Chapter 313 - The Divided God part 7

If Ilio had been a more powerful blood drinker, he probably would have cleaved me in two. But he was not. The blade sliced into my shoulder diagonally and caught against my spine. Still, it was enough to drive me to my knees, or perhaps it was really shock that stole the strength from my legs, shock that Ilio had attacked me. No parent can ever quite believe it when a child strikes them in anger. And make no mistake, Ilio was my son. He might not have been the fruit of my loins, but I loved him as much as I loved any of my children, and his betrayal shattered my spirit. It was not Khronos who defeated me that night, it was my son.

I tried to tell him I was sorry, but I choked on the blood that gushed up into my throat. I fell forward onto my hands and knees, and more blood pattered onto the stones beneath me. Ilio wrenched the blade from my upper torso and a great gout of it splashed the floor. I would heal, but it was a grave injury. It would take a moment or two.

But Khronos did not intend to give me that moment.

He leapt up in triumph and roared, "Tear him apart!"

I lashed out as dozens of brutal hands seized me, but I was lifted from the ground before I could do any damage to my attackers. I writhed as they bore me up, hissing and kicking and trying to twist out of their grip. All around me were contorted white faces, glaring eyes and sharp champing fangs.

My right arm made a horrid crunching sound and my hisses turned to howls of agony as the bone came out of the socket. I could feel my enemies pulling me in several different directions at once. A snarling Eternal had seized my broken right arm and he twisted it completely around and yanked. With a sound like a melon being ripped in half, the entire limb came free of my torso. The Eternal fell back with my flopping right arm and then held it up like a prize and went dancing across the chamber, laughing and swinging it around.

They tore off my left arm and then I was thrown down on my back and they seized ahold of my upper body and ripped my legs off, too. Maddened by the pain, I tried to bite the ankles dancing around my crippled body. I saw Ilio for an instant between my capering enemies. He had withdrawn and was watching them tear me apart with a hand clamped over his mouth.

"Bring me his head!" the God King commanded, and my head was ripped away from my neck.

Please, ancestors, let this be the end of me, I prayed. Let me die!

The throne room of the God King swayed like a ship in a storm as my head was passed to the hands of my enemy. He held me up and grinned at me, his fangs curled over his bottom lip, his eyes ablaze with savage glee.

"Oh, the fun we are going to have with you, Gon of the River People!" he crowed. "But my victory is not quite complete. Not yet. Witness, Gon, my crowning triumph!"

The room spun around, and there stood Ilio, gaping at me in abject horror. I could see the remorse on his face, and the fear. It was the expression of a boy who has awakened to find a serpent in his bedding.

"Kill the boy!" the God King commanded. "Kill the usurper's son!"

I couldn't speak, but I could mouth the words. I'm sorry, Ilio, I said to him silently. Be brave.

My beautiful, headstrong boy. I had loved him and I had wronged him, and now I would watch him perish.

The fear passed from his countenance. His shoulders fell and he nodded and closed his eyes.

I tried to close my own eyes, but Khronos used his fingers to hold them open.

"Oh, no you don't! You will watch your boy die!" he snarled.

They seized him. They took my son in their hands and began to tear him apart. My son! He fell in one direction and then another as they tugged him to and fro. At the last second, Ilio opened his eyes. He reached out to me and cried, "Father!" and then some brutal Master ripped his head from his shoulders.

A moment later, his body fell to dust.