Chapter 1

"It is enough that you hear me! I tire of your mortal greed. Remember that what has been granted to you can also be withdrawn!"

She begged for my return; she sought for me, kneeled at that mirror and called out for me, for her Angel of Music, but I did not return. I could not. And yet, try though I may, I found myself unable to stay away from her. I shadowed her through the opera house, sat behind the mirror and watched her every move... The boy came to her, visited her, was as flattering and charming as I longed to be. He knocked upon her door and was admitted entrance just as easily as I should have been. He stalked about the opera in full view of the world, speaking with her as openly and carelessly as he pleased.

I wished for a freedom of that sort. I longed to approach her door—her real door, the simple wooden barrier that she and the rest of the world used, not this contraption of mystery through which I spoke. I longed to knock upon that door, flowers in hand, and to woo her. I longed to win her over truly and fairly.

So can one truly blame me, for my actions? When the opportunity presented itself to me, I leapt upon it like a ravenous beast.

I had been wandering down the streets, wrapped in my dark cloak and my even darker thoughts, wondering only how it was I could ever accomplish such a monumental task. For years, I had been working on a mask that would allow me to appear, from slight distances, to have a face like any other man. In broad daylight, even, would I blend—but not under close scrutiny. No, it would not serve to woo a woman; she would wish to touch, wish to admire, and the simple illusion would fall apart.

"I have a solution to your problems," came a nerve-grating croak. I was startled out of my reveries, and very nearly let out a cry. I kept my lips sealed together, however, and continued walking with my head bent, as if I had not heard the words.

Her hunched form stepped into the light of a nearby streetlamp, and a hand as skeletal as my own reached out to grab my sleeve. "Do not walk past me as if you are deaf!"

I turned slowly to face her, trying to keep my face still within the shadows. Without even hesitating, she jerked my hood back. "No illusions between us." Before I could react, she was pulling me into an alley with a strength I would not have expected of such an old woman. When she felt we were far back enough from the street, she turned again, and extended her other hand to me. Within it was a satin bag, decorated as if from the Far East, and secured by way of a tiny crimson rope.

"Mix it with your morphine," she told me, as she pressed the bag into my hand. "Your illusion will be complete."

I had no words to give her. How had she known? Had she known? Had she guessed? Certainly not...

She squeezed my fingers shut over the bag. "I ask a thing in return," she said, with a toothless grin. "You must swear to tell her the truth, before she weds you, or else the masquerade shall fall away."

Slowly, my head shook back and forth. "I know not of what you speak, Madame. I think perhaps—"

One bony hand smacked against my arm; I have few doubts that she would have hit my head, had she been able to reach. "Do not play games, Phantom—or do you prefer Angel, these days?" She cackled, and for a moment, I wondered if I had been drawn into a fairy tale, and had been faced with the wicked witch. "You do as I say, and you will be only a man—no longer a ghost, or a living corpse, or an angel. Only a man."

Only a man...

It was too good to be true. I watched as she hobbled into the darkness, pausing only to give a single warning: "Do not forget your promise, Opera Ghost..."

I did not dally on the streets, that night. I returned to the opera immediately, returned to my home and sat down upon one of the armchairs. The morphine tempted me, but I feared to indulge, for I knew that if I considered that option, so would I consider the option of the old woman's gift—or, curse. Who knew which? I feared to discover the answer. What she had promised... Could it truly be so? I would be only a man... Only a man?

Only a man...

That dainty needle lay curled in my fingers for many hours, before finally I arose and opened the little bag from the Far East. Within it lay a mass of powder. Would this be for an eternity, or would it need to be renewed? There was enough powder here to last a man a multitude of years...

Ayesha brushed against my calf, purring loudly. "Yes," I crooned in reply. "Enough of this foolishness." Without another pause, I took a pinch of the powder, and mixed it in with my morphine. The needle was prepared, and slid up into the lovely crevice of my inner elbow.

I recall staggering to my coffin, near-blind, the blood pounding wildly in my ears. Ayesha screamed as I nearly stepped on her; that scream echoed in my ears for what seemed like hours, though it was less time than it took me to reach the coffin. Carefully I lowered myself into it, tucking my arms around myself and fighting back the scream of pain that my vocal chords were begging me to make. My entire body felt as if it were trapped within a fever of an intensity previously unknown to man. My skin, always so cold, had heated to a degree that was nearly frightening. Ayesha would not come near me.

My face hurt—that terrible corpse's face, it felt as if it were being peeled, strip by strip, inch by inch, from the bones of my skull. My entire body trembled, not a bit of it spared from the pain, this pain beyond belief. I briefly toyed with the idea of more morphine, but dreaded the attempt at standing. I fought for the longest time to open my eyes, before realizing that they were, indeed, open—I had gone blind!

It was an immeasurable length of time before mercy was granted me, and I tumbled into unconsciousness, my tongue moving feebly with curses for the old woman.

Only a man...