After the initial panic of landing in the worst possible place - the iron tree looming, its mirror image displayed all around - I became aware of the silence that greeted us. My companion still gaped in awe, confusion, and terror at the room around us, the whites of his eyes shining in the lantern light, but my own fear had moved on to the overwhelming lack of sound emanating from the house on the lake. Erik was capable of being as silent as a stalking cat, but surely I should have been able to hear something of Christine Daaé? Perhaps she had been drugged, or knocked unconscious. I told myself that particular scenario was more likely than the dark places my mind started to go. Erik loved the girl, and Erik had spared my life in the lake. That action had stemmed from a debt of gratitude, not love, and love was far more powerful. Still, the silence disturbed me to my core.
I gently shushed the Vicomte, whose breathing was becoming loud enough that if Erik did lurk outside the chamber, his keen ears would surely pick up on it. The young man opened his mouth as if to speak, and I grabbed his arm, further urging him to return the silence we heard outside. Eventually we would need to communicate, but first, we must be certain we were indeed alone.
A moment passed, and the silence was broken by an electric bell. Then I heard them - footsteps with a faint, wet squish leading away from our location, followed by a door being closed firmly. Had Erik been in the lake for some reason?
"Christine?" The Vicomte called as soon as the door was shut. "Christine?"
Silence was the only answer.
"Perhaps she is asleep, or in some part of the house where we cannot be heard," I reasoned.
"We have to find her; we have to escape this room. What is this room?" the young man's voice was a mix of fear and curiosity.
"This is a replica of a torture chamber Erik designed in Persia..."
"You cannot be serious!" He shook in anger. "Christine! Christine!"
"Stop shouting! As long as he does not know we are here, we at least have a chance. But if we are discovered, that is it. Do you understand? And there are two of us, so if we do not panic, we may think of something. If we can find the spring, we can open the door and escape." At least I could reassure de Chagny that we might find some way out, though I knew Erik, and the design of Erik's torture chamber far too well to harbor much hope myself. That did not mean it was not worth trying. I began to feel the walls and floor.
The sandy blond head nodded in begrudging acquiescence, as he breathed deep, steadying breaths. The young man's sense appeared to surface as he calmed himself and whispered, "If we cannot find the spring, could we use the tree to escape? It can't be that different from climbing a real tree, can it?"
"The chamber was only designed for one occupant... We could boost each other, and perhaps reach the door in the ceiling." I lifted my lantern aloft and tried to judge the distance in comparison with our heights. It was not a bad idea, though it was unfortunate that neither of us were above middle height. Then there was the issue of who should be the one to try. While I was in excellent shape for a man of my age, and had more insight into how Erik's mind worked, the Vicomte was much younger and more agile. "But let's search for the spring first."
As I pushed on the mirrors, a door creaked open in the room outside, followed by more wet footsteps and a conspicuous dripping noise. Someone had undoubtedly fallen prey to the Siren. I resumed barely breathing, and motioned to de Chagny to do the same. The previous silence was broken by consistent drips hitting the floor, and then by a sob that only could have belonged to Erik. Soon, Erik's solitary sobs filled our ears and drowned out the sound of the dripping water.
My companion's eyes were wide with fear. He was undoubtedly just as troubled as I was by the lack of sound issuing forth from any source other than Erik. Even if the girl had been a sleep elsewhere in the house, the sound of those sobs surely would have woken her. Unable to contain himself any longer, de Chagny whimpered faintly.
The sobbing stopped.
Footsteps crossed the room, and suddenly the mirrored chamber was flooded with light.
"Daroga, Monsieur de Chagny," Erik, his voice thick and raw.
"Erik," I returned cautiously.
"I should have known..." Erik sighed wearily.
"Where is she?" de Chagny demanded, his voice sounding far more confident than he looked. "What have you done with her?"
Erik did not answer, he only sobbed again.
The young man turned an even sicklier pale.
"Erik," I firmly, "Answer his question."
"I loved her," the golden tenor voice replied.
"And where is she?" I asked again.
"I loved her so..."
The Vicomte began to tremble anew. There was no mistaking Erik twice using the past tense to refer to Christine Daaé.
"What have you done?" I asked forcefully, desperately trying to maintain a sense of my old professionalism. "Open the door, Erik. Open the door at once!"
For several minutes, Erik's choked sobs were the only response I received. Then we heard more shuffling footsteps, and a door neither myself nor de Chagny could have seen from inside the room swung open. I had known that whatever sight was going to greet us would be horrific, so I tried to urge the young man to look away, but he did not follow my instructions and fell into a dead faint.
It was not the worst scene I had ever witnessed, but still I was not prepared. Erik's crimes were usually so neat, so precise, and this was not. A lake of blood coagulated upon the floor, and poor Christine Daaé sat tied to a chair, her throat slashed so violently that she was nearly decapitated.
I tried not to gag. "Oh Erik! Erik!" I barely managed to whisper. He soaked to the skin, his clothes were stained with blood, his hideous face on full display.
"It was all planned," he said. "She would marry me, or I would blow up the Opera... but then she wouldn't stop screaming. Erik made a horrible mess, and now she will not even be a pretty corpse..."
He fell to his knees before me.
"How could you?" I asked. "I thought you loved her..."
"I did. I loved her. Oh, how I loved her." He curled in on himself. "Sacrificies should be consummated in blood. Oh, I loved her."
Erik continued to babble, repeating himself. And I weighed what I should do. Erik had murdered Christine, and I was certain some other poor unfortunate soul in the lake, and he had confessed that he had planned to blow up the Opera. I could not slip away and leave him, even if I could have carried the Vicomte all the way to the surface. He had been my responsibility, and I had failed horribly.
Almost without realizing it, I held my pistol in my hand, knowing what had to be done. In the enclosed space, the sound was deafening.
I carried my companion from the room, and did not allow him to return once he had resumed consciousness. He did not need to see Christine's corpse again, nor Erik's. He did not need to see the two pools of blood, mingling on the floor. He did not need to see how much it grieved me to put an end to Erik's misery.
Author's Note: First of all, forgive my absence on other works. I'm 8 months pregnant, and I've been really preoccupied with baby stuff for months. I imagine this is only the beginning of several years of not having much time for anything that isn't related to my family. I swear I read back through this more than once, but it probably still has errors because my brain has turned to mush...
Anyway, this story, or at least Erik's last words, were inspired by the very real case of Hans Schmidt, a Catholic priest who murdered his "wife" Anna Aumüller in 1913. There was something about it that just made me think of Erik, and the idea has been playing through my head for a while. I realize some people won't like it, because they don't like the idea of Erik harming Christine, or of Erik committing a messy murder, but I don't believe it outside the realm of possibility.