid had lit soft oil lamps to light the living room.
    They sat in silence for a time, and Arian spoke first in the end. “I do not believe that you lie, but I must have proof. Show me the amulet.”
    Without a word, Erik removed the crystals on their chain and passed them to her. The old woman raised it up, allowing the drained crystals to reflect the lamplight, for a moment seeming to glow like they'd never been touched. As the crystals turned in the light, Erik realized where he'd recognized the symbol on the outside of the house – the crystals on the amulet were formed in the same pattern.
    “Harmon would not know the significance of this,” Arien said finally. “His family may be hepti , but it is a tradition only the sept follow, and not one we speak of much.”
    “Which tradition?” Erik asked. “And who are the ' sept '? And the ' hept' , for that matter.”
    She smiled, her eyes tired. “The sept and hept are the noble families of the Aeradi. I will instruct you more in their nature as time goes by, but only one thing is important now. These amulets,” she twisted it in her fingers and it shone in the light again, “are given to the septon s – the family patriarchs – and their heirs.”
    “Heirs?” Erik could not imagine his father being the heir to anything . “To what?”
    “To the authority, wealth, powers and ancient rights of their sept ,” Arien replied. “Your father felt he could leave because I was pregnant with a younger brother for him – a replacement heir so to speak. But that child died,” she continued, old grief adding to the new in her face, “and both your grandfather and father are dead.”
    Erik looked at her, confused. “So?”
    “Some sept have many members, side families and so forth,” Arien said softly, “but the sept Tarverro has only the direct line. Your father and grandfather are gone, and a female can only hold the authority in trust for a