I couldn’t place this moment. Not in words or feelings.
He was the villain of my origin. The nightmare plaguing my rest. He had created me and tried to end me in more ways than one.
Yet he was just… a person.
A mortal being drawing final breaths, who had the same value as anyone else in the end.
“S-son,” he croaked.
I sank down slowly to a crouch, continuing to study every piece of him as if it might offer an explanation as towhy.
Why did I ever fear him?
Why did I let him control me?
Why did I ever try to gain his approval?
I didn’t mourn for him. I never would. But my chest constricted and emotions so long buried clawed their way around my entire body because I mourned for myself. All the years I let him have of me.
The glowing violet light of the key highlighted his scared face.
“You don’t have anyone,” I said. “No one who will cry for you. No one will remember you with anything other than loathing. That is the path you always walked no matter how long it was to be. Why would anyone want that?”
“To mean something to myself.”
My brow twitched, not expecting an honest answer.
“Your pursuit of meaning poisoned everything in your path.”
“I don’t expect you to understand. You were always so weak.”
I couldn’t deny that comment impacted me. After all I’d done under his command and the black soul I harbored for it… I was notweak.
Patting over his torso, I tried to feel for the distortion of the key piece. With his protection from the gods, the key was the only true weapon to ensure he truly died.
I’d let my guard down, thinking he was teetering too close to the brink of death to be a threat. I didn’t detect his movement fast enough to retract my hand back fully when he moved, slicing a blade across my wrist.
I hissed venomously, dropping the partially forged key when this wound burned through me far more intensely than a shallow slice should. There was only one way for such a cut to roar inside me.
The blade had been laced with Astraea’s blood.
A surge of otherworldly power distracted me from my urge to lunge for father with all my loathing. The unmistakable eminence of the Maiden’s key blasted around me, and when the light dimmed enough I cast my horrified sight up, finding my father on his feet, holding the key aloft like a god triumphant.
“Don’t you see, Rainyte? You were merely a bad sample of what I was to become.”
I couldn’t believe it. Eltanin roared and I detected his preparation to strike. Father pointed the key in his direction, and I yelled, desperate for the dragon to flee, to save himself. I could only watch in horror as the violet flare of the key grew blinding…
As the power released, searing red flame clashed with it.
When it cleared and smoke choked the air, father had changed from attack to defense, fashioning a dome shield around himself. His furious sight cast up to Athebyne.
“Looking for me?” Drystan said.
Those words accompanied the fall of his skyward blade.
Father only caught a glimpse of Drystan, who’d expertly managed to creep right up to him with the distraction of Athebyne. Then father’s roar of agony stunned me.
The key fell, still gripped in the hand Drystan had severed from his elbow with a single mighty swipe.
