Chapter 10 - Blood Against Iron
The primary portcullis slammed down with the force of a guillotine, separating Evelyn and her soldiers from the marble landing where Alina, Diane, and Julian stood. Julian had lunged forward at the last second, driven by an instinct he couldn't control, rolling beneath the falling iron bars just before they embedded themselves two feet into the solid stone floor.
On the other side of the bars, Evelyn hissed in fury, her aristocratic composure completely shattering. Her jaw distended unnaturally, and an aura of crimson, shadowy mist erupted from her body, fracturing the stone around her boots. "Julian! Open that gate this instant!"
Julian stood up slowly, coughing from the pulverized stone dust. He was trapped on the landing with Alina and Diane. The iron doors to the vault were half-unlocked, humming with volatile, unstable energy.
Diane didn't hesitate. She lunged at Julian with her silver knife, aiming for his throat. "He's a monster, Alina! He won't change!"
Julian reacted with terrifying, unnatural speed. His hand shot out, catching Diane’s wrist mid-air. The impact cracked the air like a gunshot. The crimson light in his eyes flared, and with a brutal twist of his arm, he disarmed her and slammed her back-first against the heavy iron bars of the portcullis. Diane cried out in pain as the wind was knocked out of her, the silver knife clattering across the marble floor.
"Stop!" Alina screamed.
The cerulean gauntlet on Alina’s arm flared with blinding intensity. The physical environment reacted instantly to her emotional state; the stone floor beneath Julian’s boots buckled upward, jagged earthen spikes thrusting from the ground to pin his legs and arms against the iron bars, holding him immobilized.
Julian struggled against the stone bonds, his muscles tearing as the red aura around him fought against the cerulean wards. Blood trickled from his nose, his human features warping into the monstrous visage of the Crimson curse. "Alina... you don't know... what she'll do..." he choked out, struggling to speak through the pressure crushing his ribs. "The Core... if she takes it... she consumes everyone in the valley..."
"And what were you going to do?" Alina demanded, stepping toward him, her eyes burning with an authority that wasn't entirely her own. "You were going to let her bind me! You slapped me across the face in front of your family because I wouldn't bow to her!"
"Because she would have killed you on the spot if you didn't!" Julian roared, the sound echoing through the subterranean vault. Tears of strain and shame leaked from his glowing eyes, cutting through the dust on his face. "She had the hounds in the cellar! She had the poison in your tea! I hit you to make you look broken so she wouldn't execute you before the ritual!"
Alina froze, three feet away from him.
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Behind the portcullis, Evelyn’s laughter was a cold, jagged shriek. "A pathetic defense, Julian. You hit her because you're a Vance. You hit her because deep down, you love the taste of absolute control just as much as I do."
Evelyn raised both hands. The crimson mist around her condensed into dense, spear-like tendrils of dark energy. With a deafening roar, she thrust them forward, shattering the massive iron portcullis into thousands of deadly shrapnel pieces that tore across the landing.
