“Zionbuss? Were you not a General in Solarius’s army?”
“My past loyalties have gone stale from my hell in the Shadowlands. Yet I will go to hell and back again if my queen commands it. With my pledge to her I am free of Solarius.”
“I should kill the pair of you and spare this world an unforgiving future,” said the Shadojak.
“Kill them and you condemn both worlds to hell,” said Nathanial, as he scrambled to his feet. Bray grasped his arm and hauled himself up. “She is the only one capable of killing Solarius.”
Bray saw Diagus hesitate, struggling with his options; his sword poised ready to take either head.
“I did this?” said Elora, as she gazed about the cell. Her eyes settled on Ragna, the huge Viking let out a moan as he sat up, wincing as his hands pressed to his shoulder. “I’m so sorry. I don’t know what happened, I wasn’t me, I was...”
“Chaos,” finished the Shadojak. “You’ve got command of the demon at least. Will he take us to Thea?”
Elora appeared ready to collapse, the effort to stand making her muscles shake. Her uncle put his arm around her, shouldering the burden.
“Zionbuss?” she started, frowning at the unfamiliar word. “You will take us safely to Thea. Without harm or trickery.”
The demon bowed. “I will my queen. And any harm delivered in the Shadowlands will not be of my doing.”
She watched the Shadojak, unsure if she had said the right things. Bray knew the man was hard to read, but he slipped the blade away which could only be a good thing.
Ragna climbed back to his feet and dusted himself down.
“Will you look what she did to The Fist,” he said, turning his war hammer over in his hands, displaying Elora’s handprint an inch deep in the steel.
Bray moved his jaw, testing the break and found that it was already healing although throbbing like hell.
“Have you seen what she did to us?” he said, his gaze settling on her and watched as her eyes rolled back into her head. Pain screamed in his injured hand as he caught her falling body, yet he put that aside as he lifted her into his arms.
“She needs rest,” he said. Diagus nodded before turning to Zionbuss.
“Can I trust you not to harm us?”
The demon grinned. “Would you prefer the drunken bard to retake this body.”
“No. But better the devil you know. Bring the peacock back and I’ll keep him dry. You cross us, Zionbuss. And I’ll take the girl’s life as well as yours, queen or not.”
The demon took a final glance at Elora, then appeared to sink into his body. Although it was more of a case that he merely shrank and allowed Otholo his physical form back. His facial features seeming softer if not bedraggled.
“Come, let’s get these two back to the inn,” said Ragna, striding passed and taking a lamp from the wall. “At least that’s one problem solved.”
“Yes,” agreed Diagus. “We only need to solve the other dozen or so.”
Rain clouds, dark and heavy, filled the morning sky above the inn. Bray knew there would be a storm later as he swung his sword above his head, grey steel against the grey morning, warming life back into his arm and stretching his back against the well, readying himself for an early practice with Diagus.
He had spent the night pacing outside Elora’s room, listening to her breathe - to her murmur random words in her sleep and feeling the rhythm of her heart, the beats reaching his sensitive skin through the oak panel door. It had been the Shadojak who’d finally ordered him to bed, to leave the girl be or else he would probably be still there, waiting for her to wake.
Diagus approached him now, his sword already drawn, face grim, eyes sharp. Bray knew his master was furious for the way in which he reacted to Elora’s death, yesterday in the keep. How he had dropped his defence and lacked control over his emotions. He was sure that this morning’s lesson would be a harsh one and the Shadojak wouldn’t be holding back.
Tendons clicked in his neck as he rolled his head to the left, then the right, the damage inflicted upon his body from the event in the dungeon had healed while he slept, unlike the heavily bruised face of Diagus. One black eye, one a pearly white. He forced the grin from his face and focused on the attack.
The Shadojak gave him a curt nod, the only recognition he would get that the lesson had begun, before launching in with a side-swipe. The dark green blade slicing towards Bray’s midriff.
Sparks spat as the blades met, Bray parrying whilst side-stepping around the foot of his master which he brought down, aiming to trip him up. Their bodies danced another step, each turning clockwise, Diagus’s elbow angling up into Bray’s face and meeting air instead of nose, while Bray flashed a punch towards the Shadojak’s kidney, yet touched nothing.
They both spun away and came back, Bray ducking low and swiping his leg around attempting to take his master’s legs from under him. They did no more than kick up dust from the floor, Diagus having jumped and as Bray rose his chest met a foot, kicking him onto his back.
A shadow cast over Bray’s face as he rolled out of the way of the falling body, his hair brushing against a knee as it thudded into the dirt. He heard his master gasp with the pain of striking the ground but was glad the pain belonged to Diagus and not himself.
He barely had time to register the dagger being flung under hand before his reflexes brought his sword about, batting the old blade away. Bray blocked a lunge on the backswing and took a step back.
Diagus meant business this morning, striking with the intent to damage, the attacks lethal as they were brutal, one flowing into another and driving the Shaigun towards the stables.
Bray caught movement from a window above, his eyes flicked up for the briefest moment and saw Otholo watching him from Elora’s room. Why was the Bard in there when they were under strict instructions not to disturb her? The momentary lapse in concentration earned him a glancing blow from the pummel of the Shadojak’s sword, connecting with the back of his head and knocking him off balance.
He shook the dizziness from his head before catching the next attack. He caught his master’s sword on the end of his and angled it down; the god-created metal cutting into his inferior blade, shearing a layer away as if it was no more than peeling an orange. He would need to do some serious sharpening later.
Diagus’s cross-piece met his, just as Bray intended, and wedging his foot against his opponent’s, he pulled back and ducked under the Shadojak, flipping the older man over his shoulder and following him down with a left-handed punch to the sternum. It connected and Diagus let out a grunt, hitting the floor hard.
Bray took the moment to cast his eyes back up to Elora’s room. Something wasn’t right. Otholo still watched from the window, a glass of wine in hand, which was also wrong. The Shadojak had prohibited him any alcohol as long as Zionbuss served the girl. What was going on, had Elora come out of her dream state? Was she well?
By the time his eyes drew back to Diagus, the old man was back on his feet, his blade pointing his way, although clearly winded.
“Good. Finally, a bit of fire in your belly,” he said, white eye searching him for the next attack. Yet he didn’t advance. Instead, Diagus paced over to a horse rug that had been thrown over a tall object, vaguely the shape of a person, the toes of brown leather riding boots poking from beneath.
“What is this?” demanded Bray, beginning to put two and two together. The boots were Elora’s, the height and rough outline similar to her also. Had the Shadojak tied her up, was this some kind of sick test? Was this the reason Otholo was watching them?
“Drive your blade through the beast,” ordered, Diagus, pointing his own sword at the figure beneath the rug. “Kill her, Bray. Purge the world of its reaper. Strike the black heart while she’s weak, while we still have a chance. You’ve seen what she can do, what she is.”
