Nox Durante

[Nox]

The Fine Gentlemen

2035

(fine in Irish is Family and in this context was referring to the Atharim 'clan')

The meeting had been going on for hours.  His dad and Uncle Jake sat around the fire with the other fine gentlemen and talked shop.  Nox was finally learning about all the things they were talking about.  He and Aurora had snuck peeks at their dad's journal with all the monsters in it.  But they'd never actually been allowed to really look and read it.  Not that he wanted to read.  He hated that part.  But being officially able to train in fighting was fun. But he wasn't allowed to sit and listen, anytime he got close the adults would shoo him away.

But they were busy arguing.  One of the younger men shouted. "But if the gods have returned we need to kill them fast 'afor they rise up and enslave us all."

Another man that Nox didn't know argued. "These are kids you wanna whack.  And their families.  What if one of them is yours."

Both Nox's father and Uncle Jake stood up, but it was Uncle Jake who spoke.  "Then I'll be the first damned one to put a knife in that kids ear and make sure he ain't ever fucking waking up.  And you all damned best do the same thing for me!"  He stuck his finger out at each of them and he saw Nox hiding behind the tree and Nox ran off into the darkness and shadows hoping his father hadn't seen him.

Uncle Jake could be cool.  But he could also be an asshole.  Nox hoped he was cool this go around.

---

Nox hadn't tried to listen again after getting caught eavesdropping on the fine gentleman.  He set to bed shortly afterwards hoping that if his dad did see him he didn't get an earful and extra work.  Aurora was too busy in her books to notice.

But when morning came Nox was up with the sun and practicing before anyone else.  He had more to prove than Aurora, their dad was always on his butt about something.

Thirty minutes into his warm up routine moving through the fighting stances his father had taught him except Nox had slowed them down, and turned them into a dance that his mother helped him perfect.  Whenever his father commented on his dancing he'd speed up and show his father exactly what he was doing.  And then his mother would explain that the slow precision helped build muscle memory and bettered his form.  He'd relent then.  But his quiet time was interrupted with a long grumble from behind a tree and his Uncle Jake watching.  "Your dad will see it one day kid.  Don't you worry."

Nox highly doubted it.

"He show you yet how to kill a man?"

Nox's eyes went wide and he shook his head. "No sir."

Uncle Jake with his gruff exterior proceeded for the next hour to show Nox the best places to hurt a man twice his size.  And then when his father was in ear shot Uncle Jake knelt down and handed Nox an hold survival knife from his belt. "You keep this real close, kid.  It could mean your survival one day."  He pulled the blade from the sheath and pointed it right at Nox's left ear. "You ever need to kill anything.  Anything at all you push this blade right through their left ear as hard as you fucking can, you hear me?  As hard as you can.  Nothing can live after a good ole twist.  Ain't found a thing.  No god.  No dog.  And ain't no fucking monsters.  Got that kid?"

Nox nodded his eyes round as saucers as Uncle Jake put the blade back in the sheath and handed it back to him.  "This will one day be your salvation."

Uncle Jake clapped Nox on the back of his shoulder and stood up in a soft groan and a pop of his knees.  His father was watching them intently, and Nox went back to practicing his forms at a much faster pace with the blade hooked to his waist like Uncle Jake.