Author's blurb: I started this in 2009 expanding on a possibility suggested in the plot. After putting it aside for a year and then some, I recently got back on it. Hope you enjoy!
Chapter One: The Audition
1831
The strappy seventeen-year-old youth took a deep breath, releasing it slowly between gritted teeth to calm down. It didn't help. His hands shook slightly as he paced around and around the small room, his eyes straying every several seconds to his violin, lying inside its velvet-lined case. His breathing returned to its shallow state and he cursed himself. More than nine years of public performing and he was letting the matter of a simple audition get to him. He had done this thing. Why on earth was he so nervous?
Because it's the audition, his mind replied.
He shook his head. The director of the Opera Populaire had learned of his prodigious talent with the violin and had offered him an exclusive spot, highly vied for in his orchestra, where he could work with adult musicians. His father had encouraged him to take the opportunity. As much as he loved his music, he could never learn to love the occasional nerves he got before an audition or performance.
He inhaled deeply. "Oh, Lord, help me perform well and prove my worth among adult masters…I am so nervous…please, I beg you," he said aloud desperately.
"You seem to be in need of assistance," An unfamiliar voice suddenly said to him.
Gustave started and looked around confusedly, unable to pinpoint the source of the voice. He was alone. "Who are you?" he replied nervously.
"Someone who wants you to succeed in your coming audition," the voice answered.
"Why should I take your word?" Gustave hedged.
"I pray you'll forgive me if I sound conceited, but I consider myself quite an expert on the violin. If you'd rather not take proffered advice from a seasoned master…" the voice trailed off.
"You sound like you're my age," Gustave muttered, loud enough for the mysterious voice to hear. "Very well. What can you help me with?"
"Your lack of relaxation, first of all," the voice said seriously. "Whether or not you're relaxed can make all the difference during your audition. When relaxed, the mind grows quiet and you are able to remember crucial details and focus much more easily. Have you experienced this before?"
Gustave thought back to all the times he had been frustrated over a passage in his sheet music, compared to when he approached it with a calm mind. "Yes, come to think of it, I have," he said, still feeling strange for talking to the walls and waiting for an answer.
"It's a common enough phenomenon. The mind is capable of tapping into its own genius when you let it. Would you like me to help you?"
Gustave paused. To an outsider, he would be talking to the walls. There was no quicker way to convince others that you had lost your wits than deciding to seemingly carry on conversations with oneself. On the other hand, whether some celestial hallucination or some flesh-and-blood soul, someone was offering him aid. His nerves were near breaking point. What did he have to lose?
"All right," he said aloud, his voice echoing off the halls.
"Good," the voice replied. "Now, follow me and do as I say. Imagine that you are on the shore of your native Sweden, all alone with the water surging onto the rocks. Your violin is with you. Can you see it?"
The strange voice was lulling and smooth, helping Gustave's mind conjure the mental images in sharp detail. "Yes, I can," he replied, his voice distant.
"Very good. Pause and look around, and feel the powerful energy of nature settle itself deep in your body. Now, in your mind's eye, take up your violin…"
Gustave found himself listening to the voice with rapt attention as it led him through a perfect mental rendition of his audition piece, then gave him reminders on relaxation, technique, and posture.
"Gustave Daaé!" a piercing voice called, breaking his concentration. "It is time!"
"This is all the help I can give you," the voice said. "Go with a bold heart and a calm mind. The best of luck to you."
"Thank you," Gustave replied. He was on his way out the door, violin and bow in hand, when he thought of asking the voice what its name was. He turned halfway around, intending to ask, but sensed that the voice had already disappeared. Shrugging to himself, he turned back around and left the room.
He slid to the center of the stage, vast and unending in its emptiness. Monsieur Pollegny, the orchestra director, sat in the center of the front row, cross-legged, his generous mustache fluttering with every breath. Monsieur Chiron, the owner of the Opera Populaire, sat next to him in his crisp suit, sharp-eyed and still.
"When you are ready, Monsieur Daaé," Monsieur Pollegny stated.
Gustave closed his eyes for a moment, hearing the hissing of dying waves in his mind as they slid back into the seas of Sweden. He opened his eyes, calm flooding through his arms and legs, raised his bow to the strings and began to play a movement from Mendelssohn's violin concerto.
Monsieur Chiron's expression did not change from its impassive state, but the face of Monsieur Pollegny gradually transformed from neutral into one of pleased encouragement as Gustave continued playing. Spurred on, Gustave relaxed as his bow flitted across the strings.
The side door to the theater opened and he almost stopped playing in surprise as a willowy, dainty-footed teenage girl approached the two formidable men in the audience nervously.
"Madamoiselle Giry?" Monsieur Chiron asked curiously.
"Céline," Gustave said under his breath in surprise as he continued playing.
Céline stepped up to Monsieur Chiron. "For you, Monsieur, an urgent message," she said softly, holding a folded paper out to him.
"Merci, Madamoiselle Giry," he said, nodding at her and taking the paper. Céline's eyes met Gustave's for a few seconds and he nodded at her minutely. I didn't forget the arrangement we made, he though in response to her silent question. Céline left, and Gustave focused on his playing, sighing in relief as he successfully executed a complicated series of notes that had been giving him trouble only the night before.
"That is sufficient, Monsieur Daae," Monsieur Pollegny said as Gustave finished, smiling at him. "Very well done for so young a musician."
"Yes. Quite excellent, indeed," Monsieur Chiron added, a smile suddenly blooming over his face as well. "Merci beaucoup, you may go."
Gustave smiled exultantly and walked off the stage. Despite being in the latter half of adolescence, he couldn't stop himself from skipping in delight the instant he was in the wings and hidden in shadow.
He flew back to the small room, laying his violin back in its case carefully, then quickly snapped it closed, took it by the handle and strode out the room. He then found the nearby flight of stairs Céline had told him about. Climbing up them, he went to the end of the hall, turned right and entered an unlocked room. Shutting it carefully, he looked around. The room was quite bare except for a spacious window seat that looked out on Paris. His eyes lighted on Céline, who was standing a few feet away from him, a faint smile on her face.
"Céline…hello," he said softly, laying his violin case down on the floor and walking over to her.
She beamed more widely and took his empty hands, leading him to the window seat. She sat across from him, her legs tucked under her slender body and hidden among her gauzy ballerina's skirt.
"I was very impressed by your audition, Gustave," she remarked, smiling softly at him. "Mendelssohn was a wonderful choice. You told me that you only started practicing the concerto a week ago, yet you sounded like a master when I heard you playing."
Like a master…the memory of the strange voice from above came back to him.
Céline had noticed his change in expression. She touched his hand. "What is it?"
Gustave frowned for a moment before answering. "I had help…of a sort…just before I was called to audition, I was extremely nervous and couldn't focus. I prayed aloud that the Lord would help me perform well and prove my worth, and suddenly—and suddenly a voice answered."
Something flickered in Céline's eyes, but before Gustave could recognize what it was, it was gone. "Go on," she urged.
He looked out the window at the bustling streets of Paris. "This voice coached me on relaxation techniques. Afterwards it gave me advice on note accuracy, posture, stage presence…things that in my nine years of playing, I had never known. He claimed to be a master on the violin and I believed him—and yet, he sounded like he was only as old as you or I." He turned away from the window to look at her. "How is that possible?"
Céline looked away from him, twisting her fingers in trepidation. Glancing at her friend, she decided on the truth.
"I know who the voice is," she said quietly.
"A spirit of some long-deceased violin prodigy?" Gustave guessed.
"No," she said, laughing a little. "He's a living person, and I know him fairly well. He is seventeen years old, the same age as you, and extremely private, I might add. That's why you didn't see him, only heard his voice." She hesitated, then said, her voice suddenly low and urgent, "Gustave, you must swear to me never to tell this to anybody else."
"Why?" he asked, bewildered.
"Promise me. Please," Céline pressed.
"I promise," Gustave said. "But I still don't understand. Why is he here, another youth with commendable skill on the violin? I thought I was the only one auditioning for the special spot in the pit orchestra. Was he my competitor?"
"I think not," she answered. "You see, he lives in the Opera Populaire, but always keeps to himself. Very few people know about him, so you are very lucky that he made himself known to you."
"But who is he, Céline?" Gustave asked, a little frustrated. "He wouldn't even tell me his name."
Céline bit her lip for a moment before replying. "Gustave, did you hear about the travelling Gypsy fair a while ago that was showcasing the Devil's Child as the main attraction, and that the Devil's Child escaped after killing his owner?"
"Yes," Gustave said slowly, a little confused by this turn in the conversation. "But what does that have to do with the voice in the room?"
Céline took a deep breath. "That was the voice you heard."
Gustave opened his mouth in shock and then closed it, unable to respond or do much else other than gape at her soundlessly for a moment. "I was talking with the Devil's Child, who is living in this opera house?" He finally managed in a faint voice.
She inclined her head in assent.
"I was taking advice from a mutilated killer our age who was claiming to be a master on the violin?" he asked in a shocked voice.
Céline shook her head, remembering the pitiful state he had been in when she first saw him. "He's not a mutilated killer, Gustave. He strangled his owner because that was the only way he could escape. But Gustave, your heart would have been broken like mine if you had seen him. Locked helplessly in his cage like an animal while his owner beat him so cruelly…exposing his marred face to the world so everyone could jeer and throw bread at him…it was heartbreaking. He didn't choose to be like this, and see how he has paid for it so dearly!" Her face twisted a little as she relived those moments. "But his owner—licking his lips greedily while counting up the money from the fairgoers, money that he had gotten from humiliating and beating a mere boy—forgive me for saying so, but I think he really may have deserved to die for inflicting such horrors, day after day, on an innocent person." Céline closed her eyes and sucked in her breath. "I was the only other person there when he killed him. Knowing what he would suffer through if caught, I took him with me back to the Opera Populaire and hid him. That was three years ago, and he has stayed here ever since. He trusts me because I saved him, but there are many things even I do not know about him, and never dared to ask."
Gustave sat in silence for a moment, studying his hands. Then he looked up. "He's also a master at the violin?"
Céline shrugged lightly. "There are many facets to him. He asked me one day if it was possible I bring him one. There were precious few options available to me—even now I cannot dream of buying one, you know they are expensive—so I ended up smuggling a spare one to him from the storage room for the pit orchestra. But once I heard him playing, I was completely spellbound. I do not know where he got his musical inclinations from, but for his seventeen years, he is a true genius. He makes his presence known to very few in this opera house and trusts even less—he has a good impression about you, Gustave."
He shook his head in wonder. "You never told anyone about this?"
"I saw no reason to," Céline said mildly, and Gustave laughed.
"It's late," he sighed, looking at the setting sun sinking determinedly over the Parisian skyline. "I must go."
Céline nodded and slipped her slender legs over the ledge of the window seat, landing lightly on the ground. Gustave crossed to the doorway and picked up his violin case. Céline followed him to the door, smiling. "Do you think you impressed Monsieurs Pollegny and Chiron today?" she asked, her eyes sparkling playfully.
Gustave thought fleetingly of the mysterious voice that had shared invaluable advice during the excruciating wait. "With luck, yes," he replied. He took Céline's hand in his free one. "In which case I will be seeing you soon, and we will have a great many days to talk. Farewell."
He turned around and was about to go, but looked over his shoulder when Céline caught his arm.
"Please, Gustave, one more time. Promise me you will never mention this to anybody."
He looked at her pleading, anxious eyes, peering at him like two stars. He nodded earnestly. "I promise. I swear."
"Thank you," Céline whispered as Gustave took his leave.
