A/N: Heads up, frosthearts! This chapter has:
✨ Broody boys with forbidden magic
❄️ An ice queen who could kill him
⛲ A fountain bearing an ancient prophecy
⚔️ A magical explosion that changes EVERYTHING
(P.S. Comment who you're already siding! 👀)
---
The first drop of Barry's blood hit the lens of his glasses like a cracked ruby.
Perfect. Just what I needed.
He wiped the smear with his thumb, leaving a hazy red streak across his vision. Below him, Jax - a hulking third-year with fists like boulders - grunted as Barry's knee pressed harder into his spine. The courtyard cobblestones were cold and gritty against Barry's own scraped knuckles. Around them, a ring of students watched, their whispers sharp as winter's wind.
"Had enough?" Barry asked, his voice low. Calm.
Jax wheezed, face mashed against stone. "You're dead, scholarship rat! My father's on the High Council-"
Barry leaned down, his breath frosting in the chill air. "Your father isn't here."
He released Jax. The bully scrambled back, face purple with rage. But before Jax could lunge, a whimper cut through the tension.
Tessa.
A first-year girl with wide, frightened eyes huddled near the iron gates. Her books were scattered, pages torn. Jax's cronies snickered behind her.
Again? Barry's jaw tightened. Targeting the weak. Pathetic.
Jax followed Barry's gaze and smirked. "What? Gonna play hero again, CrimsonWood?" He spat the nickname they'd given him - the boy with no family name, no noble blood. Just a scholarship slot at the infamous Bloodlore Academy.
Barry adjusted his glasses. The thin, golden frames and transparent lenses, made him look like a bookworm. Irony. I'd rather be anywhere but a library.
"Leave her alone, Jax," Barry said.
"Or what?" Jax sneered, turning toward Tessa. "You'll bleed on me?"
The words hit Barry like a physical blow. He knows? He can't know.
Jax took a step toward Tessa. The little girl flinched.
Barry didn't think.
He moved - a blur of black hair tipped with crimson, athletic frame closing the distance. He grabbed Jax's arm, twisting it behind his back. Jax yowled.
"Touch her," Barry said, icy quiet, "and I'll break it."
"You freak!" Jax snarled, thrashing. His elbow slammed backward, catching Barry's ribs. Pain flared. Barry's glasses slipped.
And then it happened.
Jax's boot stomped down - hard - on Barry's bare hand.
CRUNCH.
White-hot agony exploded in Barry's fingers. He hissed, stumbling back. Blood welled from his torn skin, dripping onto the grey cobblestones.
No! Not here! Not now!
But it was too late.
The blood twitched.
Shadows pooled around it, thick and hungry, rising like smoke. They swirled, forming shapes - jagged, wolf-like creatures with eyes like glowing coals. Blood-shadows.
Gasps ripped through the crowd. Students backed away, faces pale.
Hide it. Stop it! Barry clenched his bleeding fist. But the shadows only grew, snarling silently, circling Jax. The bully froze, eyes wide with terror.
"M-monster!" Jax choked out.
Barry focused, pouring every ounce of will into the command: DISAPPEAR.
The shadows wavered. Flickered. Slowly, they sank back into the blood on the stones, vanishing like smoke in wind.
Barry's lungs burned. He counted the seconds in his head. Fourteen minutes. Fifty-nine seconds.
Close. Too close.
A cold voice sliced through the silence.
"Ungoverned magic is a disease."
Professor Alicia stood at the courtyard's edge, her gaunt face carved from stone. Her frost-blue robes shimmered with trapped starlight. Her eyes locked onto Barry's bleeding hand.
She saw it.
"And diseases," Alicia continued, her voice like cracking ice, "are cleansed at the gallows."
Barry's blood turned to slush in his veins. He followed Alicia's gaze to the far end of the courtyard.
There they stood.
The Gallows of Silence.
Three twisted pillars of black iron, hung with nooses woven from enchanted frost-vines. A permanent warning. Last week, a third-year student had swung there for summoning "chaotic fire." His ashes were still scattered on the wind.
Barry forced his face blank. Don't flinch. Don't show fear. He pulled his hand behind his back, blood soaking into his dark sleeve.
Alicia's thin lips curled. "Control your... impulses, CrimsonWood. Or you'll find yourself starring in Bloodlore's next execution spectacle."
She turned, robes swirling, and stalked away. The students scattered like scared mice.
Barry let out a shaky breath. His hand throbbed. Fifteen minutes. I almost hit the limit. If he'd passed out here, in front of everyone...
Game over.
He bent down, picking up his glasses. One lens was cracked. Oh great!
A small hand tugged his sleeve.
Tessa looked up at him, tears streaking her dirty cheeks. "Th-thank you, Barry."
He nodded, unable to speak past the tightness in his throat. He handed her a fallen book - Fundamentals of Elemental Control.
"Get to class, Tessa," he managed.
She scurried away.
Barry stood alone in the vast courtyard. Bloodlore Academy loomed around him - a nightmare castle of jagged black spires piercing the perpetually grey sky. Magic pulsed from its stones, a low thrum Barry felt in his teeth. This place fed on emotion. Fear. Anger. Joy. Pain. All of it became fuel for the spells crackling through the air.
He glanced at an ancient inscription on the school's stone fountain, its words worn but still legible:
"When blood and frost entwine,
One heart shall cease to beat."
The "Prophecy of the Entwined". Students whispered it like a ghost story. Barry had never believed in prophecies, until now. Until he met... 'her'.
A sudden drop in temperature prickled Barry's skin. The air grew sharper, cleaner, like the first bite of winter.
He didn't need to turn around.
He knew.
Belinda Frostvale had arrived.
---
The courtyard fell utterly silent. Students froze mid-step, conversations dying. Even the wind seemed to hold its breath.
Barry turned slowly.
She stood at the arched entrance, framed by ancient stone. Belinda Frostvale; Heiress to the Frostvale Dynasty. The most powerful ice-wielders in centuries.
She was... breathtaking.
Hair like spun moonlight fell past her waist, so pale it seemed to glow. Her skin was flawlessly fair, her eyes the exact shade of glacial ice - sharp, clear, and utterly devoid of warmth. She wore robes of shimmering silvery-blue and white, cut with sharp, elegant lines. Frost patterns crept up the hem, alive and shifting.
She didn't look at anyone. She simply 'existed', radiating an aura of pure, controlled cold. Students pressed themselves against walls to avoid her path.
Exquisite. And lethal.
Barry felt his shadow-magic recoil deep inside him, like a dog cowering before a blizzard. Her frost hurts it. Why?,
Belinda's gaze swept the courtyard. It passed over Barry as if he were another cobblestone.
Then she saw it.
The small pool of Barry's blood on the stones near Jax.
Her glacial eyes narrowed. Almost imperceptibly.
She knows it's mine.
A gong boomed, deep and resonant.
"Combat Trials!" Professor Alicia's voice echoed from the central tower. "Assemble in the Crucible Arena! Now!"
The crowd surged towards the massive stone building shaped like a clenched fist. Barry moved with them, keeping his bleeding hand tucked close. He could feel Belinda walking several paces behind him. The air grew colder with every step she took.
Focus. Hide the pain. Hide the power.
Inside the Crucible Arena, the air hummed with raw energy. Sand covered the floor, stained with old blood and scorch marks. Tiered stone benches rose steeply, filled with whispering students. Barry found a spot near the back, pulling his hood up.
Alicia stood in the center, her voice amplified by magic. "Today, we test control under pressure! You will duel your assigned partner! No holding back! Bloodlore spares the strong, crushes the weak!"
A holo-screen shimmered into existence above her. Names flashed, pairing students.
Barry scanned the list, dread coiling in his gut.
"CrimsonWood, Barry. Partner: Frostvale, Belinda".
No! Absolutely not!
A collective gasp went up. Whispers exploded like shrapnel.
"CrimsonWood versus Frostvale?"
"He's dead!"
"She'll freeze his organs solid!"
"Poor scholarship rat..."
Barry's shadow-magic writhed inside him, agitated by the fear swirling in the arena. Calm. Stay Calm. He touched his cracked glasses.
Fifteen minutes. That's all I have if it comes out.
Across the arena, Belinda stood. She hadn't even glanced at the screen. Her expression remained serene, frozen. But Barry saw it - the slightest tightening of her lips. She's not pleased either.
"First pair!" Alicia barked. "CrimsonWood and Frostvale! To the sand!"
Barry stood. Every eye followed him as he descended the stone steps. Belinda moved with liquid grace, seeming to glide across the sand. She stopped ten paces from him.
The cold radiating from her was intense now. Barry's breath misted heavily in the air. His shadow-magic felt sluggish, buried deep under the weight of her frost.
Alicia smirked. "Begin!"
Belinda didn't wait.
Her hand lifted, elegant and precise. Five shards of ice, sharp as diamond daggers, materialized in the air before her. They hovered, humming with lethal cold.
With a flick of her wrist, they shot towards Barry.
Fast. Too fast.
Barry dove sideways, rolling across the gritty sand. The ice shards slammed into the spot where he'd stood, exploding into clouds of glittering frost.
She's not playing.
He scrambled up. Belinda was already conjuring again. This time, a swirling vortex of snow formed between her palms, growing rapidly.
Barry couldn't use his blood-shadows. Not here. Not with Alicia watching. Not with the gallows waiting.
He had to dodge. Block. Survive.
Belinda unleashed the snow vortex. It roared across the arena, a miniature blizzard aimed right at him.
Barry dropped flat, the freezing wind tearing over his back, coating his clothes in instant frost. He gasped, the cold biting into his lungs.
Get up! Move!
He pushed himself onto his knees. Belinda was closer now. Her ice-blue eyes held no anger, no cruelty. Just... detached efficiency. Like she was removing a stain.
She raised both hands. The temperature plummeted. Frost raced across the sand towards Barry.
Panic, sharp and hot, sliced through him.
She's going to encase me!
Instinct took over.
Barry slammed his bleeding fist - the one Jax stomped on - into the sand.
DON'T! his mind screamed. But it was too late.
Pain flared. Fresh blood soaked into the sand.
And the shadows answered.
They erupted from the bloodied sand swirling around his left arm - not smoke this time, but solid, snapping tendrils of liquid darkness. They whipped out, forming a crude shield just as Belinda's wave of frost hit.
CRACK!
Ice met shadow. The sound was like a mountain splitting.
Barry's shadow-shield shuddered, holding back the tide of frost... but barely. He could feel the cold seeping through, numbing his bones. He poured his will into the shadows, sweat beading on his forehead despite the cold.
Fourteen minutes...
Across the shield, Belinda's eyes widened. Just a fraction. Shock? Disgust? He couldn't tell. But she didn't stop. She pushed harder.
The frost thickened, crawling up the shadow-shield, turning it into a grotesque sculpture of ice and darkness.
Barry's strength was draining fast. The sand beneath his hand felt like fire where his blood touched it. The shadows flickered.
No! Hold on!
He gritted his teeth, pouring every ounce of defiance into the shield. I won't end on the gallows!
Belinda took a step forward, her expression hardening. She raised a hand, fingers curling like claws. A massive, jagged spike of ice began to form above her head, glowing with unnatural blue light.
It was meant to finish him. To shatter his weakening shield and pierce right through him.
Alicia watched, a hungry glint in her eyes.
Barry saw the spike. Saw Belinda's cold certainty. Saw the gallows waiting.
Fifteen minutes... almost...
Despair clawed at him. He couldn't hold. He couldn't win. He was going to-
His foot slipped on the icy sand.
He stumbled backward.
His concentration snapped.
The shadow-shield shattered and vanished.
Belinda's massive ice spike shot forward, unstoppable.
Barry threw himself sideways, but he was too slow, too off-balance.
The spike didn't hit his heart.
It grazed his left arm.
Searing cold exploded through him, worse than any fire. He groaned out loud, stumbling back. Blood - shockingly red against the frost - welled from the deep gash on his bicep.
And then...
Contact.
His blood splattered onto the sand... right onto a patch of Belinda's frost.
Time stopped.
Barry's shadow-magic, wild and terrified by the pain and the nearness of Belinda's power, surged out of the wound. Not as wolves or shields. As pure, chaotic crimson light causing his left pupils to turn glowing crimson red, and the white part of his eye, void black.
At the same instant, Belinda gasped. Her perfect control faltered. The frost where Barry's blood had touched it... reacted.
Her ice didn't melt. It... changed.
It turned to a deep, swirling crimson. Tendrils of Barry's blood-shadow shot through it like lightning in a storm cloud. The red ice pulsed, growing, twisting into jagged, impossible shapes.
It wasn't her frost. It wasn't his shadow.
It was something new. Something terrifyingly powerful. Something... entwined.
The mass of crimson ice exploded outward.
KA-BOOM!
A shockwave of red light and freezing wind ripped through the Crucible Arena. Stone benches cracked. Students screamed, thrown backward like leaves. Alicia was flung off her feet.
Barry was hurled through the air. He hit the arena wall hard, the breath knocked out of him. Darkness swam at the edges of his vision.
Fifteen minutes...
He was slipping. Falling.
Through blurry eyes, he saw Belinda.
She hadn't been thrown. She stood amidst the swirling chaos of crimson ice and frost, untouched. But she wasn't looking at the destruction.
She was staring at her own hand.
Where a shard of the crimson ice had sliced her palm.
Her blood — silvery-blue like liquid starlight — dripped onto the sand.
And where it fell... tiny shadows, dark as Barry's void-black hair, flickered within the frost.
As Barry's consciousness slipped away, one thought burned through the dark:
The prophecy... Blood and Frost... It has begun.
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A/N: WHOAAAAA! 😱 What did you think of Barry and Belinda's magical collision?! What's Alicia hiding? And what happens when Barry wakes up? 👀 Does he wake up in a cell? Or does he wake up in Belinda's room? 😏. Let me know your theories in the comments!