EXT. CLOCK TOWER - NIGHT
Wind HOWLS through the skeletal ironwork of the spire. Snow does not fall; it is driven horizontally like shrapnel.
LUCY (17), wrapped in layers of patchwork wool and worn leather, clings to the frozen gargoyles. Her lips are blue. Her eyelashes are thick with frost.
She pulls a glove off with her teeth. Her fingers are stiff, pale, corpse-like.
She reaches into her coat. Withdraws the SUNSTONE. An egg-shaped gem pulsing with a deep, rhythmic ORANGE GLOW.
She presses her bare hand against it. Steam RISES from her skin. The pallor in her fingers recedes, replaced by a flush of pink blood.
She closes her eyes. Exhales a long, steady plume of white vapor.
A HEAVY CRUNCH of boots on slate shatters the moment.
Lucy snaps the stone back into her coat. She flattens herself against the icy roof tiles.
Three ICE GUARDS emerge from the gloom. Seven feet tall. Armor made of translucent, enchanted glacier ice. It GLOWS with a dead, internal blue light.
The lead Guard holds a crystalline compass. The needle—a shard of pure ice—spins wild, then locks onto Lucy’s hiding spot. It TREMBLES.
Lucy scrambles backward. Her boots scrape on the black ice.
EXT. CLOCK TOWER - ROOF EDGE - CONTINUOUS
Lucy slides toward the edge. A fifty-foot drop to a narrow alley below.
She looks back. The Guards vault the gaps between spires with unnatural, heavy grace. They draw weapons—maces and spears of jagged ice.
Lucy looks down. A frozen drainpipe clings to the wall. Thick with rime.
She swings her legs over. Grabs the pipe.
The metal GROANS. Ice flakes off in sheets, tumbling into the abyss.
A CRYSTALLINE SPEAR slams into the gargoyle above her head. Stone SHATTERS. Shards rain down on her.
She slides down. Fast. Too fast. Her boots spark against the frozen masonry.
EXT. ALLEY - CONTINUOUS
Deep shadows. The wind is a mournful whistle here.
KEVIN (20s) leans against a brick wall. Lean, wearing a long coat and dual scabbards. He watches the descent with bored detachment.
Lucy hangs by one hand twenty feet up. Her feet scrabble for purchase on a patch of black ice. She slips.
Drop the rock.
Lucy stares down, eyes wide.
Are you insane?
I catch the rock. Then I catch you. In that order.
Above Lucy, an Ice Guard begins to rappel down the wall, gauntlets punching holes in the brick.
Lucy looks at the Guard. Looks at the drop.
She rips the Sunstone from her pocket. The alley floods with warm orange light.
She lets it go.
Kevin moves. A blur of motion. He snatches the stone from the air before it hits the cobblestones. He pockets it instantly. Darkness returns.
Your turn.
Lucy releases the pipe.
She plummets. Kevin steps in, bracing himself. He catches her—an awkward collision of limbs and heavy wool. They stumble into the damp wall.
(Grimacing)
You're heavier than you look.
THOOM.
The Ice Guard lands in the center of the alley. The pavement CRACKS under the impact. He rises, a tower of frost and malice.
Kevin draws two curved blades. The steel RINGS in the cold air.
Go.
He'll kill you.
He'll try.
Kevin flows forward. He doesn't block; he evades. The Guard swings a massive ice-mace. It pulverizes a crate.
Kevin slides underneath the swing. His blades flash against the back of the Guard's knee. Sparks of blue energy fly.
The Guard ROARS—a sound like a cracking glacier. He falls to one knee.
Lucy draws a weighted cosh. She steps in, swinging hard at the Guard's exposed elbow joint. CRUNCH.
Kevin spins, driving both blades into the Guard's neck seam.
The armor dissolves into slush. The blue light fades.
DISTANT WHISTLES pierce the air. Dozens of them. Closing in.
Kevin sheathes his blades. He grabs Lucy’s arm.
The grate. Now.
He drags her to a rusted iron sewer grate frozen into the mud. He kicks the locking mechanism. It snaps.
He heaves it open. A blast of stagnant, rotting air.
Ladies first.
EXT. UNDERBELLY - SEWER TUNNEL - CONTINUOUS
Pitch black. The sound of dripping water echoes endlessly.
Don't move.
A flare of light. Kevin holds the Sunstone. The tunnel is revealed—slick brick walls, phosphorescent moss, a channel of black, unmoving water.
Lucy presses her back against the slime-covered wall. She clutches her shoulder.
Kevin extends the stone toward her.
You need it more than I do.
Lucy hesitates. She snatches it. She presses it to her chest, eyes fluttering shut as the warmth hits her.
Who are you?
Someone who knows that stone is a dinner bell.
He kneels in the dirt. He uses a dagger to scratch a shape into the grime. A six-pointed, geometric star.
Frost-Eaters. Old things. They don't eat meat. They eat heat.
Lucy looks at the stone. It pulses steadily.
It's just a rock.
It's a beacon. And you're holding it in the dark.
The Sunstone FLICKERS.
The warm orange light stutters. A vein of ICY BLUE light shoots through the center of the gem.
The temperature in the tunnel plummets. Breath fogs instantly, thick as smoke.
Frost blooms rapidly across the rusted pipes on the walls. The moss withers and turns black.
Lucy gasps. She tries to drop the stone.
It sticks to her palm.
Get it off!
The blue light intensifies. It's blinding now. Cold, harsh, surgical.
Lucy SCREAMS.
She rips her hand away. The stone clatters to the mud, rolling away, glowing with a malevolent blue pulse.
Lucy cradles her hand. She falls to her knees.
Kevin grabs her wrist. He shines a small flashlight on her skin.
On the back of her hand, the flesh is raised and white. Branded.
A perfect, six-pointed snowflake.
Kevin stares at it. He looks at the dark tunnel ahead.
They've tasted you.
The brand on Lucy's hand GLOWS faintly in the dark.