A/N: trigger warning for DubCon!
The angel of music was very strict. This was a fact Christine knew without a doubt, although she could not deny that the results of his instruction were without equal. In the time she had been training with him, her voice had grown into something she scarcely recognized, so full of power of and clarity it was. If dealing with her angel's...less than orthodox methods of instruction was the price she had to pay, it was a paltry sum.
Christine was no fool, or at least, she was one no longer. She'd learned the truth about the angel months before; learned that he was not a heavenly being sent by her father to instruct her from the great beyond, had learned he was a man. A man! Just a man, a man named Erik, who despite his earthbound reality, shaped her voice with all the skill of the heavens. Even knowing this, knowing what he was-what he wasn't-Christine still thought he'd been sent to her by divine intervention. How else to explain a man such as he? He was made of music; sound and melody and feeling were evident in his every gesture, in his every word.
His voice...oh, his voice! Christine could not put into words how Erik's voice made her feel. It was dark and powerful, and seemed to curl around her like a warm embrace. It made her feel as though she were sinking into a pool of molten heat whenever she was with him, and she was ashamed to admit she'd be happy to drown there. His face...well, his face was yet still a mystery, but it seemed strangely unimportant, not when he shaped her voice so beautifully and made her pulse race with his own. Christine trusted Erik beyond all reason; he made her feel safe and secure, was unfailingly a gentleman, and had turned her voice into something glorious. The unusualness around their methods of meeting and his instruction were worth the results.
Still, the first time he'd placed his hand on her there had been a bit of a shock.
"You are far too easily distracted, my dear. You must learn to focus your voice, and tune all exterior...stimulation out. How else do you expect to triumph on the stage where any number of things could and will go wrong?"
He had come up behind her as he spoke, and she had been unable to keep her eyes from fluttering closed, so that she might soak up the amber honey of his voice without distraction. They were mid-way through her lesson that day, and he'd pointed out how her focus had been less than stellar during that morning's blocking rehearsal. She hadn't been able to help it, not really-there had been far too much commotion, what with the lead tenor sniping with the director over his use of a sword in the last scene of act one and the head of the lights hurling angry words at the disgusting man who ran the flies.
"I know, and I'm sorry angel, but-"
The great mirror in her dressing room was to her back, so she was unable to see just how close Erik actually was, didn't realize she was close enough to be touched. Christine let out a slight gasp when he pulled her flush to him, breaking off her protestation. He had placed a hand on her ribs, while the other floated near her hip.
"No excuses, my dear. How do you expect to be a great diva if your voice is so easily distracted, hmm? I want you to breathe into my hand, Christine. Let your lungs inflate across your back. You are to keep your focus. If you allow yourself to be distracted, I shall be displeased."
She shivered at his words, and the sensation of his breath, hot on the back of her neck. She didn't like to closely examine the way her angel made her feel sometimes, didn't like to dwell on the tingling pulses her body experienced after her rehearsals with him, the heat she felt in places that had been previously unexplored. It was far easier to simply obey. She adjusted her posture and prepared to sing. His voice was suddenly right at her ear, his lips nearly grazing the shell of it.
"Begin."
She began. She breathed into his hand, as instructed, enjoying the firm pressure of it against her side. She concentrated on shaping her vowels, on spinning her tone out across the room, as he'd instructed her, on keeping her diaphragm supported. She was so intent on her technique, she scarcely noticed that he had steadily been gathering up her voluminous skirts with the hand that wasn't pressed to her ribs. It wasn't until his long, cool finger found the slit in her bloomers that she was suddenly jolted to awareness, stopping mid-phrase.
"My dear, what did we just discuss?" He tsked in her ear. "From the top, again."
Heat had flooded her cheeks. She could feel the cool air of the room against her exposed legs, as he had her skirts gathered up and secured under his arm. She said a silent prayer of thanks for having put on her pretty, lace trimmed bloomers and stockings that were in good repair that morning.
"Center you breath, Christine." His voice was a whisper of velvet against her neck. "From the top."
"Una voce poco fa," The aria sat in her lower register, was not truly a piece she would ever perform, but it was a useful way to warm up and work on moving through her lower passaggio.
She had just come to her first "si Lindoro" when she again felt his finger move at the slit in her bloomers. She tensed, but sang through the distraction. He ghosted over the dark curls there as she came to the run, with only the barest hint of a waver to her tone. When his cool digit made contact with her warm skin, however, her voice hitched.
"Hmm...from the top, I think. Concentrate, Christine."
It took her a moment to steady herself. She adjusted her posture, and lowered her chin. This time, she was ready for him. His touch against the outside of her woman's place felt strange-nearly indecent!-but she would not allow it to distract her. Erik would never do anything to harm her, after all. His teaching methods were simply...outside of the ordinary. She couldn't account for the way her body seemed to buzz in excitement as the tip of his finger teased at her cleft-back and forth, back and forth, with the lightest pressure-or the warmth that suffused her as he gripped her steadily around the ribs, but she felt singularly proud of herself for not allowing it...him to distract her.
"Si Lindoro mio sará,"
She refocused on her tone, imagining she could see it leaving her mouth and spinning across the room. Her first run on 'Lindoro' was approaching again, and Christine steadied her breath in readiness. Rather than the cadenza she was prepared for, the noise that issued from her mouth was instead part moan, part squeak of surprise; for her angel, Erik, had slipped his cool finger into her hot folds at that precise moment.
"My dear, you are truly doing deplorably this evening. I'm quite disappointed in your lack of concentration. Da capo, again."
By the sixth time he'd made her start the piece anew, she was almost used to the sensation of his finger sliding against her. She couldn't help notice that with each successive start, the glide of his skin against hers seemed easier...slicker somehow. At one point, he'd touched on something, some hidden spot within her that made her gasp and drop her head back against him as light exploded against her eyes.
"Again, my dear. Let's see if we can at least make it to the coloratura section this time, hmmm?"
She blushed furiously. They had barely gotten halfway through the aria, and might still be working at it by breakfast the next morning at this rate. This time, though, this time she'd be ready. When he pulled her flush against him, Christine noticed something...strange. There was something hard against the small of her back, something that hadn't been there before, and Christine had to fight against the urge, the instinct, to push back against it. When she began to sing again, his finger found its way back to that electric spot, and her breath hitched for an instant before she quickly corrected herself and pushed on. She very nearly didn't make it. His finger stroked against her until it settled into a circular rhythm, and she thought she might liquify in his arms from the feeling. She was close, so close to something, something amazing or dreadful, she wasn't sure which, but she desperately needed to find out. She thought if she finished the aria before she discovered what it was, she'd go mad.
"Once more from the top, Christine. If you can make it through this time, you may have your reward, my dear."
His voice had lost it's dark, honeyed tone, she'd noticed. It seemed strained, nearly short of breath. The firm pressure against her back had never gone away once she'd become aware of its presence, and Christine thought she could feel heat pouring through the layers of her dress where it pressed to her. She didn't know what her reward might be, but this had been the most difficult lesson of her life. She simultaneously wanted to end it and flee from this room, from this heat, from him...and extend it indefinitely.
His touch was light against her, lighter than it had been, and she raced through the song. Her voice soared through the coloratura section, tripped easily through the cadenzas. She wasn't sure when he'd steadily increased the pressure as he stroked her, but she was nearly at the end of the aria, nearly at the blessed end, and she wasn't sure if she'd be able to make it. Her head had dropped back against his shoulder and he hadn't even corrected her posture. She felt as though she were riding on the crest of a great wave, a wave that threatened to swallow her up once it crashed over her head, dragging her down to God only knew where, the tempo of which was directed by the speed of his hand against her, a tempo which had increased dramatically, and by God she wanted to drown. Christine couldn't tell if it was her imagination, or if her angel was caught on the same great wave, but she could have sworn she felt him moving against her, nearly imperceptibly, as though he too were swimming along rhythmically, trying to keep his head above water.
"Prima di cedere farò giocar!"
The last line of the aria erupted from her mouth only moments before the wave crashed over her head, and were it not for his arm locked around her waist, she would have dropped to the floor under the weight of it. Pleasure pulsed through her body, and her vision was replaced by a million little pinpricks of light. She had lost control over her movements, over the hand that had pushed against his, securing it in place, for she felt if he were to move his finger from her before this great wave had finished throbbing through her, she'd expire right there in his arms.
She certainly had no control over the way her hips rolled, partially against his hand, where she pulsed so deliciously, and partially to move against that rigid something at her back. She could not explain her compulsion to do so, any more than she could explain the sound that came from her throat. High, and breathy, she moaned as though she were dying, when in fact she had never felt more alive! She felt less self conscious about the noise she made when, after a roll of her hips, Erik went rigid behind her, groaning in a way that mirrored her own sound of distress. The pulsing she felt through her body was so intense, she thought she could almost feel it against her back as well.
Like any wave, what crashes to the shore is pulled away again, and eventually the feeling of blind euphoria that gripped her gradually lessened. Vision was restored and the ordinariness of her dressing room, with its little chintz chair and pink pouf were almost a shock to behold in the aftermath of... whatever that had been.
Erik's breath was a heavy pant in her ear, so unlike anything she'd ever heard from him before. His hand still gripped her midsection tightly, but her skirts had fallen back around her ankles, and the hand that had brought her so much delight, so much distraction, was held aloft, away from her. The firm hardness at her back was gone, although he still held her closely, she noticed. Christine had the feeling that she was holding him up, as much as he was holding her, and they stood, moored together as the great wave of feeling receded.
"I finished," she murmured, turning her head slightly. Her hand had closed over the bony wrist that still held her, and she thought she felt a shudder ripple through him.
"I got through the song, Erik."
His responding dark chuckle liquified her insides. "That you did, my dear. That you did. You sang marvelously today."
He had released her and as he turned away, he brought the hand he'd stroked her with up to his mouth before his broad back was all she could see of him. She knew she had certainly not sung marvelously, her control was all over the place, but she supposed for it being the first lesson in distractions, she had performed admirably. She felt cold with his arm no longer supporting her, which made next to no sense, as Erik was always seemed to have a chill about him, but the heat that had lived between them, the warmth of what they'd shared, of what he'd done to her...his absence left her feeling empty once his arm was withdrawn. A heaviness descended in the wake of the intense pleasure she'd felt, and Christine suddenly felt dead on her feet.
"Erik, I-I feel quite sleepy all of a sudden, I don't know what's come over me...I think I might need to end our lesson and lie down for a bit."
"Oh, we're certainly done for the evening. You are...a marvel, my Christine."
She allowed him to support her again, and found herself stretched out on the divan in the corner of the room, having done little to get there herself.
"You must rest, my dear." Her eyes were heavy, but she could still see him there, just hovering over her. "Sleep well, my angel." His voice was little more than a breath, and Christine watched, through heavily hooded eyes as he leaned down to her. She held her breath, expecting him to kiss her...but when she opened her eyes after a moment of nothing, he was gone. She felt a peculiar emotion that may have been disappointment, but decided she'd not let it ruin the hazy balm that enveloped her after Erik's...attentions. Before she could give it more thought, sleep claimed her.
.
.
"Christine? Lotte?"
A sharp rapping on her door made Christine sit bolt upright some time later. The noise had startled her, and she was breathing quite harshly as a result. Her brow furrowed as she tried to place the voice calling her name.
The Vicomte.
Raoul de Chagny had been a playmate in her childhood, but she hadn't seen him in years, up until just a few weeks prior, that is. Since then, he'd come by her dressing room several times. The attention had been pleasing at first, had made her blush to think about it...yet she found herself frowning at the intrusion now. Glancing down at herself, Christine noticed at once that her soft shawl had been pulled up to her chin, and her shoes removed.
Erik
Erik would certainly never be ill-mannered enough to be banging on her dressing room door, without regard for what she may be doing on the other side, she thought, blushing at what had transpired in this very room earlier that day. Christine sighed heavily. She thought she might have been having a lovely dream before…the sharp knock came again.
"Christine? Are you there?"
Jamming her feet into her little embroidered slippers, Christine stomped to the door, flinging it open. "Monsieur, what is the meaning of this racket?!"
"Mademoiselle Daaé! I had hoped you'd still be here! I was hoping you might do me the honor of joining me for supper?"
The Vicomte's blue eyes sparkled. He was very handsome, Christine thought. She supposed she should have been flattered that he was paying her so much attention, grateful even...but women at the opera had questionable enough reputations without being further sullied by the fleeting attentions of aristocrats. He's just another distraction.
Christine smiled tightly. "I'm sorry, Monsieur le Vicomte, but I'm afraid that won't be possible."
"But of course it is! You need to change, and I shall fetch my hat."
She shook her head determindley. "No, I'm sorry...but no. I cannot."
"But, Christine! -"
"I'm sorry, Raoul. I have rehearsal in the morning, and I need my rest. The angel of music is very strict."
She closed the door on the sputtering young man and turned away with a small smile.
The angel of music was strict indeed. She wondered when they might be able to practice that way again. After all, he did have a point! She must be ready for all manner of distractions on the stage, and what better way than to practice her composure than with her angel?