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Kirkcaldy didn't quite follow, but she smiled at Fell anyway, just in time for her bright little moment to be ruined by n'Barit.

"You don't know the meaning of the word clean," n'Barit shot back at Fell, turning up his nose in disgust at the boy's ignorance. He hefted Kirkcaldy up in his arms even more, as if Blackfell might have grown taller in the past minute.

N'Barit sucked in air through his teeth and held his ground. The little brat was standing that close to the towel. His precious Kirkcaldy's towel. If n'Barit had been capable of seeing the color red, he would have been seeing it right now. "Get off that bench, brat!" he said firmly.

Realizing n'Barit was moments away from another of his temper blowups, Kirkcaldy bleated in marning, "Giya!" She waved her hand back and forth in alarm. "Banna!" As if offering Blackfell a banana might help.

From n'Barit's perspective, that was the first unidiotic thing out of Nikomas's mouth, but by some miracle he kept the sentiment to himself. Instead, he managed to say something even worse. "Yeah, before I smack you, brat." In his own mind, he was helpfully reinforcing Nikomas's attempt at parenting.

Kirkcaldy covered her face with her hands. Had she been a fan of the Teletubbies, it would have been the perfect time for an "Uh oh!"

"Then you're the one he gets it from," snapped n'Barit. No one, no one criticized him! Not even Emperial! Maybe Sally, but she was a special case, and n'Barit always gave her a verbal lashing straight after. It was mostly for show. Sally was a strong leader, for a human, and knew how to stand her ground. N'Barit respected her for that. It was a respect that had taken her ten years to earn, and n'Barit was not about to give such respect to Nikomas freely after less than ten minutes.

N'Barit took a large breath of air. "If you had any notion of manners you'd get your whelp off my bench and beat sense into him. Any brat that spoiled deserves to have some dirt put in his coffee! You coddling humans and your spoiled children have no idea what a real life is about, living in cowardly houses filled with lazy technology, never working a single honest day in your entire lives! It's no wonder your energy is so corrupted the divine won't touch it, and your lives so filthy I'd sooner be a furred tunneling rodent than one of you!" In his arms, Kirkcaldy just sat with a shocked expression on her face, staring with her mouth open, totally stunned.

"The divine is all," seethed n'Barit, never one to back down, "and only a moron ascribes to it a mind and personality. The feeble attempt of a lesser intelligence struggling to understand a greater concept by putting it into finite, understandable terms of consciousness. Your kind are all alike, no matter what you call yourselves."

Kirkcaldy's mouth closed and puckered into a sour frown. N'Barit had totally forgotten about her. Blinded by her indignation, she momentarily forget about Blackfell in turn. Her world narrowed to just n'Barit and the person currently distracting him: Nikomas. She did not like this, and unless the situation changed, she just might have to do something about it. Not that she had many options in her position, but she had a knack for dealing with n'Barit. She would think of something.

It worked. The adults were too busy battling it out, but Kirkcaldy noticed the whistle and looked at Blackfell with brightly curious eyes. Had that ridiculously awesome sound come from him? But how? That was an amazing trick! She covered her mouth shyly as she giggled.

"You follow a false deity!" n'Barit was saying. He pointed at Nikomas with his free hand in accusation, wobbling just the tiniest bit without his crutch. The metal of his fingers seemed to give the motion a sinister edge. "I know their kind well enough, and they're nothing but poison-tongued, delusional, completely undivine beings that happen to be able to do something we can't, but that doesn't make them gods! Any sufficiently advanced technique or technology looks like magic to an undeveloped mind!"

"All personifications are false and flawed in comparison to the true divine!" maintained n'Barit. "All worlds, all universes touched by such false imposters are corrupted, and all followers of those imposters are stupid and unclean." Leave it to n'Barit to never pass up an opportunity to personally insult his opponent.

Kirkcaldy wiggled, sort of getting the idea to follow, but knowing that wasn't allowed, not even in the slightest. She smiled at Blackfell anyway and dropped her bauble to the end of its silver tether. This was the most play with another child n'Barit allowed her -- and had he been aware of what she was doing, he probably would have put a stop to it.

"What?" asked n'Barit, honestly insulted and confused. He had done nothing but hold Kirkcaldy and protect her from these unclean people and things. He could think of nothing he'd done to give this woman the impression he was mistreating Kirkcaldy. He was wearing all his clothes! "She's clean and safe! Which is way more than I can say for your little brat. My daughter knows how to behave, and--"

He caught a glinting flash off the bauble as it swung and spotted Blackfell near his leg. N'Barit immediately took half a step away and hugged Kirkcaldy. "Hey! Techt, lady, can't you control that thing at all? Your brat is the one that doesn't know how to treat something!"