Silencing the gods

Chapter I - Rebirth

Deep in the forest of a small town called Thornwall sat a cottage, built of Oak and stone. The two story building is covered in the orange, red, and yellow leaves of the freshly shed trees around the yard. Smoke billowed from the gray chimney, slowly climbing through the opening of the forest canopy that the house was occupied. A stable sat outside the home to the left, there rest three shire horses each eating at their morning grain and hay their tails lazily swatting at flies
that pestured them occasionally. Behind the home rests a garden, filled with fruits and vegetables growing in plots separated by a wooden fence that split it into segments of five. One for wheat, one for corn and beans, another for grapes and berries. The other two were meant for trees bearing apples, cherries, and a fruit that only grew in the mountainous region
called Ptyre. A bright purple fruit that was used for stews, on meats, and was heavy in Elven culture. Around the building were flowers of all shapes and sizes, bursting with color like a water painting of a sunset. Not but half a mile away was a river, the river of Leeth that ran to the ocean and down to the town of Frighten three days downstream. To the right of the house was a small forge and blacksmith's shop, the stone furnace still burning with embers and glowing with life. The cottage itself was quaint and welcoming, with sharp curves for a roof. The walls seemed to bend inward slightly, giving it a slight oval shape and in the front having a porch where two lanterns sat perched on either side about six feet from one another.
   
Here, a family of three lived. An Elven mother, Violet of thirty eight years old. She had pale skin as most Fae do, standing at five feet eight inches. She had bright red hair, falling to the small of her back that she normally wore in a ponytail made of two braids that wrapped around her forehead. Her face round with a button nose, her figure was a "perfect" hourglass with wide hips and slender around the abdomen. She was a Wood Elf, a race of Elves known for their uncanny tracking, hunting, green thumb, and magic revolving around nature. A father who was a mysterious Elven man, his name was Fran'kyer though his wife called him "Frank". He stood at six feet and one inch tall, an abnormally tall height especially for Elven males though this was not unheard of. He was only thirty nine, yet his hair was a pure white extending to the shoulders with pale skin. His face is sharp and mostly grim to look at. His eyes sank into his sockets as if he'd seen horrors of which no one had seen before. He was missing his left arm, this was according to Violet due to the result of him fending the home from a pack of wolves when one had bitten into the flesh and torn it away. Finally, their son. Jack, a young man of sixteen years standing at five foot seven inches.
He took most of his features from his father, sharp faced and sunken eyes yet his figure was more closely to his mother's slim and toned frame. His nose resembled that of a fox, sharp yet stout with auburn hair extending to his shoulders with a single braid tucked behind his left pointed ear.

    It was early morning, the sunlight glistening over the inside of Jack's room as he sat hunched over a desk writing down in a leather faced journal a language his mother had taught him the night beforehand. He brushed aside the auburn locks that fell in his face aside, his emerald eyes peering down as the quill in his left hand steadily mimicked the swirls and curves dotting here and there before he pulled his hand away nodding in silent approval at his penmanship. He had been learning this type of language for years, his mother and father helping him hone it, ensuring he could understand it well enough to read it without even needing to think about it. Shutting the book, Jack stood up, walking across the wood panel floors to a pair of leather boots, slipping them on his feet before walking out of his room. Shutting the door, he made his way down the narrow hallway, walking downstairs he arrived at the family room his mother curled up in a chair reading a book. She had her legs to her chest like a giddy child flipping happily through the pages, her purple eyes following the words on the parchment as she flipped to the next page. Jack had smirked at the sight, his footsteps silent as he made his way behind his mother before  she reached up her right hand in front of his face. "Sorry, son it'll take you a lot better to catch me off guard." She said not even glancing up, her soft voice in a singsong tune as she
spoke.
"Damn, thought I had you that time." he said, his own voice deeper, a bass that seemed to resonate from his diaphragm and make its way out his throat.
"Your father is waiting outside for you, he says you two will be doing some more training today." his mother informed him, pointing her hand to the front door.
"Alright, thanks mama." saying this, Jack made his way to the front door and made his way to the front yard. The sunlight shining through the forest canopy creating a dotted shadow of the leaves and branches above or at least what remained of the leaves, a breeze blowing shaking the branches as they slowly began to sway back and forth in the wind. There about ten feet among the trees his father stood, a wooden broadsword in his hand the man was so large that he made even some of the trees look thin especially his slim son who not nearly had the same amount
of muscle from years of training and battle experience as he did.
"Ah good, I see your mother told you." His father said, his voice seemed to demand the respect of others deeper than his son's and much more hoarse as for years of tobacco use one of the hidden
crops (or at least he thought was hidden) amongst the fruit trees.
"Aye, she said we would be training today." Jack said, walking to a barrel across from him sheathing the many training blades they had.
"Well. Yes and no...you see today is also a very important day. In our culture when a young man reaches adulthood, he not only is trained to fight, tend to fields, and hunt. But he is also given his marks."
"Dad, I turned sixteen three months ago, hell come tomorrow four." Jack said, picking up a wooden longsword but his father gestured with his own wooden blade to put it back.
"I know I'm late, but this blade isn't for me....it's for you to bite on in case the ink or blade I'll be using is too much for you to bear." He said, his own body covered in many black swirls and jagged edges, according to his mother his father was a foreign tribe not from their lands and that was why Jack had not been taught their language as she didn't know their meaning.
None of the family knew the true meaning behind the tattoos, Violet vaguely remembered bits and pieces of her tribe having them at the age of sixteen while Frank only said they had to mean something to the individual that they were placed on.
"So I'm actually going to be given mine in your tribe's language and not mama's?" Jack asked, "I don't deserve that though...I hardly know anything from your clan."
"You know your way with a blade, you know how to focus your ashay, you know how to sense others ashay and auras, therefore. You've earned it." All Jack could do was nod slightly, it didn't make sense but he would allow his father to do this. Ashay, aura, words his family often spoke of yet when asked what they were used for, much like the language he was being taught he never got any straight answers for. All they'd say was, "When the time comes."
His father walked to the forge, grabbing a box that sat on the edge of the stone wall separating the hot coals from the wall.
Removing from it he now held a thin needle like prod and a bottle of ink. "These marks will help you with your control, as well as limit your body from doing anything that may cause you harm if it's too straining on you." he said, dipping the prod into the ink, "please remove your shirt." His father said, with another silent nod Jack removed the linen shirt covering his torso the black fabric had fitted his figure well having no other clothing to his name beyond what his mother made and taught him to make. Sitting on the front porch his father began to drag a needle-like blade across his son's skin tilting it at an angle, allowing the ink to settle in his skin. The prod felt like cat scratches repeatedly sinking into his body near the bone where it hurt more so yet he kept silent and still, blood mixing with ink and his father whispering under his breath a type of chant which he knew the words to have in common.
"Old ones protect my child, watch over him as he journeys into adulthood, guide, protect, give him strength, courage, honor, and wisdom. May he overcome all obstacles in his way, may he slay all who oppose him, may you give him the knowledge to make choices for the better of others. With these blessings I write your will, with these blessings, I give passage into his journey, so above, as is below." his father said repeatedly over and over. It was around three hours before his father pulled the prod away, Jack's body hurt now covering it however was a series of
swirls, dots, and sigils lacing together at some places; others they stood alone. The series covered him from his stomach and back up to his neck, flowing down his left arm and none touching his right arm as it was only needed in the dominant hand. When they were done, his father smiled at the work he'd done before his mother walked out to see the markings smiling herself,
"Beautiful work, dear and they suit you well Jack." she said, there was a look in her purple eyes that seemed distant from the current scenario her brows furrowed slightly yet she spoke in her normal warm tone.
"I'll be making dinner soon, Jack, could you help your father with some work? We'll need firewood soon."
With a nod Jack began walking back to the forge grabbing an ax that rested next to a grindstone. Skimming his thumb across the blade he could feel his skin stick to it, he walked to the left of the house towards
a stump they used. Placing a log on the stump, Jack took the ax and using his right hand at the base he swung it over his shoulder. The tool came down with a heavy crack as the log now split into two, placing a new log on the stump though his body ached from the newly made tattoos he continued to do this until he heard a loud clap of thunder from above.