Lineage (Book 3 of the Torrent Skies Saga)

Chapter Sixteen: Of Myth, Discovery, And Prayer

The next day, Katerin and Arjiah walked through Hearth-Home with a purpose. They would study and do their best to piece together any of the pieces Mordai had left in his wake.

There were half a dozen libraries in the city, but for their purpose, the temple library would work best.

As they found the wide ornate doors and watched the robed acolytes to half a dozen gods rove about the grounds, Arjiah leaned toward Katerin.

"You take the history of the city, and I'll try the more obscure topics?"

The two smiled at each other, and once they were in the building they split off, both equipped with charcoal and parchment, and a sense of surety that between them, they would find something worth discovering.

Katerin walked up to the second floor and held in a laugh. The whole of the place smelled of parchment and incense. But the books surrounding her had a profound effect on her mood. Libraries had the tendency to make her feel capable, like nothing else could. Katerin wound her way through Stone and wooden shelves, browsing far into the depths of the place for Varsly family history.

Through her time spent Katerin learned much about Hearth-Home, and it's rise to power. And oddly enough, the Varsly line was as old as the city. She knew the Varsly family had ruled it for many generations, but in the books she quickly found a strange detail.

The kings of Luminya appearance changed with each new generation, the eyes especially always changed, seeming to reflect the eyes of the queen. They were all unique, with their own expressions.

Until 467 P.C. From that year onward, the king always stood in the same position, looking at the artist with the same gaze. Hard, unwavering. Even in a painting it was intimidating. Height, haircut, and jawline all changed, but that gaze remained the same. For over four hundred years, the king looked as if he could have been the same man, with a slightly re-imagined appearance.

That detail never quite left Katerin's mind as she continued her research. Luminya had once been a struggling Kingdom, never quite on peaceful terms with the Krenel dwarves. But that changed in the year 470 P.C.

Hearth-Home was constructed that year, to serve as a marker to a kingdom that was steadily gaining stability. Becoming a human bastion, against what was once a dwarven and elvish dominated world.

Padrig Varsly, the king at the time, had a way with words—or so the histories said. After the fall of a great red dragon, that Luminya and its armies had defeated, he found influence quickly.

Praise for his deeds, his so called single-handed slaying of the dragon, washed across the lands, and even found the ears of the dwarves. That was when the tables turned, and the dwarves decided, with Padrig's persuasions, at least, that they would rather let the humans make their own rules, and find friendly terms.

Padrig's son was Bernard Varsly the first, and his son the second, and so on, down the line until Bernard Varsly the thirteenth.

From Katerin's knowledge, the namesake would end with him. And she realized with disdain that Bernard had not always been the moniker for king and ruler. She wondered why not keep the name Padrig, as it was he who had slain the dragon, and ironed out any such creases with the neighboring dwarves. She read onward through the ages, considering deed after deed of the many kings. Rolling her eyes at some, questioning others, and applauding yet more.

She read through the chronology of Bernard the thirteenth's children, and her stomach twisted. All of them, dead. Their names on the pages twisted her stomach as she imagined them. She pushed the heavy tome away from where she sat on the floor, and glanced up from her reading to see a human woman, dressed in silver robes, who held a pipe in her hand, with smoke still wafting from it.