She increased the pressure than all of a sudden it was gone, her fingers gripped nothing and she fell to the floor through a cloud of smoke.
A heartbeat later, she felt scolding fingers about her own neck as she was lifted and turned to face her father.
Elora’s hands gripped the armour that surrounded his wrists, crushing the metal to his flesh as he crushed her windpipe. Deep red eyes gazed upon hers, with anger mixed with a touch of curiosity. He stared for a moment, turning her head to the left, then the right, like a butcher surveying a prized lamb he was about to slaughter. Then Solarius let out a guttural chuckle.
“Daughter?” he asked, applying more pressure to his fingers and choking off any air that she tried sucking in.
She applied pressure of her own, trying to crush his wrists, pushing heat into her hands as she had with the Fist of the North. It’s only effect was to make her father smile.
“Powerful little creature - fruit of my loins. But I have no need of you. My army, as we speak, already crosses the border between the worlds. It will conquer Earth, then turn to Thea; crushing them both together and making fire and dust, death and ash.”
Elora attempted to wriggle free of his grasp, jamming her feet against his chest, she pushed with all her might.
Her father’s arms stretched as he struggled to contain her, she almost broke his hold. Then her feet passed through smoke and she fell to the floor beside Diagus.
Rolling onto her knees she sucked in great gasps of air and coughed it back out, the pain in her neck excruciating.
Fire surged around her and Diagus, forming a blazing ring, trapping them inside.
“The worlds will end,” Solarius’s voice circled around them, his body was yet to materialize. “The path that lays before you will be of punishment, death and destruction. Chaos awaits all.” He then stepped through the flames, his greaves momentarily catching fire before dying out.
“You are a tool to me, nothing more. A key to unlock my chains. Yet free me you did.”
Elora averted her gaze away from Diagus, guilt breaking through her chest at what she had done. She glared at her father, the cause of so much pain and suffering. The guilt was quickly being replaced by anger once again and she felt a sudden surge of strength, pulsing through her body.
“Killing everything in one fell swoop isn’t chaotic. There needs to be room for unpredictability. An imbalance. Wiping the slate clean with life, is just that: clean. Sterile. Not chaos.”
Elora listened to the God’s ramblings, but didn’t take the words in. She was angry. Her blood boiling with rage with the desire to kill, to destroy. She was her father’s daughter, after all. Hadn’t she tried doing the right thing? And where did that get her?
“I will let you live, daughter of mine. Spawn of Chaos. You will be at my heels to witness the worlds collide. You will be the imbalance.”
The Shadojak had tried to kill her. Cut her head from her shoulders. She looked down on the broken man; pathetic, crippled. Why had she feared him so much?
She didn’t intervene when Solarius stooped and lifted the Shadojak from the ground. One arm curling around his neck as he pressed him against his chest.
“I ask but one thing of you, daughter, so as I can trust you to keep out of my way.”
“Name it,” she said, staring into his face which hovered above Diagus’s shoulder.
“Take my blade. The sword which this broken mortal has used as his own and take his head,” he said, increasing the pressure on the Shadojak’s neck, causing the white of his remaining eye to go bloodshot and the other to bulge so far out that Elora feared it may fall out.
The daughter of darkness retrieved the sword, the dark green blade causing her teeth to itch. It felt alive beneath her grip as if it could think, could comprehend what was about to happen and fought against her.
Diagus watched her approach, lips pulled back in a grimace, teeth stained red.
“Kill him,” Diagus, choked between breaths.
Solarius laughed, his wings folding out, the tips curling in and forming a crescent around them.
“I’m not such a fool to trust in my daughter completely, mortal. Why else do I shield behind your back. Now make your choice, daughter. Watch the worlds end and live forever, or die.”
She advanced another step, gripping the sword with both hands as it vibrated within her grasp. She put it to the side of the Shadojak’s neck, the blade only inches away from severing its former owners head...Kill.
“Do the right thing, girl,” growled Diagus, his eyes never leaving hers, “Do it for Bray, for love.”
“You don’t believe in love. Just a chemical, remember?” Elora replied, twisting the edge of the blade towards his pulsing artery.
“My life is over now,” continued Diagus. “Yet yours and everything on Earth, on Thea, may still go on.”
“Enough. I grow impatient,” spat the God, yanking Diagus into a tighter hold, “End him.”
Elora pulled the blade away, readying to swing the sword, feeling that there was no option left to her. Diagus had just said his life had already ended and she couldn’t stop her father. Chaos rules over everything.
“Do the right thing,” the words passed the Shadojak’s lips, choked from the throat, little more than a croak, but they set something off in Elora. He was sacrificing himself, but how was she to kill Solarius without killing Diagus first. Her father was out of reach; his body behind the Shadojak.
Then she worked it out.
Changing her grip on the sword, she placed a hand upon Diagus’s shoulder for support.
His aged hands had already pulled his shirt apart to reveal his chest, his gaze still upon hers, she thought he gave her a subtle nod and clenching her teeth - she did the right thing.
A scream left her lungs as she plunged the blade through the Shadojak’s chest. The sword seeming to come alive in her hands as it parted his ribs and punctured his heart; blood spilling out along the blade mixing with the reds of the flames reflection.
Diagus’s head sank forwards as a moan escaped his mouth. Elora averted her eyes from his and locked them on her fathers. An evil grin split his beard, his red pupils dilating with pleasure.
“Chaos dies with the Shadojak,” she growled, as she thrust the sword deeper, applying all the weight and force she could, feeling the blade pass fully through Diagus and then into her father that hid behind him, slicing through his heart.
The sword was buried to the hilt before Solarius reacted. His eyes suddenly going wide, the centre of his pupils looking like twin red suns, as he tipped his head back and screamed.
