Chapter 7 - The Furnace of Secrets
""Cover your faces!"" Victor shouted, lunging down the stairs and grabbing Julianna by the arm.
Above them, a muffled whoosh echoed through the ceiling joists as the ballroom ignited. Within seconds, orange light began flickering through the cracks between the floorboards. The temperature in the cellar spiked instantly, the dry timbers overhead crackling as the blaze took hold.
""The wine cellar drainage pipe!"" Clara shouted over the roar of the flames. She sprinted toward the deepest corner of the cellar, where an ancient wastewater trench led beneath the foundation toward the estate's storm drains.
""It’s sealed with an iron grate!"" Victor yelled, coughing as thick, acrid smoke began rolling down the staircase.
""Then blow it off!"" Clara screamed back, tossing him the crowbar.
Victor wedged the bar between the rusted bars of the drain while Julianna collapsed onto the floor, choking on the black smoke pouring from the ceiling. Clara grabbed the cassette recorder and the charred tin, jamming them inside her jacket before dropping to her knees beside Victor.
Together, using their combined weight, they threw their shoulders against the crowbar. The seventy-year-old rusted bolts gave way with a deafening screech of torn iron.
""Julianna, move!"" Clara commanded, hauling the weeping bride to her feet and shoving her headfirst into the damp, muddy conduit.
Victor followed, and Clara slid into the darkness just as a section of the burning ballroom floor collapsed above them, sending a shower of flaming beams crashing onto the very spot where they had been standing seconds before.
They crawled through eighty yards of slime and jagged concrete, the heat pressing against their backs like an iron press, until the pipe finally opened onto the rain-swept embankment of the estate’s private lake.
They spilled out onto the wet grass, coughing, gasping for air as cold rain beat down against their soot-stained faces.
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Behind them, Vance Manor was engulfed in a towering column of fire, lighting up the midnight sky in hues of violent orange.
Clara sat up, wiping wet silt from her face. As she pulled the cassette recorder from her pocket, the red light on its antique battery indicator suddenly flickered to life.
