Free Riven (The Arinthian Line Book 2) by Sever Bronny Page A

remain silent, until quite suddenly he began speaking in a rapid sharp accent.
    “The aforementioned scions are symbiotically linked to Ley, yet we can only scrutinize the observable effects of said link. Apropos, we failed to anticipate the inherent attachment upon forging. Incongruously, we foresaw the seven could fall under the influence of a single mind, and thus took appropriate precautions. You may be under the impression possibilities are as invisible to us as they are inversely visible to the Seers. Let us agree that in this era we Leyans endeavor to occupy the moment and must accept the consequence of an opaque future.
    “In addendum, and you will forgive my alliteration, the scions appertain to an epoch prior to the covenant, wherein the dissemination of Leyan sapience was the norm, from which you are the unwitting benefit. As a stalwart weed begets an entire field, so you stand as the latest harvest of countless procreations, yet perhaps only the middling step of a super process in search of the singularity.
    “The first concurrent summary is therefore a question—was withdrawal beneficial to the whole? Upon examination, I judge the answer inconclusive, though you must factor my limitations of practicality. The second concurrent summary is a statement you may find vacuous—the link is real, the outcomes and subsurface effects unknown, at least to this base body. I therefore conclude advising skepticism and humbly beg forgiveness for the capricious traipsing of an impertinent mind eternally sizzling under the Leyan sun.”
    Guests and Leyans stirred alike. Augum blinked, trying to understand a single phrase. Might as well have been spoken in Nodian though. There was one thing he did understand, however—Krakatos was very old. Maybe even so old that he might have been around when Atrius Arinthian became a Leyan. He might have even known him! The thought made his blood flow a little quicker.
    “You have my thanks, Krakatos the Ancient,” Mrs. Stone said at last. “Though I admit it will take me much time to digest your thoughts. Now, my husband, Thomas Stone, suggests the only way to destroy one who yields multiple scions is to let him have them all. Can I assume this is what you meant by ‘precautions’?”
    “That is so,” answered an ancient man with almond shaped eyes, not unlike Mya’s. He wore a simple scarlet robe that hid his entire body, except for his bronze colored head.
    “I know my grandson. He will butcher half the world in the process of acquiring the scions. Surely there must be another way—”
    “There may be, but we are unaware of it.”
    “For that you must seek the wisdom of the Seers—” said a pink-skinned woman in a servant’s outfit.
    “—past the Northern Peaks—” continued an ivory-skinned woman wearing a queenly gown.
    “—in the Kingdom of Ohm,” finished another ancient woman with avocado skin and sunken eyes, wearing a puffy-sleeved wide-skirt dress fringed with elegant ruffles.
    “I will think on this. I know he will not stop until his goals have been achieved, and many would die in the mean …”
    “The future is as yet unwritten,” said an old woman with pale skin, the only one with milky eyes. Her hair was tangled and black as night. A tattered raven cloak hung loosely around her neck, a triangle with a black dot at the tip of each point emblazoned on the chest. The sharpness of her somehow reminded Augum of the claw at Hangman’s Rock.
    “He lusts for the powers of Ley, particularly eternal life,” Mrs. Stone said.
    “The eternal can only come to those with peace in their hearts,” the avocado-skinned woman said.
    “My grandson has become the Lord of the Legion and the Lord of Dreadnoughts. He seeks Occulus’ old throne as the Lord of Death, and now wishes to become the Lord of Scions as well. Perhaps … perhaps there is a way his heart could be mended.”
    Krakatos the Ancient, his gray eyes an echo of time itself, tilted his head ever