He could hear the footsteps. Even as he loosely shook and sweat in his bed. Fighting off the rattling after-effects of his recurring nightmare. The one he'd had on the day of every full moon since his father was taken from him six years ago.
The heavy pad and uneven gait of the persons footfalls told him who it was long before they came busting through the door like the brute they were.
"MAX, WAKE YOUR SKINNY ASS UP—"
"I know…. I know." Max said without opening his eyes— as if he wanted to see the wolven shapes in the shadows a while longer as they took his father from him, "I know."
"What do you know? Tell me, young one." The voice went playfully serious, taking on the audial allure of a professor of sorts guiding their young student to some grand discovery.
"It's Tamer's Day, Martha. Yay." Max said, eyes still closed, voice still slightly annoyed— and slightly overslept. He did that on full moons too.
He could feel his younger sister's smile dampen due to his lack of excitement. Soon after, her heavy lumbering footfalls entered his small bedroom. She smelled like outside air, sunlight, sausages and sweat as she stood over him.
Max opened his eyes. He'd had enough of the Wolfish creatures and the drip drop sound of his fathers tears.
Martha stood over him. His younger sister. Half sister. By three years. You'd never be able to tell though due to her... physical gifts.
She was well over six feet tall and strapped with hulking muscle due to her love for yard work and labor. A real beast of burden. A fitting term considering the pure silver septum piercing running through her nose in a perfect circlet.
She kept her blue-black hair short with wild spiky bangs and wore nothing but a black whool tank-top and dark jeans with patchwork fix ups at the knees.
"Yes. It's Tamer's Day. And you aren't as excited as you should be. This happens everytime. Are you gonna skip this one too? You're making mom and dad nervous, you know?" Martha said as she crossed her arms. The muscle flexion in her forearms was its own violent act. Sometimes he grew jealous looking at her.
"No. I'm not." Max replied and put his arms behind his head. If he could, he would've went back to s—
"You son of a—" Martha snarled and grabbed Max by the shoulders with her massive hands.
Before he could react, she was ripping him out of the sheets and slamming him against his bedroom walls.
She was so mad, the vein in her forehead bulged— just like their mother when she was on the ground cleaning too long and all the blood rushed to the front of her face.
"Dammit, Max!" Martha shook him. "You're seventeen, man!"
"I know my age. Now put me down." Max said. The wooden wall was cold against his shirtless back.
"No. You need to hear this." Martha said, "The world doesn't care that you lost your dad." She hesitated after saying the words as if even she was stunned to say them.
Nobody spoke about his dad. Not since a kid in school joked about it and Max cut off three of his fingers in a brawl gone awry. He did two years community service and battle-zone clean up for that one.
A part of him— a part that had long been asleep woke up, shown in the angered twist of his angular face.
Martha pushed on like the fearless battle fiend she was, "—If you keep moping and purposefully underachieving, we're all gonna pass you by and you'll be alone. Worse off, you'll be at the mercy of whatever lives in the sky-wilds…. Or oceans…. Or the sewers. We don't exactly live in a safe area. Moon-Glass Grove is a battle zone. You need to be ready. You need to beast-up. If not for yourself, then for mom and dad."
"Are you done, boss?" Max asked.
"I'll be done if you promise to participate in the Taming Trials today." Martha said, her thick black brows furrowed just above her ocean-blue eyes.
"Ma—"
"This is your last chance. Once you turn eighteen you have to pay for private Tamer Trial Runs. We don't have the money for that. Nobody does but the Neo-Nobles."
Max tried once more to speak but Martha was always one to bulldoze first and assess the scene later.
"If you don't join the event today, I'm going to try and Tame a Dragon in the sky-wilds." Martha said.
"First, no one under the age of thirty has tamed a Dragon— second, there's no dragons this far west... third, if there was, that's suicide." Max said.
"And it'll be your fault if you don't nut up. Also, you didn't check the newspapers or Fauna Reports this morning." Martha said, still holding him off the ground with his back to the wall.
"Alright. Put me down, you ogre." Max said, now anxious at the thought of a Dragon so close to home.
"Promise me." Martha said.
"I promise. Now if I say put me down one more t—"
Martha dropped him. And suddenly he was a head shorter than her and crudely aware of how much his knee still heart from yesterdays training session.
"Now get out."
Martha leaned forward and gave him a quick hug before running out of his room. "Be ready by ten! If you need some gear dads buddies at the labor camp donated some hand me downs for the—"
"They do that every year, Martha. I know." Max said as he stood alone in his room.
The footsteps stopped halfway down the hall and slowly came back to his doorway.
Martha stood so only half of her body and face was visible in the doorway as she nervously fidgeted and made a pouty face. It didn't fit her gargantuan stature. But he remembered it like it was yesterday when she was the small and fiesty little girl that epitomized all little sisters.
"Hey, Max... listen….. uhhh… I'm sorry. About your dad. I know things were …. strained, between him and mom even before he di—"
"He was murdered." Max said, sounding more awake than ever.
Martha flinched, "Yes. Murdered. But I still consider him family too. He was like my uncle. I know you don't talk about him to anyone, but I'm always here. And when I said nobody cares that he was killed.... I was trying to make a point about how other people will see you. I just really don't want to see you give up. We all care. That's why we want you to succeed."
"I'm not giving up. Can't have you going to face dragons alone, can I?" Max asked after forcibly calming himself.
"No." Martha smiled and puffed out her chest. "Todays gonna be amazing. Just you wait."
Martha left. For good this time.
Max was suddenly more alone than before in his room. Less comfortable now as he scanned the small wooden room fit with a single twin-size bed, a metal desk covered in papers and schematics and a chest with a giant padlock covered by a wolf-pelt.
"That's the problem. I hate waiting." Max said before getting ready to start his day.