Princess of Amathar by Wesley Allison Page A

There was a different word for the paternal grandfather, than there was for the maternal grandfather. There was a different word for uncle when he was the brother of one's father than there was when he was the brother of one's mother, and still a different word for one's uncle when he was your mother's sister's husband. This went on to such an extent, that there was even a specific word which meant fifth cousin twice removed, and that was different from the word for fifth cousin three times removed. All of this made me wonder about Norar Remontar's title--Homianne Kurar Ka, child of the overlord. He had told me himself that he had been working for his uncle's trading group. My friend explained that his paternal grandfather was Kurar Ka of the Sun Clan, the most powerful and respected of the Amatharian clans. Norar Remontar's father would have been the next Kurar Ka, but he had been killed in battle when still a young man. Thus, Norar Remontar had become Homianne Kurar Ka--a kind of heir apparent. He worked, as was the custom, in the clan businesses, one of which was Hissendar Trading group, run by his uncle.
    "So, you are related to Bentar Hissendar." I observed.
    "Yes," he replied. "We are distantly related, and so is Tular Maximinos."
    "It is not that distant," said Bentar Hissendar. "The sister of Norar Remontar's paternal grandmother's maternal grandmother, was married to the brother of my maternal grandmother's paternal grandmother. That is not a distant relation. Now, Tular Maximinos is a distant relation."
    "That is not true," put in the subject of their discussion. "My paternal grandmother's paternal grandmother was the sister of Norar Remontar's maternal grandmother's paternal grandfather. And I am related to Bentar Hissendar in three different ways."
    I smiled. It felt wonderful for me, an orphan who knew only two parents who had died when I was but a child, to look at these creatures of a civilization where family kinship had been taken to the level of an art form. I sat back and thought of just what it would be like, to live knowing countless thousands of relatives, and hundreds of close kin. I was interrupted in these musings by Bentar Hissendar.
    "There is Amathar," he said.
    Chapter Twelve: Amathar
    I looked through the forward view port and felt my stomach drop away. Since coming to Ecos, I had come to expect things on a grand scale--seemingly endless plains, forests so dark and thick they seemed to block the sun, vast seas and broad rivers, huge flying battleships--but nothing had prepared me for the city of Amathar. Ahead of us was a wall that stretched to the left and right as far as the eye could see. Seemingly held within this wall was a city, straining to be free of its confines. It was a city of tremendously high buildings, tall towers, and massive constructions of bizarre shape and ungodly dimension, painted with a rainbow of pastel colors from red to blue with bits of silver and gold. The city seemingly went on forever into the distance, rising up into the horizon until it became a part of the sky.
    "Just how large is Amathar?" I asked.
    "The city wall is a circle two thousand five hundred kentads in diameter." That information took several moments to compute, and at least that long to comprehend. According to my admittedly incomplete knowledge of Amatharian measurement, twenty five hundred kentads was the equivalent of two thousand miles. This seemed beyond belief, and I questioned it, but the three Amatharians confirmed my figures. Here was a single city that would, had it been located on my home planet, have almost completely covered North America.
    The transport dropped lower as Bentar Hissendar guided in to a landing at a large installation just within the wall of the city. On a large tarmac, surrounded by several buildings, sat a dozen transports just like the one in which we were flying. When our craft came to a stop on the ground, a crew of Amatharian men and women ran out onto the field to