Chapter 9 - The Burning Threshold"No, Evangeline! It's too fast!"
Doctor Sterling’s frantic voice echoed off the high plaster ceiling of the grand ballroom as he dropped his clipboard, his hands outstretched in panic.
It was the first week of March.
The grand ballroom of Vance Manor had been completely cleared of furniture. Sunlight poured through the tall arched windows, casting long, golden bars across the polished oak floorboards.
In the center of the room stood Evangeline.
She was not in her wheelchair.
She wore a simple light-blue woolen dress, her bare feet resting directly against the dark oak floor. She was trembling violently, her face drenched in cold sweat, her teeth gritted so hard her jaw ached. Standing three feet away from her was Julian.
Arthur Vance stood near the grand entrance doors, his broad shoulders rigid, his white knuckles gripping his silver-topped walking cane so tightly the wood creaked. He didn't breathe. He didn't blink.
"Hold your focus, Evangeline," Julian commanded, his voice raspy and strained.
Julian looked terrible. His face was ghostly pale, blue shadows dark beneath his grey eyes. His chest heaved with every breath as if he had just run ten miles through heavy snow. His right hand was extended toward her, hovering inches from her waist, sending a steady, visible haze of warmth through the air between them.
"I... I can't feel my heels, Julian!" Evangeline gasped, her knees bowing inward, her ankles shaking like thin twigs under the weight of her body. "It feels like... like standing on hot knives!"
"The knives mean you're alive!" Julian shouted, his voice cracking with fierce intensity. "Step on the knives! Push through them!"
"Arthur, stop this!" Doctor Sterling pleaded, rushing toward the lord. "The strain on her lumbar spine is too immense! If the bone collapses now—"
"Silence!" Arthur growled, his voice a low, terrifying rumble. His eyes were locked on his daughter’s feet. "Let her try."
Evangeline cried out, a raw, painful sound tearing from her throat. She took a deep, shuddering breath, lifted her right foot, and brought it forward.
Slap.
Her bare foot struck the oak floorboard. Six inches forward.
"Father..." she sobbed, tears spilling down her cheeks. "Father... look..."
Arthur Vance took a slow, staggering step forward, his silver cane slipping from his grip and clattering uselessly to the floorboards. The iron lord of the Vance Railway Estate fell to his knees in the middle of the ballroom, his large hands trembling violently as he reached out toward her.
"One more step, sweet girl," Arthur choked out, his voice completely broken. "Just one more step to your father."
Evangeline looked at her father kneeling on the floor, then turned her head to look at Julian.
Julian’s eyes were fading. The grey in his irises was clouding over, his knees buckling under his own weight. He was giving her everything he had left—every drop of his vitality, every spark of his grandmother's Life-Thread, pouring it out until his own glass was entirely empty.
"Julian... stop!" Evangeline cried out, realizing what was happening. "You're dying!"
"Step..." Julian whispered, his lips turning blue. "Take... the step..."
Evangeline lifted her left foot.
She didn't just take a step—she lunged forward, her bare feet slamming against the floorboards, crossing the three-foot gap, and collapsed directly into her father's open, waiting arms.
Arthur caught her, pulling her small, trembling body tightly against his chest, burying his face in her hair as heavy, silent sobs shook his massive frame.
"My girl... my sweet, beautiful girl..." Arthur wept openly, kissing her forehead over and over again. "You're walking... you're walking..."
Evangeline didn't cheer. She turned her head over her father's shoulder, her eyes wide with sudden, terrifying horror.
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Across the polished floor, Julian had collapsed.
He lay motionless on his side against the hard oak wood, his thin arms folded limply across his chest, his eyes half-closed and unseeing. His heart had stopped beating.
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